Krimsky - GMOs decoded : a skeptic’s view of genetically modified foods

Food, Health, and the Environment

Series Editor: Robert Gottlieb, Henry R. Luce Professor of Urban and Environmental Policy, Occidental College

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Sheldon Krimsky, GMOs Decoded: A Skeptics View of Genetically Modified Foods

GMOs Decoded

A Skeptics View of Genetically Modified Foods

Sheldon Krimsky

The MIT Press

Cambridge, Massachusetts

London, England

2019 Massachusetts Institute of Technology

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means (including photocopying, recording, or information storage and retrieval) without permission in writing from the publisher.

This book was set in Stone Serif by Westchester Publishing Services. Printed and bound in the United States of America.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Krimsky, Sheldon, author.

Title: GMOs decoded : a skeptics view of genetically modified foods / Sheldon Krimsky.

Description: Cambridge, MA : The MIT Press, [2019] | Series: Food, health, and the environment | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2018016803 | ISBN 9780262039192 (hardcover : alk. paper)

Subjects: LCSH: Transgenic plants. | Crops--Genetic engineering. | Genetically modified foods.

Classification: LCC SB123.57 .K75 2019 | DDC 631.5/233--dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018016803

Contents

List of Figures

A taxonomy of living organisms

After a gene has been isolated and cloned (amplified in a bacterial vector), it must undergo several modifications before it can be effectively inserted into a plant. This simplified representation of a constructed transgene cassette contains the necessary components for successful integration and expression. The marker gene also has its own promoter and terminator.

A canonical description of DNA transcription and translation in cells.

Global increases in glyphosate-resistant weeds.

Power analysis and biological significance

List of Table

Herbicide-resistant genetically engineered crops approved for sale in the United States, 1994 to 2006

List of Box

The Regulatory History of StarLink Corn, 1996 to 2001

Series Foreword

GMOs Decoded: A Skeptics View of Genetically Modified Foods is the fourteenth book in the Food, Health, and the Environment series. The series explores the global and local dimensions of food systems and the issues of access, community well-being, and social, environmental, and food justice. Books in the series focus on how and where food is grown, manufactured, distributed, sold, and consumed. They address questions of power and control, social movements and organizing strategies, and the health, environmental, social, and economic factors embedded in food-system choices and outcomes. As this book demonstrates, the focus is not only on food security and well-being but also on economic, political, and cultural factors and regional, state, national, and international policy decisions. The Food, Health, and the Environment books therefore provide a window into the public debates, alternative and existing discourses, and multidisciplinary perspectives that have made food systems and their connections to health and the environment critically important subjects of study and for social and policy change.

Robert Gottlieb, Occidental College

Series Editor (gottlieb@oxy.edu).

Foreword
Marion Nestle

GMOs Decoded is a gift to anyone confused about genetically modified foods. In this latest addition to Sheldon Krimskys prolific output of books about how societies interact with new technologies, he takes on a formidable challengeto examine the science of GMOs as a basis for dealing with the ferocious politics they incite. I use the word ferocious advisedly. Positions about GMOs appear polarized to the point of outright hostility. Krimsky wants dtente. If we understood the science better, we might be able to achieve more nuanced views of the risks and benefits of GMOs and of the genetic techniques used to create them.

To anyone familiar with Krimskys previous and ongoing work, this book may come as a surprise. Trained in physics and philosophy, Krimsky is a sharp critic of the role of technology in society with particular interests in the ethical implications of genetics and biotechnology and in risk communication. I have long admired his work for its firm grounding in science and its clear delineation of the ways in which political, cultural, and other societal factors color perceptions of the safety and other risks of new technologies.

In GMOs Decoded, Krimsky takes a deep dive into the science of food biotechnology on its own, separate from issues related to how the science is used by the companies producing and profiting from GMOs, or is interpreted by proponents, critics, or the general public. An attempt to discuss the science of GMOs distinct from its politics may appear foolhardy, if not impossible, and Krimsky deserves much praise for taking this on.

I speak from experience. My book about food biotechnology, Safe Food, first published in 2003, began with a reference to C. P. Snows two-culture problemwhat Snow called the gulf of incomprehension between scientists and nonscientists over matters of technological risk. To greatly oversimplify: scientists argue that if GMOs are safe, they are fully acceptable and no further criticism is justified. But to nonscientists, safety is only one of many concerns about GMOs and not necessarily the most important. Holders of this broader view argue that even if GMOs are safe, they still may not be acceptable for reasons of ethics, social desirability, unfair distribution, nontransparent marketing, or inequitable and undemocratic control of the food supply.