Okay, we all hate mosquitoes. But here in the continental U.S., what mosquitoes mostly do is annoy us. They don’t generally kill us with dreadful tropical diseases, like yellow fever or sleeping sickness, as they do in many other parts of the world.
Do we hate mosquitoes enough to plunge full-throttle into an experiment in genetic engineering–releasing swarms of artificially-created GMO mosquitoes, in hopes that these will wipe out all the regular mosquitoes? (http://www.mosquitomagnet.com/articles/gmo-mosquitoes-pros-cons)
Yep, they’re gonna try that in the Florida Keys. The way it’s supposed to work, the GMO skeeters are modified so that their offspring die before reaching maturity, and they will out-compete the regular mosquitoes and pretty soon, no more skeeters. And then the environment hangs out a “Help Wanted: New Mosquito Species” sign because there’s now an empty niche to fill. With worse mosquitoes, maybe.
Somebody please cue that Jurassic Park music. And switch on our flashing neon sign: the one that says We’re In Control!
Oh, come now–what could go wrong?
Well, we won’t know, will we, until after it has gone wrong and the genie is out of the bottle. Our modern egotism encourages us to blunder into things without regard for unforeseen consequences that could have been foreseen if only someone had taken a bit more time to think about it! But hey, we’re smarter than God, we’ve got Science, we can do anything we want–
Could we please think this over just a bit longer? Pretty please?
Chilling!
Terrible idea, they can’t possibly know all the unintended consequences of tampering with mother nature.
SMH
I didn’t get where I am today by trying to swat Frankenmosquitos.
Or worse yet, finding ourselves swatted by Frankenmosquitos. (Takes on a greater meaning since Al Franken.)
Welcome to the community.
LOL!
And yes! Welcome, Jessica!
Someone needs to follow the money – somebody is going to get rich if this works. If it backfires, then the federal gov’t can cover the losses (too big to fail?) and blame the Right Wing if people are hurt.
True, every mosquito has a right wing… But maybe they’d better genetically engineer these new mosquitoes to have two right wings.
There were no mosquitos whatsoever in this area, until the academics at the University of Arizona inadvertently released some into the wild. These people belong in a Romper Room filled with harmless objects and under the watchful eye of caretakers skilled in dealing with the mentally deficient.
I wish that the statement above was pure satire, but it isn’t. Some in the academic world have been exposed to their own “caca de toro” for so long that they not only believe it, but are convinced that they possess unique insights that no one else can comprehend. The fact is, their insights are incomprehensible, not because of holding great truth, but because they are essentially composed of fertilizer the rest of us avoid.
Only in the subsidized world of academia can such idiocy function.
Frightening.