Should Genetic Engineering be allowed? What about with plants and animals? In my opinion and from pictures that I have seen, I don't think it's right to do at all. Idk what do you think? :confused:

Recombinant DNA technology may be able to improve our quality of life should we need assistance in the distant future to survive a cataclysmic event. I give it a thought in passing when the subject is brought up in conversation. I prefer not to discuss it and change the subject.

It seems to be a volatile conversation piece nowadays.

I think that it should be discussed. If we keep ignoring it, genetic engineering will keep being pursued and before we know it, genetic engineering may lead to our destruction. Idk. Genetic Engineering does have many advantages and it can help us out in many ways but I don't know...

Well, estefania, you are drawing everyone into a discussion on this.Be prepared to defend your views It may be a good topic for here, may not be. We are a diverse bunch of members here. I steer away from anything that may involve ethical questions. Which yours seems to be. Sorry just my opinion.

Tick

Yea sorry. I see what your saying, but the only reason I bring this topic up is because of school. I need to write a paper on it and I have no idea what to say on the subject. Id like to avoid it too but if I do that I will get a failing grade and I can't have that lol that would be very bad : (

We have strict rules here on homework questions, estefania. There are several sources on the net to access the information you want. This is not the way to write your paper actually. Start by Google 'genetic engineering', that will lead you to other sources. Digging for this type of information on the net is the most interesting and nformative way I know of discovering new viewpoints.

Yea I know, I've just been getting different opinions from people all day. I've already done research and I've already started working on my paper. Thanks for all your help!

estefania, stick around a while within the forum and probably we can all benefit from your opinions and education. We always need informed decisions. Some could probably benefit from you.

Tick

Thanks! : )

We've been doing it for thousands of years already in the form of selective breeding, why get all wound up just because we have a more efficient technology to do it with?

Genetic engineering has been in use for more than 20 years. The discussions about whether genetically modified organisms should be allowed or not, mostly took place in the 1980s, so this a question of primarily historical concern.

Some of objections are that modified crops will escape into the wild and alter the local ecology, but we are already doing that world wide in much more dramatic ways. It IS possible that a GMO crop will wreak havoc, but probably not likely and no more likely than a traditionally bred crop.

Another objection is that GMO crops often carry an antibiotic-resistant marker. I don't know if that's still the case. It such an obviously bad thing to be feeding people that I always assumed they'd eventually find another way to produce GMO crops.

The majority of genetic engineering is done with lab animals for the purposes of exploring what different genes do. For example, biologists can remove a specific gene from a mouse and that mouse is called a "knockout" because the gene has been knocked out. Or a gene may be added, in which case the mouse or other organism is a "knockin." There are thousands of breeds of lab animals with different genes added or deleted. All of these are the product of genetic engineering.

In addition, genetic engineering is used to add human or other genes to the DNA of bacteria, as a way to make the bacteria produce human proteins. Almost anything that the pharmaceutical industry wants in large amounts can be produced this way, much more cheaply than having human chemists do the work.

In cases where the bacteria cannot make a particular human protein, the gene may be added to the DNA of a goat and the goat's milk then contains the desired human protein.

That's true. Genetic engineering can be useful in many ways and I also think that its increasing our knowledge of science around us which can be a good thing.

That's interesting information asking, and I'm still not sure whether it should be right or wrong. There are many good uses for genetic engineering and it can be helpful in many ways, but its also bad in the fact that it can alter the environment and that it is harmful to the animals. Altering the environment I don't think would be a good thing. I know steps are taken to prevent that, but still their could be an escape and I also think that genetic engineering is good for science. Furthering genetic engineering can give us a better understanding of science and the world around us.

Estefania,
I agree with you. Like most technologies, it depends a lot on how it's used. I think you have to look at the specific application to decide if it's good or bad.

As far as escaping into the environment, I think *generally* that's probably not a huge problem, in that most crop plants are poorly adapted to a wild environment and do not escape well. But there are clearly exceptions. California, where I live,is filled with escaped exotic plants, mostly from Europe and South Africa. These are not genetically modified, of course. Most of them are not crops, either, but garden plants or weeds.

