The Umbrella Corporation...

[Nightshade]

...has a real-world counterpart; it's called 'Monsanto.'

People howl about how evil Halliburton is, but this multinational is about as close to true evil as you can possibly get. Genetically engineering seeds to keep them from producing seed-bearing crops? They are called \"Terminator seeds\" in that they produce infertile plants that force farmers to keep buying new seed from the company rather than keeping seed from their food crop.

Food isn't a DVD or CD that needs to be 'copy protected.' Genetically altered life forms can also escape into the wild and contaminate or destroy far beyond the original field. In theory, it could create a worldwide famine at the very worst.

Tin foil hats not required:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto

[Kilarin]

Genetically engineering seeds to keep them from producing seed-bearing crops? They are called "Terminator seeds" in that they produce infertile plants that force farmers to keep buying new seed from the company rather than keeping seed from their food crop.

Doesn't require any genetic engineering to get this result. MOST of the seeds gardeners and farmers purchase now are Hybridized. Hybrids give us incredibly large and healthy crops. But they don't breed true. Save seed from any modern sweet corn and the result will be NOTHING like the crop you grew last year. And no genetic engineering required.

I agree that this is a troublesome issue. It's one of the reasons I shop at http://www.nativeseeds.org. but it's nothing new and genetic engineering is not even close to the major impact.

Genetically altered life forms can also escape into the wild and contaminate or destroy far beyond the original field. In theory, it could create a worldwide famine at the very worst.

Not from THIS issue. By definition, the problem with these seeds is that they don't produce seed bearing crops. Being afraid of them escaping into the wild is like being afraid of seedless grapes escaping into the wild.

I'm not denying that genetic engineering has some frightening possibilities. The biological revolution is going to make the computer revolution look like small potatoes.

BUT, genetic engineering on plants is usually just doing the EXACT same thing that farmers have been doing for thousands of years, just faster and more efficiently. Breeding flowers and plants to get different results is just genetic engineering done slowly. Seedless grapes are a result of breeders taking advantage of a mutation. The mutation happened because of a copying error, or cosmic radiation, or who knows what reason, but the mutation would not have been any different if it had been deliberately genetically engineered.

The first corn plants (American corn, Maize, not wheat), was probably just a kind of grass that produced some rather big seeds. It bears very little resemblance to "corn on the cob". The Native Americans genetically modified it the slow way until they came up with the colorful corn you see used as decoration. Sweet Corn is a mutation of that corn that was further developed by the Native Americans. In the 20th century, further mutations, and massive work on hybridization developed the se and sh2 variations, which is probably the ONLY kind of corn you have ever eaten besides pop corn. It is VERY MUCH genetically modified from the original wild grass that was growing 1500 years ago. Just done the slow and hard way.

If you aren't afraid of seedless grapes or corn on the cob, or really, the VAST majority of food grown in this era, then there is no reason to be panicked by what's been done with Genetically Modified crops so far.

I say so far, because we are only on the very edge of actually designing plants. The differences between plants that were bred and plants that were directly genetically manipulated will continue to grow.

[Grendel]

Old news The interesting stuff is happening here.

[WarAdvocat]

I'm not denying that genetic engineering has some frightening possibilities. The biological revolution is going to make the computer revolution look like small potatoes.

EEEK! Massively parallel DNA-based quantam computational arrays... coming soon to your local bee hive!!

[roid]

ThunderBunny, i too heartily approve of this hippy cause.
But i thought you hated hippies?

Are you going to protest side by side?

[Canuck]

Kilarin;

Hybrids give us incredibly large and healthy crops.

At the sacrifice of taste and quality I might add. I suspect they are engineered to grow as fast and retain as much water as they can so that they can tip the scales with less product. As for healthy crops thank pesticides Whether its sprayed or engineered into the food its causing damage to our DNA. Here is an article that tells the truth about our food today.
Hippie Site

I have tomatoes and eggplants growing in my sitting room year round, and everyone who have tasted the fruit from them, have commented how good they taste and that the texture is much better than from the grocers. If I didn't have boulders the size of Volvos in my yard I'd definitely have a garden.

After researching the differences between Supermarket food and Organically grown food I go out of my way to purchase true organic food.

[Sirius]

Genetic engineering is a misnomer... it's not engineering at all, that would imply you know what you're doing.

[Kilarin]

Hybrids give us incredibly large and healthy crops.

At the sacrifice of taste and quality I might add.

Not necessarily. Your argument is completely valid, but only if you limit it to what you find at the grocery market.

Plants bred for market are bred primarily for durability. They must be able to survive being machine picked, packed into a truck, hauled across the country (or world) to the store, there to sit on the shelf for days while being handled and thumped by multiple customers. With all of that going on, breeding for flavor is a minor issue.

BUT, if you'll look in the home garden market, many (probably most) of the seeds are STILL hybridized, and they ARE bread for producing "tasty" crops.

As an example, look at the Henry Fields corn menu:. Every single kind of corn on this list, including the popcorn, and with the sole exception of the ornamental Rainbow Indian Corn, are all hybrids. You can't save seeds from them because what they produce will bear no resemblance to the parent plant.

BUT, if you compare them on flavor, these hybrids will CERTAINLY beat out the Rainbow Indian Corn. You can still find Golden Bantam Yellow Sweet Corn at a few places. It's a non-hybridized sweet corn. BUT, the primary reason it has lost popularity is that it can't compete with the hybrids for sweetness.

Hybridization can produce incredibly tasty crops, IF that is what you are breeding for. BUT, it comes at a price. The grower no longer has the ability to save seed. AND, if we ever had a serious disaster that damaged our capacity to produce and distribute the hybridized crops, you could NOT rely on small farmers and home gardeners growing produce to help keep the country alive. They won't have maintainable seed.

[Kyouryuu]

People howl about how evil Halliburton is...

And we shouldn't because...?

[Canuck]

Kilarin;

Hybridization can produce incredibly tasty crops, IF that is what you are breeding for. BUT, it comes at a price. The grower no longer has the ability to save seed. AND, if we ever had a serious disaster that damaged our capacity to produce and distribute the hybridized crops, you could NOT rely on small farmers and home gardeners growing produce to help keep the country alive. They won't have maintainable seed.

And this is one of the reasons why I think its not a good thing. Disasters do happen.

[roid]

i thought the seed is just \"crazy seed\", in that you don't know what it's going to produce.

One seed will produce sweet corn, the next seed will produce a Shiny Red Buick. But they still produce something, it's just not as awesome.

[Kilarin]

i thought the seed is just "crazy seed", in that you don't know what it's going to produce.

One seed will produce sweet corn, the next seed will produce a Shiny Red Buick. But they still produce something, it's just not as awesome.

The issue is that what they produce does not have much resemblance to it's parents, and is usually NOT a good crop on the gastronomic scale.