Lets examine the good side first since I think that so much of what can happen is good. This glass is way more than one half full in my eyes because it offers a hope for better human control of the impacts of their population on the life that shares the earth with us. We ought to be able to use this revolution to clone endangered species and grow their populations when we reach the next stage in the knowledge just now being applied. So far this technology is being applied in simple ways to changing crops and animals raised for food. The changes are obvious early attempts at using trans-genetic tools to offer advantages to the crops and animals produced over their unaltered ancestors. Productivity, resistance to natural pests, resistance to pesticides, improvements in flavor, increases in protein yield per plant or other qualities considered desirable are immediate targets. Among the benefits should be; reduced cropland requirements to meet the needs of the human population, improved variety in foods available to poorer populations, less use of chemical fertilizer in intensive cropping, less use of pesticides and herbicides, reductions in cost based on longer shelf life and less wastage in the harvesting process. There are many more but these will give you an idea about the breadth and depth of change this could bring in our food production process. It is a genuine revolution in control of the features of crops and their productivity, something that has merely been hinted at in the prior green revolution that has saved so many people from starvation.

On the other side of this revolution are several areas of concern any one of which could reduce or offset the substantial benefits to be derived from use of this technology. There are two categories of issues that are involved in human concerns about this genetic revolution. One is the truly scary level of concern regarding a disaster that reduces human viability and or the viability of many other species. That includes releasing genetic material and the viruses or bacteria used to transport them into the biosphere where it infects plants or animals for which it was not intended with serious consequences. Bioethics is developing to a level where this is less of a concern but the mad scientist scenario still exists. I am relatively clear that these types of damage are certainly possible but at this point very unlikely. Nonetheless it is an issue that needs to be guarded against by the scientists who make this revolution work. They are doing this to the best of their ability but no one can absolutely guarantee that their control of these technologies will remain intact in this uncertain world.

The second level of concern involves commercialization of these products and the ownership of the life forms created. The proper use of patents to regulate these types of products will bring this issue to a satisfactory close over the next twenty years. That will occur as long as rights extended beyond the length of patents are not granted to the companies involved. Governments involved in the process of regulating these products, and the natural monopolies that might occur related to them must use the patent structure to guide them. That means that improved versions of crops and animals will enter the public domain within twenty years of the date the patent was granted. That is well within the timeframe that will allow developers to recoup development costs and still bring competition into the markets for these highly improved products.

Oh yeah, about the Spidergoats, Salmoneel, Featherless Fowl and Insecticide Oats, they are real constructs being prepared for market. The Salmon in question here has a new growth gene derived from an eel-like fish that helps it to grow to full size within eighteen months instead of five years. How it will taste is still a slippery topic but I would willingly try it if it were available in the market. The Spidergoats are carrying a spider gene that adds spider silk as an element of their milk. The spider silk will be useful for sutures that reabsorb easily and other medical uses, it may also be useful as a construction material when enough goats are in production. I wonder if the milk is stringy? The featherless fowl and insecticide oats are fairly self-explanatory. It seems foul to make a bird freeze in order to spare the effort of plucking it. What impact the insecticide will have on the taste or food value of the oats is still unknown. It will no doubt make the war between insects and food crops more interesting.

Doesn't this technology scare me? When I am afraid I think less well, yes there are scary elements of this area of science but we have survived through sixty years with nuclear weapons in the hands of some scary people both on our side and that of those opposed to our power. I am convinced that these changes will come regardless of how much we fear them, so I will struggle to understand them and help implement them safely. That is the way of human beings that believe in the human social and political revolution at the roots of this biological revolution. We cannot back away from science any more than we can eliminate a few billion people in order to help our planet's ecosystem survive. It is our greatest blessing and most threatening quality that we were made in the image and likeness of the creator, and our blessing that we have ethics and morals to guide us. God bless you, our troops our protestors, our bioethicists, our scientists and those opposed to this revolution. They will all help us change and grow in the ways necessary to benefit from this new knowledge.