Myths of our time: genetically modified organisms. Is the devil so terrible?
A person has long been interested in the world around him and find explanations for the surrounding things and events. Actually, without this man would not have become a man. On the basis of beliefs, myths, religion developed first, and then modern science, which already very successfully explains the world from very small to impressive scales. But there were always people who opposed progress and spread well-established myths, saying that they answered all the questions and there was no need to move on. Thunder roars - this Perun, the god of thunder, is angry; someone is sick - this is God punishing him, here's an explanation for you, leave me alone, do not ask questions , but rather pray .
Modern myths are deeper and usually associated with science. The reasons are clear - science has developed (especially recently) to such an extent that it often takes a huge amount of knowledge to simply understand what is at stake. Many people of this volume do not have or are irretrievably lost, which reduces their resistance to various myths of our time. The myth about the harmfulness of food additives Exxx; the myth about the usefulness of natural and the harmfulness of "chemistry"; a myth about killer doctors who poison people with vaccines; The myth about so terrible GMOs that the stickers with the words "non-GMO" should be glued even on napkins and on packs with salt.
What is GMO? What are they needed for? How great is the danger and benefit of using them? Is there evidence of the safety of these organisms?
In the picture - DNA processed by DNA ligase (picture from Wikipedia)
DNA is a colossal molecule; if its spiral is simply unfolded, this line will be several centimeters long. DNA contains a sequence of genes (the genome), which, together with the environmental conditions (growth conditions), determine the phenotype - the appearance of the organism (and also the internal one), its characteristics, and the characteristics of internal processes. Each gene encodes the production of a protein or functional RNA, which subsequently participate in the biochemical processes of the body.
There are a lot of different proteins with different purposes, for example, in the human body there is a hemoglobin protein, which is used by the body to provide internal organs with oxygen, there is insulin, which regulates the level of glucose in the blood, and many others.
Insulin. For its production in the body is responsible for one of the genes of the 11th chromosome.
It is obvious that different people have different DNA, because people do not resemble each other (and not people, too - virtually every organism, with the exception of the simplest, has its own unique DNA). DNA is constantly changing - under the influence of external factors (radiation, ultraviolet radiation and other things) mutations arise in DNA - changes in genes, "turning off / on" genes and other transformations. According to the theory of evolution, the most successful mutations are fixed, individuals with unsuccessful mutations are eliminated. DNA mutations occur more often than usual. Every second, the human body is pierced by hundreds of high-energy cosmic particles, naturally, many of these particles get into DNA and cause changes in it. Many of these changes are corrected by the body itself (see the picture above with the DNA ligase, which is exactly involved in DNA repair), but some are stable and lead to various mutations. Mutations can be harmful (for example, the internal control mechanism of reproduction “breaks” in the cell and a cancer cell is obtained), they can be neutral and useful - useful ones are fixed in the process of evolution. Note that according to the theory of evolution, positive mutations are fixed, that is, those that allow the species to survive in current conditions. Man fixes the change of plants (and animals), which is beneficial to him, and not to the environment - more juicy and large apples, more milk cows, and so on. For this there is a selection and genetic modification.
In fact, the traditional goal of selection is the same - a change in the genotype of a certain species (mostly plants) in order to achieve the results that a person needs. Breeding on plants is also simple because plants are very prone to changing the genotype depending on external conditions - this is one of the methods of protection from animals and other pests that has developed in the process of evolution. We mention some methods of selection:
Thus, traditional selection widely uses such methods as x-ray irradiation, radiation irradiation, and the use of toxic substances. It is obvious that at the same time a substantial part of the genocode changes, and no one controls what exactly has changed in the code and what consequences these changes can cause.
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The key word here is an artificial change. At the same time, different methods of genetic engineering are used, for example, special viruses are mainly used now - after all, viruses are very well able to penetrate a cell and change its gene code to their own. A small modification of the virus - and it already changes the code not with its own, but with the one we need.
There are other methods of modification, separately I will only mention the TALEN method ( Transcription activator-like effector nuclease ), which allows you to create unidentifiable GMOs - that is, such genetically modified organisms in which the fact of modification cannot be proved by any analysis (in the “older” methods of modification there is the possibility of proof for certain Border sequences. It is expensive and difficult, but possible. For more, see the article “Not caught - not GMO” ).
In general, in fact, the only difference between traditional breeding and genetic modification is that in the gene modification we know what we are changing, we know what we want to receive and purposefully. In the traditional way, we don’t know , we just see if it’s necessary or not.
Fears against GMOs are usually associated with GMOs used in food. But their area of ​​use is not limited to this. With the help of gene modification, for example, bred cats that glow in the dark , cats that do not cause allergies, bacteria that produce certain drugs, and many other useful things .
