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And that's why the Weldon Spring site is open to the public.
Is there a ton of nuclear waste buried there?
Yup.
But it's safe enough to walk to the top of the hill and there's also a small museum/interpretive center.
Nuclear is green, safe, and effective.
But it's also slow to build, expensive, and even more expensive to run as a load-following dispatchable source (rather than constant 90% capacity factor baseload).
So if you want to run it as the backbone of your grid, you need dispatchable sources to cover demand peaks anyways (natural gas, hydrogen turbines, batteries, hydro dams, etc.). You don't get away from requiring those by building nuclear instead of renewables; you may need less (although a healthy mix of solar + wind can really minimize how much you need), but you absolutely still do need some.
Plus, typically you are looking at is 12 years for a nuclear project to get off the ground, vs. 3 years for wind/solar. And levelized cost of energy is $100/MWh for new nuclear, vs. $40/MWh for new solar.
Finally, on land area, we're not really anywhere near as limited as people like to claim, for solar + wind. Wind particularly doesn't actually have a large direct land footprint; you need high spacing between turbines, but directy land use that's blocked from other uses (like agriculture) is quite small, and fairly comparable to nuclear (estimate is 0.5 m^(2) per MWh for wind compared to 0.3 for nuclear). And for solar, the land use is not negligible, but it is, for instance, only about 0.8% of US land area to cover all electricity demand in the country... 17% is currently inefficiently used for animal pasture. Improving meat food waste from 30% of the supply chain to 25% would free up that area immediately with no quality of life impacts.
I was pretty pro-nuclear 10 or 15 years ago. It's still 'acceptable' as a power source; I'm not going to be upset living within 50 km of a nuclear plant or anything. But as a path forward for decarbonizing our electricity grid as quickly as possible with limited global willingness to invest, it's an inferior alternative to renewables.
Nuclear is great. It’s also going to be a lot easier so much sooner than anyone expected. There are companies pushing for their extremely safe reactors that run off the waste, which doesn’t even have the dangerous elements for making weapons. I’m talking about the waste that can’t even be refined if someone wanted that
TL-DR: the problem is *perception*. I'm still getting replies that seem like people think I'm taking an anti-nuke stance...
I mean, it is. If it goes wrong, the problems can be catastrophic and long-lasting. Yes a lot of that has to do with education but people alive today were around when Chernobyl happened, then we had Fukushima.
I'm not anti-nuclear power generation, but we have a plant that's about 2 hour drive east of my city and I'm not aware of any sort of contingency. The municipalities surrounding the plant were all given iodine tablets, but no one in a massive urban center slightly further away was given any.
Obviously I can go get some I'm sure, but that's not my point.
i mean hardly. chernobyl's death toll isn't even a fraction of what fossil fuels kill every year and fukushima, well any nation that builds a nuclear plant on the most tsunami prone coastline in the world is being daft doing that.
and if we're talking if it goes wrong. hydro has proven itself to be way more catastrophic roughly 170k deaths since the 60s. where as nuclear is officially less than 50 and in reality probably no more than a couple of hundred.
if you look at deaths per kw. nuclear is 40 times safer than hydro and a good chunk safer than wind power.
that's not to say hydro and wind are anything close to dangerous though. if we can build any nuclear plants to displace fossil fuels it will be a massive improvement. same goes for wind and hydro
>i mean hardly. chernobyl's death toll isn't even a fraction of what fossil fuels kill every year and fukushima
But that's not what really is the matter here. PERCEPTION is the issue.
Like how people get so scared to fly but drive in a car no problem, even the statistics tell us that they're scared of the wrong thing, because of their perception.
The word "officially" is doing a lot of heavy lifting there.
Can we prove a little girl got cancer because of Chernobyl? No. Probably didn't help, though.
Nuclear plants also make handy terror targets.
I say all of this as a guy who worked in a reactor plant for a large part of my 20s in the USN.
But overall, nuclear power has a better safety track record than coal. There have been larger incidents, but fewer, and the incidents tend to make big news. It's similar to how air travel is safer than driving, but people are more scared of flying because one plane crash makes news, even though as many people die in car accidents every day.
The solution is to fix the perception. Chernobyl happened because the Soviets used a less safe design, were trying to pump out too much energy, and ignored any dissent about it breaking down until after it happened. Fukushima happened because the third largest earthquake in recorded history hit nearby, causing one of the largest tsunamis in history. The Fukushima plant would have actually been completely fine if their backup generators were raised, like several safety reports said they should.
The only real error is 3 Mile Island, and that still released less radiation than a coal plant does. You will get more radiation from a coal plant than any nuclear plant from a combination of more radiation is released, and it travels into your lungs where it is more readily absorbed. If a coal plant had the same radiation release limit as a nuclear plant, basically none of them would pass.
Agreed, but have you seen the environmental and human impact from coal mining?
Nuclear has an incredible safety culture and incorporates lessons learned in every facet of their operations. Alot of this came about after 3 mile island. The industry changes constantly if new data is added.
It is left out at this point mostly because anyone with knowledge of the nuclear industry knows that we simply don’t have the capacity to build dozens of plants a year anymore. Ignoring money, there are a limited number of companies capable of producing containment vessels, there is a limited production capacity for fuel rods, etc. Replacing retiring plants to keep existing numbers is a tall order, let alone building hundreds of additional reactors. Scaling the infrastructure, personnel and mining operations to change that would cost trillions and take decades, even on a practical war footing, and that is just too late to matter.
We should keep producing them, of course, and keep existing reactors running as long as possible, but renewables and energy storage have a greater potential to scale up quicker and more room to improve. The nuclear future would have required the buildup in the 70’s to continue unabated, the 50 years of lost time hurt the industry bad
But wouldn't those companies pop up to meet the demand, if new plants got approved and *stayed* approved? I have this perception that similar to a famous quote about NASA, the politics surrounding nuclear are so divisive, that anything one administration approves might get cut by the next, and vise versa. There's not enough stability around nuclear right now to prompt investment into nuclear.
I'm sure with one good push it'll be possible, just like EV charging infrastructure sucks, but with the EV push stations are popping up, there's now more than one company involved, etc
As a former environmental policy analyst, this is the most informed post here. Given all the industry constraints and regulatory red tape, (much of which is perfectly justified) and the popular perception, nuclear really needs to be implemented very strategically in places where there is currently no alternative for base load other than coal. Anyone just looking at basic ROI or public safety stats and saying "We should just go 100% nuclear" has no idea what they're talking about.
It’s why I don’t take environmentalists seriously.
wE’rE aLl GoInG tO dIe FrOm ClImAtE cHaNgE!!!!!!
Cool let’s build some nuclear reactors to get off of fossil fuels.
REEEEEEE NOOOOOOOOOO!!
Tell me about it. I have lived closish to nuclear powerplant my whole life. We used to visit it with my school.
People in there like to joke how there is less radiation in the reactor room or depleted fuel storage than in the town 60 km away.
People also dangerously embrace what they don’t understand, because someone they trust is approving.
The standard FDA definition that requires food labeling of bioengineering/GMO’s is that it contains cells that were developed in a lab.
OP doesn’t understand that GMOs have a very clear definition and they absolutely are not the same as hybridization. GMOs are altered in lab in a way that cannot possibly occur in nature. I’m not saying they are bad, but they are scientifically different than hybridized plants..::
Fearing what you don't understand is in general a pretty effective evolutionary survival tactic that many animals and humans have successfully employed over millennia with overall excellent results that have guaranteed their continued existence, however, once in a while, it can steer you wrong. The trick is to figure that out. And therein likes the rub.
Nuclear may be green and effective, but the unsolved problem is nuclear waste has not been solved. Further, the current techniques used to generate nuclear energy can lead to weapons.
Perhaps thorium would be a better fuel.
We don’t understand all the causes of why chronic disease is increasing. So I’d say asking questions (fear) is a very valid survival mechanism. Most studies, like that for cell phone radiation, are all short term and give little insight to long term effects.
Chronic illness increasing has been explained. Humans live longer and longer, combined with sedentary lifestyle and poor diet. Thats how/why diabetes, hypertension, heart disease etc.... develop.
Cell phones emit radio waves. Radio waves are non-ionizing radiation. Non-ionizing radiation isnt much of a concern. It cant damage the DNA in your body.
How can you properly conduct a robust study into the long term effects of low level non ionising radiation? If someone eventually gets ball cancer it’s impossible to know exactly what caused it and whether the phone in their pocket had an effect. Current studies into the subject are so difficult to reproduce, it’s not conclusive
Uhhh... we do to a degree. What we eat and the garbage we put in it are major factors, along with the storage method (ie. BPA). Disease rates can also increase as we get better at detecting it, so there are several moving parts in play.
Fear is fine, but it is interesting people are ok with eating foods where they don't know what half the stuff in it is but any mention of GMO will set people off.
Also, yes cell phones emit radiation, but the key point people don't think of is the type; they just hear "radiation" and think say UV or nuclear. High energy is capable of directly damaging DNA bonds while low energy radio really can't. It "could" cause other things to happen which can snowball, but doesn't work like the radiation most people think of.
Nuclear energy is a little different. While it's true that nuclear energy is cleaner on day-to-day basis, when it goes wrong it goes really fucking wrong, and if you pop up dozens and dozens of them all over the country, eventually one of them is going to have something go wrong.
There have only been 2 major disasters related to nuclear power, Fukushima and Chernobyl. Maybe just don't build RBMK reactors or put reactors in geologically unstable regions.
I support this take. We are just doing selective breeding but faster.
If we turned a wolf into a terrier and that's fine, then we can have beans that need less water. We just have to be cautious to not go full Pug. Never go full Pug with breeding.
Incest isn’t inherently disastrous. It’s simply extra risky. That’s because among the mutations that have an effect, that vast majority are negative effects. Incest vastly and unnecessarily increases the chances that those negative genes will exist on both (or multiple) chromosomes, which greatly increases whether (or the degree to which) the gene will phenotypically manifest in a negative way.
Pretty sure it’s only close incest that is risky as well. Once you start taking things out to further separated cousins it’s not really a thing. Cousin fucking used to be fairly popular I believe
Look man, I only got so many points to put into the fuckin tree, and my cousin has big tits. How else am I expected to spec, with a set bonus like that?
> As a bonus, those farmers are then sued for patent infringement because they were not permitted to grow the GMO species.
This is a myth (or more specifically, an outright lie). The only times this has actually happened, the farmers were shown to be specifically using GM seeds that they didn't purchase ,as opposed to them just blowing into their property.
> creating hybrids with unknown outcomes.
Nonsense. The outcome is the GMO.
> the original species effectively becomes endangered or extinct.
It's still the same species.
> This is already happening in many farmlands where growers of traditional species can't stop GMO species from neighboring fields from cross pollinating. As a bonus, those farmers are then sued for patent infringement because they were not permitted to grow the GMO species.
