>> Dr Johnson, who is head of the biotechnology advisory unit and head >> of the >> land management technologies group at English Nature, the >> government nature >> advisers, said: "Unlike the researchers I am not surprised by this. >> If you >> apply herbicide to plants which is lethal, eventually a resistant >> survivor >> will turn up." > That is true, but can't they, like *analyze* the new shrubs to make > sure > they really don't have the new modifications instead of fighting it > out > on paper ? I think that this issue is *rather* important ? No ? Also > this piece of news was picked off Slashdot or such so it is not > exactly > 'unknown' or 'obscure'. Some kind of reaction should become visible > soon > imho. Doom, doom, told you so, doom, ... :-) Not really. Not yet. But just give it time. Nobody who is doing this REALLY cares. Not really. Not enough. Or we'd be doing it in an internationally sponsored deeeeeep containment facility far below the surface of a really large desert with a 50 year + moratorium. ((Reminds me of a certain movie :-) ). It's always been 103.5% certain that GM will cause transfer of genetic materials into places we have no inkling of. We provide Nature the unnatural enabling that 'Nature' in it's infinite 'wisdom' has long ago sealed off its own access to and Nature will do the rest. We have absolutely no idea of whether the end result in any given case will be benign or will kill, literally, millions. Or maybe just cause irrevocable non-lethal damage to millions. or 100's of millions. We have SOME idea of the probabilities based on the very few we've managed to kill so far and the relative rarity of the really neat results to date, but what can happen will happen, and what can't happen will happen as well. That worse disasters than are available by any other man made means stand at GM's beck and call is obvious (far worse than all out nuclear war) - but all too many people have the doubting Thomas gene and need to see "real evidence" to be convinced. The *fact* that there are really really really nasty possible consequences is competently demonstrated by eg the entirely accidental mouse / interleukin virus discovery in Australia a few years ago now. In that case the disease was extremely lethal but very non infectious. (Googling on mouse interleukin virus Australia will get you going OK on this one). It's only a matter of time before something highly infectious, highly lethal and very hard to combat turns up. How much time is the only question. Could be centuries. Or could be too late already. Something with the incubation period and difficulty of prevention of HIV, infectiousness of the common cold and efficacy when triggered of Ebola should be about right. And such is entirely conceivable. By the time the first cases appeared everyone on earth would have had it for a decade or so. How many people would survive if everyone on earth had Ebola? There is about zero doubt that all the major germ warfare people and many minor ones will have picked up on the Australian mouse/interleukin discovery and will have been pressing ahead ever since and that by now they will have it down to a fine art. If one fine morning all the worlds eg Ch... er um Celts die, or all but the worlds Celts, nobody should be surprised (and most would then be unable to be). The genetic boundaries may be a bit rough but scatter-gun genetic targeting is liable to be not at all hard and a few hundred million either way is small beer. Anyone: By all means point out why you consider that any or all of the above is rubbish :-). No disrespect intended - but if the late Peter Crowcroft were alive he would rubbish me big-time over this offlist (and possibly on). I never understood the basis of his objections and he would never explain them to me. Anyone else is really most welcome to explain why I'm wrong. I'd be happy to be :-(. Russell McMahon -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist