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GENETIC ARMAGEDDON (Part 3)
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MORE THAN HUMAN PART 3: GENETIC ARMAGEDDON
This report is the property of Rema Marketing and is considered to be strictly for reading only. With receipt of this report, the recipient acknowledges and agrees that written permissions must be secured from the publisher to use or reproduce any part of this report, except for brief quotations in critical reviews or articles. A publication of Rema Marketing. ©2012, All rights reserved.
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MORE THAN HUMAN PART 3: GENETIC ARMAGEDDON
MORE THAN HUMAN PART 3: GENETIC ARMAGEDDON When God created the heavens and the earth he established specific boundaries which were designed to offer protection and a mutual appreciation for his handiwork and design. When these boundaries are violated it becomes repugnant to the Almighty. Whilst Genetic engineering promises us a better world tomorrow, it is the nature of man that whatever he finds which is good is eventually corrupted and used in variance to Gods plan for mankind. This then leads to consequences unlike no other.
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FAIRY TALES, MONSTERS AND THE GENETIC IMAGINATION
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BIBLICAL EVIDENCE FOR HYBRIDS AND CHIMERAS
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THE ORIGIN OF THE BIBLICAL HYBRIDS
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FAST FORWARD TO 2012
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HOLLYWOODS DEPICTION OF THE FUTURE
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THE FRANKENSTEIN MODEL
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THE EARLY WARNING SIGNS
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THE HYBRIDIZATION OF HUMAN AND PLANT
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CHINESE FINDINGS PUTS PRESSURE ON GM FOOD
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GENETIC ENGINEERS REPORT
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GENETIC MIXING VARIATIONS
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TEN CONSEQUENCES OF MIXING ANIMAL AND HUMAN DNA
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DARPA: THE NEW WORLD ORDER TECHNOLOGY FRONT
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FOOTNOTES
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MORE THAN HUMAN PART 3: GENETIC ARMAGEDDON
MORE THAN HUMAN PART 3: GENETIC ARMAGEDDON
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1. FAIRY TALES, MONSTERS AND THE GENETIC IMAGINATION Between September 2012 and January 2013 a controversial exhibition is taking place in Canada called “Fairy Tales, Monsters and the Genetic Imagination” This exhibition includes contemporary artworks inspired by fantastic stories in which the boundaries between human and animal are blurred. Whether in mythology, fairy tales, or science fiction, these stories and their wondrous characters are often thought of as children’s entertainment. But as the artists in this exhibition demonstrate, while the novelty of invented creatures makes them delightful or frightening, they also have a serious dimension; they can cause us to reconsider our notions of what it means to be human. This takes on a new immediacy today, when scientists are able to conceive new species by mixing and matching existing genetic material. For the artists in this exhibition, the hybrid body— whether imagined or potentially real—expresses hidden desires, ancient fears, the intrigue of transformation, and the wonderful irrationality of life’s paradoxes.
In the official gallery guide it states regarding “Other artists consider the wondrous possibilities opened up by science’s capacity to fashion chimeras, a word derived from a hybrid monster in Greek mythology that had the body of a goat, head of a lion, and tale of a serpent, but which today refers to biologically engineered organisms. Research into cloning, stem cells, intelligent prostheses, the transplantation of animal organs and cells into humans, and varying degrees of genetic modifications have made the bodily metamorphosis that was once only imagined into a present and future reality. Suzanne Anker and Aziz + Cucher consider potential directions for human life in its most elemental aspect. Named for a nineteenth-century evolutionary parable called “Water Babies,” Anker’s photographs show fetuses in various stages of development. For her, these roughly formed specimens represent life as a cycle from birth to death that always holds the possibility of transformation into new forms. Aziz + Cucher’s Chimera series shows abstracted figures sheathed in human skin and hair, but with no other feature that might identify them as human; no sexual characteristics, faces, arms, or legs. These mammalian amoeboids suggest the exciting potential of raw, organic matter that has been cultured in the bio-lab, which might become anything we can imagine.
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MORE THAN HUMAN PART 3: GENETIC ARMAGEDDON
Images of mutated or hybrid beings by Janaina Tschäpe and Saya Woolfalk also offer optimistic alternatives to natural biology as a force shaping what life may yet become. Tschäpe’s Polaroids show wonderful new species that resemble nineteenth-century fairy pictures, which portrayed the supernatural little creatures as mergers of human and insect. Inspired by the abundant flora and fauna of the Brazilian rain forest, Woolfalk has created an entire world of new life-forms that are governed by a radically inverted set of natural laws. A more cautionary note is struck by Patricia Piccinini, who warns not of a Pandora’s Box of unleashed genetic horrors, but of our own unpreparedness in dealing ethically and humanely with the results of our scientific adventurism. In works such as The Long Awaited (2008, cover), Piccinini places play and nurture over fear and rejection, suggesting that our own future creations might ask the same questions that haunt Frankenstein’s monster: Why was I made? Who will love me? What is my destiny? These mysteries, of course, mimic our own. We can only wonder and speculate, or perhaps ask God for answers and receive silence; in the future, how will we answer our own creations as they move from fiction into reality?”
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Piccinini states “This work returns to one of my favourite themes, which is question of our responsibility to the creatures we create. My work rarely attempts to present the viewer with a definite answer to the great questions of our day. I believe it is up to the community to discuss and resolve these issues. However, I do have very clear views about some things. I strongly believe that we have a responsibility to anything that we might create, regardless of whether we judge it to be useful or successful or otherwise. I am also convinced of the intrinsic value of diversity. As far as I'm concerned, 2 the more different creatures there are in the world the better it is.”
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Piccinini’s sculptures have drawn criticism although with the criticism has also come respect and almost an inability of critics to actually come to a conclusion about this enigma and thus convey a love-hate relationship with her work. Once critic stated on her blog “She creates sculptures, and also short films, drawings and photographs, that have a special effect like level of realism (most reminiscent of Ron Mueck's experiments with scale) even as they represent impossible mutations between human figures and pigs, reptiles or apes. It sounds awful (and I mean 'bad', not simply repellent), but the figures manage to avoid being beautifully executed freakshow exhibits. Once inside this feels a long way away from vogueish shlock and I found myself moving through deep felt and often contradictory responses. A typically moving piece is 'The Long Awaited', on a bench a boy seems to fall asleep with the head of a wrinkled, grey haired, naked sea creature cradled in his lap. It is achingly affecting, the creature with her wrinkled dugs might be Tiresias or an ancient mermaid, but she also exudes an immense weight that might be resignation or peace. The boy too is ambiguous, his features hint at Down's Syndrome but the most striking figure is the way his tiny hand cradles the creature's immense head. 'The Long Awaited' speaks eloquently of acceptance and benediction, there is 3 something wrenching in its grace.”