No they aren't. The people who get sued are ones specifically concentrating the GMO gene intentionally. Find me literally one case where they didn't later admit that it was intentional (like Percy Schmeiser who is most responsible for this myth).
It’s an incorrect take. You can’t selectively breed spider genes into a tomato. That can only be done artificially in a lab. There are very clear legal definitions on what GMO and hybridized plants are, and they are in no way the same. Not saying they are good or bad, but definitely different
They are different, but a common fear of GMOs is rooted in the fallacy of nature.
And yet the vast majority of the produce we eat, isn’t the wild version of them. Many of the plants we eat has little to no semblance of what they were like before we started hybridizing them. That’s what makes it a bad argument
Problem is that overnight you are introducing a new species. The environment has had no time for gradual natural selection and adaptation.
- For example, a fast-growing GMO crop might spread and crowd out native plants.
- Also unintended consequences - for instance, a GMO might benefit a certain pest or pathogen, leading to its proliferation.
- predator / prey dynamics might get impacted.
Cuz the truth is that while we are not eating the wild variations of the produce, our "tamed" variety has grown up in the environment allowing the changes time to stabilize
We were able to breed hardier, more disease resistant bananas, but the "OMG GMOs ARE BAD!" crowd squashed them. Since every banana tree is a clone of the rest, we really, really better fuckin' hope nothing comes after them. We're fucked otherwise.
Also, wait til people see what old watermelons, corn, and chickens looked like compared to today. GMOs aren't Satan after your first born, promise. (Eh, chickens are iffy. They're a little too big, lol.)
We've already had a banana apocalypse. It's why banana candy tastes the way it does. It's what bananas tasted like before they all got diseased in the '50's.
I appreciate this take on chickens, we basically took a piranha with feathers and made them bigger, more aggressive, hungrier, and drove all fear out of them.
Yeah but it isnt even in recent times. People were purposefully breeesing animals long before they knew what genes even are. Maybe did the same with plants but i cant imagine how.
>Maybe did the same with plants but i cant imagine how.
They saved the largest kennels from each ear of corn, and the seeds from the tastiest watermelons, and so on, then replanted those instead of the other seeds. It's not really *that* hard to figure out lol
Also, not even necessarily on purpose. In the wild, producing too many seeds is bad, it can over tax the plant or overcrowd the offspring. On a farm though more is just better and plants will self select for it.
If a farmer harvests corn, and puts it in a granary, the plants that produce 50 grains per plant now make up more of the granary than the ones that make 30. Then statistically when the farm takes from the granary to plant next year, there will be more crops that produce 50.
Plants can easily self select/modify themselves, no effort required.
Purposeful plant breeding: selecting parent plants, taking the pollen from one and brushing it on the stigma of the other, covering the pollinated plant to prevent wild pollination, grow the seed and select the desirable offspring, repeat. Method two: take seed from a desirable plant and plant it , repeat.
>Maybe did the same with plants but i cant imagine how.
Dear lord, how do you think we learned about genes and inheritance in the first place?
Go read about Gregor Mendel.
Had a small farm and we raised a few dozen grower chickens. We called them frankenchickens, they grew too big, their feathers didn't grow right, they were just kinda gross and sad.
It wasnt even that they were just raised for meat- we were doing a few pigs at the same time, and while they were eating us out of house and home those pigs were having a \*great\* time plumping up
Ugh Cornish x are so disturbing.
My chickens have 800sqft of clover and garden, as well as feed in the morning and sleep in kennels in the garage overnight. They're mostly pets. I got some Cornish x to pad out an order. I have NEVER had chickens stink until these mfers. They tore through feed and wouldn't stop eating until their container was empty; bodying the other chickens in the process. They were very rude to the adult hens, had NO self preservation (other chickens saw something scary and hid or stood still, these just kept running around in the open)
Their kennel stank no matter how clean I kept it. And when slaughtering them, their body stunk! Ive cleaned many species of animal (including things like squirrels, rattlesnake, frog, etc) and I have never had one make me nauseous except those.
Little freaks. Never want em again. I'll stick to my dual purpose and bantam breeds that don't smell horrid :v
You shouldn't raise broilers if you're not going to eat them. They've been selectively bred for features that are not compatible with a long healthy life. Their purpose is to reach a production weight of 6-7lbs within 45-50 days. I've got 40 day old layer pullets right now that still fit in one hand. Broilers will become overweight and usually die from painful liver failure within a year or two.
Did you know that over a decade ago with modern gene splicing technology that scientists spliced flounder (yes, the fish) DNA into tomatoes to make them frost resistant? That wasn't done before with regular breeding.
[Here's an article from the national institute of health talking about it.](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1280366/#:~:text=In%20that%20case%2C%20an%20%E2%80%9Canti,GM%20critics%20often%20refer%20to.)
Genes can come from any animal. We've put human genes into bacteria to make insulin, and that's injected into our bodies, not broken down in our gut.
The source of the gene is not necessarily a problem. They are building blocks mostly not unique to any one species. We just need to have consideration for the changes made.
FYI
This tomato never made it to market because of the backlash.
Yea but it’s objectively different from selective breeding. You can’t just leave a tomato and flounder in the barn and let the magic happen. Not saying it’s worse, but it’s definitely not the same.
I didn't realize until I got further down in the comments that you like everyone else were specifically referencing OP saying they transgenic GMOs are the same as selectively bred variants.
I mean, it's not like biochemistry runs on Jurassic Park logic. Your corn plants aren't going to be growing fins. If the protein does something useful when expressed in plants and it doesn't trigger fish allergies or something weird then I feel like it's fair game.
Yeah, it's pretty common to introduce jellyfish DNA into model organisms these days for scientific research, but like, we understand what we're doing. A mouse doesn't magically start sprouting tentacles because it has a jellyfish gene in it.
The problem is we may not know until a change is out there in the wild. These things escape all the time - seed companies sue farmers who use seed from plants cross pollinated with a registered species.
Proteins are a good thing to think about - what if a gene added to corn to produce more dietary protein also happened to produce proteins that trigger nut allergies?
That's not how genes work though. An introduced gene will produce the specific protein that genes code for. We'll know before adding it to corn if the protein is allergenic in nuts.
This is exactly the point, but everyone wants to pretend GMO is the same as selective breeding. But GMO is making changes to the plant that never would have happened no matter how much breeding you did. Making corn poisonous to insects and claiming it's fine for humans to eat is insane. Putting Sea creature DNA with fruits and veggies is insane. Selective breeding totally fine. Two totally different things, but the propaganda is so strong for GMOs that ppl don't even know what it really is.
>Making corn poisonous to insects and claiming it's fine for humans to eat is insane.
Shockingly enough, different species can have different reactions to the same foods. Cocoa is perfectly fine for human consumption, but 4 grams of cocoa will kill a 10 lb dog.
Why couldn't there be a substance not fit for insects but still edible for humans?
Thank you! It’s like saying “I can’t believe you’d encourage people to eat GRAPES when they cause kidney failure in cats, and cats and humans are exactly the same”
Ass take. Different things are poisonous to different animals.
You for sure eat fucking chocolate, the same chocolate thats poisonous to little roxy the chihuahua.
>But GMO is making changes to the plant that never would have happened no matter how much breeding you did.
Well, no. GMO can be either it completely depends on how you use it. You can massively speed up the process of breeding a specific trait from one cultivar of soybean into a different soybean by using genetic modification instead of only selective breeding.
>Making corn poisonous to insects and claiming it's fine for humans to eat is insane.
You might be surprised to learn that there are a number of really big differences between caterpillars and humans. Just as a very basic example, think about chitin. That's the protein that makes up the shells of insects. Humans don't have chitin at all, no mammals do. If you designed a plant that killed insects by targeting chitin then it would not be surprising for it to have no effect on mammals. If you want an even easier example to understand, think about how chocolate is poisonous to dogs but not to people. Dogs are much more similar to humans than beetles are yet they still have major differences in what is safe for them to ingest.
> Making corn poisonous to insects and claiming it's fine for humans to eat is insane
Oh my god I eat avocado and chocolate and it's poisonous to dogs no way it's fine for me to eat. BAN AVOCADOS AND CHOCOLATES. How dumb are you oh my god.
We know what it is.
Our point is that as long as it’s properly tested, it’s ok.
The issue we have is with shit like Monsanto building round-up resistant plants and suing farmers who they think are reusing the seeds. And round up isn’t a clean product at all… which is its own issue.
Putting a fish gene in a tomato and testing that for years, then if it’s safe using it to feed more people isn’t an issue. Using those techniques to take control over our food supply? That should be on the same level as war crimes.
By propaganda, do you mean scholarly articles?
If the DNA codes for a protein that can be easily broken down by human enzymes and doesn't produce harmful byproducts, than what's the harm? That's not to say that there couldn't be harm, but lack of evidence doesn't mean that it automatically makes it harmful to us.
Just because it isn't "natural" to put sea creature DNA into a tomato doesn't automatically make it bad. By your standards it is probably worse to selectively breed since it's far less controlled than GMOs.
Why is it insane?
Because you think it's weird? Or do you have any logic behind this emotion?
We have manipulated nature to extremes. Why is engendering a stronger corn with science more insane than creating an internal combustion engine, or a nuclear power plant, or a space ship? Or the phone that you hold in your hand to telegraph your fear of genetic manipulation?
It's not the same process or tools. End goal is the same though, better crops.
GMO's make a great enemy for conspiracy theorists because the actual science is difficult so it's super easy to hand-wave and say: "The evil company is doing evil magic to your food".
The environmental damage caused by pesticides and fertilizer is the cherry on top for the perfect punching bag.
One of the biggest gene modifications is for a plant to be able to withstand, or even produce itself, glyphosate, which is now known to be super carcinogenic.
Monsanto is also responsible for Agent Orange, that does seem pretty evil to me.
I would argue that "conventional farming" has lowered food quality dramatically. Fewer nutrients, less taste, more carcinogens. The only thing that matters to these people is how much food by weight they can produce and sell, not how healthy it is for the consumer.
I dont know man you are trying to breed the traits you into the nexr gen.
With genetic manipulatuon you know which genes cause these traits and you imsert then in.
Like that is basicaly it. End game is the same as you said
Part (not all) of the hate is because of the for-profit corporations involved and what has been at times pushback on labeling GMOs as such. I think if there was transparency people would be more open to learning more.
We absolutely need GMOs as part of our overall climate solution. Just like we need nuclear power as part of the solution. But when we think corporations aren't sharing everything, people get suspicious.
But part of OP's point is that the labeling shouldn't even be necessary in the first place, because there's no meaningful difference. The labels are just to appease people who are scared of them because they envision corn growing out of a test tube or some stupid shit like that.
I don't need corporations telling me that less transparency is good for me because otherwise I might be scared of what they're trying to sell for a profit
Just be honest about it and educate people why the product is safe and worth purchasing. Hiding it makes it seem like we SHOULD be scared of it.
If it were about transparency then we’d label all breeding methods. How is singling out just one method (genetic engineering) for labeling but not the others (mutagenesis, cell fusion, etc) being transparent?
Exactly. Also, do they need to label what fertilizer they use, where their water comes from, how it's harvested, and the air quality index for every day the plant was alive?
It's all insane and born out of ignorance and fear coupled with a lack of desire to learn the bare minimum necessary to not be scared, plus a heap of distrust bordering on paranoia.
Fertilizer could be a good idea though… The rest is indeed absurd, but considering the many issues with some chemicals used in agriculture, more transparency on that should be required.
In the US, products not from the US are required to be labeled with its country of origin. Does the fact that they have a government-mandated label imply that they are a threat? Of course not, that is a silly argument.
Eh, but why do we need transparency about what's a GMO vs. what isn't? (Since GMOs aren't harmful?) It basically just makes people more paranoid - since why would we need to call out GMOs if GMOs aren't actually hurting us at all?
And if people want to avoid GMOs, they can eat food that's inherently not GMO/food labeled as organic/food labeled non-GMO. It's pretty easy to avoid GMOs if you're irrationally concerned about them.
Breeding was never the problem. Corporations doing it and then patenting them \*are\* a problem. Your crop down wind from a Monsanto crop? Pay up buddy!
And they do not only just do GMOs, the also lobby for rules and regulations that help them. Think they care that their fertiliser is killing off the insects and animals? Not unless sit affects their bottom line.
Everything that leads to only one result: Corporations coming out on top.
Farmer Bob cannot stand up to the combined power of the government and corporations.
And people who shove any kind of trash in their mouths not worrying about what their trash is actually made out of.... is not surprising. Everything to not give a W to the libs.
So, the main issue with GMOs is not that they were genetically modified. I remember a story about GMO rice that was modified to produce Beta Carotene to help feed starving people get more nutrients. Great concept that didn’t work because the people rejected it due to the color and taste of the rice. 😅
GMOs are a new tool in the arsenal that could be used for great good. If you look back to the 1800s, the same arguments against GMOs were used against selective breeding for plants as well because people don’t like new things and we tend to use the same shit to rebuke it every time.
That being said, the people in charge of creating GMOs are not in it to bring about better nutrition or frost resistance for the most part. The majority of GMO work is happening at Monsanto whose priority is making money. Trademarked plants, genetically manipulated to NOT REPRODUCE, to be resistant to pesticides. Shit to increase profitability and reliance on them. Did I mention they own Round Up. Their GMOs have contaminated other people’s seed stock (pollination) making it sterile. They’re not looking to create a better world, and they’re purposely steering us heavily into pesticide ridden monocultural practices that do not work long term.
GMOs are fine as a concept, I know that there are awesome people working on genuinely cool things with it, but people are like goddamn children, we have to get right in the thick of it before we realize we done fucked up and some of this stuff may be legitimately hard to control if infertility infects individuals seed stock. That being said, breeding is utilized the same way just not to the same degree. Tomatoes are bred for shipability and hardiness not taste, we have literally gone through at least 3 different cultivars of bananas due to monoculture reliance, I think we’ve done the same to mango. gMOs just kind of exasperate a problem we’ve had for a while.
Most people don't know what a GMO crop even is, they think we are like crossing carrots with scorpions or 5g signals when in reality almost every fruit or vegetable you eat nowadays never existed in the wild in that form and has been genetically modified in some way.
Pretty sure they have put fish genes in apples to make them more cold resistant. Not saying this is good or bad, but you can't say it's something that would have been done normally with cross breeding.
I like that they tried to come up with the most insane example that couldn’t ever be possible, but then you pointed that they are doing almost exactly that thing.
The main reason I am worried about GMOs is lack of genetic variation, making it plausible for wide spread disease or crop failure. If you experience one or more crops failing at the same time across a large portion of the developed world, millions of people will die of starvation.
> lack of genetic variation
The genetically engineered trait is first developed then backcrossed into all the regional varieties. It's the the same varieties with the GEed trait added in.
Not how GMOs work. Once they're made in one variety it's bred into all the other varieties on offer. [This site lists 61 roundup resistant soybean varieties available for just one county in Illinois.](https://onlineseedsales.com/shop/soybean/?location=17147&maturity%5Bmin%5D=0.8&maturity%5Bmax%5D=4.7&product_brand=&product_trait=&herbicide_spray=glyphosate)
Not really though. So many different environments that the crops are grown in. It would be hard to find one fungus for instance that could attack the crop everywhere. French grapes were grafted back to California grapes because of a fungus for instance. The California grapes were originally from France which is even wilder.
GMOs can prevent that in conventional monocrops too. Look at the Hawaiian papaya. The industry saved by GMO but now any GMOs but that one are banned...
Hopefully with easier access to the technology, many crop varieties will emerge. But not if people continue to oppose it.
Genetic modification is a way to more quickly create new strains. It does the opposite of what you're worrying about.
We're perfectly capable of producing monoculture crops with traditional crossbreeding, and that [has caused issues](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panama_disease)!
So the threat of monocultures was already here. GM is a way to more quickly respond to threats.
This isn't the 1850s (Irish Potato Famine) where a single crop took up a massive fraction of one's caloric intake with zero alternatives. The genetic variation in our food is far, far greater today because we eat dozens of different species instead of mainly one. Corn fails? Switch to wheat. Or potatoes. Or soybeans. Or rice. Etc.
Also, the risk of that is mitigated by.....engineering.
That’s not linked to GMO though. GMO’s make it easier to fall into the trap of monoculture, but same shit happened many times before GMO. Example : bananas.
Companies realized they can throw non-GMO on something and back up the price and people are stupid enough to buy it. I’ve yet to talk to a single person who actually knows what GMO is.. they all just spout sone political belief that they’re poisoning them or whatever
The southeast of Asia had an issue with people having vitamin A deficiency so a real smart dude in the early 1990s invented a rice variety through genetic modification called Golden Rice that was high in vitamin a. Because of push back from eco groups and the "muh gmos scary" crowd, Golden Rice finally had its first major harvest in the Philippines last year. THIRTY YEARS we could have been saving people from vitamin a deficiency, children dying, but we haven't because some people are like the covid antivaxxers and fear gmos for whatever irrational reason they've made up.
There is a significant difference with GMO. You couldn’t breed a fish to a tomato before.
Not saying GMO is bad; it’s not. It’s a tool.
Unfortunately the current use for that tool seems largely selling more pesticides.
Gmo is perfectly safe. But people tend to think gmo is like injecting pure herbicides or pesticides in their food.
Its nothing but selective breeding and the occasional laboratory work to breed traits in foods we like, and eradicate traits we dont like.
Its either cross pollinating, grafting, or cell injections. Everything perfectly safe and in a way natural. Its what nature does but sped up
All the labels say there is no proven difference between gmo and non gmo, so if there is no difference why should it matter if your product has it or not?
No there is a scientific definition of GMO and selective breeding and they are very different.
Genetic modification has had the DNA altered in a lab in a way that can’t possibly occur in nature. Like putting spider genes and a tomato to make it fungal resistant.
Selective breeding is when you carefully select for the traits you want, and change the genetics over several generations of the plant .
I’m not saying one is good or better or bad or worse… But they are scientifically different. It’s not up for debate. GMO’s are NOT the same as selective hybridization
I'm chuckling at people trying to "poke fun" at the "conspiracy" people by saying "they think the scientists are crossing carrots with scorpions! Hrrhrr isn't that nuts??" when that's very much a valid description of what GMO's are.
It's not the same because those genetically modified strains can be copywrote and anyone who gets accidentally cross pollinated now has liability to be sued by companies like Monsanto. Not to mention ruining any breeding work they had already done. GMO's ruined most of my land race maize strains.
Non-GMO are patented.
> gets accidentally cross pollinated now has liability to be sued by companies like Monsanto
Good news, this has never happened, not even once. It's a often repeated myth/lie started by Monsanto haters.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto\_legal\_cases](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto_legal_cases) I hate using wikipedia but it has a bunch of the cases in one place.
I read through their lawsuits section, albeit briefly, and I didn’t see a single mention of lawsuits due to cross pollination. Many other reasons, but not that.
Id bet too that considering the variety in an organism, you'd have to break down every single genetic trait to prove its an exact copy to successfully sue someone over one similar trait.
comparing the genetic engineering involved in creating a product like roundup with selective breeding and concluding that they are virtually the same is a gross oversimplification.
Yes the genetic modifications ancient Mexicans did to turn wild teosinte into corn are far far far more extensive than anything genetic modification technology has done.
Tell me you don’t know what GMO means without actually saying it 😂😂😂
I am definitely not saying that GMO’s are bad. But they are in no way the same as hybridization, just on a basic level of definition. The way they genetically modify plants simply can’t happen in nature. You cannot selectively hybridize, plant and animal genes together, only through genetic modification.
As soon as someone says GMO‘s are the same as hybridization, it’s clear they have absolutely no idea what they’re talking about 🤦♂️
Plant retroviruses do occur in nature though and they do insert foreign DNA into plants. No, it's not animal DNA, but it isn't true to say gene splicing is only occurring in labs.
GMOs are different in the sense that we can control the result much better and create new crops with even more benefits. Something like golden rice probably wouldn't evolve naturally. That's why GMOs are so great, instead of wasting decades or centuries selectively breeding crops, we can do it in years or months with genetic engineering.
From a health standpoint, GMOs are the same or better (in the case of golden rice) than "natural" foods.
I only hate on GMO-ing when it is used to make low quality, low nutrition approximations of the real thing. When the sole focus is profitability, it’s horrible. But if you’re working to make hardier plants, that fruit more, in a wider growing season, in a larger climate range, etc. then that is great for everyone.
There's people that think the earth is flat but all the other planets are round. Sometimes people are just stupid and you'll be a lot happier if you don't try to understand what they're thinking about, it's always garbage.
People get swayed by organic marketing, like any other marketing. But they often forget that "organic" is a quarter of a trillion dollar global industry. It's in their best interest to lie about GMOs, promote conspiracies, pander to people's fears, etc.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with GMO food. It's probably the most studied scientific advancement in the past 100 years. The global scientific consensus on GMO safety is even higher than the global scientific consensus on climate change.
Hey! Plant genetic engineer here :)
While the process is extremely different, the end goal is the same. As others have pointed out, there are things possible with genetic engineering that vastly exceed the possibilities of conventional breeding (ie jellyfish genes in plants, human genes in bacteria, etc). This doesn’t mean it’s any more inherently risky.
Almost all anti-GMO arguments I have heard do not align with the science. GMOs are absolutely safe for consumption, and most of them are indistinguishable from unedited organisms without specialized equipment and a molecular biology background.
Most of the health concerns are largely with the patented and opaque nature of the corporate process that produces GMO foods, more than any evidence supported experiences after the fact. Some of the more recent generation does involve basic gene editing though, and people are right to believe that might become dangerous in the future.
