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Wednesday, April 13, 2011

It's Modern So it Must be Great, is it?

What's more important?

The Economy or the Biodiversity?


What are we talking about?
Agriculture is the artificial cultivation and processing of plants and animals for food, fibers and other by-products. It is farming from different vegetations to raising different animals in farms. People are planting crops and raising animals for the purpose of earning money. People also need agriculture because they are the ones who provide us with food and sometimes money. There are two types of agriculture; industrial agriculture and sustainable agriculture.

What's the difference?
 If you think everything is fine with our agriculture today, you might be wrong. People today are more concerned about making profit than taking good care of our plants and animals today. They use the modern way of industrial agriculture rather than the traditional way of sustainable agriculture. What is the difference of industrial and sustainable agriculture? 

The Modern Way


Industrial Agriculture is a form of modern way farming that refers to industrialized production of livestock and crops. This means that its the way of farming where they just focus on making profit. People will do everything to make their crops grow faster and bigger so that they would earn more money. 

The Traditional Way


Sustainable Agriculture is a form of farming where it involves using the principles of ecology. It is considered to be the safe way of farming because they don't use chemicals that enhance the growth of their by-products and they take care of their animal's well being. This is a more expensive way of farming because it requires hard work and the natural necessities of the animals like clean food and clean shelter.




The Problem
Now that we know the different types of farming and their effects on society we can now focus on the problem. Since industrial agriculture is less expensive than sustainable agriculture, more people are relying on it. But is it really necessary to rely on this modern way of farming?

Industrial Agriculture has its negative effects. It may be a good thing that its less expensive than the sustainable agriculture but do you know what`s behind it? First of all, it has the risk of allowing less productive breeds to becoming extinct. Second, most of their products aren't as healthy as the products from sustainable agriculture.

The world is growing every day so there's need for more resources. The main purpose of Industrial Agriculture is to keep up with the demand of the people. They want their livestock breeds and crop varieties to grow fast and big. They put different chemicals to help the livestock, mostly poultry, grow fat. 

The benefits of relying on a few highly productive livestock breeds and crop varieties do not outweigh the risks of reducing genetic diversity. If we continue to rely on a few breeds and completely ignore the less productive breeds, they will become extinct. What if in the future a new disease will be discovered and the only epidemic will be the extinct less productive breeds.



Sources:

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Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Blue eyes? Check. Blonde Hair? Check.

D - E - S - I - G - N - E - R            B - A - B - I - E - S


What are Designer Babies?


"Designer Baby" is the term used  to refer to a baby whose genetic makeup has been selected by scientists in the preference of the parents. It is still an ongoing process and is never been tested on human beings but only on animals. Several techniques have been involved in the research of this project InVitro Fertilisation and Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnosis. InVitro Fertilisation is the process of fertilising eggs with sperm outside the mother's womb and the way only selected embryos are implanted back into the mother's womb is called Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnosis.


I personally think that "designer babies" is one of the best and creative ideas the human mind has come up with. Who wouldn't want your baby to have the physical and mental characteristics you would want them to have when they grow up. If you look in the eyes of a religious, ethical person, you would probably feel offended and to see that the project is on the negative side. 




The project "designer babies" has its negative effects on society especially in the religious field. Processes that were derived from researching the project were considered to be immoral. Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnosis is the way of selecting healthy embryos to implant back to the mother's womb. What happens then to those embryos who have diseases? They get THROWN OUT or is another way of saying that they killed them. As Catholics, we all know that killing is bad, and is prohibited by both the religious and general law.




Another negative effect on having this so-called "designer babies" is the possible existence of "super humans". There are various effects of having "super humans" in the world. Getting the genes that you like for your child is expensive especially if its a new technology, so the majority of parents who will use this are rich. What about the poor families then? Here comes the problem. Poor families can't afford to choose the genes they want for their child so in the future their will be rich super human kids who will discriminate those poor but normal children. These "super humans" can also serve a threat to society if many sided in the evil ways. 


designer_baby_shopping_pm.jpg



What does religion have to say about this? Of course they will disagree. Changing your child's natural traits is like disagreeing with God's choices of how they'll look like. Every decision God makes has a reason and that because He has a plan for them. It is better if you leave things the way it is and not intervene with it. It is the same as nature where the more you do something to it more bad things will happen. 


Sources:
http://www.bionetonline.org/english/content/db_cont1.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Designer_baby
http://www.momlogic.com/2009/02/pick_your_babys_gender_hair_color.php
http://www.emedicinehealth.com/in_vitro_fertilization/article_em.htm
http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/273415-overview

Images:
http://www.skewsme.com/cloning/designer_baby.jpg
http://singularityhub.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/german-super-baby.jpg

People whom I commented on:
http://agtbio.blogspot.com/2011/01/genetic-babiesasset-or-liability.html?showComment=1296056981106#c8845426539309100522

http://cfbioblog.blogspot.com/2010/12/designer-baby-infant-created-by-genetic.html?showComment=1296059392295#c6999616500528850626