> > Hmmm. Frankly I think the danger of nuclear/biological weapons in 
> > the
> > hands of politicians seem much more dangerous to me.
> 
> All nukes used at once in worst case manner would kill most people on 
> earth - but vvvvv likely not all and vvvv likely would leave 100's of 
> millions alive. A worst case event would require all nuclear powers 
> cooperation and the cost to develop this capability has been and 
> continues to be "large".

I've heard different figures. A nuclear winter could be caused by
a relatively small number of nukes. Yes, it would take a lunatic at
the button to do this. And our current president seems to be too loose
around the edges for me.

BTW: What does "vvvvv" and "vvvv" mean?

> GM ***could*** kill all humans on earth and the cost to do this could 
> be utterlytrivial on a 'cost benefit' basis. Mons[a/t/c/g]n[a/t/c/g]o 
> may yet do it for us for free :-). My daughter could possibly do it 
> for you if you could persuade her to (you couldn't).

Heck. I'm pretty sure that anybody with a good education in genetics
and microbiology could do this now.

> > Yes, there is a chance that GM could cause some major problems. 
> > However,
> > nature has been doing GM for, well, ever since there was nature.

> No.
> No no no.
> No no no no no.
> This, alas, is the lie that 'they' tell over and over and we have all 
> largely accepted it gullibly.

Where is the lie? And repeating "No" several times doesn't help anything.

> Nature has been doing *safe* GM since forever. safe GM consists of 
> burying or destroying the problems and blockading the genetic 'mine 
> tunnel' the problems live in. Darwin award class events are carefully 
> stubbed out and buried in unused backwaters. BIG ring fences are 
> erected around things that need them. if they break out the fences are 
> made bigger for next time. Many really bad 'experiments' lie buried 
> deep withing the wonderful machine.

Any how has nature been doing this? When mankind dwelt in little villages
this may have been the case, but it hasn't been that way for a couple
thousand years.

Nowadays scientists are worrying (and rightly so from what I've read)
about a new flu epidemic. This would be a perfectly naturally produced
virus that could potentially devistate most major nations. For example,
if 20% of the US were dying at once it would overload the medical system.

Most of our major institutions require manpower that we wouldn't have
in this case.

Of course, I'm postulating a near-worst-case scenario here.

And don't forget that nature brought us bubonic plague, ebola, HIV,
and George Bush.

> GM comes along and leaps over the ring fences, and/or drags mareial 
> from its enclosures and stuffs it willy nilly into othe rplaces where 
> it looks like it may do something useful. Sometimes it does. We have 
> NO idea about the majority of what is going on in there. Most of the 

Right now we don't have the information. GM is one way of actually
getting that information.

> time nature has done enough GM already that it handles it all pretty 
> well. Sometimes we get the pea/bean/baaaaad allergy result. Nature 
> says - why goodness me, who could have put that in there - I'm sure I 
> TRIPLE ring fenced that one off about 200,000 years ago after the last 

Hmmm. You're assuming that nature *thinks*?

> disaster. So, I'll have to ... . In the mice/pea/bean case the 
> researchers noticed and shut things down and no harm may have been 
> caused, and the worst case harm may not have been bad.

That is because most corporations and scientists are not as bad as
you characterize them as.

> But imagine eg a really really nasty one that not only causes immune 
> system responses in people but also in many other animals at all 
> levels and then some. Now imagine that the proteins are produced in 
> the crop byproduct and are plowed back into the soil. Inagine it 

And now imagine that *nobody* has done any testing on it...

> What sort of nonsense is this. How bad can a bit of bad protein be 
> after all. How importang could this possibly be. Google anaphylactic 
> shock / and peanut allergy / and ... . Sure smells nice out there 

I do know about these things. Yes, something like you suggest *could*
happen. However, chances are it would happen in a small area first which
would allow us to deal with it before it became something that threatens
the world.

> today Mable, I think I'll .... Splat. // This new cultivar gives more 
> yield than ... / We can now make bread that ... / Dead? What do you 
> mean dead? All of them? Are you mad?!, I ... /

Isn't that being more than a bit alarmist? I think that we have a better
chance of being hit with an asteroid than your scenario.

> Of course, Murphy and nature don't make things simple. It may take a 
> certyain mix of rainfall and temperature profile plus a bit more 
> acidityin the  rain than usual before the ancient doors creak open and 
> the protein monster sallies forth to battle in the cereal packets and 
> bread products of you nation.

Yes. It could happen. And somebody would eat the stuff first and it would
get pulled from the shelves. Yes, many people probably would die before it
was over. But the certain mix would cause the problem in a small area.

> Probable? No. Possible? Of course. When? - ask the mice.

To be honest, we have more than enough mice. That's why we test these sort
of things on them.

Not to mention the fact that mice breed extremely fast so genetic damage
spreads through their population faster than human population.

> > After looking at the numbers it seems that the chance of reward (and 
> > I'm
> > not thinking of finances here) is much greater than the chance of 
> > disaster.
> 
> That's certainly what the numbers 'they' publish say.
> GM is balancing someone's prfits against life on earth, or millions 
> crippled, or 100's of millions damaged, or just a few kids (probably 
> not in your family) dead.

It's also balancing many lives saved against many lives lost.

And if there is any genetic damage to kids in my family (and there seems
to be) it ends with my generation. Not that I'm a kid, but my wife and
I aren't into breeding, and my sister isn't either.

> > Imagine produce that doesn't go bad as fast. People die in the US of
> > bad produce.
> 
> True risk / benefit is
> - not attempted
> - not possible so
> - not attempted

So you're assuming that the benefits are impossible so it should never
be attempted? Otherwise I'm not understanding.

> > Of course, we could do the same thing easier with irradiating the 
> > food
> > products,
> 
> A whole other issue.
> Irradiation doesn't offer a small fraction of the potential benefits 
> of GM.

Actually food irradiation offers a *lot* of benefits with few problems.

> Itdoes have its own risks. and advantages.
> Some products are almost unusable without it (eg certain bug-prone 
> spices which have re probably been illicitly irradiated if you see 
> them for sale )
> 
> >but Americans seem to have a strong irrational tabu against
> > anything nuclear.
> 
> Indeed.
> And some strong rational ones as well :-)

Very few rational ones.

Most of the problems caused by nuclear power in this country is caused
by this irrational tabu. Things like having to guarentee that the waste
would be safe for 100,000 years. Things like having to store the waste
in the open because it was against the rules to store it in a mine because
they could only guarentee saftely for 10,000 years.

> But with GM anything is possible.

And why is *anything* possible?

> Doom doom ... :-)

And when the Balrogs come out to get us you can have the pleasure of
telling me "I told you so".
-- 
D. Jay Newman           ! _Linux Robotics: Building Smarter Robots_
jay@sprucegrove.com     ! To be released soon to unsuspecting bookstores
http://enerd.ws/robots/ ! everywhere.
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