" but the reality would probably be grim and have many terrible and unforeseen (not to mention long lasting) consequences."

I just love articles, like the one cited, written by people that have no clue what they are talking about.  Please remember horizontal DNA transfer between species is nothing new.  Nature has been doing it for a few billion years now.  And horizontal DNA transfer between species is the definition of a GMO organism.  In fact Mother Nature made sure you and everyone you know is a brand new GMO product, generally before you are even born, which had never before been created.  As you get older you accumulate even more genetic material horizontally transferred from other species.  The same is true of every honey bee in your hives and your dog or cat and the food you eat.  The cattle genome contains a total of about 25% of its DNA that was transferred by mom nature directly from a particular snake to cows.  We even know which species of snake it came from these days.  If you choose to not eat GMO products I expect you to never again eat beef or milk, cheese or butter from cows milk.  Of course you will shortly starve to death as all the rest of your food is also GMOs made by nature in a totally uncontrolled fashion.  A few of you will die from this uncontrolled experiment mother nature performed on you.  Most will suffer no measurable harm at all.

The difference between a GMO product made by mom nature and one made by man is simply the man made one can be carefully thought out ahead of time and carefully tested before release.  Thus the man made one is far, far less likely to be of any environmental danger or danger to the organism itself.

Read the footer on this post.  Most of the negative stuff about science in the popular press follows Mencken's saying.

Dick

HL Mencken said: "The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed — and hence clamorous to be led to safety — by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary. "

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