Dear Kevin,

I always look forward to listening to scientists in a speciality speak on subjects that should not be controversial.

Could you address your views on modern Luddism wrt biotechnologies, possible gross waste recycling (CO2 and sewage) and nuclear technologies?

Anastasia,

You are correct, terminator technology was purely a concept, but it didn’t take long for the folks opposed to the technology to grab on. Ironically, the same folks complain about containment of GE materials, and terminator-like technologies could help that. My point about hybrids was simply that those opposed to GE feel that terminator lines are unfair to farmers that want to brown-bag seeds for subsequent years. Hybrids are not much different. It is just protecting IP with heterozygousity! Thanks for the note.

Chakolate, Thanks for the note. None of my funding comes from Monsanto (wish it did!). My paycheck comes from University of Florida. Our science is funded by the National Science Foundation, USDA, the Florida Strawberry Growers’ Association and whatever I contribute. The only corporate funding I receive come from compensation for consultation, but none of that has ever been from projects involving GM plants (my lab also studies optimization of artificial light environments, that’s where it comes from).

The only GM plants we produce are for research purposes only. We can learn about what genes do, especially the huge number of genes classified as “unknown” or “hypothetical”. What do they do? The only way to find out is to change their expression in the plant and see what happens. Once we know this we can find natural variants and make the crosses to bring in the desired traits by traditional breeding.

We’d love to use GM and see it deployed. We have plants that might solve important questions. Unfortunately just do to a test in the field is a massive amount of regulatory expense and paperwork (that our lab can’t pay for). That’s why the Monsanto’s and Syngenta’s monopolize the GM field. They are the only ones that can afford to deploy that technology (and would like to keep it that way).

I did leave out many important topics, and that was not by convenient omission. We only had 45 minutes, it went by in a blink, and most of the conversation was driven by the audience. If you have any other topics you’d like to discuss, just let me know.

I engage opportunities like Skeptically Speaking only to try to help educate the public, part of my job as a State researcher that fuels his program on federal funds. I don’t want people to fear technology, but rather understand it. That’s my only motivation. It would be easy to lock myself in my office and not enjoy public interaction (like most scientists do), but it is so important to share this information.

Thanks for listening. It is not the first time it has been suggested that I’m on the Monsanto payroll. I’m not going to get on it stating facts they already know!

I appreciate the feedback. Thank you.

Kevin

Kevin,

Thanks for responding – it’s very helpful. I find that in many controversial things, following the money often helps clarify it. :-)

I’m a big supporter of GM, and I don’t think it’s very far at all from what we’ve been doing for centuries with selective breeding. It’s just (sometimes) more efficient.

I’ve always thought that any real scientist smart enough to work on genetic engineering should be smart enough to worry about mucking up the only planet we’ve got. Glad to see how smart you are. ;-)

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