Genetically modified mosquitoes arrive in Florida

[Subduction Zone]

Humankind has learned & advanced because of "hubristic idiots"
who couldn't anticipate the consequences of their actions.
We should return to the safety of prehistoric hunter gatherer
existence, praying to our volcano gods for some rain, eh.

I'm not worried about...

Those are not a serious problem outside of Minnesota.

 

[Subduction Zone]

Except that's not the case because the aren't doing this bases on no data or prior tests. In other places where they've been the population of mosquitoes caring dengue fever and zika have dropped by over 90%.

That appears to be a temporary drop. In a year or so the population recovered.

 

[Augustus]

Except that's not the case because the aren't doing this bases on no data or prior tests. In other places where they've been the population of mosquitoes caring dengue fever and zika have dropped by over 90%.

Tests that don't show long term consequences and did show the company's predictions to be wrong?

You place a hell of a lot of faith in corporations to be cpmpitent and act in the public interest.

a team of independent researchers analyzing an early trial of Oxitec’s technology is raising alarm—and drawing fire from the firm—with a report that some offspring of the GM mosquitoes survived and produced offspring that also made it to sexual maturity. As a result, local mosquitoes inherited pieces of the genomes of the GM mosquitoes, the team revealed last week in Scientific Reports.

The important thing is something unanticipated happened,” says population geneticist Jeffrey Powell of Yale University, who did the study with Brazilian researchers. “When people develop transgenic lines or anything to release, almost all of their information comes from laboratory studies. … Things don’t always work out the way you expect.”

Study on DNA spread by genetically modified mosquitoes prompts backlash

 

[Augustus]

New Why are people so certain they are running in the dark and have no idea what will happen when this isn't the first time these mosquitoes have been used?
When they were first released, that's when they didn't know, amd the fist batch had a genetic modification that killed all offspring. That one didn't work. Then they targeted specifically female offspring as they are the ones who bite.
There are results of this project. Fear of science treading into new grounds, the old "playing god" fears is what I see.

It's not being certain they will cause harm, it's precaution against an uncontrolled and potentially self-replicating risk in a scenario where there are multiple overlapping domains scientists don't really understand that well.

There are multiple examples in this thread of humans causing great harm to ecosystems because they hubristically think they are smart enough to can control them.

I'm not against "science", I'm on the side of the scientists who understand risk and the limitations of human understanding.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

Tests that don't show long term consequences and did show the company's predictions to be wrong?

You place a hell of a lot of faith in corporations to be cpmpitent and act in the public interest.

a team of independent researchers analyzing an early trial of Oxitec’s technology is raising alarm—and drawing fire from the firm—with a report that some offspring of the GM mosquitoes survived and produced offspring that also made it to sexual maturity. As a result, local mosquitoes inherited pieces of the genomes of the GM mosquitoes, the team revealed last week in Scientific Reports.

The important thing is something unanticipated happened,” says population geneticist Jeffrey Powell of Yale University, who did the study with Brazilian researchers. “When people develop transgenic lines or anything to release, almost all of their information comes from laboratory studies. … Things don’t always work out the way you expect.”

Study on DNA spread by genetically modified mosquitoes prompts backlash

The genetic mutation was supposed to be inherited. That's how it kills the female larvae, that's how new generations of males survive and pass the gene on so the females of future generations die.
Complaining that things are going as intended because that's how evolution works seems funny.
And it's not corporations I place trust in. It's science and data. Amd the data strongly suggests things are working out fine.
And here's and interesting thing to note. This method introducing a predator or other new species to a local environment. But lots of people are drawing that comparison. But, in reality, it's releasing something already there, something not entirely foriegn to the environment. Altered genetics, but it's nothing at all like releasing toads or rabbits to environments that didn't previously have them.
And the data is already showing a trend in dengue fever and zikka going way down, which is great news. And, as we know, am ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cures.

 

[Augustus]

And it's not corporations I place trust in. It's science and data.

Amd the data strongly suggests things are working out fine.

Why trust the corporate scientists who say it is perfectly safe, nothing to worry about here, rather than the other scientists who note we are taking potentially significant risks in an area we lack knowledge.

Is it scientific to be overconfident that nothing much can go wrong when we lack sufficient information to make a call?

The 'data' is not sufficient to make any call on the degree of risk presented.

1. Do we know how these GM mosquitos will adapt and evolve in the wild? No
2. Can we rule out heritable changes that make the problem worse? No
3. Do we fully understand the role of mosquitos in the ecosystem and the effect of culling large numbers of specific species? No
4. Do we know that changes in ecosystems can have significant, unintended effects? Yes

And here's and interesting thing to note. This method introducing a predator or other new species to a local environment. But lots of people are drawing that comparison.

These were examples of what may happen when people try to introduce significant changes to the food chain.

The worst example wasn't about predators, but Mao's attempt to kill all the sparrows as they were "pests" which resulted in unintended disruption to the food chain.