There is one statement by this blogger which within itself is profound. This is when she states “even as they represent impossible mutations”. This statement is a reflection of the general public at large which is based firstly on the fact that such mutations people associate with mythology rather than reality such as the Medusa in Clash of the Titans or the Centaur in “Narnia”. Yet over the last few years there is evidence that Patricia Piccinini’s sculptures are within themselves, a self fulfilling prophecy and nasty surprise for many of us who believe that technology and medicine is at the level of what we are familiar with and aware of.
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2. BIBLICAL EVIDENCE FOR HYBIDS AND CHIMERA’S Before we address modern science and the state of genetic engineering what may be of surprise is that the Bible also makes references to creatures which we would normally associate with mythology. Animal human hybrids have to a large extent been associated with Greek mythology where there are significant accounts of creatures that were half human half animal. Much of what we know has been shaped by childhood movies such as “Clash of the Titans”, “Jason and the Argonauts”, “Hercules” and other such movies. In such movies we see half human animals such as the centaur or medusa, yet this enigma within Greek Mythology has to a large extent, been influenced by much earlier civilizations such as the Assyrian and Egyptian empires. Examples of human deities with animal heads in the Ancient Egyptian pantheon include jackal-headed Anubis, cobra-headed Amunet, lion-headed Sphinx, falcon-headed Horus etc. Earlier mythological hybrids were very popular in Assyrian art. The "angel" (human with birds' wings, see winged genie) the "mermaid" (part human part fish, see Enki, Atargatis, Apkallu) and the (Shedu) all trace their origins to Assyro-Babylonian art. In Mesopotamian mythology the urmahlullu, or lion-man served as a guardian spirit, especially of bathrooms. But can we treat all of these descriptions as mythology or does the Bible provide evidence of something which the vast majority of us did not know existed. Let us now investigate the evidence. SHEDU/LAMASSU One such creature mentioned in the Bible is the Shedu/Lamassu which was a creature which had the torso of a man, wings of a bird, but the body of a bull (lions in some cases), and the Assyrians, who resided in Mesopotamia, made detailed carvings of these creatures some of which reside in the British Museum, Musée du Louvre, National Museum of Iraq, Metropolitan Museum of Art and one extremely large example kept at the Oriental Institute, Chicago.
The Shedu/Lamassu were household protective spirits of the common Babylonian people. Later during the Babylonian period they became the protectors of kings as well as always being placed at the entrance. Statues of the bull-man were often used as gatekeepers. To protect houses, the Shedu/Lamassu were engraved in clay tablets, which were then buried under the door's threshold. They MORE THAN HUMAN A PRODUCTION OF REMA MARKETING AND WWW.GLOBALREPORT2010.COM ©2012, All rights reserved
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were often placed as a pair at the entrance of palaces. At the entrance of cities, they were sculpted in colossal size, and placed as a pair, one at each side of the door of the city, that generally had doors in the surrounding wall, each one looking towards one of the cardinal points. A bull with a man's head is found among the creatures that make up Aslan's army in “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.” He appears at the Stone Table, challenging the White Witch "with a great bellowing voice". In the film Alexander, Shedu/Lamassu are seen at the Ishtar Gate in Babylon. In the Disney movie Aladdin, a gold Shedu/Lamassu can be found in the scene where Aladdin and Abu enter the cave in the desert to find the lamp. The reference to this creature in the Bible is in Deuteronomy 32:17 where it says “They sacrificed unto devils, not to God; to gods whom they knew not, to new gods that came newly up, whom your fathers feared not”
This scripture is in reference to strange gods that the Israelites worshipped causing Gods anger to result in their destruction. Any Hebrew-English concordance such as Strong’s, will show that the Hebrew word that is translated “devils” in Deuteronomy 32:17 is the word “Shed” Brown Driver Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon also states that the Hebrew word “Shed” comes from the Assyrian word “Shedu” meaning a protective spirit of bull colossus. SA’IYR In Greek mythology, satyrs are a troop of half-man, half-goat male companions of Pan and Dionysus. "Satyresses" (female Satyrs) were a late invention of poets that roamed the woods and mountains. In both instances they are associated with music and dancing especially pipe-playing. In Greek culture Satyrs were known to come after woman for purpose of sex. In many versions of the Bible, Isaiah 13:21 and 34:14, the English word "satyr" is used to represent the Hebrew se'irim, "hairy ones," from "sa'ir" or "goat". “But wild beasts of the desert shall lie there; and their houses shall be full of doleful creatures; and owls shall dwell there, and satyrs shall dance there.” Isaiah 13:21 “The wild beasts of the desert shall also meet with the wild beasts of the island, and the satyr shall cry to his fellow; the screech owl also shall rest there, and find for herself a place of rest.” Isaiah 34:14
The word Sa’iyr comes from Sa ar ad means “fear”, “to shiver” or to be “horribly afraid of”.
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There is also an allusion to the practice of sacrificing to the se'irim in Leviticus 17:7 which is translated as “devils” in the Kings James Version or “goat idols” or “goat demons” in other bible translations. However the same version also suggests that people went after Satyrs and prostituted themselves after them which could be interpreted as actual physical sexual intercourse with these creatures. “So they shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices to goat demons, after whom they whore. This shall be a statute forever for them throughout their generations.” Leviticus 17:7 (English Standard Version)
In the apocrypha the book of Jasher tells us about an encounter that Esau's grandson Zepho (Genesis 36:15; Jasher 36:23) had with a Centaur, or perhaps a Satyr, when one of his oxen went astray, saying: "And Zepho went and he saw and behold there was a large cave at the bottom of the mountain, and there was a great stone there at the entrance of the cave, and Zepho split the stone and he came into the cave and he looked and behold, a large animal was devouring the ox; from the middle upward it resembled a man, and from the middle downward it resembled an animal, and Zepho rose up against the animal and slew it with his sword" (Jasher 61:15).
Although the book of Jasher has not been accepted as inspired, it still is clearly part of a collection of books which have known to offer great insights into the traditions, customs and beliefs of the old testament times. The books are collectively known as the apocrypha. There can be an opposing argument as to whether the references in the Bible are speaking of physical beings that are alive or simply objects of wood and gold that were worshipped as gods part of idolatrous practices during old testament times. However using this case against Isaiah’s mention of Satyrs is extremely weak because in the same verses Isaiah makes references to wild beasts and owls so it is clear that Isaiah saw the Satyr as an actual living being. One of the closing statements to make about this is in regards to the fact that the people who were involved in translating the Bible from Hebrew would have already had their own predefined bias on certain topics. This is why in some versions of the Bible, they have translated the original Hebrew to mean goat rather than satyr, since satyr being closely associated with greek mythology, would have created a paradox for translators. Translators would want to ensure they did not cause controversy by referencing mythological creatures as being real. However other bible translations that try to stay true to the original Hebrew have ensured that Satyr remained in the translation. Additionally the reference in Deuteronomy 32:17 of “devils” and “new gods coming up” clearly suggest tangible beings rather than just replica’s or objects of wood, stone or gold, if we allow a natural interpretation of the passage.