By the way, the joke about the tomato with the flounder genome is very old and is just a joke. The most famous genetically modified tomato is the Flavr Savr variety, which was modified by trying to get rid of the “tastelessness” of store tomatoes — it simply “turned off” the gene responsible for scrapping the cell walls when the tomato ripened (that is, no new genes were added, just made inoperative one of the existing ones responsible for pectin production). Initially, the line was quite popular, but because of the history of the Pushtai experiments (see below) and the general hysteria about GMOs that started, the branch was closed, more GMO tomatoes never entered the market.
Read more - article on elements.ru - "Why tomatoes became tasteless . " And another article in LJ .
The problem is that the poor "keeping quality" of a tomato is a consequence of its taste - the main components of the tomato's taste (glutamate and others) with a high content (in tasty ripe tomatoes) lead to a "breakdown" of the cell walls due to the high content of pectin, and the tomato itself it becomes very vulnerable - the usual garden tomato is very difficult to bring to the store shelves, it is soft, crumpled and deteriorates. Therefore, the selection brought out a tomato in which such scrapping does not occur, the tomato itself is stronger, but the taste eventually suffered, because with the breakdown of pectin production during traditional breeding, the production of glutamate and other tasty foods broke.
This argument is also surprising to hear from people whose potatoes are one of the staple foods. But even some 200 years ago, an attempt to force the peasants to grow potatoes caused rejection up to the "potato riots". Place quote :
And this is a potato, one of the staple foods. In the topic we can mention the very beloved by many tangerines, oranges and other exotic fruits, which in large quantities could not be here just a hundred years ago.
Lovers of "natural" can ask simple questions - why did nature create a bunch of poisonous berries, plants and animals that a person cannot eat? The “time-tested” argument also does not pass - there is an example of a plant tested for a long time and used for a long time, which causes cancer (I emphasize, it does not serve as a stimulating factor, not a concomitant symptom, but directly causes cancer of the urinary tract).
Is there a danger of GMO and is it proven? Of course, there is - for example, with the help of GMOs it is quite possible to derive, for example, tomatoes with cyanide and they will be deadly. And here the reader is given the next exercise in logic - does this mean that all GMOs are a priori dangerous and their production and research should be prohibited?
Moreover, there are no absolutely safe products. Even the banal dihydrogen monoxide is deadly poisonous in a single application in volumes from 10 liters. Therefore, the question should be put like this - whether commercial GMO products are more dangerous than traditional non-GMO products. Experimental results show that no, no more dangerous. And even if we assume a theoretical danger, then the real positive effects of using GMOs far exceed the hypothetical harm from it.
And again it is worth recalling that the products of traditional breeding are checked on a voluntary basis. That is, as a rule, are not checked by anyone.
GMO has more than 20 years of research. And there is no one built according to the rules of scientific research, which would show the danger of such organisms precisely because of the use of gene modification.
Who are the Greenpeace? Theoretically, fighters for the environment, with the dominance of corporations that poison the planet and so on. Practically, this is a long time ago organization that made a name for itself on the mythical “nature protection” and earned money with environmental racketeering. I recently stumbled upon an emotional but curious Greenpeace article, the facts in which speak for themselves .
But maybe Greenpeace gives reasonable arguments against GMOs? Honored We see the same populist slogans about “non-exploration”, as well as a repetition of the old joke about tomatoes with the flounder gene. (An organization struggling against GMOs and at the same time not distinguishing a gene from a genome is quite significant, I think. I emphasize, this is the official site). But even they confirm that GMOs have been studied for over 20 years.
First came the first argument - that GMO plants can mutually fertilize with wild plants and go into the wild. In the most "advanced" version - that GMO-plants grow their own legs and leave themselves. We will not seriously consider the latter, but to consider the very possibility of “going into the wild”, several conditions must be fulfilled: the presence of closely related plants that are capable of inter-pollination with GM plants, the fact of such pollination, and most importantly, that the resulting hybrid will actually survive in the wild (that is, it will have properties that allow it to actively deal with weeds and other plants that already occupy uncultivated land). Since neither the goal of selection nor the goal of the GM mod is almost never to produce a plant,able to survive in the wild - then this danger should be recognized seriously exaggerated.
However, some seed manufacturers make sterile (mainly due to the charges of the previous paragraph). This gave rise to speculations like "GMO producers will plant farmers for their product and force it to buy every year." Why the farmers will lose their memory and they will forget how to grow non-GMO plants and why farmers in this case will not be allowed to buy the usual selection (non-GMO) material - usually not specified.
And so, farmers, as a rule, alreadybuy seed every year. The fact is that the cultivation of seed material and the cultivation of the product itself, which then goes on sale (for bread, for livestock feed, ...) are different activities and it is more convenient for farmers to buy ready-made seed material than to allocate land for growing seed material carefully control its growth, provide storage of seed material and so on.
