Altering Nature

Altering Nature.

It is said by some that “what is unnatural is evil.” The same statement could be said for GMO’s. GMO is short for genetically modified organism. Now this does not mean some sort of Frankenstein walking about but some genetically modified organism that has been given some sort of gene therapy to better suit our needs. There have been many successful thriving GMO’s some of which we eat every day. Herbicide resistant and BT toxin expression are 2 FDA approved GMO’s that are on the market now. The number one argument among protestors today is that it is unnatural. The counter argument I have is what is Natural? John Stuart Mill said that you can never act against nature. One must ultimately choose “what particular law of nature they should make use of.” We are so quick to argue the unnaturalness of something and we choose to ignore everything unnatural around us. If what is unnatural is evil then are the clothes on my own back evil? There is no cotton that can be found in the shape of a shirt or pants. Are the medicines we give our children when they are ill evil? The author of the article Who’s afraid of GMO’s?ME! begins his article with a sarcastic demeanor with condescending remarks belittling the very means of her work. http://www.saynotogmos.org/ud2005/ujun05b.html#afraid He makes one very good argument though that there has never been an actual study supporting or disproving GMO health risks. GMO’s in our food have only been around for a short period of time but the FDA saw that the benefits outweighed the possible risks thus allowing them to go public. Long ago when the banana was first being cultivated, it was not unnatural to strategically pick out which bananas we wish to grow which are the seedless ones. No use of gene therapy was used, yet we are the reason why they cannot naturally reproduce by means or normal pollination. The actual steps to gene therapy for a GMO can be seen on the video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jAP6ZtfP9ZQ. The actual video itself is educational but the only problem about the young girls argument is where is the data for these studies? Who did the studies? Under what circumstances were they done? “If we are not important, not central, not the apple of Gods eye, what is implied for our theologically-based moral codes?... the significance of our lives and our planets is then determined only by our own knowledge and courage. We are the custodians of life’s meaning… If we crave some cosmic purpose then let us find ourselves a worthy goal.” Carl Sagan’s views on the natural world can be used to answer the question: what is natural? The definition of nature can be put Nature, in the broadest sense, is equivalent to the natural world, physical world, or material world. "Nature" refers to the phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general. It ranges in scale from the subatomic to the cosmic. (courtesy of Wikipedia) what is natural is not determined by us nor a higher power. What is natural can be associated with what is possible. When we begin to separate ourselves from nature that is when the views of what is natural comes to play. The master narrative widely accepted by many is that what is natural is good and what is unnatural is either indifferent or evil. In modern times there are paradigm shifts every day due to the increased number of ways to communicate information whether it be television or the internet. Someone is publishing some study that proves or disproves something else and it is up to the people who are in charge of these means of communication that are responsible for what gets published and heard. This is not in support of any side of the argument about GMO’s I have no say in disapproving of them considering I eat them every day. Nor can I approve of them because of the lack of studies observing the long term effects of genetically modified organisms. The real question that should be asked is what is natural and who determines whether it is or not?