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3. HOW DID THESE HYBRIDS COME ABOUT? When the Lord Jesus was describing the “end of days,” the time just prior to His Second Coming, He drew a direct connection back to the days of Noah: the time just before the Great Flood. He mentioned that the people were involved with eating, drinking and marrying right up until the flood came. They were totally unaware of the coming judgment. At first glance, there does not seem to be anything unusual about eating and drinking until all the Scriptures are studied about the time of Noah rather than just this passage in isolation. The big picture shows this time period was full of violence and rebellion against God. It was also a time of intense sexual immorality as women were having sexual relations with spiritual beings identified as the “sons of God.” GENESIS 6:1 Now it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born to them, that the sons of God saw the daughters of men, that they were beautiful; and they took wives for themselves of all whom they chose. And the LORD said, "My Spirit shall not strive with man forever, for he is indeed flesh; yet his days shall be one hundred and twenty years."There were giants on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of men and they bore children to them. Those were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown. (NKJV)
The belief is that "the sons of God" were fallen angels who consorted with human women, producing giant offspring called nephilim (Heb. )נפליםis a view of antiquity that was widely held in the world of the first century, and was supported by Flavius Josephus, Philo, Eusebius and many of the "Ante-Nicene Fathers," including Justin Martyr, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Tertullian, Irenaeus, Athenagoras, Commodianus and even the Jewish historian Flavius Josephus. Other references in the old testament to the “sons of God” have always been in reference to angels when one allows a natural interpretation of the passages without any preconceived bias. Job 1:6, Job 38:7 and Psalms 29:1. It is always Genesis 6:1 that causes controversy because of what the Sons of God did.
The underlying Greek text indicates that the fallen angels left their own domain and indulged in sexual immorality, going after "strange," or "other" flesh. The King James Version translators of the original
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Hebrew obscure this fact, probably because the view that the fallen angels were "the sons of God" was not an accepted view when the Bible was translated in 1611. However, some translations do more clearly show the meaning of this passage. The New English Bible better presents what Jude was saying: JUDE 6 “Remember too the angels, how some of them were not content to keep the dominion given to them but abandoned their proper home; and God has reserved them for judgement on the great Day, bound beneath the darkness in everlasting chains. 7 Remember Sodom and Gomorrah and the neighbouring towns; like the angels, they committed fornication and followed unnatural lusts; and they paid the penalty in eternal fire, an example for all to see.” (NEB)
It's clear that Jude wrote of the fornication of the angels as a fact. In verse 7 of his epistle, he compares the sexual wickedness in Sodom, Gomorrah, and the surrounding cities to the sin of the angels. The nature of the angels' fall is also clearly stated in Jude 6, where it is said that they left their own "abode" (Gr. oiketerion). This word occurs in the New Testament only here and in II Corinthians 5:2, where it is used of a change of state from one dimensional form to another. The Kings James Version application of “taking of wives” also seems to indicate it was as if the Sons of God were lured by their attraction for the female race but the bible translations do not really convey the real agenda of these beings that came down. Fallen angels have no love for the human race and absolutely despise what God created including female. The whole intention of coming down and interbreeding with humans was totally for the purpose of attempting to corrupt the gene pool and possibly prevent the coming of the promise of a messiah and it needed interaction with women to do this. This combination of violence and sexual immorality grieved the heart of God. The wickedness of man filled the earth. Man’s thoughts and imaginations were continually evil, and this triggered God’s judgment on mankind. Mankind was so corrupted that God deemed it necessary to destroy man and start over again with Noah and his family. Genesis 6:5-7 “And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And it repented the LORD that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart. And the LORD said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth”
The effect of man’s sexual immorality was staggering since it altered the race. The offspring of this union between human females and the fallen angelic beings were physical giants. These children were not fully human. They grew enormous in stature with great intellects and were called “men of renown.” This cohabitation between humans and the spiritual beings was not isolated to a few individuals but became widespread throughout the earth and led to the creation of super humans called giants or nephilim. Genesis 6:4 “There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown.”
The idea that the nephilim or giants were the offspring of the fallen host and human females was not unique to Judaism. This understanding was likely behind the Greek, Roman, and Egyptian mythologies, MORE THAN HUMAN A PRODUCTION OF REMA MARKETING AND WWW.GLOBALREPORT2010.COM ©2012, All rights reserved
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as well as those of India and the near east. All these beliefs resulted not as mere inventions of fertile human imagination, but as a corruption of antediluvian truths which were distorted as their origin was forgotten over time. Take, for example, the legend of the Titans. In Greek mythology, the Titans were a family of giant gods who were the offspring of Uranus (heaven) and Gaea (earth). The most famous of the Titans was Cronus, who killed his father. Cronus later led the Titans in their losing war against Zeus and the Olympian gods. After their defeat, the Titans were imprisoned in a section of the underworld called Tartarus.
In his second epistle, the apostle Peter uses part of this Greek myth to explain the fate of some of the fallen angels. He states that for their sins, these angels had been consigned to tartarosas, which The NKJV Greek English Interlinear New Testament translates literally as "confining them to Tartarus" (also known in the Bible as "the Abyss"). II PETER 2:4 “For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but cast them down to hell [tartarosas] and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved for judgment;” (NKJV)
This is the same Tartarus where Greek mythology says the Titans were imprisoned. It's highly unlikely that Peter would have used such an analogy if this pagan legend wasn't based on at least some grain of truth which his readers would have knowledge of. The idea that evil angels mated with human women and had offspring (the nephilim) appears far-fetched to us in this modern era, but it seems to have been widely accepted as fact in the ancient world. This cohabitation was part of the reason God’s heart was grieved with mankind and triggered the flood as judgment to wipe out this corrupted race of humans. In modern science, the biologists would identify what happened to mankind as altering the human DNA. The DNA of man was changed by this union and some men were no longer fully men. They were a hybrid. The Bible describes God’s selection of Noah in order to preserve mankind. Noah qualified because he was “perfect” in his generation. This does not mean he was a morally perfect human, but that he was genetically perfect in his lineage. He had perfect human DNA and was not corrupted by the sons of God. Genesis 6:9 “These are the generations of Noah: Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God.”