In addition, farmers buy seeds regularly on a regular basis also due to the fact that hybrid (mutant) versions of the plants that they grow, when seed-crossed with ordinary (perepylivaniya) lose their hybrid properties in the second or third generation (degenerate) - see The law of splitting according to Mendel. In order not to lose the properties of hybrids, they should be crossed exclusively among themselves, that is, to allocate special fields for this, to monitor the sterility of these fields from non-hybrid options - in general, all these farmers, as a rule, do not really want to do, for this there are some special seed producers.
Yes, the degree of hysteria has reached such heights that the government, for example, of Ukraine, issued a decree on mandatory notification of the buyer, whether or not the GMO contains certain products, which, according to the letter of the law, leads to such paradoxes as the need for “non-GMO” labeling even in salt , water and napkins.
Common sense still prevailed in Ukraine and Russia, and such labeling is canceled, and in return they introduce mandatory labeling, if the product contains more than 0.9% GMO .
Monsanto (a very large producer of GM-modified plant seeds, and concurrently the largest producer of the popular Roundup herbicide, the commercial name of glyphosate) is regularly accused of its monopoly position in the field of GMOs. Immediately deal with monopoly. Thanks again to the general hysteria about GMOs, the procedure for admitting GMO products to the markets has become such that it is commercially beneficial to deal with only large manufacturers. Small biolabs simply will not pull such expenses. Nevertheless, Monsanto is not the onlymanufacturer of GM seeds, which is easy to see if you look at the above database.
The source of the myth comes from the actual ignorance of the procedure for applying fertilizers. For some reason, it is argued that watering plants that are resistant to herbicide, should be 10 times more. It is also argued that glyphosate can provoke cancer. The latter is true. Certain interrelations were found that, in principle, it is not particularly surprising for a herbicide - a substance designed to destroy living organisms (glyphosate is able to destroy plants and bacteria, but has virtually no effect on people and animals, because they lack the enzymes that block this substance).
Now the facts:
The most reasonable argument considered. Indeed, if modified soy bean produces peanut-containing protein, negative effects may occur in people who are allergic to peanuts.
But for GM, it is usually known exactly what has changed and which new protein will be produced, that is, cases of allergenicity can be checked already at the stage of preliminary studies. And in this case, not marking “contains GMOs” is needed, but marking what proteins exactly this GMO contains (the words “can contain peanuts” seen on chocolate? That's something in this style), which, in fact, no one objects. And if a person voluntarily eats products on which it is written that this particular product can cause allergies for a given person, then this is not at all GMO's fault.
Almost all papayas now grown in the world are GM varieties. "Natural" papaya was destroyed by the pest, to which GM papaya is stable. So if you do not want to eat GM organisms - never buy papaya.
Thanks to Greenpeace and other environmentalists, “golden rice” with a high content of vitamin A has just entered the fields of China. It took an additional 12 years of research to make these ecologists calm down. It is estimated that during this time in China some 8 million children died or became seriously ill from lack of vitamin A .
And an apology to all who read. The picture to attract attention at the beginning of the post has nothing to do with GMOs. Moreover, a frog with extra legs is not a product of human activity at all.
All because of only a small worm-parasite . It was he who, falling into a frog, makes it grow its extra legs. The goal is to get into the stomach to certain birds, where this parasite lives comfortably on. The modified frog is not only similar to a grasshopper (more attractive for birds), but less mobile, which makes it easy prey.
Here is another curious example of the parasite:
Ants parasite mushroom that can seize control of the ant's central nervous system and completely subjugate it to itself. The goal is the same - to get the optimal conditions for your life and the ability to leave offspring.
These facts are presented to demonstrate that nature itself is extremely diverse and our rather absurd, small, careful attempts to edit the genome are a trifle compared to what nature can already show. If a primitive fungus can control the nervous system of a more complex organism, and a primitive parasite - force the frog to change its morphology, then why should a person not use what even simple atomic particles have long been able to do?
Recommended for study:
Modern myths are deeper and usually associated with science. The reasons are clear - science has developed (especially recently) to such an extent that it often takes a huge amount of knowledge to simply understand what is at stake. Many people of this volume do not have or are irretrievably lost, which reduces their resistance to various myths of our time. The myth about the harmfulness of food additives Exxx; the myth about the usefulness of natural and the harmfulness of "chemistry"; a myth about killer doctors who poison people with vaccines; The myth about so terrible GMOs that the stickers with the words "non-GMO" should be glued even on napkins and on packs with salt.
What is GMO? What are they needed for? How great is the danger and benefit of using them? Is there evidence of the safety of these organisms?
Disclaimer: the author of the article is not related to biology - he is neither a biologist, nor a biochemist, nor a geneticist and does not have at least some related profession. This article is just an attempt to deal with a heap of information and reality about one of the threats of the modern world. So if you are closer to biology and genetics, I warn you in advance, you may suffer while reading an article, for example, burst out laughing. In fact, this article is a compilation of articles on the topic of GMOs (links are given in the text).