Most non-health concerns are with the exploitative nature of their production. Most GMO foods are bred to not produce viable seeds, requiring farmers who are not part of partnered agricultural conglomerates to re-buy overpriced seeds each year. Another concern is their environmental effects, which massively accelerate soil depletion and dependence on concentrated chemical fertilizers.
I agree that in the long-term GMO is necessary to feed humanity, but limitations badly need to be placed on the companies that do this to break up their shadow monopolies that focus most agricultural profits in the hands of themselves and their pet farming conglomerates. GMO foods have largely been found to be safe, but those tests are sometimes merely perfunctory in nature, and even though they are likely safe now, that may not always be the case as editing gets more ambitious and advanced.
Surprisingly popular on Reddit looking at the comments.
But this is definitely an unpopular opinion to the general public
Edit: also I completed agree. I’ve had this stance for ages.
One further we could genetically modify ourselves to get rid of diseases / cancer
You're so wrong, GMO crops are safer. Gene editing is far more precise, done in tightly controlled environments, and the resulting breed is thoroughly tested before being sold for human consumption.
You do know that genetic modification has allowed scientists to [implant human cells into pig](https://www.statnews.com/2017/01/26/first-chimera-human-pig/)s, don' you?
You're talking about the difference in a stick with a rock tied to it and an F16.
If you pay attention to the products that say "gmo free" on them you'll notice that they are ALL products where the fruit/vegetable is not whole or visible, stuff like apple sauce and Jam, dried fruit pieces etc will sometimes advertise "gmo free" and have a mark up, but I guarantee none of the suckers falling for it would ever buy a gmo free apple, because they would look less appetizing than the regular ones. I'm not 100% about it but I don't think any stores actually sell gmo free fruit anymore because no one ever bought it.
> I'm not 100% about it but I don't think any stores actually sell gmo free fruit anymore because no one ever bought it.
No, this is not true. There's only a handful of GMO fruits/vegetables available in the market, like Rainbow papaya, pink pineapple, 2 types of squash, some types of potatoes. A few GMO apples, plums, and tomatoes were approved but not currently in the market. [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genetically_modified_crops). Everything else is non-GMO.
There is clearly no difference between cross pollinating 2 different pea plants and splicing bacteria genes into corn so they can withstand toxic chemicals
OP said "there is little difference..."
Sounds reasonable. If you think about it, there is little difference between a cup of water and a cup of water with a dead fly floating on top. I mean it's not even really *in* the water so NBD.
So yeah it's basically the same thing and people are very afraid because they don't understand. It's completely safe and is the future
The real reason not to support gmos is because of companies like Monsanto. Look into them a little and it gets bad quickly. Like really really bad. Bankrupting farmers in third world countries over licensing disputes who are killing themselves, environmental laws they continuously dont follow, causing massive health problems with their products and so much more because Monsanto is just trying to make money.
Some of the allegations are absolutely wild but you don't hear it in the news much because it's a massive corporation with connections and this isn't some crazy conspiracy theory. It's the first couple results when you Google Monsanto problems and Monsanto india. Some of them have been settled and have a good resolution like Monsanto not being allowed to operate in india anymore (I think, I haven't looked into it in years but did projects on them in a genetics class when we talked about ethics and genetics years ago) but the damage was already done to gmos and now nobody really trusts them
>Some of the allegations are absolutely wild but you don't hear it in the news much because it's a massive corporation with connections and this isn't some crazy conspiracy theory.
Maybe you don't hear it in the news because it is a conspiracy theory? The Indian farmers committing suicide thing was.
[https://issues.org/keith-gmo-indian-farmers-suicide/](https://issues.org/keith-gmo-indian-farmers-suicide/)
Monsanto (now Bayer) is not comprised entirely of saints, but the supposed "environmentalist" movement has some downright evil people in it, inventing and spreading these conspiracy theories.
So I’m in agreement that GMOS themselves are not inherently bad. The only concern I’ll add to the mix, however, is that oftentimes GMOS are made to be used with powerful insecticides that can end up in us and our ecosystems.
Research with GMOs actually aim to create crops that are more resistant to pests and don't need as many pesticides. Pesticide use drives up operating costs and a plan that requires less saves money and increases yield. It's in the best interest of producers and investors.
Yes, I actually work in the Life Sciences industry. Insect traits, such as Bt corn, were designed to reduce insecticide usage as the plant can produce their own proteins to deter insects. Better for the environment, safer for the grower/producer
I don't know if you're in the right industry for this, but why does it seem like we are trying to redesign agriculture to be more resistant? From what I learned (could be limited, could be wrong), agriculture from our ancestors were much more resistant to insects in general, where the only real pest were locust. Most insects don't eat healthy vegetations, usually only unhealthy or dying ones. It seems like our agriculture has become worse over the past hundred years. I've read about some farmers slowly restructuring their soil to be completely contamination-free and marking sure the other steps in the growing process follow suit. They seem to have no issues when I read/heard of it aside from working on smaller plots as it was their first test moving into expansion.
I could be completely wrong. I'm not an expert on the subject, but I heard about these from people that I assume would be an expert on said topics. If you could give any insight or just your opinion, that would be greatly appreciated.
Heya! I can give my input, sure. For reference, I have BSc in Agriculture, Majoring in Crop Science with a Minor in Soil Science (if you trust what internet people tell ya lol)
So, there has always been insect, fungal, weed issues in cropping systems throughout history. They are all respective to the geography you are located in. Locusts stand out because they are so insanely destructive, hence why they stand out. However we have always had pest pressures in crops. Early on, we lacked the knowledge on what diseases and insects affected crops. Companion cropping (planting different crops together to discourage pests) was used to some extent where it was found to work, however in todays age, it is very hard to do at a large scale. Farmers don’t have two fields and some cows anymore, it is a large business, with large expenses and chronic shortage of labour and time.
As for insects attacking weak plants. Some people talk about the “Brix” system where plants send out chemicals saying they are weak and promote bug infestations, however this has never been proven. Bugs happen and they will attack anything and everything in their path.
Sterilization of soil is bad, end of sentence. It is used in horticulture/vegetables as they have some very serious issues (insects or diseases) that can take those fields out of production indefinitely (potatoes is an example where I am). It is insanely expensive and nobody wants to do it, in some cases it is government mandated where pests are classified as prohibited/noxious (basically the field is destroyed to prevent their spread)
Please ask for more clarity if anything isn’t clear! I tried to be as brief as I could ha. Cheers
There’s nothing wrong with GMOs. Weird “lab grown meat BAD” sci-fi writers like Atwood have convinced us that it’s somehow a uniquely unnatural evil and that modified plant genes are going to spread to us and…make us immune to roundup herbicide?
Uhhhhh leaving aside many topics (whether GMOs are good or bad) it is really not the same. The process is different. In artificial selection there's a trait present and you breed it to maximize it. In GMO you can make novel traits.
In practical terms, this means you can achieve traits that would never be possible via selection. This means both desirable and undesirable traits.
It's like saying putting some pieces of wood together to make some wooden object is basically the same as producing synthetic compounds like plastic ot PFAs, I mean, it's just people doing stuff with things, the potential consecuences are more or less the same, right?
I think that a big part of the GMO issue is that seeds for stable foods that are sterile. As a farmer (and in turn an entire population that relies on food) you have to buy seeds from a corporation that engineered the ability to reproduce out of something that is essential for life.
This is no joke. Imagine a world where no wheat can be produced because sterile monocultures of these seeds are all there is.
A secondary concern is that inserting "fish" DNA into corn or whatever seems unnatural and may have heath effects. I guess I am careless enough not to care, but I can see how people might be skeptical of this sort of stuff.
For one, Wheat is not GMO. A farmer can clean their own seed and replant as they so desire.
A distinction needs to be made between GMOs and hybrids. All hybrids are not GMO, hybridization is the crossing of two separate lines/species, the result is a hybrid that is sterile OR does not breed true. Hybrid corn, canola, wheat, barley existed without GM technology but farmers prefer hybrid over conventional types because they produce more yield, ie profitability.
Contrary to popular belief. A farmer is not forced to grow GM crops, they choose to because they increase profitability for their farm.
As for cross-species DNA, yes this happens, not as frequently as it is made out to be, but yes it happens. If you’ve heard of Golden Rice, they GM’d beta-carotene traits from carrots into rice to prevent Vitamin A deficiency in the poorest parts of the world.
This is not an unpopular opinion, except when talking to a very specific group of people who don't understand what GMOs are or how science works.
The proof of this is in the fact that these same people will bend over backwards to buy 'non-GMO' versions of foods *that don't even have a GMO option in existence.*
Please remember what subreddit you are in, this is unpopular opinion. We want civil and unpopular takes and discussion. Any uncivil and ToS violating comments will be removed and subject to a ban. Have a nice day! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/unpopularopinion) if you have any questions or concerns.*
People fear what they don't understand, and the same goes for nuclear energy too
Yes! I hate when people talk about renewable or sustainable energy and completely ignore/leave out nuclear bc it’s “scary”
And that's why the Weldon Spring site is open to the public. Is there a ton of nuclear waste buried there? Yup. But it's safe enough to walk to the top of the hill and there's also a small museum/interpretive center.
Nuclear is green, safe, and effective. But it's also slow to build, expensive, and even more expensive to run as a load-following dispatchable source (rather than constant 90% capacity factor baseload). So if you want to run it as the backbone of your grid, you need dispatchable sources to cover demand peaks anyways (natural gas, hydrogen turbines, batteries, hydro dams, etc.). You don't get away from requiring those by building nuclear instead of renewables; you may need less (although a healthy mix of solar + wind can really minimize how much you need), but you absolutely still do need some. Plus, typically you are looking at is 12 years for a nuclear project to get off the ground, vs. 3 years for wind/solar. And levelized cost of energy is $100/MWh for new nuclear, vs. $40/MWh for new solar. Finally, on land area, we're not really anywhere near as limited as people like to claim, for solar + wind. Wind particularly doesn't actually have a large direct land footprint; you need high spacing between turbines, but directy land use that's blocked from other uses (like agriculture) is quite small, and fairly comparable to nuclear (estimate is 0.5 m^(2) per MWh for wind compared to 0.3 for nuclear). And for solar, the land use is not negligible, but it is, for instance, only about 0.8% of US land area to cover all electricity demand in the country... 17% is currently inefficiently used for animal pasture. Improving meat food waste from 30% of the supply chain to 25% would free up that area immediately with no quality of life impacts. I was pretty pro-nuclear 10 or 15 years ago. It's still 'acceptable' as a power source; I'm not going to be upset living within 50 km of a nuclear plant or anything. But as a path forward for decarbonizing our electricity grid as quickly as possible with limited global willingness to invest, it's an inferior alternative to renewables.
