Transgenic fish go large

Discussion in 'Biology & Genetics' started by Michael, Sep 15, 2010.

?

Are you going to eat transgenic salmon?

  1. Yes

    8 vote(s)
    57.1%
  2. No

    4 vote(s)
    28.6%
  3. I would but I don't like salmon so no.

    2 vote(s)
    14.3%
  1. Michael 歌舞伎 Valued Senior Member

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    Transgenic fish go large

    I don't know why, but I just do not want to eat this fish? I LOVE salmon. I buy a whole salmon once every month or so in steaks for around $70 and snap freeze the steaks. As much as I love to eat salmon I don't want to eat a transgenic salmon. Why? I have no problem with the technology. But the thought of eating one seems disgusting somehow.

    Would you be happy to eat a fast growing salmon: yea or nay?
     
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  3. Hercules Rockefeller Beatings will continue until morale improves. Moderator

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    “.....seems disgusting somehow” isn’t much of an answer to the question you posed yourself. Can you elaborate on why you do not want to eat such a fish? Some specifics would make discussion somewhat easier.
     
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  5. Doreen Valued Senior Member

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    4,101
    Hm. Would I like to be part of the generation, or first generation of guinea pigs? Hm....No.

    As a very simple problem with the fish, they are designed to be tolerant to toxins. So they may seem to be just fine after building up higher levels of toxins than their natural 'cousins'. Have to wonder what the plans are also if they are being designed to be tolerant of toxins.

    Another problem, which could be made by making them sterile is if they escape and breed out there.

    Salmon farming in general - GM or not - is pretty devastating for the local environment around these farms.

    And then there is the crap shoot of what these multispecies hybrids actually have chemically in their bodies.
     
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  7. kurros Registered Senior Member

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    I'd be cool with it, so long as the science is solid. It sounds like they just have increased metabolisms and eat a lot all year, thus letting them grow faster. Nothing too weird there. I know a few genetics researchers and none of them seem too concerned with such things. Sure, while development is underway they are super careful to make sure no weird transgenic creatures escape into the environment, but once sufficient testing is done to make sure the things aren't going to devastate the natural environment if they escape I see no real problem with it. Especially these fish, it sounds like their enhancements are poorly suited to life in the wild and they wouldn't outcompete natural salmon even if they did escape.

    But as for the original question, yes I'd eat them, so long as I had faith in the regulatory system. Although I hear there are all kinds of drugs and things floating around in the US system that shouldn't be so maybe you guys do have cause for concern. I don't really know much about that though.

    Oh, and they are farmed fish so they shouldn't accumulate much in the way of heavy metals or anything, just want to make sure that not too much pesticide or other chemical garbage gets washed into their pens...

    Oh and I am curious, why are Salmon farms as destructive as you say to the environment around the farms? I don't know much about this. Is it just the original development of the farm? Or the water usage or whatever they put in the water to feed the salmon which drains off into random places? Or something else?
     
  8. Doreen Valued Senior Member

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    4,101
    You have more faith in how concerned companies are and what their priorities are. I also have little faith in goverment oversight, given the revolving door between industry and government, amongst other 'influences'.
    you can have farms in the ocean. I think the Norweigen Salmon industry does it that way.

    Oh and I am curious, why are Salmon farms as destructive as you say to the environment around the farms? I don't know much about this. Is it just the original development of the farm? Or the water usage or whatever they put in the water to feed the salmon which drains off into random places? Or something else?[/QUOTE]

    Some info on that...
    Probably no where near the problems of factory pig farms, at least not yet.
     
  9. Hercules Rockefeller Beatings will continue until morale improves. Moderator

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    The usual automatic anti-GM mantra utilising the logically fallacious tactic of scaremongering.

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    “Normal” livestock and poultry are routinely pumped full of hormones. This isn’t going to impact the general public’s exogenous hormone consumption at all.


    Who’s talking about toxins? The article in question has nothing to do with toxins.


    More nonsense. There is no such “crap shoot”. What random “chemicals” do you suggest will be present in such a GM salmon as opposed to a non-GM salmon grown side-by-side? C’mon, give us specifics for once instead of vague references to ‘chemicals’.
     
  10. Doreen Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    4,101
    Interesting. 1) I didn't mention hormones. 2) I was asked a personal question about what I would do or not do. I don't think government oversight is properly handled and there is too much revolving door between industry and government. I think companies will do what they are supposed to do. Make the best returns on investments. I do not have your faith they will take all the precautions necessary and they have a strong motivation to get their products out earlier than more drawn out and thorough testing would allow. There was nothing fallacious about my argument. You and I may disagree about whether appropriate precaution will take place, but that does not make my argument fallacious. Labelling something without responding to it, however, is a fallacious argument.

    I mentioned toxins. Am I supposed to only refer to issues in the OP? Am I allowed to bring in new issues? Well, gosh, yes I am.

    http://www.science.gu.se/english/Ne...=100001&contentId=889631&disableRedirect=true

    So you think that Salmon with added genes from other species will have the same chemical make up as natural salmon. You must think the designers are morons. I mean why go to the trouble of genetically modifying them.

    All you do is act like a shill for the industry. Any critique you label. You have little to add, but you know that by attacking the people who are critical of an industry which you have FAITH in you can reduce the debate to a pissing match. It is as if, in the current world, it is inconceivable that companies might take short cuts or that government oversight is unduly influenced by industry. To even raise the issues is an outrage to you.

    How dare we not just nod our heads and eat these products and question them.

    Yes, massah.
     