What is the gene and genotype
From the very beginning we will determine what the discussion will be about. For starters, what is a gene? As is known, the carrier of hereditary information (genome) is DNA - a very long molecule that looks like a double helix, which is contained in every cell of the body and stores full information about the body. In rare cases (in viruses) the carrier of hereditary information is RNA.In the picture - DNA processed by DNA ligase (picture from Wikipedia)
DNA is a colossal molecule; if its spiral is simply unfolded, this line will be several centimeters long. DNA contains a sequence of genes (the genome), which, together with the environmental conditions (growth conditions), determine the phenotype - the appearance of the organism (and also the internal one), its characteristics, and the characteristics of internal processes. Each gene encodes the production of a protein or functional RNA, which subsequently participate in the biochemical processes of the body.
There are a lot of different proteins with different purposes, for example, in the human body there is a hemoglobin protein, which is used by the body to provide internal organs with oxygen, there is insulin, which regulates the level of glucose in the blood, and many others.
Insulin. For its production in the body is responsible for one of the genes of the 11th chromosome.
It is obvious that different people have different DNA, because people do not resemble each other (and not people, too - virtually every organism, with the exception of the simplest, has its own unique DNA). DNA is constantly changing - under the influence of external factors (radiation, ultraviolet radiation and other things) mutations arise in DNA - changes in genes, "turning off / on" genes and other transformations. According to the theory of evolution, the most successful mutations are fixed, individuals with unsuccessful mutations are eliminated. DNA mutations occur more often than usual. Every second, the human body is pierced by hundreds of high-energy cosmic particles, naturally, many of these particles get into DNA and cause changes in it. Many of these changes are corrected by the body itself (see the picture above with the DNA ligase, which is exactly involved in DNA repair), but some are stable and lead to various mutations. Mutations can be harmful (for example, the internal control mechanism of reproduction “breaks” in the cell and a cancer cell is obtained), they can be neutral and useful - useful ones are fixed in the process of evolution. Note that according to the theory of evolution, positive mutations are fixed, that is, those that allow the species to survive in current conditions. Man fixes the change of plants (and animals), which is beneficial to him, and not to the environment - more juicy and large apples, more milk cows, and so on. For this there is a selection and genetic modification.
Traditional selection
Since GMOs are often compared precisely with traditional selection (by the way, it often seems that the opponents of GMOs do not know anything about its methods), it is necessary to mention the methods of traditional selection.In fact, the traditional goal of selection is the same - a change in the genotype of a certain species (mostly plants) in order to achieve the results that a person needs. Breeding on plants is also simple because plants are very prone to changing the genotype depending on external conditions - this is one of the methods of protection from animals and other pests that has developed in the process of evolution. We mention some methods of selection:
- Selection. The oldest and easiest method of selection. We sow vegetables / fruits, collect, leave only those that we need (for example, with the largest fruits), sow again, grow again and select, and so on. So, for example, Antonovka. He is obviously the slowest method of selection.
- Polyploidy. Duplication of chromosomes in a plant, which leads to an increase in the size of cells and the whole plant. Quote from here:
Currently, methods of artificially producing polyploids are used, affecting plants with various mutagens (mainly colchicine), which destroy the cell spindle. Thus, from diploid (2n) it is possible to obtain tetraploid (4n) forms.
Colchicine is a toxic substance. He was planned to fight against cancer due to high toxicity towards cancer cells, but was banned when he was found to be toxic for normal cells too. - Mutagenesis. Spontaneous or induced production of mutants (genocode change). Again give way to quotes:
http://sbio.info/page.php?id=40 :X-ray-induced mutants have been isolated from many grains (barley, wheat, rye, etc.). They are distinguished not only by increased yield, but also by a shortened shoot. These plants are resistant to lodging and have significant advantages when machine cleaning.
http://vodospad.kiev.ua/books/book18/dubinin_16.htmlCurrently, on the basis of the enormous development of nuclear physics, which has given new, affordable sources of radiation in the form of gamma rays from Co60, neutrons in nuclear reactors, etc., the powerful influence of radiation is used for practical purposes in the selection of plants and microorganisms. Creating new methods of radiation selection was associated with the development of a number of scientific positions in the field of genetics, and primarily with the development of the question of the nature of the material foundations of heredity, the knowledge of which made it possible to reveal the physical and chemical nature of tviya radiation on hereditary structures in the cell.
...
When the initial strain of penicillus was introduced into industrial use (strain 1951B25), its activity was only about 50 units. The sale value of penicillin at that time was enormous. For ten years of work by methods of radiation selection, by 1960, strains with an activity of up to 5000 units were obtained. At the same time, strains that did not emit a golden-yellow pigment were obtained, which greatly facilitated the chemical purification of penicillin. As a result, penicillin has become a cheap, widely available remedy. The same thing happened with streptomycin. The activity of the original strains was about 200 units, now radiation strains emit 2000 or more units.