I certainly don't give gmos a free pass, but my objections are more to do with economics and politics. For example, I think farmers in poor countries who are using genetically modified seeds should be able to use their own seed from their own fields, and not have to buy new seed from Monsanto every year.

I was not only talking about plants, but animals and creatures as well. I read an article about a type of fish that was being genetically altered to withstand harsher environments. The people doing the research had an entire lake devoted just to the fish. They had wire and netting protecting the lake and if the nets didn't stop them they also had some type of poison and people watching the lake. There still is a possibility that they could escape and alter the environment.

Yes. I agree with you. They could escape. It's very difficult to contain animals. But I think it would be rare for an animal whose genes had been modified by people to be better adapted than the fish shaped by natural selection.

So if I add a gene to the genome of a fish, it may make it more tolerant of cold, but that protein is also going to do other things that the biologists can't predict. Those fish might do better in a very cold year, but when oxygen levels plummet or a certain predator population increases, they'll do badly. It could be any environmental variable--I'm just making this up to make the general point. But the wild population of the same fish is almost by definition better adapted to current conditions and able to respond appropriately to minor changes than the genetically modified version. I'm not saying there will not be exceptions, but I would say gmo animals are generally less likely to compete well with unmodified organisms.

Another disadvantage they have is that they have no genetic diversity. They are all going to be clones. In wild populations, every individual is different and carries different combinations of genes that may be helpful when the environment changes.

Most gmo animals are made for the purposes of experiments or meat or milk containing some pharmaceutical product. Were these fish being modified to be farmed fish eventually?

But this is also part of the larger question of how we use animals--whether that is right or not.

Animal rights is a huge topic.

I never really thought of the fish being unable to adapt in better suited environments and being able to only survive in a certain environment. From what I was saying earlier, they were engineering a certain type of salmon or trout, I think, to be better suited for the colder temperatures when they migrate upstream. They were engineering them to be better adapted to the environment and they hoped to increase the number of fish.

And when I was researching I found that 97% of human DNA is considered junk because scientists do not know the functions of the 97% of the DNA. The outcome of genetic engineering with animals and humans is pretty much unknown until its actually experimented.

And I agree with you- the rights of animals does seem to be a big topic. In my opinion, I think that its wrong for animals to be used in the testing for genetic engineering. They are treated poorly, and even though we have more knowledge and are more advanced than other animals, I still think its not right to experiment with them. Im an animal lover, and so when I see a creature that is being mistreated and used for testing experiments on, it breaks my heart. And also the animals used with genectic engineering experimentation turn out freakish and strange looking which I think is not right. But, for years we have been experimenting with animals for many experiments, and if we haven't experimented with them, we may not have as great as a scientific knowledge than we do now.

In some ways genetic engineering is good and bad. I also found when I was researching that when scientists genectically engineered bacteria, 37 people died, 1500 were paralyzed, and 5000 more were left disabled that was caused by a symptom called tryptophan. I found more evidence that went against genetic engineering than for it.

With what I found from researching off Google, there were more disadvantages than good ones. Its good to increase our knowledge of science by pursuing genetic engineering, but it may also lead to a catostrophic event that will be irreversible. I think it would be better to just leave the whole genetic engineering experimentation and furthering scientific discovery alone if it could lead to devastation. We shouldn't mess with it if people think that it may lead to our doom as a planet.

Genetic Engineering also ties into religion and what people believe in. Many people believe that its not right for mess with God's creations and that God is the only one who has the rights to mess with changing the way we are. Some people go against them and believe that we are just using what God gave us. Either way, genetic engineering is also an issue. It also affects us because if in the future people could choose what they get as offspring, they could make there child be smart, tall athletic, prone to diseases, thin, etc. this would also tie into fashion -people would want their children to grow up as the latest fashion that's out, like blue eyes, tall, super skinny and thin, blond hair, and so on. There would be no individuality and we will all just be the same.

I think that its just better off to not pursue genetic engineering because all it will do is change who and what we are and no one would be unique. With all the information and pictures I have seen, I think its not good for us to continue experimentation on genetic engineering at all.

What is genetic engineering

Why is genetic engineering important? Because of what? And give me 3 reasons y is it important?