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However what is also of great significance is that some form of bestiality was involved whether it was angels having sexual relationships with animals or humans having sexual relationships with animals. Regarding this strange corruption, the book of Jubilees echoes the passage from Genesis but gives no doubt that when God said “all flesh” was corrupted it was applicable to both the human race and animal kingdom. Whether this applies to the sea world is of debate, "And lawlessness increased on the earth and all flesh corrupted its way, alike men and cattle and beasts and birds and everything that walketh on the earth - all of them corrupted their ways and their orders, and they began to devour each other, and lawlessness increased on the earth and every imagination of the thoughts of men (was) thus evil continually. And God looked upon the earth, and behold it was corrupt, and all flesh had corrupted its orders, and all that were upon the earth had wrought all manner of evil before His eyes" (Jubilees 5:2-3)
Could this explain how the Satyr and the Shedu appeared on the earth because clearly these were not beings whose lineage was from the animal kingdom in the Garden of Eden. The Genesis account and the books of Enoch and Jubilees state that the corruption that God saw was not just the result of angelic beings trying to corrupt the human DNA pool but also the result of humans. But there is an interesting reference in the book of Enoch which suggests humans were significantly influenced by the fallen angels. I Enoch 10:8 states concerning the chief of the fallen angels, “The whole earth has been corrupted through the works that were taught by Azazel: to him ascribe all sin.”
This indicates that a huge influence behind the heights of man’s depravity at this time was due to the corruption that was taught by the fallen angels which had come down specifically with the purpose to wreak havoc, chaos and corruption on the earth. Ultimately what is presented to us from the Old Testament is confirmation that there was a genetic alteration of both animal and human DNA which was repugnant to the Almighty God. One final consideration is what happened to the nephilim when they died. In part 1 we spent some time focusing on the nature of man in that when the body dies the spirit then either goes to paradise or hades depending on the eternal destination of the individual. However what happened when the nephilim died? Were the nephilim dualistic in that they were human in body but non human in spirit or were they tripartite in that they were human in body, human in spirit but then also had a non human (passed down from the fallen angel) spirit somehow mingling within this unholy union? Some are of the school of thought that when the nephilim died that the spirit that departed from the body is what we would call today “demons”. These are beings that are distinct from fallen angels. Could this explain why in the New Testament there are many incidences where demons always seemed to be inhabiting the physical bodies of people as their dwelling place because they are tormented existing just as a spirit.
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For instance there is an interesting episode in the Bible in Luke 8:31 where Jesus cast a group of demons called Legion out of a man. The demons actually beg Jesus not to send them to the deep and instead ask Jesus if he can send them into the pigs herding near by. “And they besought him that he would not command them to go out into the deep” Luke 8:31
What is of interest here is that the greek behind the word “deep” in Luke is “abysson” which means in English the “abyss”. Other bible translations translate it directly as “abyss” or the “bottomless pit”. If we go to Revelation 9 we can clearly see that the bottomless pit is some spiritual area of containment and also that what comes out of the bottomless pit after it is opened is non human. Ultimately the pigs end up running violently down a hill and drowning in the sea meaning that the demons ended up again existing without inhabitation.
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4. FAST FORWARD TO 2012 Man’s increase in scientific knowledge reached a point that starting in 1990 was a concerted effort to map the human genome. The United States led this project with assistance from other nations. This was an enormous task as the genome has 25,000 genes with 3.1 billion DNA pairs. The project was completed in 2003.
Immediately while this mapping was taking place, the manipulation of the DNA began. This manipulation included splicing DNA together from two females to create a multiple parent egg, and splicing human DNA into other animals such as mice and pigs. Animals such as sheep were cloned, but to this day there is no known case of a human being cloned except for a controversial case we will examine later on. Since 2003 there has been a tremendous acceleration in tampering with man’s DNA. It seems that scientists are now on a regular basis making discoveries about DNA. Never before in history did man have the knowledge to break the genetic code. Man now has such knowledge and is developing the technology to alter his DNA. This is once again setting the stage for corrupting the human race. We are now living in “As the days of Noah were”. Some believe that scientists tamper with man’s DNA under the guise of increasing health by identifying genetic diseases and imperfections. By using this argument, the scientists are virtually insulated from criticism and control. They have a free hand to tamper with the human DNA as long as it is tied to health. With this freedom, the geneticists will move to create babies free of any genetic flaw. In 2006 Great Britain opened what is called “Designer Baby Clinics.” In these clinics, an eight day old embryo was examined for over 200 inherited diseases. A “defective embryo” was destroyed while the accepted one was used for invitro fertilization. The following is a quote from an article about the use of two female monkey eggs to produce an offspring. With this type of argument it is impossible to stop the manipulation of man’s DNA: “The prospect of a human baby with three biological parents has moved closer after scientists created monkeys using a technique that one day could stop children from inheriting severe genetic disease … It should allow scientists to replace faulty “cellular batteries” called mitochondria, which affect about 1 in 6,500 births. While most
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mitochondria defects have mild effects, some can trigger severe brain, heart, muscle and liver conditions, as well as cancer, diabetes, blindness and deafness.”
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The natural progression is to enhance the human race by sharpening the senses. If the DNA is now understood and can be manipulated, why not increase the eyesight and hearing? With the addition of eagle DNA man could see like an eagle. By placing deer DNA, man could hear like a deer. The same enhancement could be accomplished for smell. For strength the introduction of gorilla DNA could give super strength, and for speed how about ostrich DNA or for the ability to see into a different spectrum and have supernatural vision introduce DNA from cats and dogs. Evolution also plays into the tampering of human DNA. The theory of evolution frees man from Genesis 1 which states that everything is to reproduce after its kind. Evolution also detaches man from his Creator and being created in God’s image and likeness. Man is now a free agent to tamper with his DNA under the guise of advancing evolution. The evolutionists believe they are rapidly advancing evolution by manipulating the DNA. Many scientists believe they are enhancing evolution by improving man. Because, through evolution, man has no fear of God and thus no restraints on tampering with DNA, any attempts to stop this tampering will be met with cries from the scientists. Unless there is a general public outcry, this tampering will continue until man’s DNA is altered and merged with animals. The following is a quote from an article which states: “… humanity is on the verge of becoming a new and utterly unique species, which he dubs Homo Evolutis. What makes this species so unique is that it "takes direct and deliberate control over the evolution of the species." Calling it the "ultimate reboot," he points to the conflux of DNA manipulation and therapy, tissue generation, and robotics as making this great leap possible...The day may come when we are able to take the best biology of the known animal kingdom and make it part of our own. This isn't just about being a bit stronger, or having perfect eyesight our whole lives. All of our organs and limbs have weaknesses that can be addressed, and there are also opportunities to go beyond basic fixes and perform more elaborate enhancements.”
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There is a basic law of life that God instituted at the very beginning. Genesis 1:24 “And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so.”
The mixing of DNA from two different species violates this law. When God created man, He stated that man was made in His image and likeness. The human DNA is what physically carries this image and likeness. The addition of animal DNA means that man is no longer in God’s image. It is extremely serious to tamper with the integrity of man as transmitted through his DNA. This is, in part, what triggered the flood in Noah’s day. All of the hybrid humans were destroyed during the flood, and God then started over with Noah. Genesis 1:26, 27 “And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness … So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.”