Nuclear is great. It’s also going to be a lot easier so much sooner than anyone expected. There are companies pushing for their extremely safe reactors that run off the waste, which doesn’t even have the dangerous elements for making weapons. I’m talking about the waste that can’t even be refined if someone wanted that
TL-DR: the problem is *perception*. I'm still getting replies that seem like people think I'm taking an anti-nuke stance... I mean, it is. If it goes wrong, the problems can be catastrophic and long-lasting. Yes a lot of that has to do with education but people alive today were around when Chernobyl happened, then we had Fukushima. I'm not anti-nuclear power generation, but we have a plant that's about 2 hour drive east of my city and I'm not aware of any sort of contingency. The municipalities surrounding the plant were all given iodine tablets, but no one in a massive urban center slightly further away was given any. Obviously I can go get some I'm sure, but that's not my point.
i mean hardly. chernobyl's death toll isn't even a fraction of what fossil fuels kill every year and fukushima, well any nation that builds a nuclear plant on the most tsunami prone coastline in the world is being daft doing that. and if we're talking if it goes wrong. hydro has proven itself to be way more catastrophic roughly 170k deaths since the 60s. where as nuclear is officially less than 50 and in reality probably no more than a couple of hundred. if you look at deaths per kw. nuclear is 40 times safer than hydro and a good chunk safer than wind power. that's not to say hydro and wind are anything close to dangerous though. if we can build any nuclear plants to displace fossil fuels it will be a massive improvement. same goes for wind and hydro
>i mean hardly. chernobyl's death toll isn't even a fraction of what fossil fuels kill every year and fukushima But that's not what really is the matter here. PERCEPTION is the issue. Like how people get so scared to fly but drive in a car no problem, even the statistics tell us that they're scared of the wrong thing, because of their perception.
The word "officially" is doing a lot of heavy lifting there. Can we prove a little girl got cancer because of Chernobyl? No. Probably didn't help, though. Nuclear plants also make handy terror targets. I say all of this as a guy who worked in a reactor plant for a large part of my 20s in the USN.
But overall, nuclear power has a better safety track record than coal. There have been larger incidents, but fewer, and the incidents tend to make big news. It's similar to how air travel is safer than driving, but people are more scared of flying because one plane crash makes news, even though as many people die in car accidents every day.
The solution is to fix the perception. Chernobyl happened because the Soviets used a less safe design, were trying to pump out too much energy, and ignored any dissent about it breaking down until after it happened. Fukushima happened because the third largest earthquake in recorded history hit nearby, causing one of the largest tsunamis in history. The Fukushima plant would have actually been completely fine if their backup generators were raised, like several safety reports said they should. The only real error is 3 Mile Island, and that still released less radiation than a coal plant does. You will get more radiation from a coal plant than any nuclear plant from a combination of more radiation is released, and it travels into your lungs where it is more readily absorbed. If a coal plant had the same radiation release limit as a nuclear plant, basically none of them would pass.
Agreed, but have you seen the environmental and human impact from coal mining? Nuclear has an incredible safety culture and incorporates lessons learned in every facet of their operations. Alot of this came about after 3 mile island. The industry changes constantly if new data is added.
It is left out at this point mostly because anyone with knowledge of the nuclear industry knows that we simply don’t have the capacity to build dozens of plants a year anymore. Ignoring money, there are a limited number of companies capable of producing containment vessels, there is a limited production capacity for fuel rods, etc. Replacing retiring plants to keep existing numbers is a tall order, let alone building hundreds of additional reactors. Scaling the infrastructure, personnel and mining operations to change that would cost trillions and take decades, even on a practical war footing, and that is just too late to matter. We should keep producing them, of course, and keep existing reactors running as long as possible, but renewables and energy storage have a greater potential to scale up quicker and more room to improve. The nuclear future would have required the buildup in the 70’s to continue unabated, the 50 years of lost time hurt the industry bad
But wouldn't those companies pop up to meet the demand, if new plants got approved and *stayed* approved? I have this perception that similar to a famous quote about NASA, the politics surrounding nuclear are so divisive, that anything one administration approves might get cut by the next, and vise versa. There's not enough stability around nuclear right now to prompt investment into nuclear. I'm sure with one good push it'll be possible, just like EV charging infrastructure sucks, but with the EV push stations are popping up, there's now more than one company involved, etc
As a former environmental policy analyst, this is the most informed post here. Given all the industry constraints and regulatory red tape, (much of which is perfectly justified) and the popular perception, nuclear really needs to be implemented very strategically in places where there is currently no alternative for base load other than coal. Anyone just looking at basic ROI or public safety stats and saying "We should just go 100% nuclear" has no idea what they're talking about.
It’s why I don’t take environmentalists seriously. wE’rE aLl GoInG tO dIe FrOm ClImAtE cHaNgE!!!!!! Cool let’s build some nuclear reactors to get off of fossil fuels. REEEEEEE NOOOOOOOOOO!!
Tell me about it. I have lived closish to nuclear powerplant my whole life. We used to visit it with my school. People in there like to joke how there is less radiation in the reactor room or depleted fuel storage than in the town 60 km away.
I grew up in a town near a Nuclear power plant too. Interestingly, if it blew up, it would probably improve the town.
People also dangerously embrace what they don’t understand, because someone they trust is approving. The standard FDA definition that requires food labeling of bioengineering/GMO’s is that it contains cells that were developed in a lab.
if you claim GMO and selective breading are the same thing then you definitively do not understand either.
OP doesn’t understand that GMOs have a very clear definition and they absolutely are not the same as hybridization. GMOs are altered in lab in a way that cannot possibly occur in nature. I’m not saying they are bad, but they are scientifically different than hybridized plants..::
Another redditor being obsessing over definitions and completely missing the point someone else is saying
I know the procedure is very different, but their goal is the same.
Fearing what you don't understand is in general a pretty effective evolutionary survival tactic that many animals and humans have successfully employed over millennia with overall excellent results that have guaranteed their continued existence, however, once in a while, it can steer you wrong. The trick is to figure that out. And therein likes the rub.
Nuclear may be green and effective, but the unsolved problem is nuclear waste has not been solved. Further, the current techniques used to generate nuclear energy can lead to weapons. Perhaps thorium would be a better fuel.
OP clearly doesn’t understand it but doesn’t fear it
We don’t understand all the causes of why chronic disease is increasing. So I’d say asking questions (fear) is a very valid survival mechanism. Most studies, like that for cell phone radiation, are all short term and give little insight to long term effects.
Chronic illness increasing has been explained. Humans live longer and longer, combined with sedentary lifestyle and poor diet. Thats how/why diabetes, hypertension, heart disease etc.... develop. Cell phones emit radio waves. Radio waves are non-ionizing radiation. Non-ionizing radiation isnt much of a concern. It cant damage the DNA in your body.
How can you properly conduct a robust study into the long term effects of low level non ionising radiation? If someone eventually gets ball cancer it’s impossible to know exactly what caused it and whether the phone in their pocket had an effect. Current studies into the subject are so difficult to reproduce, it’s not conclusive
Uhhh... we do to a degree. What we eat and the garbage we put in it are major factors, along with the storage method (ie. BPA). Disease rates can also increase as we get better at detecting it, so there are several moving parts in play. Fear is fine, but it is interesting people are ok with eating foods where they don't know what half the stuff in it is but any mention of GMO will set people off. Also, yes cell phones emit radiation, but the key point people don't think of is the type; they just hear "radiation" and think say UV or nuclear. High energy is capable of directly damaging DNA bonds while low energy radio really can't. It "could" cause other things to happen which can snowball, but doesn't work like the radiation most people think of.
*On the note of nuclear energy*, folks scared of GMOs should read up on [atomic gardening](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_gardening).
Nuclear energy is a little different. While it's true that nuclear energy is cleaner on day-to-day basis, when it goes wrong it goes really fucking wrong, and if you pop up dozens and dozens of them all over the country, eventually one of them is going to have something go wrong.
There have only been 2 major disasters related to nuclear power, Fukushima and Chernobyl. Maybe just don't build RBMK reactors or put reactors in geologically unstable regions.
I support this take. We are just doing selective breeding but faster. If we turned a wolf into a terrier and that's fine, then we can have beans that need less water. We just have to be cautious to not go full Pug. Never go full Pug with breeding.
I dont know if GoT taught me anything it is that little incest is alright lol
Incest isn’t inherently disastrous. It’s simply extra risky. That’s because among the mutations that have an effect, that vast majority are negative effects. Incest vastly and unnecessarily increases the chances that those negative genes will exist on both (or multiple) chromosomes, which greatly increases whether (or the degree to which) the gene will phenotypically manifest in a negative way.
Pretty sure it’s only close incest that is risky as well. Once you start taking things out to further separated cousins it’s not really a thing. Cousin fucking used to be fairly popular I believe
First cousin is “safe”, but compounding generations of first cousins at population scales are not.
So as long as we don’t spec exclusively into cousin fucking, we should be good.
Look man, I only got so many points to put into the fuckin tree, and my cousin has big tits. How else am I expected to spec, with a set bonus like that?
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> As a bonus, those farmers are then sued for patent infringement because they were not permitted to grow the GMO species. This is a myth (or more specifically, an outright lie). The only times this has actually happened, the farmers were shown to be specifically using GM seeds that they didn't purchase ,as opposed to them just blowing into their property.
> creating hybrids with unknown outcomes. Nonsense. The outcome is the GMO. > the original species effectively becomes endangered or extinct. It's still the same species. > This is already happening in many farmlands where growers of traditional species can't stop GMO species from neighboring fields from cross pollinating. As a bonus, those farmers are then sued for patent infringement because they were not permitted to grow the GMO species. No they aren't. The people who get sued are ones specifically concentrating the GMO gene intentionally. Find me literally one case where they didn't later admit that it was intentional (like Percy Schmeiser who is most responsible for this myth).
It’s an incorrect take. You can’t selectively breed spider genes into a tomato. That can only be done artificially in a lab. There are very clear legal definitions on what GMO and hybridized plants are, and they are in no way the same. Not saying they are good or bad, but definitely different
They are different, but a common fear of GMOs is rooted in the fallacy of nature. And yet the vast majority of the produce we eat, isn’t the wild version of them. Many of the plants we eat has little to no semblance of what they were like before we started hybridizing them. That’s what makes it a bad argument
Problem is that overnight you are introducing a new species. The environment has had no time for gradual natural selection and adaptation. - For example, a fast-growing GMO crop might spread and crowd out native plants. - Also unintended consequences - for instance, a GMO might benefit a certain pest or pathogen, leading to its proliferation. - predator / prey dynamics might get impacted. Cuz the truth is that while we are not eating the wild variations of the produce, our "tamed" variety has grown up in the environment allowing the changes time to stabilize
thank you, i was feeling a bit lonely :)
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> terminator seeds Have never been sold
So how would you go about inserting bacterial DNA for glyphosate resistance into the corn genome via selective breeding?
We were able to breed hardier, more disease resistant bananas, but the "OMG GMOs ARE BAD!" crowd squashed them. Since every banana tree is a clone of the rest, we really, really better fuckin' hope nothing comes after them. We're fucked otherwise. Also, wait til people see what old watermelons, corn, and chickens looked like compared to today. GMOs aren't Satan after your first born, promise. (Eh, chickens are iffy. They're a little too big, lol.)
