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Post by Drextin on Jun 20, 2011 11:34:53 GMT 10
So I'm watching a show on the history channel. They were talking about GMO foods. Seems that they were basing their modifications on the fact that every gene produced one chemical. Then it was discovered that despite the high number of different chemicals and what have you there were only a fraction of that number of genes. Meaning that each gene could produce more than one reaction. So modifying a gene they knew produced a certain chemical may also have an adverse effect in other areas because whatever else it produced would also be changed.
Now I am of the belief that they can get the science down where there won't be any dangers but as it stands they don't know enough and they are experimenting with products that enter into our food supply. Not really something we should feel safe about.
I really should do my homework before taking some of these stances. I'm lazy. That is my excuse.
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Post by boxfree on Jun 20, 2011 12:22:59 GMT 10
So I'm watching a show on the history channel. They were talking about GMO foods. Seems that they were basing their modifications on the fact that every gene produced one chemical. Then it was discovered that despite the high number of different chemicals and what have you there were only a fraction of that number of genes. Meaning that each gene could produce more than one reaction. So modifying a gene they knew produced a certain chemical may also have an adverse effect in other areas because whatever else it produced would also be changed. Now I am of the belief that they can get the science down where there won't be any dangers but as it stands they don't know enough and they are experimenting with products that enter into our food supply. Not really something we should feel safe about. I really should do my homework before taking some of these stances. I'm lazy. That is my excuse. To err is to be human. They can gene splice not only different species of plants but animal genes with plant genes. There has to be some oversight and control with extensive testing not only to for us, but the plant world and soils. Too much can go wrong and some affects may be irreversible.
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Post by Wes Gear on Jun 20, 2011 13:36:51 GMT 10
Nice point Drex, I have never thought too much about how chemicals interact with genes. I think of the gene as a string of numbers. A program written using sequences of genes. If you are a good programer you can write a complex program with fewer bits, a shorter sequence. Other programers, using a basic coding language, would need a longer program sequence. As an example: So we have maybe 25 000 genes, but check this marvel out. It has 31,000 genes. So it should be better than us right. A common water flea species, tiny and translucent Daphnia pulex, currently holds the record for highest number of genes among all animals that have been gene sequenced so far. It is also the first crustacean species to be gene sequenced. This tiny creature, just visible to the unaided eye, possesses about 31,000 genes! earthsky.org/biodiversity/winner-for-largest-number-of-genes-in-any-animal-known-so-far-a-water-fleaSo some animals seem to have better coding in their genes. If that is what Nature does with 31 000 genes, we seem to have turned out rather well with only 25 000 genes.
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Post by Drextin on Jun 20, 2011 14:29:19 GMT 10
The show I watched was doomsday technologies. They mentioned that exact number you found wes. They had estimated something like 250,000 which was more inline with the amounts of acids and other variants produced. When they discovered that there were only 30,000+ and that each could have multiple jobs to perform they had already made some serious mistakes with the food supply. A lot of it had to do with corn. The real problem now is they take care to see if altering one gene to produce a desired effect could also have an adverse reaction in other ways. Thing is they only do short term experiments. The long term effects which they know are quite possible is on us to test as the consumer/guinea pigs. What concerns me most is the push by the government to put these foods into the system. Are we in such dire need of these crops that they are willing to risk a major and deadly mistake? Food prices are rising and it used to be tied to gas prices. Now gas goes up then food goes up but yet the food prices don't fall back to their previous numbers when gas does. The trend is there and rather obvious. Scarily obvious. If I was of the conspiracy mind I might think they were inflating gas prices just to up the price of food stuffs. Each yearly gas crisis we have the excuse used is getting weaker or just doesn't exist. We have become so used to gas hikes now we pay little attention to the reason they give for it. Like I said..............if I was of the conspiracy mind.
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Post by Wes Gear on Jun 20, 2011 21:34:45 GMT 10
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Yeah Drex we're not that short of food that we have to eat the experimental stuff, they need to find safe ways to test this for a while and get a better understanding of what's going on.
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Post by brillbilly on Jun 21, 2011 4:15:17 GMT 10
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