When God moved to redeem mankind through the Lord Jesus, the Bible specially states that He rejected the nature of the angels, but took on Him the seed of Abraham. The Greek word for seed is very interesting; it is sperma, which is the basis for the English word sperm. Sperm is what carries the male DNA. The Lord Jesus had a human body which had pure DNA that could be traced back to Abraham,
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then to Noah and finally to Adam. His DNA was 100 percent human, and thus when He shed His blood on the cross for sin, He could redeem mankind! Hebrews 2:14,16 “Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil ...For verily he took not on him the nature of angels; but he took on him the seed of Abraham.”
Mankind is racing towards altering his nature. Paralleling tampering with DNA is the merging of man with robotic technology. The merging of man with machines is called Singularity Both Singularity and DNA tampering are on the threshold of altering what it means to be human. This is coming so fast, yet so few outside of the scientific circles are aware of this. God is fully aware of what is happening. He will only let the tampering with man’s DNA go so far, and then he will step in to stop it. It is clear that modern man, led by the geneticists, is right at the very point when God will intervene to stop this madness.
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5. HOLLYWOODS DEPICTION OF THE FUTURE The Island of Dr. Moreau is a 1996 science fiction horror film, the third major movie version of the H. G. Wells novel about a scientist who attempts to convert animals into people. In the year 2010, Dr. Moreau claims to have successfully conquered the impossible: to introduce human DNA into animals, eliminating their baser instincts and thereby creating a supposedly divine human, free from malice and hatred. After many attempts, only one experiment was successful and now the unsuccessful ones are given drugs every day to keep them from regressing into their animal forms. They are also controlled with electrical shock devices to keep them in order.
However, one of the creatures tears the shock device from his body and when he informs others of this, the animal hybrids break loose on the island. One of Dr. Moreau's allies is Dr. Montgomery, a physician gone mad with devotion to Moreau and intense drug abuse. United Nations negotiator Edward Douglas, the sole survivor of an airplane crash, is brought ashore on Moreau's island, against his better judgment, by Dr. Montgomery, and eventually becomes his prisoner. Horrified by the doctor's monstrous experiments and fearing for his own life, Douglas seeks the help of Moreau's lovely daughter, Aissa, in escaping the island, but is foiled at every turn by Dr. Montgomery and his man-beast lackeys. Another movie of interest is “The Island” a 2005 American science fiction/thriller film directed by Michael Bay, starring Ewan McGregor and Scarlett Johansson. It was released on July 22, 2005, in the United States, and was nominated for three awards, including the Teen Choice Award. In the year 2019, Lincoln Six Echo and Jordan Two Delta live in an isolated compound. The closed community is governed by a set of strict rules. The residents believe that the outer world has become too contaminated for human life with the exception of the titular island. Every week a "lottery" is conducted and the winner gets to go to the island. Lincoln however begins to have some problems and doubts which lead him to discover a sinister truth. MORE THAN HUMAN A PRODUCTION OF REMA MARKETING AND WWW.GLOBALREPORT2010.COM ©2012, All rights reserved
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Lincoln starts having dreams, with memories that he knows are not real. Dr. Merrick, the founder of Merrick Biotech and the person running the compound, is disturbed and inserts probes into Lincoln's body to monitor his cerebral activities and to record what he sees for 24 hours. While secretly visiting a power-plant basement where his friend James McCord (a technician) works, Lincoln discovers a live moth in a ventilation shaft, leading him to deduce that the outside world is not contaminated. Lincoln follows the moth to another section, where he discovers that the "lottery" is actually a guise to kill the "winners" for organ harvesting, surrogate motherhood or other purposes. The organs or babies are given to sponsors, whose faces (and even DNA composition) match with the winners.
Merrick discovers that Lincoln has learnt the truth, forcing Lincoln to escape. In the meanwhile, Jordan has been selected for the island. Lincoln escapes the facility along with Jordan, where they emerge in a Arizona desert. He explains the truth to her, and they realize that all the residents are clones of wealthy and/or desperate sponsors. Merrick's technology evolves the clones directly into adults, while keeping them ignorant or unable to cope with real world. Here, Merrick makes sales to more sponsors before the word gets out. He hires French mercenary Albert Laurent, admitting that the organs of unconscious clones inevitably fail, making them useless. Thus, he needs the clones conscious in the compound. Lincoln and Jordan find McCord in a bar. McCord gives them the name of Lincoln's sponsor in Los Angeles, and helps them to the Yucca railway station, before being killed by the mercenaries. Jordan's sponsor, model Sarah Jordan, is in a coma because of a car accident. Lincoln's sponsor, Tom Lincoln, explains some of the situation, whereby Lincoln realizes that he has gained some of Tom's memories. Tom agrees to help expose the truth about the organ harvesting, but secretly informs Merrick about the situation by telephone. Merrick sends the mercenaries to the location, but Lincoln tricks Laurent into killing Tom, allowing him to assume Tom's identity. Merrick decides to take action to avoid a similar incident from happening. He decides to eliminate the four newest generations of clones as they all seem to be affected by the same cloning defect. Lincoln and Jordan plan to liberate their fellow clones. Posing as Tom, Lincoln returns to the compound in order to destroy the holographic projectors that hide the outside world from the clones. With help from Laurent, who has moral qualms about the treatment given to the clones, Merrick is killed and the clones are freed. The film ends with the clones seeing the outside world for the first time. One can also see that Jordan
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and Lincoln have developed their very own personalities. In the final scene they were riding on a boat happily. Science fiction authors sometimes use the term parahuman to refer to distinct "races" of human-like creatures created through genetic engineering. A parahuman created starting from a nonhuman-animal template could be considered a biological uplift, as in the works of David Brin, while a parahuman based more closely on the human form and genome might also be called posthuman or transhuman. The roleplaying game Transhuman Space and the related book "GURPS Bio-Tech" use the term parahuman interchangeably with variant human to refer to a wide array of heavily modified racial templates. These range from a "Gilgamesh-Series" resembling normal humans but with increased lifespan; a "LepusSeries" resembling anthropomorphic rabbits; to a "Tek Rat" described as a mix of human, raccoon, and possum. The television series Dark Angel featured a group of parahumans (referred to in the series as "transgenics") with animal DNA selected to enhance their abilities to serve as supersoldiers. In Chapterhouse: Dune, by Frank Herbert, there is a species called Futar; they are a genetically engineered human/feline hybrid trained to kill the Honored Matres. The TV miniseries First Born dealt with the subject of a geneticist, portrayed by Charles Dance, who created a human-gorilla hybrid. John Scalzi's Old Man's war Series also includes parahumans, where elderly "soldiers" are mentally transferred into a forcegrown body that, though humanoid, has animal characteristics to help it be a better soldier. In Will Self's novel The Book of Dave, set partly in the present day and partly in a post-apocalyptic far future, pig-like parahuman creatures called "motos" feature strongly in the futuristic chapters. It is implied that they are descendants of hybrids created in a genetic laboratory operating in modern-day London. Octavia Butler, in her novel Clay's Ark, has written about an alien disease that causes the children of infected people to be born as quadrupeds with superhuman reflexes. Her later trilogy Xenogenesis explores the topic of human-alien sexuality and cross-breeding. Parahumans are a useful tool for the science fiction writer, because they offer ways to explore issues of personhood, racism, alienation, religion, and freedom, and to make more plausible the colonization of exotic environments, such as the ocean or planets with non-Earthlike properties. During the Golden Age of Science Fiction, Cordwainer Smith's parahuman underpeople (humans derived from animal stock) were an important part of his Instrumentality stories. More recently, Caitlín R. Kiernan, who has described herself as a parahumanist, has explored the subject of parahumans in a number of science fiction stories, including The Dry Salvages, "Riding the White Bull", and "Faces in Revolving Souls". John Crowley, in his novel Beasts, centered his plot around lion-human hybrids, with a lone fox-human hybrid acting as a kingmaker. H. P. Lovecraft's short story Facts Concerning the Late Arthur Jermyn and His Family involves the repercussions of the mating of a white explorer and a white she-ape and their having offspring. Humor authors such as Lewis Carroll in English and Sukumar Ray in Bengali have had parahuman characters in their writings. More recently, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Maximum Ride, Fullmetal Alchemist, and Blue Submarine No.6 are themed around human-animal hybrids.
