Taking Frankenfoods to Another Level

From the UK Independent via Eschaton, news of a really bizarre twist in genetically altering food crops: putting human genes into those plants. For Atrios, this brings up flashbacks of the Charlton Heston movie Soylant Green; for me, it shows how badly the debate over agriculture has deteriorated. Scientists are more willing to play with these kinds of monstrous combinations than consider rethinking the effectiveness (and effects) of chemical herbicides. Do the chemical agribusinesses have such a stranglehold on research funding that experimenting with organic agricultural techniques will only happen at a grassroots level? That's not necessarily a bad thing, but it does guarantee a radically unequal playing field.

Technorati tags: agriculture, gmo

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