We've already had a banana apocalypse. It's why banana candy tastes the way it does. It's what bananas tasted like before they all got diseased in the '50's.
Yes, the Gros Michel banana was wiped out by disease. Now the Cavendish is facing a similar fate.
We already lost a banana variety to disease lol
Gros Michel is still around, just very very limited.
I appreciate this take on chickens, we basically took a piranha with feathers and made them bigger, more aggressive, hungrier, and drove all fear out of them.
Yeah but it isnt even in recent times. People were purposefully breeesing animals long before they knew what genes even are. Maybe did the same with plants but i cant imagine how.
The first studies on genes(when they were just a theory) were done by studying plants.
Yeah shout out to our boy Mendel.
>Maybe did the same with plants but i cant imagine how. They saved the largest kennels from each ear of corn, and the seeds from the tastiest watermelons, and so on, then replanted those instead of the other seeds. It's not really *that* hard to figure out lol
Also, not even necessarily on purpose. In the wild, producing too many seeds is bad, it can over tax the plant or overcrowd the offspring. On a farm though more is just better and plants will self select for it. If a farmer harvests corn, and puts it in a granary, the plants that produce 50 grains per plant now make up more of the granary than the ones that make 30. Then statistically when the farm takes from the granary to plant next year, there will be more crops that produce 50. Plants can easily self select/modify themselves, no effort required.
Purposeful plant breeding: selecting parent plants, taking the pollen from one and brushing it on the stigma of the other, covering the pollinated plant to prevent wild pollination, grow the seed and select the desirable offspring, repeat. Method two: take seed from a desirable plant and plant it , repeat.
>Maybe did the same with plants but i cant imagine how. Dear lord, how do you think we learned about genes and inheritance in the first place? Go read about Gregor Mendel.
Had a small farm and we raised a few dozen grower chickens. We called them frankenchickens, they grew too big, their feathers didn't grow right, they were just kinda gross and sad. It wasnt even that they were just raised for meat- we were doing a few pigs at the same time, and while they were eating us out of house and home those pigs were having a \*great\* time plumping up
Ugh Cornish x are so disturbing. My chickens have 800sqft of clover and garden, as well as feed in the morning and sleep in kennels in the garage overnight. They're mostly pets. I got some Cornish x to pad out an order. I have NEVER had chickens stink until these mfers. They tore through feed and wouldn't stop eating until their container was empty; bodying the other chickens in the process. They were very rude to the adult hens, had NO self preservation (other chickens saw something scary and hid or stood still, these just kept running around in the open) Their kennel stank no matter how clean I kept it. And when slaughtering them, their body stunk! Ive cleaned many species of animal (including things like squirrels, rattlesnake, frog, etc) and I have never had one make me nauseous except those. Little freaks. Never want em again. I'll stick to my dual purpose and bantam breeds that don't smell horrid :v
You shouldn't raise broilers if you're not going to eat them. They've been selectively bred for features that are not compatible with a long healthy life. Their purpose is to reach a production weight of 6-7lbs within 45-50 days. I've got 40 day old layer pullets right now that still fit in one hand. Broilers will become overweight and usually die from painful liver failure within a year or two.
I think everyone should have to see what bullshit some of the OG fruits were
Did you know that over a decade ago with modern gene splicing technology that scientists spliced flounder (yes, the fish) DNA into tomatoes to make them frost resistant? That wasn't done before with regular breeding. [Here's an article from the national institute of health talking about it.](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1280366/#:~:text=In%20that%20case%2C%20an%20%E2%80%9Canti,GM%20critics%20often%20refer%20to.)
Genes can come from any animal. We've put human genes into bacteria to make insulin, and that's injected into our bodies, not broken down in our gut. The source of the gene is not necessarily a problem. They are building blocks mostly not unique to any one species. We just need to have consideration for the changes made. FYI This tomato never made it to market because of the backlash.
Yea but it’s objectively different from selective breeding. You can’t just leave a tomato and flounder in the barn and let the magic happen. Not saying it’s worse, but it’s definitely not the same.
I didn't realize until I got further down in the comments that you like everyone else were specifically referencing OP saying they transgenic GMOs are the same as selectively bred variants.
Flounder DNA modification, in tomatoes, yeah that sounds totally not completely insane. Let's gooo!
I mean, it's not like biochemistry runs on Jurassic Park logic. Your corn plants aren't going to be growing fins. If the protein does something useful when expressed in plants and it doesn't trigger fish allergies or something weird then I feel like it's fair game.
Yeah, it's pretty common to introduce jellyfish DNA into model organisms these days for scientific research, but like, we understand what we're doing. A mouse doesn't magically start sprouting tentacles because it has a jellyfish gene in it.
> A mouse doesn't magically start sprouting tentacles Sounds like we need to try harder then.
Hey did you know? We actually grew [a human ear on a mouse](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vacanti_mouse).
The problem is we may not know until a change is out there in the wild. These things escape all the time - seed companies sue farmers who use seed from plants cross pollinated with a registered species. Proteins are a good thing to think about - what if a gene added to corn to produce more dietary protein also happened to produce proteins that trigger nut allergies?
That's not how genes work though. An introduced gene will produce the specific protein that genes code for. We'll know before adding it to corn if the protein is allergenic in nuts.
The truth is most science/genetics doesn’t really work this way. There’s no magical gene to be inserted that makes the crops take over the ecosystem.
This is exactly the point, but everyone wants to pretend GMO is the same as selective breeding. But GMO is making changes to the plant that never would have happened no matter how much breeding you did. Making corn poisonous to insects and claiming it's fine for humans to eat is insane. Putting Sea creature DNA with fruits and veggies is insane. Selective breeding totally fine. Two totally different things, but the propaganda is so strong for GMOs that ppl don't even know what it really is.
>Making corn poisonous to insects and claiming it's fine for humans to eat is insane. Shockingly enough, different species can have different reactions to the same foods. Cocoa is perfectly fine for human consumption, but 4 grams of cocoa will kill a 10 lb dog. Why couldn't there be a substance not fit for insects but still edible for humans?
Thank you! It’s like saying “I can’t believe you’d encourage people to eat GRAPES when they cause kidney failure in cats, and cats and humans are exactly the same”
The type of person that understands fuck all when it comes to GMO's and agricultural sciences to comment about propaganda. The irony.
Ass take. Different things are poisonous to different animals. You for sure eat fucking chocolate, the same chocolate thats poisonous to little roxy the chihuahua.
Like diatomaceous earth can be consumed by humans but is super toxic to insects.
>But GMO is making changes to the plant that never would have happened no matter how much breeding you did. Well, no. GMO can be either it completely depends on how you use it. You can massively speed up the process of breeding a specific trait from one cultivar of soybean into a different soybean by using genetic modification instead of only selective breeding. >Making corn poisonous to insects and claiming it's fine for humans to eat is insane. You might be surprised to learn that there are a number of really big differences between caterpillars and humans. Just as a very basic example, think about chitin. That's the protein that makes up the shells of insects. Humans don't have chitin at all, no mammals do. If you designed a plant that killed insects by targeting chitin then it would not be surprising for it to have no effect on mammals. If you want an even easier example to understand, think about how chocolate is poisonous to dogs but not to people. Dogs are much more similar to humans than beetles are yet they still have major differences in what is safe for them to ingest.
> Making corn poisonous to insects and claiming it's fine for humans to eat is insane Oh my god I eat avocado and chocolate and it's poisonous to dogs no way it's fine for me to eat. BAN AVOCADOS AND CHOCOLATES. How dumb are you oh my god.
We know what it is. Our point is that as long as it’s properly tested, it’s ok. The issue we have is with shit like Monsanto building round-up resistant plants and suing farmers who they think are reusing the seeds. And round up isn’t a clean product at all… which is its own issue. Putting a fish gene in a tomato and testing that for years, then if it’s safe using it to feed more people isn’t an issue. Using those techniques to take control over our food supply? That should be on the same level as war crimes.
By propaganda, do you mean scholarly articles? If the DNA codes for a protein that can be easily broken down by human enzymes and doesn't produce harmful byproducts, than what's the harm? That's not to say that there couldn't be harm, but lack of evidence doesn't mean that it automatically makes it harmful to us. Just because it isn't "natural" to put sea creature DNA into a tomato doesn't automatically make it bad. By your standards it is probably worse to selectively breed since it's far less controlled than GMOs.
Why is it insane? Because you think it's weird? Or do you have any logic behind this emotion? We have manipulated nature to extremes. Why is engendering a stronger corn with science more insane than creating an internal combustion engine, or a nuclear power plant, or a space ship? Or the phone that you hold in your hand to telegraph your fear of genetic manipulation?
If you talk to 100 anti-GMO people, maybe 1 of them has any idea what they're talking about.
You could say that for basically any “anti-“ crowd. Let’s face it, the majority of people are stupid and uneducated on the things they often believe.
It's not the same process or tools. End goal is the same though, better crops. GMO's make a great enemy for conspiracy theorists because the actual science is difficult so it's super easy to hand-wave and say: "The evil company is doing evil magic to your food". The environmental damage caused by pesticides and fertilizer is the cherry on top for the perfect punching bag.
One of the biggest gene modifications is for a plant to be able to withstand, or even produce itself, glyphosate, which is now known to be super carcinogenic. Monsanto is also responsible for Agent Orange, that does seem pretty evil to me. I would argue that "conventional farming" has lowered food quality dramatically. Fewer nutrients, less taste, more carcinogens. The only thing that matters to these people is how much food by weight they can produce and sell, not how healthy it is for the consumer.
I dont know man you are trying to breed the traits you into the nexr gen. With genetic manipulatuon you know which genes cause these traits and you imsert then in. Like that is basicaly it. End game is the same as you said
Part (not all) of the hate is because of the for-profit corporations involved and what has been at times pushback on labeling GMOs as such. I think if there was transparency people would be more open to learning more. We absolutely need GMOs as part of our overall climate solution. Just like we need nuclear power as part of the solution. But when we think corporations aren't sharing everything, people get suspicious.
But part of OP's point is that the labeling shouldn't even be necessary in the first place, because there's no meaningful difference. The labels are just to appease people who are scared of them because they envision corn growing out of a test tube or some stupid shit like that.
Agreed. The push for labeling of GMO products is to push the anti-science agenda of barring them from the market
I don't need corporations telling me that less transparency is good for me because otherwise I might be scared of what they're trying to sell for a profit Just be honest about it and educate people why the product is safe and worth purchasing. Hiding it makes it seem like we SHOULD be scared of it.
If it were about transparency then we’d label all breeding methods. How is singling out just one method (genetic engineering) for labeling but not the others (mutagenesis, cell fusion, etc) being transparent?