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If there was ever a movie which highlighted the grave fears about the way that Genetic engineering is going it is a move released in 2009 called Splice. Centaurs, minotaurs, nymphs, fawns, are all familiar images from Greek mythology, but was it just mythos? Were these so-called fictious creatures in fact the by product of genetic engineering from the sumerian era and days of Noah which then became the basis of myths handed down from generation to generation about fully formed chimera’s. Clive Nicoli (Adrien Brody) and Elsa Kast (Sarah Polley) are two brilliant scientists who are developing genesplicing technology to create new species. They have just put the finishing touches on their newest creature, “Fred”, a large dog-sized wormlike creature that produces proteins beneficial in growing crops. Clive and Elsa bring Fred to meet his companion, Ginger, a female version of this new species. The two instantly get along well and start imprinting (weird tendrils come out and start circling one another). Elsa and Clive are pleased that the two are getting along so well. Barlow (David Hewlett) is excited about the development of the proteins and takes the pair to meet with the head of Newstead Inc, Joan Chorot (Simona Maicanescu). Joan tells the pair that their splicing laboratory will be converted into a protein observation lab so that they can identify and synthesize the gene developing the growth protein in Fred and Ginger. Elsa and Clive immediately object; they had planned to incorporate human DNA into the splicing procedure in order to start work on curing numerous genetic disorders. Barlow makes it clear that the company doesn’t have a choice: They need profits to offset the cost of the splicing technology and the protein is the only way to do that. Joan tells them that in five years, they should be able to start testing with human genes. Elsa and Clive go back to the lab and immediately start testing to see if they can produce a viable hybrid with human DNA. They try numerous iterations, but get frustrated with each failed attempt. Clive gets lucky and accidentally finds the best fit when Elsa gives him a new genetic sample from a Jane Doe. They produce some genetic material and put it on ice, so that they will have a starting point in 5 years time. On the way to storage, Elsa hijacks the material and takes it to the fertilization portion of the lab, changing the password to the room so that Clive won’t be able to interfere. He reminds her that they could go to jail for what she’s doing but Elsa insists that they won’t carry the fetus to term, just see if it can sustain growth. Clive debates aborting the fertilization, but decides against it at the last minute, allowing Elsa to have her experiment. Clive and Elsa relegate most of their work onto their team, headed up by Clive’s brother, Gavin. Instead of synthesizing the protein, they spend their time studying the splice fetus as it develops at an astonishing rate. They go home to their apartment after work. Elsa shows Clive an apartment she wants to get, but Clive says he doesn’t feel like moving around after, since it’s not big enough for a child. Elsa says she doesn’t want to accommodate a third party who doesn’t even exist. They curl up and prepare to go to bed, but Clive’s phone goes off: The fetus in the lab is past maturity and trying to leave the artificial womb.
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The couple arrives at the laboratory and sees the machinery leaking. Elsa puts her hand inside of the artificial womb in order to pull the specimen out but the specimen bites her and doesn’t let go of her hand. Clive breaks the container and cuts the artificial womb with a surgical scalpel. He stabs the specimen and it falls onto the floor. Clive puts a plastic container over it to keep it from moving and goes to treat Elsa’s wounds.
After bandaging Elsa’s arm, the two go to examine the specimen but it doesn’t move. Clive and Elsa think that it’s dead, so Clive leaves the room to get a scalpel to perform an autopsy. Elsa examines the specimen’s corpse, but discovers that it is merely a shell: The specimen has evolved into something new and escaped the containment box. Elsa sees the weird new creature walking around like a chicken, but crashing into everything. Clive wants to gas the room and kill it, but Elsa removes her mask so that the specimen can live. Over the next few days, the pair examines the creature. They take X-rays of its body and study its habits to determine what it eats and how it develops. It goes from having no arms and a thin torso to developing into a child like humanoid stage, with 4 fingers, weird legs and a tail that has a sharp blade shoot out of it. This short overview of the movie is a context for a wider argument about the direction that human genetics is now moving in. What if you saw a hybrid like the one pictured above? How would you react. Would you shun it? Would you embrace it? The big question that films like Splice raise, is that it explores what is human? What is the soul? Where does it reside?
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6. THE FRANKENSTEIN MODEL The novel” and the concept of cloning have a lot in common. In reading the novel “Frankenstein,” and taking a look at cloning, one can see how much the two topics have in common. Several controversial issues come up. What is life? What defines a person? Does the idea of being your own creator literally appeal to cloning and Frankenstein’s monster? Cloning does bring up a lot of questions. On a site titled Frankenstein for Cloning Tech. it says, “This is controversial because many see this as a wrong in the human society. Much like Victor saw his creation as a devastative plague on the people of his time.”
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In general, cloning is the modern Frankenstein, just like Frankenstein is the modern Prometheus. Prometheus stole fire from the gods. He took something that did not belong to the humans and gave it to them. He was punished. In the same way, Frankenstein let his ambition overpower him. He took from God what was not his and created a monster. Cloning also creates something that was not given to humanity. The possibility of human cloning was raised when Scottish scientists at Roslin Institute created a sheep, "Dolly," in 1997. There are different types of cloning technologies including recombinant DNA technology or DNA cloning, reproductive cloning, and therapeutic cloning. “In the not too distant future it is envisaged that we will be able to replicate a person's body, mind and memories.”