Thus, traditional selection widely uses such methods as x-ray irradiation, radiation irradiation, and the use of toxic substances. It is obvious that at the same time a substantial part of the genocode changes, and no one controls what exactly has changed in the code and what consequences these changes can cause.
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Genetic modification
We turn to the topic of our story. Genetically modified organisms according to the modern classification are organisms (bacteria, plants, animals), in the genetic code of which artificially made certain changes - for example, additional genes, changes in the activity of already existing genes and the like.The key word here is an artificial change. At the same time, different methods of genetic engineering are used, for example, special viruses are mainly used now - after all, viruses are very well able to penetrate a cell and change its gene code to their own. A small modification of the virus - and it already changes the code not with its own, but with the one we need.
There are other methods of modification, separately I will only mention the TALEN method ( Transcription activator-like effector nuclease ), which allows you to create unidentifiable GMOs - that is, such genetically modified organisms in which the fact of modification cannot be proved by any analysis (in the “older” methods of modification there is the possibility of proof for certain Border sequences. It is expensive and difficult, but possible. For more, see the article “Not caught - not GMO” ).
In general, in fact, the only difference between traditional breeding and genetic modification is that in the gene modification we know what we are changing, we know what we want to receive and purposefully. In the traditional way, we don’t know , we just see if it’s necessary or not.
Arguments for
Pros are easy to find from manufacturers of genetically modified organisms, as well as browse the database of genetic modifications . These are increased yields and the presence of certain substances (for example, “golden rice” - rice with a high content of vitamin A, more details a little further), resistance to herbicides that allow changing herbicide spraying mechanisms of crops, the production of certain toxins against pests (for example, potatoes with to the Colorado potato beetle), which reduces the use of the same pesticides, and so on.Fears against GMOs are usually associated with GMOs used in food. But their area of ​​use is not limited to this. With the help of gene modification, for example, bred cats that glow in the dark , cats that do not cause allergies, bacteria that produce certain drugs, and many other useful things .
Arguments against
Let us examine the arguments "against" that are used by opponents of GMOs. Arguments are given in decreasing order of delusion. Below are comments about.Flounder genes will be added to tomatoes, and the person will eat it and his gills will grow
For the average man in the street, it may not be necessary to know that a gene and a genotype are two different things. And that there is no gene for a tomato or a gene for flounder. And that the modification does not change the genotype, but individual genes, and not artificial, but quite ordinary ordinary genes (they may be from plants or animals, but there may be simply “included” genes of the plant itself). But that is why the same genes, eaten separately in the form of ordinary flounder and ordinary tomato, do not lead to the growth of the gills, and when combined into one organism they lead - a mystery to me personally.By the way, the joke about the tomato with the flounder genome is very old and is just a joke. The most famous genetically modified tomato is the Flavr Savr variety, which was modified by trying to get rid of the “tastelessness” of store tomatoes — it simply “turned off” the gene responsible for scrapping the cell walls when the tomato ripened (that is, no new genes were added, just made inoperative one of the existing ones responsible for pectin production). Initially, the line was quite popular, but because of the history of the Pushtai experiments (see below) and the general hysteria about GMOs that started, the branch was closed, more GMO tomatoes never entered the market.
And how to know what they changed there?
Many people are not aware that all GMOs are subject to mandatory registration, and there is an open database of all currently existing GMO organisms: http://www.isaaa.org/gmapprovaldatabase/default.asp . At a minimum, the description of the change is indicated. In addition, again it is worth comparing with the traditional selection, where it is not known exactly which parts have changed in the genome.The spread of GMOs has led to the fact that even tomatoes in supermarkets are tasteless
Usually, it is in this context that tomatoes are remembered. It should still be noted that store tomatoes really are not as tasty as they were personally grown. But these tomatoes have nothing to do with GMOs, this is a product of ordinary breeding, which they actually asked to make a tomato, in which a) all the fruits ripen at the same time; b) all the fruits of which can be delivered to the store in a presentation.Read more - article on elements.ru - "Why tomatoes became tasteless . " And another article in LJ .
The problem is that the poor "keeping quality" of a tomato is a consequence of its taste - the main components of the tomato's taste (glutamate and others) with a high content (in tasty ripe tomatoes) lead to a "breakdown" of the cell walls due to the high content of pectin, and the tomato itself it becomes very vulnerable - the usual garden tomato is very difficult to bring to the store shelves, it is soft, crumpled and deteriorates. Therefore, the selection brought out a tomato in which such scrapping does not occur, the tomato itself is stronger, but the taste eventually suffered, because with the breakdown of pectin production during traditional breeding, the production of glutamate and other tasty foods broke.