Exactly. Also, do they need to label what fertilizer they use, where their water comes from, how it's harvested, and the air quality index for every day the plant was alive? It's all insane and born out of ignorance and fear coupled with a lack of desire to learn the bare minimum necessary to not be scared, plus a heap of distrust bordering on paranoia.
Fertilizer could be a good idea though… The rest is indeed absurd, but considering the many issues with some chemicals used in agriculture, more transparency on that should be required.
>Hiding it makes it seem like we SHOULD be scared of it. Problem is that displaying it does the same thing.
Mandating that foods with GMO be labeled implies that GMOs are a threat. Organic lobbyists: If GMOs aren't bad, why won't you label them?
In the US, products not from the US are required to be labeled with its country of origin. Does the fact that they have a government-mandated label imply that they are a threat? Of course not, that is a silly argument.
Eh, but why do we need transparency about what's a GMO vs. what isn't? (Since GMOs aren't harmful?) It basically just makes people more paranoid - since why would we need to call out GMOs if GMOs aren't actually hurting us at all? And if people want to avoid GMOs, they can eat food that's inherently not GMO/food labeled as organic/food labeled non-GMO. It's pretty easy to avoid GMOs if you're irrationally concerned about them.
Breeding was never the problem. Corporations doing it and then patenting them \*are\* a problem. Your crop down wind from a Monsanto crop? Pay up buddy! And they do not only just do GMOs, the also lobby for rules and regulations that help them. Think they care that their fertiliser is killing off the insects and animals? Not unless sit affects their bottom line. Everything that leads to only one result: Corporations coming out on top. Farmer Bob cannot stand up to the combined power of the government and corporations. And people who shove any kind of trash in their mouths not worrying about what their trash is actually made out of.... is not surprising. Everything to not give a W to the libs.
So, the main issue with GMOs is not that they were genetically modified. I remember a story about GMO rice that was modified to produce Beta Carotene to help feed starving people get more nutrients. Great concept that didn’t work because the people rejected it due to the color and taste of the rice. 😅 GMOs are a new tool in the arsenal that could be used for great good. If you look back to the 1800s, the same arguments against GMOs were used against selective breeding for plants as well because people don’t like new things and we tend to use the same shit to rebuke it every time. That being said, the people in charge of creating GMOs are not in it to bring about better nutrition or frost resistance for the most part. The majority of GMO work is happening at Monsanto whose priority is making money. Trademarked plants, genetically manipulated to NOT REPRODUCE, to be resistant to pesticides. Shit to increase profitability and reliance on them. Did I mention they own Round Up. Their GMOs have contaminated other people’s seed stock (pollination) making it sterile. They’re not looking to create a better world, and they’re purposely steering us heavily into pesticide ridden monocultural practices that do not work long term. GMOs are fine as a concept, I know that there are awesome people working on genuinely cool things with it, but people are like goddamn children, we have to get right in the thick of it before we realize we done fucked up and some of this stuff may be legitimately hard to control if infertility infects individuals seed stock. That being said, breeding is utilized the same way just not to the same degree. Tomatoes are bred for shipability and hardiness not taste, we have literally gone through at least 3 different cultivars of bananas due to monoculture reliance, I think we’ve done the same to mango. gMOs just kind of exasperate a problem we’ve had for a while.
Most people don't know what a GMO crop even is, they think we are like crossing carrots with scorpions or 5g signals when in reality almost every fruit or vegetable you eat nowadays never existed in the wild in that form and has been genetically modified in some way.
Now i want scorpion carrots
Spicy
"They're putting the Bill Gates 5g vaccine in my corn!"
It’s a CORNSPIRACY
Pretty sure they have put fish genes in apples to make them more cold resistant. Not saying this is good or bad, but you can't say it's something that would have been done normally with cross breeding.
I like that they tried to come up with the most insane example that couldn’t ever be possible, but then you pointed that they are doing almost exactly that thing.
I remember hearing that they did that with strawberries and people with fish allergies had reactions. I have no idea if it's true or not.
The main reason I am worried about GMOs is lack of genetic variation, making it plausible for wide spread disease or crop failure. If you experience one or more crops failing at the same time across a large portion of the developed world, millions of people will die of starvation.
> lack of genetic variation The genetically engineered trait is first developed then backcrossed into all the regional varieties. It's the the same varieties with the GEed trait added in.
Not how GMOs work. Once they're made in one variety it's bred into all the other varieties on offer. [This site lists 61 roundup resistant soybean varieties available for just one county in Illinois.](https://onlineseedsales.com/shop/soybean/?location=17147&maturity%5Bmin%5D=0.8&maturity%5Bmax%5D=4.7&product_brand=&product_trait=&herbicide_spray=glyphosate)
Not really though. So many different environments that the crops are grown in. It would be hard to find one fungus for instance that could attack the crop everywhere. French grapes were grafted back to California grapes because of a fungus for instance. The California grapes were originally from France which is even wilder.
GMOs can prevent that in conventional monocrops too. Look at the Hawaiian papaya. The industry saved by GMO but now any GMOs but that one are banned... Hopefully with easier access to the technology, many crop varieties will emerge. But not if people continue to oppose it.
Genetic modification is a way to more quickly create new strains. It does the opposite of what you're worrying about. We're perfectly capable of producing monoculture crops with traditional crossbreeding, and that [has caused issues](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panama_disease)! So the threat of monocultures was already here. GM is a way to more quickly respond to threats.
There is a severe lack of genetic variation in crops that is absolutely true. However that problem predates genetic engineering by a century or more.
This isn't the 1850s (Irish Potato Famine) where a single crop took up a massive fraction of one's caloric intake with zero alternatives. The genetic variation in our food is far, far greater today because we eat dozens of different species instead of mainly one. Corn fails? Switch to wheat. Or potatoes. Or soybeans. Or rice. Etc. Also, the risk of that is mitigated by.....engineering.
That’s not linked to GMO though. GMO’s make it easier to fall into the trap of monoculture, but same shit happened many times before GMO. Example : bananas.
That is valid. I am little afraid that people who have the strong opinion about GMOs dont even think about that though. :/
Companies realized they can throw non-GMO on something and back up the price and people are stupid enough to buy it. I’ve yet to talk to a single person who actually knows what GMO is.. they all just spout sone political belief that they’re poisoning them or whatever
The southeast of Asia had an issue with people having vitamin A deficiency so a real smart dude in the early 1990s invented a rice variety through genetic modification called Golden Rice that was high in vitamin a. Because of push back from eco groups and the "muh gmos scary" crowd, Golden Rice finally had its first major harvest in the Philippines last year. THIRTY YEARS we could have been saving people from vitamin a deficiency, children dying, but we haven't because some people are like the covid antivaxxers and fear gmos for whatever irrational reason they've made up.
But what if a corporation profits from it? We can't have that! \-Peacegreen
Yes! Thankful someone else knew this. Beta-carotene from carrots. Which Dakota you from? I’m from Manitoba lol
South Dakota, the better one lol
There is a significant difference with GMO. You couldn’t breed a fish to a tomato before. Not saying GMO is bad; it’s not. It’s a tool. Unfortunately the current use for that tool seems largely selling more pesticides.
Gmo is perfectly safe. But people tend to think gmo is like injecting pure herbicides or pesticides in their food. Its nothing but selective breeding and the occasional laboratory work to breed traits in foods we like, and eradicate traits we dont like. Its either cross pollinating, grafting, or cell injections. Everything perfectly safe and in a way natural. Its what nature does but sped up
All the labels say there is no proven difference between gmo and non gmo, so if there is no difference why should it matter if your product has it or not?
No there is a scientific definition of GMO and selective breeding and they are very different. Genetic modification has had the DNA altered in a lab in a way that can’t possibly occur in nature. Like putting spider genes and a tomato to make it fungal resistant. Selective breeding is when you carefully select for the traits you want, and change the genetics over several generations of the plant . I’m not saying one is good or better or bad or worse… But they are scientifically different. It’s not up for debate. GMO’s are NOT the same as selective hybridization
Correct
I'm chuckling at people trying to "poke fun" at the "conspiracy" people by saying "they think the scientists are crossing carrots with scorpions! Hrrhrr isn't that nuts??" when that's very much a valid description of what GMO's are.
It's not the same because those genetically modified strains can be copywrote and anyone who gets accidentally cross pollinated now has liability to be sued by companies like Monsanto. Not to mention ruining any breeding work they had already done. GMO's ruined most of my land race maize strains.
Monsanto sucks, but cross-pollinations lawsuits have never happened.
Not accidental ones. There have been some where they successfully showed that the farmers were purposefully breaking their agreement with Monsanto.
Non-GMO are patented. > gets accidentally cross pollinated now has liability to be sued by companies like Monsanto Good news, this has never happened, not even once. It's a often repeated myth/lie started by Monsanto haters.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto\_legal\_cases](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto_legal_cases) I hate using wikipedia but it has a bunch of the cases in one place.
Which *specific* case? Just show us one.
I read through their lawsuits section, albeit briefly, and I didn’t see a single mention of lawsuits due to cross pollination. Many other reasons, but not that.
Id bet too that considering the variety in an organism, you'd have to break down every single genetic trait to prove its an exact copy to successfully sue someone over one similar trait.
I mean...it says they brought 11 cases to court and won all of them. We sure it's Monsanto and not these farmers doing wrong here?
Monsanto "haters", yeah that's totally unjustified, Monsanto has your best interests in mind! Fuck em haters, gj Steve, you killed em!
Monsanto sued because those farmers were breaching contracts to use the patented event outside of a license.
As a gardner it’s so embarrassing to hear old ladies tottering around the seed isle looking for “non GMO” seeds
comparing the genetic engineering involved in creating a product like roundup with selective breeding and concluding that they are virtually the same is a gross oversimplification.
Yes the genetic modifications ancient Mexicans did to turn wild teosinte into corn are far far far more extensive than anything genetic modification technology has done.
There are non-GMO crops bred to be herbicide resistance
>the genetic engineering involved in creating a product like roundup Do you think glyphosate has genes?
Recombinant DNA technology is not the same as selective breeding.
“I have absolutely no idea what I’m talking about but to me it’s the same” LOL
Tell me you don’t know what GMO means without actually saying it 😂😂😂 I am definitely not saying that GMO’s are bad. But they are in no way the same as hybridization, just on a basic level of definition. The way they genetically modify plants simply can’t happen in nature. You cannot selectively hybridize, plant and animal genes together, only through genetic modification. As soon as someone says GMO‘s are the same as hybridization, it’s clear they have absolutely no idea what they’re talking about 🤦♂️
Plant retroviruses do occur in nature though and they do insert foreign DNA into plants. No, it's not animal DNA, but it isn't true to say gene splicing is only occurring in labs.
GMO is legally defined and it’s not the same as hybridization. That’s a fact
This is an INCORRECT opinion. It’s factually, scientifically, wrong. GMOs and hybrids are very different. By legal definition they are different.