  11. keith1 Guest

    Thanks for the heads up. yuck

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    uke:
     
  12. Mr MacGillivray Banned Banned

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    527
    If you live in the western world you have eaten GM corn. You have used GM medication.

    Why GM corn and not GM salmon?'

    And who doesn't like salmon!?!?!
     
  13. Hercules Rockefeller Beatings will continue until morale improves. Moderator

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    Why not? It’s the pertinent issue with the GM salmon in question. Instead of actually addressing the relevant science you launch into your typical anti-GM rhetoric at any mention of the application of any sort of GM technology.


    You didn’t say any of that. In response to the question you alluded to the totally unsupported notion that the public are being used as guinea pigs instead of actually addressing any of the science in question. This is the Biology and Genetics forum, after all. That’s why your statement about guinea pigs is fallacious.


    Okay, fair enough.


    No, I don’t and have never said as much. But that’s not the issue and is a strawman argument. We know that the GM salmon will have elevated fish growth hormone levels. The issue is whether that poses any risks.


    More strawman/fallacious arguments.


    And you act like a brainwashed stooge for the anti-government, anti-industry, anti-scientific establishment. And probably a load of other anti-‘s as well.


    I can discuss the science behind this issue, whereas all you seem to have is your automatic industry-is-evil conspiracy corruption mantra. One of these lines of argument belongs in B&G.


    Wrong again. I don’t have faith, I have an understanding of the underlying technology/science and an understanding of the risk-benefit processes that are involved in bringing GM products to the market.


    I have never said that this cannot occur. However, I take situations on their merit, you automatically play the big-business-corruption-conspiracy card every time. It should be said that I do not automatically favour the introduction of every GM animal or foodstuff that is created.


    I’m not outraged; I’m quite calm.


    Strawman/fallacious argument, again.
     
  14. Michael 歌舞伎 Valued Senior Member

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    20,285
    I'm not sure, I just feel like it's gross. It shouldn't be harmful, I mean, triploidie transgenic animals are still made out of the same bits and peaces of all natural protein and DNA at the end of the day :shrug:


    But, I can't help but think of Blinky:

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    Last edited: Sep 15, 2010
  15. Blindman Valued Senior Member

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    1,425
    As I swig my transgenic vodka, puffing my modified tobacco, and getting high on the heavily manipulated THC plants. I would rather eat a transgenic fish then stand on a street corner and inhale all that car exhaust.
     
  16. keith1 Guest

    The difference is the effects of car exhaust on health was exhaustively (pun) tested over time, so that the debate could lead to a realistic discussion of realistic cures to the problem. Not the same for effects of GM products.

    Laboratory testing results on rats are available on the internet, are not very conclusive, in that they were not extensive enough. Conclusions do show a needed lengthy examination. If signs of "digestive system and breeding malfunction after four generations" is found to be conclusive, in further testing, that should clearly show reason for the need for that further testing.
     
  17. Skeptical Registered Senior Member

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    1,449
    An article I read a few years back suggested that, before any transgenic food is released to the public, it must undergo about 1000 laboratory and field tests. In the 1050's and 1960's chemical and radiation mutagenesis was used as a tool to develop new, higher producing foods. I believe that we all now eat mutant tomatoes from that era. I can guarantee that the mutants did not get tested to anywhere near the degree that transgenic foods are.

    We all eat transgenic foods. Not just the GM corn previously mentioned, but also soy flour, which is added to a hell of a lot of the processed foods, including bread, that we eat daily. After 15 years of eating GM foods, there is still no evidence that any are harmful.

    The human body is actually very adaptable in relation to food intake. We eat substantial amounts of toxins all the time. Plants produce these toxins to fend off insect attack. Potatoes contain solanine. Celery psoralin. Tomatoes contain tomatin. Zucchinis cucurbitacin. etc etc. All those toxins do us no harm at all. And there is no credible evidence that anything in GM foods causes us any harm at all either.
     
  18. keith1 Guest

    Source please.
     
  19. Skeptical Registered Senior Member

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    Keith

    The reason why I was vague about the source is that I no longer have the article. It was a part of the email newsletter Agbioview, but I deleted it. As I am sure you will appreciate, we get so much stuff via the internet these days that if I did not push the delete button often, we would be inundated.

    It does not matter, though, about the exact figures. 1000 tests is probably a round up or round down of the actual number. The point is that GM foods are extremely thoroughly tested.
     
  20. keith1 Guest

    I question the accuracy of that statement. But it is in your interest to further substantiate it, since it is your statement. I have other fish to fry (pun).
     
  21. Hercules Rockefeller Beatings will continue until morale improves. Moderator

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    Your analogy is not valid. The effects of car exhaust on health may well have been exhaustively tested over time, but the key point here is that the widespread introduction of cars was not delayed until that testing had been completed. The testing was performed parallel to the phased introduction of cars. As is the same for GM organisms. As is the same for all new technologies.


    Be careful about playing the “support your statements with references” card. You posted first with a series of unsupported statements. If you’re going to insist on referenced statements from others, I’m going to insist on them from you also.
     
  22. keith1 Guest

    "...As of January 2009 there has only been one human feeding study conducted on the effects of genetically modified foods..."
    courtesy: wikipedia

    "...Most feeding trials were short-term and restricted to a single generation or a single breeding cycle..."
    courtesy: FBAE
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Sep 20, 2010
  23. Skeptical Registered Senior Member

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    1,449
    Actually, there have been numerous feeding studies on humans. Duration : 15 years. Numbers : at least one billion.
    Results : no harm.
     

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