It is necessary to eat only natural, proven food for centuries.
Here are two very common myths:- Irrational belief in "natural" and the fact that it is necessarily better than "artificial." It is based on the ridiculous belief that nature has created apples, bananas, corn, soybeans, and so on, exclusively for human consumption and contains a perfectly balanced set of vitamins, proteins, fats and everything else for humans.
- The conviction that all non-GMO products sold in the markets and in the stores are unchanged for centuries, varieties that people eat and grow for a very long time.
This argument is also surprising to hear from people whose potatoes are one of the staple foods. But even some 200 years ago, an attempt to force the peasants to grow potatoes caused rejection up to the "potato riots". Place quote :
Under Catherine II, the “earthen pear”, “tartufel” began to be introduced in Russia as a means of fighting hunger. On February 8, 1765, by a decree of the empress, all the governors pledged themselves to take care of the breeding of the product. But the village authorities were formally and quietly sabotaging the case. In the formal replies to Petersburg it was reported: “There were no certain apples in the world”, “by the Divine dispensation there was not a single apple harvest”, “the apple did not show an apple to the lay people”, “not only the stock, but it didn’t have planted ".or from here :
The decree on sowing potatoes, which had no compulsory character, was made as early as 1837-1838 and did not cause any explanations to the people. Subsequently, when the excitement had already broken out, the people seized on him too, looking for evidence of his conviction in selling the peasants to a certain master. The rewards promised for the sowing of potatoes were incomprehensible to the peasants, and they tried to find some special, secret meaning in the actions of the authorities. Being provided in bread, they saw in a potato the same vegetable that they did not need, just like any other. These rewards could be important in the province of non-fruit farmers, in which potatoes could replace the lack of bread.That is, a “time-tested” potato, in general, does not have even a couple of centuries of use, and modern varieties even dozens of years (for example, the popular variety Nevsky was entered into the register of Ukraine only in 1984 ).
And this is a potato, one of the staple foods. In the topic we can mention the very beloved by many tangerines, oranges and other exotic fruits, which in large quantities could not be here just a hundred years ago.
Lovers of "natural" can ask simple questions - why did nature create a bunch of poisonous berries, plants and animals that a person cannot eat? The “time-tested” argument also does not pass - there is an example of a plant tested for a long time and used for a long time, which causes cancer (I emphasize, it does not serve as a stimulating factor, not a concomitant symptom, but directly causes cancer of the urinary tract).
GMOs are under-researched and there is no research proving their complete safety.
Readers who are familiar with the formal logic and techniques for conducting discussions should instantly see the ridiculous reception in the phrase “complete safety is not proved”. For those who do not understand - google "Russell's teapot." If briefly - it is formally impossible to prove the complete safety of something, for the simple reason that it is fundamentally impossible to prove the absence of something.Is there a danger of GMO and is it proven? Of course, there is - for example, with the help of GMOs it is quite possible to derive, for example, tomatoes with cyanide and they will be deadly. And here the reader is given the next exercise in logic - does this mean that all GMOs are a priori dangerous and their production and research should be prohibited?
Moreover, there are no absolutely safe products. Even the banal dihydrogen monoxide is deadly poisonous in a single application in volumes from 10 liters. Therefore, the question should be put like this - whether commercial GMO products are more dangerous than traditional non-GMO products. Experimental results show that no, no more dangerous. And even if we assume a theoretical danger, then the real positive effects of using GMOs far exceed the hypothetical harm from it.
And again it is worth recalling that the products of traditional breeding are checked on a voluntary basis. That is, as a rule, are not checked by anyone.
Scientific studies confirm the harmfulness of GMOs
Often mentioned in the dispute. That GMOs cause cancer; that GMO leads to third-generation infertility; that GMOs cause stomach problems. The common feature of these studies is the irreproducibility of the results. Consider some studies:- Pushtai Experience
Now it is hard to believe, but once the phrase “genetically modified” did not scare anyone and even served as a marketing advantage.
