How many people know that there have been deaths linked to GM foods? I was in favor of more research, but I have re-considered my position based on the risks. I think the GM food push is based on a desire for easier profits, not for helping people.
Among the thousands of strains of staple crops that exist, we grow very few strains in this country. A single pest or disease targeting one of these strains could potentially cause tremendous damage. But growing a single, controlled strain is far easier for the food giants than growing many strains to mitigate the risk. So what do the food giants want to do - grow a lot more strains, or just stick some nasty little piece of genetic code from some other species into their preferred strain to try and ward off those diseases? Problems arise on two fronts: 1. there is no guarantee that the genetic modifications will prevent some pest/disease from wiping out an entire crop of a single strain, and 2. we have absolutely no idea what consuming these GM foods will do to us over the long term, and anyone who says different has no idea what they are talking about. Just look at the pharmaceutical industry for examples of profits coming before the safety of the public. I would prefer to see more organic agriculture combined with diversification of our food supply. As to the herbal remedy craze, I am involved with a startup nonprofit that is focused on transforming alternative herbal medicines to modern medicine (containing purified compounds rather than messy extracts). Forget about "fear of science" being responsible - the work we are doing has been made possible because of scientific progress in the study of natural products. On Mon, Apr 12, 2010 at 4:06 PM, Medic <hofme...@gmail.com> wrote: > > I feel that we could go far enough with just cross breeding. I don't see why > we need to modify our food on a genetic level. I understand that farming is > a for profit endeavour and it's getting harder and harder for farmers to > compete, but there's got to be a way to make natural farming profitable. > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Want to reach the ColdFusion community with something they want? Let them know on the House of Fusion mailing lists Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:315712 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/unsubscribe.cfm