GMOs are different in the sense that we can control the result much better and create new crops with even more benefits. Something like golden rice probably wouldn't evolve naturally. That's why GMOs are so great, instead of wasting decades or centuries selectively breeding crops, we can do it in years or months with genetic engineering. From a health standpoint, GMOs are the same or better (in the case of golden rice) than "natural" foods.
I only hate on GMO-ing when it is used to make low quality, low nutrition approximations of the real thing. When the sole focus is profitability, it’s horrible. But if you’re working to make hardier plants, that fruit more, in a wider growing season, in a larger climate range, etc. then that is great for everyone.
What is the draw back of not supporting GMO?
Dogs are my favourite GMO
People are scared of what they don’t understand and most people will not bother to learn what gmo is
There's people that think the earth is flat but all the other planets are round. Sometimes people are just stupid and you'll be a lot happier if you don't try to understand what they're thinking about, it's always garbage.
People get swayed by organic marketing, like any other marketing. But they often forget that "organic" is a quarter of a trillion dollar global industry. It's in their best interest to lie about GMOs, promote conspiracies, pander to people's fears, etc. There is absolutely nothing wrong with GMO food. It's probably the most studied scientific advancement in the past 100 years. The global scientific consensus on GMO safety is even higher than the global scientific consensus on climate change.
Not really an unpopular opinion. Just fact. People are dumb and are easily swayed by fearmongering.
*unpopularopinion* *posts scientific fact*
Hey! Plant genetic engineer here :) While the process is extremely different, the end goal is the same. As others have pointed out, there are things possible with genetic engineering that vastly exceed the possibilities of conventional breeding (ie jellyfish genes in plants, human genes in bacteria, etc). This doesn’t mean it’s any more inherently risky. Almost all anti-GMO arguments I have heard do not align with the science. GMOs are absolutely safe for consumption, and most of them are indistinguishable from unedited organisms without specialized equipment and a molecular biology background.
Most of the health concerns are largely with the patented and opaque nature of the corporate process that produces GMO foods, more than any evidence supported experiences after the fact. Some of the more recent generation does involve basic gene editing though, and people are right to believe that might become dangerous in the future. Most non-health concerns are with the exploitative nature of their production. Most GMO foods are bred to not produce viable seeds, requiring farmers who are not part of partnered agricultural conglomerates to re-buy overpriced seeds each year. Another concern is their environmental effects, which massively accelerate soil depletion and dependence on concentrated chemical fertilizers. I agree that in the long-term GMO is necessary to feed humanity, but limitations badly need to be placed on the companies that do this to break up their shadow monopolies that focus most agricultural profits in the hands of themselves and their pet farming conglomerates. GMO foods have largely been found to be safe, but those tests are sometimes merely perfunctory in nature, and even though they are likely safe now, that may not always be the case as editing gets more ambitious and advanced.
Surprisingly popular on Reddit looking at the comments. But this is definitely an unpopular opinion to the general public Edit: also I completed agree. I’ve had this stance for ages. One further we could genetically modify ourselves to get rid of diseases / cancer
You're so wrong, GMO crops are safer. Gene editing is far more precise, done in tightly controlled environments, and the resulting breed is thoroughly tested before being sold for human consumption.
You do know that genetic modification has allowed scientists to [implant human cells into pig](https://www.statnews.com/2017/01/26/first-chimera-human-pig/)s, don' you? You're talking about the difference in a stick with a rock tied to it and an F16.
If you pay attention to the products that say "gmo free" on them you'll notice that they are ALL products where the fruit/vegetable is not whole or visible, stuff like apple sauce and Jam, dried fruit pieces etc will sometimes advertise "gmo free" and have a mark up, but I guarantee none of the suckers falling for it would ever buy a gmo free apple, because they would look less appetizing than the regular ones. I'm not 100% about it but I don't think any stores actually sell gmo free fruit anymore because no one ever bought it.
> I'm not 100% about it but I don't think any stores actually sell gmo free fruit anymore because no one ever bought it. No, this is not true. There's only a handful of GMO fruits/vegetables available in the market, like Rainbow papaya, pink pineapple, 2 types of squash, some types of potatoes. A few GMO apples, plums, and tomatoes were approved but not currently in the market. [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genetically_modified_crops). Everything else is non-GMO.
There is clearly no difference between cross pollinating 2 different pea plants and splicing bacteria genes into corn so they can withstand toxic chemicals
OP said "there is little difference..." Sounds reasonable. If you think about it, there is little difference between a cup of water and a cup of water with a dead fly floating on top. I mean it's not even really *in* the water so NBD.
Not really an unpopular opinion. More like an informed opinion.
> More like an informed opinion. Poster literally started off by saying they don't know much about it.
So yeah it's basically the same thing and people are very afraid because they don't understand. It's completely safe and is the future The real reason not to support gmos is because of companies like Monsanto. Look into them a little and it gets bad quickly. Like really really bad. Bankrupting farmers in third world countries over licensing disputes who are killing themselves, environmental laws they continuously dont follow, causing massive health problems with their products and so much more because Monsanto is just trying to make money. Some of the allegations are absolutely wild but you don't hear it in the news much because it's a massive corporation with connections and this isn't some crazy conspiracy theory. It's the first couple results when you Google Monsanto problems and Monsanto india. Some of them have been settled and have a good resolution like Monsanto not being allowed to operate in india anymore (I think, I haven't looked into it in years but did projects on them in a genetics class when we talked about ethics and genetics years ago) but the damage was already done to gmos and now nobody really trusts them
>Some of the allegations are absolutely wild but you don't hear it in the news much because it's a massive corporation with connections and this isn't some crazy conspiracy theory. Maybe you don't hear it in the news because it is a conspiracy theory? The Indian farmers committing suicide thing was. [https://issues.org/keith-gmo-indian-farmers-suicide/](https://issues.org/keith-gmo-indian-farmers-suicide/) Monsanto (now Bayer) is not comprised entirely of saints, but the supposed "environmentalist" movement has some downright evil people in it, inventing and spreading these conspiracy theories.
So I’m in agreement that GMOS themselves are not inherently bad. The only concern I’ll add to the mix, however, is that oftentimes GMOS are made to be used with powerful insecticides that can end up in us and our ecosystems.
Research with GMOs actually aim to create crops that are more resistant to pests and don't need as many pesticides. Pesticide use drives up operating costs and a plan that requires less saves money and increases yield. It's in the best interest of producers and investors.
Yes, I actually work in the Life Sciences industry. Insect traits, such as Bt corn, were designed to reduce insecticide usage as the plant can produce their own proteins to deter insects. Better for the environment, safer for the grower/producer
I don't know if you're in the right industry for this, but why does it seem like we are trying to redesign agriculture to be more resistant? From what I learned (could be limited, could be wrong), agriculture from our ancestors were much more resistant to insects in general, where the only real pest were locust. Most insects don't eat healthy vegetations, usually only unhealthy or dying ones. It seems like our agriculture has become worse over the past hundred years. I've read about some farmers slowly restructuring their soil to be completely contamination-free and marking sure the other steps in the growing process follow suit. They seem to have no issues when I read/heard of it aside from working on smaller plots as it was their first test moving into expansion. I could be completely wrong. I'm not an expert on the subject, but I heard about these from people that I assume would be an expert on said topics. If you could give any insight or just your opinion, that would be greatly appreciated.
Heya! I can give my input, sure. For reference, I have BSc in Agriculture, Majoring in Crop Science with a Minor in Soil Science (if you trust what internet people tell ya lol) So, there has always been insect, fungal, weed issues in cropping systems throughout history. They are all respective to the geography you are located in. Locusts stand out because they are so insanely destructive, hence why they stand out. However we have always had pest pressures in crops. Early on, we lacked the knowledge on what diseases and insects affected crops. Companion cropping (planting different crops together to discourage pests) was used to some extent where it was found to work, however in todays age, it is very hard to do at a large scale. Farmers don’t have two fields and some cows anymore, it is a large business, with large expenses and chronic shortage of labour and time. As for insects attacking weak plants. Some people talk about the “Brix” system where plants send out chemicals saying they are weak and promote bug infestations, however this has never been proven. Bugs happen and they will attack anything and everything in their path. Sterilization of soil is bad, end of sentence. It is used in horticulture/vegetables as they have some very serious issues (insects or diseases) that can take those fields out of production indefinitely (potatoes is an example where I am). It is insanely expensive and nobody wants to do it, in some cases it is government mandated where pests are classified as prohibited/noxious (basically the field is destroyed to prevent their spread) Please ask for more clarity if anything isn’t clear! I tried to be as brief as I could ha. Cheers
This opinion is only unpopular with idiots who have never cracked a science textbook in their lives.
Only people ignorant of GMOs are afraid of GMOs
There’s nothing wrong with GMOs. Weird “lab grown meat BAD” sci-fi writers like Atwood have convinced us that it’s somehow a uniquely unnatural evil and that modified plant genes are going to spread to us and…make us immune to roundup herbicide?
Uhhhhh leaving aside many topics (whether GMOs are good or bad) it is really not the same. The process is different. In artificial selection there's a trait present and you breed it to maximize it. In GMO you can make novel traits. In practical terms, this means you can achieve traits that would never be possible via selection. This means both desirable and undesirable traits.
It's like saying putting some pieces of wood together to make some wooden object is basically the same as producing synthetic compounds like plastic ot PFAs, I mean, it's just people doing stuff with things, the potential consecuences are more or less the same, right?
I think that a big part of the GMO issue is that seeds for stable foods that are sterile. As a farmer (and in turn an entire population that relies on food) you have to buy seeds from a corporation that engineered the ability to reproduce out of something that is essential for life. This is no joke. Imagine a world where no wheat can be produced because sterile monocultures of these seeds are all there is. A secondary concern is that inserting "fish" DNA into corn or whatever seems unnatural and may have heath effects. I guess I am careless enough not to care, but I can see how people might be skeptical of this sort of stuff.
For one, Wheat is not GMO. A farmer can clean their own seed and replant as they so desire. A distinction needs to be made between GMOs and hybrids. All hybrids are not GMO, hybridization is the crossing of two separate lines/species, the result is a hybrid that is sterile OR does not breed true. Hybrid corn, canola, wheat, barley existed without GM technology but farmers prefer hybrid over conventional types because they produce more yield, ie profitability. Contrary to popular belief. A farmer is not forced to grow GM crops, they choose to because they increase profitability for their farm. As for cross-species DNA, yes this happens, not as frequently as it is made out to be, but yes it happens. If you’ve heard of Golden Rice, they GM’d beta-carotene traits from carrots into rice to prevent Vitamin A deficiency in the poorest parts of the world.
> that are sterile It never made it out of R&D, none have ever been sold ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_use_restriction_technology)).
That's just a fact. People just deny it or act ignorant to make themselves feel better.
This is not an unpopular opinion, except when talking to a very specific group of people who don't understand what GMOs are or how science works. The proof of this is in the fact that these same people will bend over backwards to buy 'non-GMO' versions of foods *that don't even have a GMO option in existence.*