• chiliedogg@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    35
    ·
    8 months ago

    We absolutely genetically modified pretty much all of our food. We just did it by selective breeding.

    The only difference with modern GMO is we’ve learned to do it directly much faster. We don’t need a random mutation to add a trait anymore.

    • qyron@sopuli.xyz
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      6
      arrow-down
      13
      ·
      edit-2
      8 months ago

      Can we get a geneticist here?

      Last time I was taught about biology, selective breeding was a process through which, over a long period of time, individuals with favorable traits were multiplied in order to increase the prevalence of such traits.

      The genes were already introduced, hence, no modification. Already existing characteristics were allowed to further express and refine.

      Genetic modification, to my understanding, implies introducing genetic information into the genome of an organism to produce another with traits previously completely absent in the species.

      Selection vs manipulation.

      I’ll concede there are a few cases where the lines blurr, like the golden rice, where a gene that codified the production of vitamin A in the grain was/is already inactive or so receassive, in order to have it express again would require gene manipulation but I think a selective production program was put forward in an attempt to bring out that gene again.

      • Honytawk@lemmy.zip
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        28
        arrow-down
        4
        ·
        8 months ago

        Selective breeding is just one of the methods used to genetically modify our food.

        • AccountMaker@slrpnk.net
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          4
          ·
          8 months ago

          I think you two have different images in your minds. You say “genetically modify” as in “modify the food through choosing which genes are to prevail”, while the other means “modify genes directly to affect the food”, and in that sense selective breeding isn’t GMO because no genes have been modified, but rather encouraged. You modify the genetic structure of future generations through natural means, not the organism directly.

          Don’t know what scientists say, I just see the other comment downvoted when they have a fair point.

        • qyron@sopuli.xyz
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          9
          arrow-down
          12
          ·
          8 months ago

          I can’t agree with that.

          The basic notion of genetically modifying an organism implies changes enacted at the genetic level, through artificial means, not biological.