But in 1998, a study by Arpad Pusztai appeared, which showed that GM plants can be dangerous and cause various negative effects. Briefly about this study - Pushtai took a set of rats and fed them with three different varieties: ordinary potatoes, ordinary potatoes with the addition of lectin, transgenic potatoes with a high content of lectin. Lectin is not the most useful component (it has toxic properties), so it is not surprising that rats fed potatoes with a high content of lectin felt much worse than rats fed regular potatoes. Pushtai connected the fact of the diseases of rats with the GM-modification - and the world went a wave of indignation about "scientists who themselves do not know what they are doing." If we take pure statistical data according to the article, it turns out that there is no connection between the fact of plant genetic modification and diseases. Details on experiments Pushtai for those interested here and here . - Experiments Ermakova
Yermakova is a well-known freak; according to the results of her experiments, she concluded that eating GM glyphosate-resistant cereals (Roundup) causes infertility and other negative effects in laboratory rats. The methodology of experiments put by many scientists into question, the results are not reproduced. Analysis on Wikipedia. - The experiments of Seralini
Most recent experiments, according to the results of which a wave of messages like “GMOs cause cancer” has swept through all the world's media. Séralini became famous overnight. By the way, simultaneously with the release of the devastating article, a book about the dangers of GMOs went on sale. Briefly about the experiment itself. Séralini took a certain line of laboratory rats and fed them with ordinary and transgenic plants. Separately, it should be noted the selected line Sprague Dawley - this line was derived for the study of cancer tumors, more than 70% of individuals of this line suffer from cancer during the first two years of life . Rats were divided into several groups of 10 individuals, some of the groups were fed with ordinary plants, some transgenic. Of some groups of those who were fed GMO plants, it was concluded that there was an increased likelihood of cancer. For those who understand statistics, such a conclusion looks ridiculous. As a result, the same thing, according to statistical calculations, no relationship between GM plants and the presence of cancerous tumors is again observed.
GMO has more than 20 years of research. And there is no one built according to the rules of scientific research, which would show the danger of such organisms precisely because of the use of gene modification.
Greenpeace vs GMO
Yes, the popular "public" organization Greenpeace is an ardent opponent of GMOs and strongly protests against its use and research. It comes to the point that the most ardent activists destroy the experimental crops of GM wheat - the results of five years of work of scientists.Who are the Greenpeace? Theoretically, fighters for the environment, with the dominance of corporations that poison the planet and so on. Practically, this is a long time ago organization that made a name for itself on the mythical “nature protection” and earned money with environmental racketeering. I recently stumbled upon an emotional but curious Greenpeace article, the facts in which speak for themselves .
But maybe Greenpeace gives reasonable arguments against GMOs? Honored We see the same populist slogans about “non-exploration”, as well as a repetition of the old joke about tomatoes with the flounder gene. (An organization struggling against GMOs and at the same time not distinguishing a gene from a genome is quite significant, I think. I emphasize, this is the official site). But even they confirm that GMOs have been studied for over 20 years.
GMO plant can interbreed with the wild and go into the wild
GMO seeds are specifically made fruitless so that farmers have to buy them every year.
Both myths are brought together to demonstrate what is happening in the minds of individual people. Yes, many GMO opponents use both of these arguments at the same time.First came the first argument - that GMO plants can mutually fertilize with wild plants and go into the wild. In the most "advanced" version - that GMO-plants grow their own legs and leave themselves. We will not seriously consider the latter, but to consider the very possibility of “going into the wild”, several conditions must be fulfilled: the presence of closely related plants that are capable of inter-pollination with GM plants, the fact of such pollination, and most importantly, that the resulting hybrid will actually survive in the wild (that is, it will have properties that allow it to actively deal with weeds and other plants that already occupy uncultivated land). Since neither the goal of selection nor the goal of the GM mod is almost never to produce a plant,able to survive in the wild - then this danger should be recognized seriously exaggerated.
However, some seed manufacturers make sterile (mainly due to the charges of the previous paragraph). This gave rise to speculations like "GMO producers will plant farmers for their product and force it to buy every year." Why the farmers will lose their memory and they will forget how to grow non-GMO plants and why farmers in this case will not be allowed to buy the usual selection (non-GMO) material - usually not specified.
And so, farmers, as a rule, alreadybuy seed every year. The fact is that the cultivation of seed material and the cultivation of the product itself, which then goes on sale (for bread, for livestock feed, ...) are different activities and it is more convenient for farmers to buy ready-made seed material than to allocate land for growing seed material carefully control its growth, provide storage of seed material and so on.
In addition, farmers buy seeds regularly on a regular basis also due to the fact that hybrid (mutant) versions of the plants that they grow, when seed-crossed with ordinary (perepylivaniya) lose their hybrid properties in the second or third generation (degenerate) - see The law of splitting according to Mendel. In order not to lose the properties of hybrids, they should be crossed exclusively among themselves, that is, to allocate special fields for this, to monitor the sterility of these fields from non-hybrid options - in general, all these farmers, as a rule, do not really want to do, for this there are some special seed producers.
The government would not ban GMOs if it were harmless
This argument is based on a strange assurance that the government’s initial goal is to benefit from its service to society. In most cases (especially in our countries, in this context, I mean Russia and Ukraine), the main goal of the government is to keep its place, if necessary - at any price. If the majority of the population will not love, for example, planes - be sure, the government will also ban them.Yes, the degree of hysteria has reached such heights that the government, for example, of Ukraine, issued a decree on mandatory notification of the buyer, whether or not the GMO contains certain products, which, according to the letter of the law, leads to such paradoxes as the need for “non-GMO” labeling even in salt , water and napkins.