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According to dictionary.com, the definition of a clone or cloning is to make multiple identical copies of (a DNA sequence); to create or propagate (an organism) from a clone cell; to reproduce or propagate asexually. The process of cloning uses “one cell and the ovum of another creature of the same species to produce an ‘embryo’. This is then implanted into 6 the womb of a mother resulting in a ‘clone,’ or an exact replica.”
The most common method of cloning is Reproductive Cloning. “Reproductive cloning is a technology used to generate an animal that has the same nuclear DNA as another currently or previously existing animal…. In a process called ‘somatic cell nuclear transfer,’ scientists transfer genetic material from the nucleus of a donor adult cell to an egg whose nucleus, and thus its genetic material, has been removed. The reconstructed egg containing the DNA from a donor cell must be treated with chemicals or electric current in order to stimulate cell division. Once the cloned embryo reaches a suitable stage, it is transferred 8 to the uterus of a female host where it continues to develop until birth.”
Because cloning involves the creation of man by man, it is especially controversial in the church. What exactly does the Bible say about cloning? Before this question can be answered, we must look at the idea of creation and how it is used in cloning and the in the story of Frankenstein. Frankenstein strives to do what no one has ever done before; he thirsts for knowledge and finds his comfort in books and scientific theories. (Shelley, Chapter 2, Paragraph 11). As he becomes more knowledgeable, he learns how to control life. He learns the intricacies of the human body, and begins to assemble a new being. (Shelley, Chapter 4, Paragraphs 2-3, 9). Once assembled, the being, or rather monster, is brought to life. (Shelley, Chapter 5, Paragraphs 1-3). Frankenstein, himself, becomes the creator, thus denying God, but leaves the creature to live on its own without family, friends, or loved ones. (Shelley, Chapter 5, Paragraphs 3-4, Chapter 15, Paragraph 9).
The parallel between this and cloning is evident. Modern Scientists continue to advance in knowledge. They strive to discover the secrets of the universe. By doing this, they wish to become all-knowing and thus take the place of God. Even so, there is no originality in cloning. Scientists just use their knowledge MORE THAN HUMAN A PRODUCTION OF REMA MARKETING AND WWW.GLOBALREPORT2010.COM ©2012, All rights reserved
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of what already is to recreate and imitate. Why do most Christians believe this is wrong? First off, God is the creator, not us. We cannot take His place. Cloning gives man the ability to create as a god, when he really is the created. Biblically, this can be compared to when sin first entered the world (Genesis 3:1-7). God said not to eat of the fruit of the one tree set out as forbidden. The serpent tempted Eve and told her that it would make her as great as God, so she disobeyed. However, no one can be as great as God. Adam and Eve were punished for their sins. They desired to be God, but there is only one God. “It seems that we shall be like God on the day we head (the) direction (of cloning). It appears that it will make us wise and be good for us. But this is an illusion born of strong temptation. In fact it will leave us naked and desolate 7 and under the judgment of God”
Another case in the Bible this can be compared to is the Tower of Babel (Genesis 11:1-9). Just like science has a desire for self-exaltation and a want to go above the limits that have been set out for us, cloning sets itself high and wishes to rise above God. Yes, man may be creating and trying to take God’s place, but what exactly gives creation its definition? When something is created by man, what does it mean for the creation? Dictionary.com defines create as to cause to exist; bring into being, give rise to, and produce through artistic or imaginative effort. If God created everything out of nothing in the beginning (Genesis 1:1), he must have been pretty imaginative. Frankenstein’s monster had all parts and feelings of being human, but was not born out of a woman’s womb and was not sexually produced. He was created not in God’s image, but in Victor’s image. He was not accepted because of his appearance. God accepts everyone, no matter what they look like, but is this what happens always with things God considers unacceptable?
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THE EARLY WARNING SIGNS "Everything has both intended & unintended consequences, & the intended consequences may or may not happen, 9 but the unintended consequences always do." Dee Hock, former CEO of VISA International
In 1988, Showa Denko, a Japanese pharmaceutical company, shipped the first batch of genetically engineered L-Tryptophan to the United States. L-Tryptophan is an amino acid, normally contained in all of our cells. Naturally-derived L-Tryptophan had been sold over the counter for decades to thousands, perhaps millions, of people to relieve symptoms of insomnia or depression. There had never been reports of any ill effects. The genetically engineered L-Tryptophan killed 37 Americans, more than 5,000 others came down with a hitherto unheard of disease called Eosinophilia Myalgia Syndrome, and many were permanently injured. Showa Denko's attorney admitted in federal court that it was most likely that the genetic engineering had caused the calamity. Just prior to the trial, Showa Denko destroyed the original batches of bacteria from which the L-Tryptophan had been extracted. Showa Denko was clearly at fault, but because the bacteria were no longer available for analysis, it could never be definitively proven that it was specifically the genetic engineering that did it. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) declared that it was not the genetic engineering that was at fault, and the deaths and injuries were probably due to some manufacturing error. Instead of banning only the genetically engineered variety, they banned all over-the-counter sales of L-Tryptophan.
When Watson and Crick unlocked the secret of DNA in 1956, they fundamentally changed our world. They enabled scientists to understand many of the basic properties of inheritance. This was followed by the introduction of techniques enabling scientists to manipulate those processes in order to alter living organisms in ways that had never before been possible. In rapid succession, scientists deciphered the code found in the sequence of molecules along the long DNA chain, and discovered that DNA produced a similar molecule called RNA, which in turn produced proteins. Some kinds of proteins make up most of our cell structures, while others function as enzymes, controlling essential bodily processes. This new field of science is called Genetic Engineering (GE) and the new forms of life produced by it are termed Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs). They are brought to you by modern wizards called Molecular Biologists. Molecular Biologists have been able to decipher the genetic code laid out in the linear sequence of genes and identify many of their functions. They can snip them out of the chains of DNA and insert them in the cells of other organisms. Farmers, animal husbandmen, and scientists have been breeding animals and plants for thousands of years in order to produce new combinations of characteristics. MORE THAN HUMAN A PRODUCTION OF REMA MARKETING AND WWW.GLOBALREPORT2010.COM ©2012, All rights reserved
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However, up until now, these characteristics had always been ones that had preexisted in some members of the same species. Through eons of evolution, living organisms accumulated combinations and sequences of genes that for the most part work together harmoniously. However, the techniques of Molecular Biology shorten the time dimension and leapfrog the species barrier. For example, it is now possible to take the "antifreeze" gene from Flounders, a cold-water species of fish, and insert it into the genome (total array of genes in an organism) of a potato! This enables GE potatoes to survive periods of frost, and to extend their growing seasons. Thus, scientists can now combine genes that had never before been in the same organism. The wonderful potentialities of this science have been emphasized for years by molecular biologists, the medical establishment, agribusiness, and government itself. They tell us that they will be able to cure humanity's illnesses, produce wonder drugs grown in genetically-altered animals, grow made-to-order organs for transplantation, feed the starving millions of mankind, etc. However, none of these institutions talk about the dark side.
