paperburn1 wrote:hanelyp wrote:ohiovr wrote:Imagine what would happen if someone was able to design an algae species that was 4x as photosynthetically productive as normal algae, it dominate any water way it got into.
If such an algae were possible, able to dominate the biome, I'd expect it to already exist naturally.
Well I think they already do exist naturally. Look at the Carp that have invaded the Illinois River. Zebra mussels in the Great Lakes just to name a few. Now let man put his meddling little fingers and in without understanding all the limitations of the local environment and I'm sure he can come up with something that can really screw things up.
Just look at the feral hog problem in the South. Most of these animals are domestic varieties that have gone wild.
What is the "hog problem"? I heard they make great eating and they have that delicious barbecue.
Full sized hogs are not native to North America, but they are supposedly the tastiest of wild game and I for one am glad they were brought over. You seem to have bought into the lunatic fringe wildlife biologists' hype that when nature carries a species into an area and it outcompetes everything, that's fine, but when a man transports a species and this happens, it's some sort of crime. I'd just point out this makes no real sense and is the product of a culture that can't think straight.
The ONLY problem with things like BT corn is that it has not been through adequate testing,. It is certainly NOT TRUE that these GMO's require more pesticide. They work just the way they're designed and produce far larger crops with the same or fewer resources. The question is rather, if they're dangerous for human consumption. The argument made by Monsanto is actually a good argument, that there is no reason to suppose these modification could cause harm. However given the population is at risk, the sensible thing is to require vast testing (which would then cause the modifications to cost hundreds of millions rather than tens of millions).
BTW, your comment about "owning the genome" is completely clueless. Monsanto HAS to own the genome or these modifications will never happen because they will not have a way to recover their investments, which are enormous. You're reading nonsense literature on the subject.
"Courage is not just a virtue, but the form of every virtue at the testing point." C. S. Lewis