Common sense still prevailed in Ukraine and Russia, and such labeling is canceled, and in return they introduce mandatory labeling, if the product contains more than 0.9% GMO .
In India, there is a series of farmers suicides due to GMOs
The myth claims that due to the large spread of GMOs in India, there is a series of suicides of farmers who grew them. In fact, there is no direct link between GMOs and suicides of Indian farmers. Details here .Monopolist Monsanto poison people
- . . , . , , . .And in general, Monsanto is a large monopolist, who has decided to destroy all living and capitalistic organizations that will stop at nothing .
Monsanto (a very large producer of GM-modified plant seeds, and concurrently the largest producer of the popular Roundup herbicide, the commercial name of glyphosate) is regularly accused of its monopoly position in the field of GMOs. Immediately deal with monopoly. Thanks again to the general hysteria about GMOs, the procedure for admitting GMO products to the markets has become such that it is commercially beneficial to deal with only large manufacturers. Small biolabs simply will not pull such expenses. Nevertheless, Monsanto is not the onlymanufacturer of GM seeds, which is easy to see if you look at the above database.
The source of the myth comes from the actual ignorance of the procedure for applying fertilizers. For some reason, it is argued that watering plants that are resistant to herbicide, should be 10 times more. It is also argued that glyphosate can provoke cancer. The latter is true. Certain interrelations were found that, in principle, it is not particularly surprising for a herbicide - a substance designed to destroy living organisms (glyphosate is able to destroy plants and bacteria, but has virtually no effect on people and animals, because they lack the enzymes that block this substance).
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The most reasonable argument considered. Indeed, if modified soy bean produces peanut-containing protein, negative effects may occur in people who are allergic to peanuts.
But for GM, it is usually known exactly what has changed and which new protein will be produced, that is, cases of allergenicity can be checked already at the stage of preliminary studies. And in this case, not marking “contains GMOs” is needed, but marking what proteins exactly this GMO contains (the words “can contain peanuts” seen on chocolate? That's something in this style), which, in fact, no one objects. And if a person voluntarily eats products on which it is written that this particular product can cause allergies for a given person, then this is not at all GMO's fault.
Interesting Facts
Already mentioned insulin for diabetics is produced by genetically modified bacteria. The modification made it possible to create insulin-producing bacteria completely analogous to human, which is easier to digest, unlike porcine insulin (differs from human by one amino acid) and from insulin from cattle (differs from human by three amino acids).So what?
: .
Almost all papayas now grown in the world are GM varieties. "Natural" papaya was destroyed by the pest, to which GM papaya is stable. So if you do not want to eat GM organisms - never buy papaya.
Thanks to Greenpeace and other environmentalists, “golden rice” with a high content of vitamin A has just entered the fields of China. It took an additional 12 years of research to make these ecologists calm down. It is estimated that during this time in China some 8 million children died or became seriously ill from lack of vitamin A .
And an apology to all who read. The picture to attract attention at the beginning of the post has nothing to do with GMOs. Moreover, a frog with extra legs is not a product of human activity at all.
All because of only a small worm-parasite . It was he who, falling into a frog, makes it grow its extra legs. The goal is to get into the stomach to certain birds, where this parasite lives comfortably on. The modified frog is not only similar to a grasshopper (more attractive for birds), but less mobile, which makes it easy prey.
Here is another curious example of the parasite:
Ants parasite mushroom that can seize control of the ant's central nervous system and completely subjugate it to itself. The goal is the same - to get the optimal conditions for your life and the ability to leave offspring.
These facts are presented to demonstrate that nature itself is extremely diverse and our rather absurd, small, careful attempts to edit the genome are a trifle compared to what nature can already show. If a primitive fungus can control the nervous system of a more complex organism, and a primitive parasite - force the frog to change its morphology, then why should a person not use what even simple atomic particles have long been able to do?
Instead of conclusion
After the evaluation of all the pros and cons, I personally consider GMOs a progressive scientific technology that allows mankind to solve some actual problems, and I think horror stories about them are either very exaggerated or completely invented. The overwhelming majority of prejudices against GMOs are broken about the simple fact that the stores are full of products obtained as a result of radiation, X-ray and chemical mutagenesis, and this for some reason does not confuse anyone. Some of the pros and cons of GMOs are discussed in the article and, I hope, will serve as an occasion for additional reasoning. More information on the topic can be collected on the links provided.Recommended for study:
- Elena Kleshchenko. GMO: urban myths. "Chemistry and Life" â„–7, 2012 http://elementy.ru/lib/431731
- . RAZGOVOR.ORG: . http://lleo.me/dnevnik/2008/02/26.html
- http://progenes.livejournal.com/tag/gmo
- http://velta-1.livejournal.com/
- http://flavorchemist.livejournal.com/tag/%D0%93%D0%9C%D0%9E
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/171273/
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