The thing that worries me the most about these technologies is when we make changes with them, those changes seem fine in the lab, and then when those changes spread in an ecosystem for long enough, suddenly, problems start popping up due to those changes.
By then, it's far too late to undo those changes. The genetic pollution remains forever.
It is therefore far better to have never done any genetic modification at all, because we simply don't understand how one change interacts with everything else.
Nature has done so much better than we have ~ therefore, because we don't understand nature's decision-making process, and never have, and most probably never will, we should never interfere with tinkering with something extremely and profoundly complicated like DNA.
Selective breeding is superior to humans tinkering with the genome directly.
> The thing that worries me the most about these technologies is when we make changes with them, those changes seem fine in the lab, and then when those changes spread in an ecosystem for long enough, suddenly, problems start popping up due to those changes.
I agree with your concern, but I don't see this technology as fundamentally different from humans have been doing for hundreds of years. We've already released so many chemicals and materials into the environment that have had many harmful and irreversible effects on the environment. Releasing a genetically modified mosquito does raise concerns, but it's not too different from putting some new chemical into the environment, which we do all the time.
Genetic pollution has always existed - humans have a bunch of dead viral code fragments in their DNA. Trying to remain "unpolluted" is more an OCD ideology than anything actually possible. And given all of the things out there which lead to mutations. It is just one od many which is how adaptations happen - the few beneficial ones catching on.
Not to mention complex systems are basically impossible to /not/ meddle with. Fish have accidentally been bred smaller because of practices to prevent depletion by giving immature ones a chance to grow to adulthood. Heck there is evidence that fear of humans is bred in animals.
By then, it's far too late to undo those changes. The genetic pollution remains forever.
It is therefore far better to have never done any genetic modification at all, because we simply don't understand how one change interacts with everything else.
Nature has done so much better than we have ~ therefore, because we don't understand nature's decision-making process, and never have, and most probably never will, we should never interfere with tinkering with something extremely and profoundly complicated like DNA.
Selective breeding is superior to humans tinkering with the genome directly.