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Strategies & Market Trends : Sharck Soup -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: velociraptor_ who wrote (4320)	11/4/2000 2:11:05 PM
From: Sharck	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 37746

Thanks and I agree Velo. Been involved in a heated debate on the subject with some friends who are trying to make it a political issue in the next Canadian federal election: The GM "debate" will undoubtedly appeal to the nuts 'n' berries set, as it conjures such fabulous images of giant atomic cabbages stomping through the countryside, eating innocent grannies and kicking small dogs. The common assertion that GM is merely selective breeding with a greater degree of accuracy is not entirely correct however. Breeding takes advantage of pre-existing genetic traits; the most daring aspect is taking advantage of random mutations that prove beneficial, such as abnormally high milk production in cows. GM allows for alterations that would not occur with natural mutations, for example bacteria that eat oil slicks. It is highly unlikely, say, that your cow would suddenly become photosynthetic via cross-breeding. So there is indeed some potential for harm through GM foods, but not to the degree that movies starring Vincent Price would lead us to believe. What's lost in the labeling debate are two elements; perspective and logistics. You are far more likely to die from eating a high-fat diet than eating bushels of tomatoes genetically modified to ripen on the vine. Peoples' inherent mistrust of anyone in a labcoat has created an environment where the vague and nebulous term "natural" has come to mean "superior to anything which is not natural". There are still people who believe that naturally produced vitamin C is superior to synthetically produced. The truth is that they are both made of identical elements, arranged in an identical way. It's either a molecule of Vitamin C, or it's not. There are no degrees of "vitamin-C-ness, and both your body and any scientific test would be unable to differentiate. Often the most unappealing of chemically derived substances have the least potential for harm. You know the sugar they put on buns in vending machines? Real sugar would dissolve so they use powdered titanium dioxide. Sounds horrid, but you could eat a pound of it, and by the time it arrived at the sewage treatment plant, it would be completely unaltered, as you would be unaltered by it. On the logistics front, once you lable a food as GM, people will want to know why, how, and the possible sequelae of ingesting it. Soon we would have to include the entire DNA base pair sequence on the back of a package of watercress. What point would it serve? The public has no idea what any of the mysterious sounding ingredients in a bag of potato chips are, and pass judgement on the edibility of chemicals based purely on the number of syllables. Want a cause? Demand labeling of "natural foods" sold at health stores. Natural herbal tea in bulk has enough arsenic to seriously harm some people, but is exempt from labeling of any kind. (Natural source, don'cha know.) Apples? Don't worry about the pesticides, worry about the naturally occurring arsenic in them too. Cyanide? Eat some oranges. There's a lab tech from McGill doing the rubber chicken circuit speaking about food additives, and an hour with him will make you cross the street rather than pass in front of a heath food store. "All is a poison, only the dosage differs"- Pericles Sharck