In 1992 the FDA issued a ruling, stating that genetically engineered foods are "substantially" like natural foods, and therefore do not need to be regulated. This has come to be known as the "Substantial Equivalence" rule. The significance of this ruling was that the food industry would not have to perform safety studies and clinical tests on GMOs, such as are required before new drugs come onto the market. The ruling also removed much of the oversight that the FDA would exercise on drugs after they reached the market. The Federal Government could thus argue, and subsequently did, that because these GE foods are just like regular foods, there is of course no need to label them in order to distinguish them from other, non-GE foods. European countries, on the contrary, have adopted a different approach to the marketing of GMOs. They have put the onus of proving the safety of these foods on the manufacturers, by invoking what is called the "Precautionary Principle". This states, in part, that "When an activity raises threats of harm to human health, or the environment, precautionary measures should be taken even if some cause and effect relationships are not fully established scientifically. In this context, the 10 proponent of an activity, rather than the public, should bear the burden of proof."
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Due mostly to these fundamentally different approaches, the United States and the European Union are locked in a struggle, and when previously in power the Bush administration had recently appealed to the World Trade Organization to issue substantial fines on European countries which did not allow importation and sale of GMO food from the US. It has been repeatedly stated by both government and food industry spokesmen that there have been no documented cases of someone being harmed by GE food. In light of these claims, an interesting incident occurred in 1996. Pioneer Hybrid, then the largest seed company in the world, wanted to make an improved soybean. Soybeans lack some of the 21 Essential Amino Acids (EAA) that human beings and most other animals need for life, but cannot produce on their own. Most of us get our EAAs from meat. Vegans, however, must carefully balance the types of plants they eat in order to make sure that they get all 21 EAAs in their diet. Pioneer extracted a gene from Brazil nuts in order to increase the soybean's production of another amino acid, Methionine. They then gene-spliced it into their soybeans in an effort to improve their nutritional value, and hopefully the company's profitability. Just before this GE soybean was scheduled to go on the market, it came to the attention of some University of Nebraska scientists. By a stroke of good luck, they just happened to have some blood sera from people who were allergic to Brazil Nuts, and they decided to test these beans on it. They got a strong allergic reaction. Quite a few people are allergic to Brazil nuts, and eating these soybeans might have killed many of them. Obviously, something else besides the gene for the amino acid had been transferred into the soybeans.
When genes are to be introduced into host cells, they do not come alone. After the donor DNA has been cut into many pieces, it is then inserted into bacterial plasmids (circular bacterial DNA), and in this form, the genes can be duplicated to any number necessary. Then, they must overcome the host cell's defenses against invasion of foreign DNA. This is usually accomplished by attaching a "ferry," an infectious virus or bacterium to that gene. The virus or bacterium can penetrate into the cell and insert the gene into the native DNA. A way also has to be found to identify and select those cells in which the new gene has been inserted and to dispose of all cells that do not contain this gene. This is usually done by attaching a so-called MORE THAN HUMAN A PRODUCTION OF REMA MARKETING AND WWW.GLOBALREPORT2010.COM ©2012, All rights reserved
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Antibiotic Resistance Marker (ARM) gene. This ARM confers antibiotic resistance, usually to Streptomycin. Treating the cells with Streptomycin then kills all cells which do not possess the desired inserted gene. Genes do not function all by themselves. Most of them are active during only part of the life of the cell. They may need the assistance of other genes, called Promoters, which “turn on” or activate them. Therefore, a promoter gene, derived from a virus, is also attached. These genes may also bring with them uninvited guests. When genes are snipped out of their original DNA chain, the process is not exact. The chain is cut in various places by enzymes, leaving pieces of, or entire neighboring genes, attached to the gene to be inserted. The properties of these DNA Fragments may not be known and their presence may not even be detected. From this and other evidence, a reasonable person could draw the conclusion that contrary to what the FDA and food industry say, GMOs used as foods are definitely different from regular foods, and need to be tested and labeled to safeguard the health of both ourselves and the rest of the planet. There are several good arguments why GE foods should be labeled. For one, people should have the right to know what is in the food they feed to their families. But even more importantly, if GE foods are not labeled, and something goes wrong, and people get sick and/or die, what could be done to trace the source of the problem? Epidemiologists, those public health officials whose job it is to track down the causes of diseases and other health hazards, would have no way to trace the problem back to the GE foods. One more important point. Agribusiness companies such as Monsanto consistently claim that their GE seeds will increase crop yields with these techniques, thus being able to feed the world's ever-increasing human population and avoid famine and starvation. Unfortunately most of the evidence so far demonstrates that on the contrary, most of them either marginally increase or even decrease yields. One theory of why this occurs is that much of the plant's energy has been diverted from normal growth into perpetually producing the inserted gene's product. A holy grail of molecular biology has been the hope that GE will one day be able to cure inherited diseases by substituting normal genes for the abnormal ones. For the first government-sanctioned attempt at Gene Therapy, children with a hitherto consistently lethal disease were selected. These socalled bubble babies have non-functioning immune systems, and need to be physically isolated from the environment in artificial enclosures. They usually die in early childhood from infections against which they have no defense. A number of clinical trials were begun around the world, in which ostensibly normal genes were inserted into such children. Eleven children were selected for one trial in France. Their physicians were optimistic due to the preliminary results. Most of the children showed improved immune functioning. Then one boy came down with Childhood Leukemia. They assumed that this was an unfortunate coincidence. A few months later a second child developed Childhood Leukemia. Analysis of their DNA showed what had happened. In the first child the Promoter gene accompanying the therapeutic gene had landed square in the middle of an Oncogene called LMO-2, and turned it permanently on. An Oncogene is a gene, probably needed for normal development, which if switched on
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permanently, causes cancer. Analysis of the other child's DNA provoked much more concern. The same Promoter gene landed near the same Oncogene, but not on it. Promoter genes show a gradation of effects, depending how close they are to the gene in question. The closer, the stronger the effect. All gene therapy trials were immediately stopped. The results of this trial are exceptionally chilling. It showed that it matters very much where in the host genome the foreign gene is inserted. The fact is that the scientists have no idea of where the gene is going to land; where, if any, there is a "good" place to land; and no way exists at this time to direct it to such a place. There has been much talk about "targeted gene repair", but so far scientists have been unsuccessful in directing foreign genes to specific sites, and may never be able to do so. Perhaps even more importantly, the question arises as to whether the insertion of the Promoter gene in the Oncogene in one case and near the Oncogene in the other, was a coincidence. Considering the vast amounts of DNA in a cell, and that a human cell is estimated to contain 10 – 30,000 genes, it is very unlikely that this was an accident. Therefore, we are left with the possibility that when foreign genes are inserted into a human cell, their destination may not be random, but directed, but not by us. In these cases, it was directed to an Oncogene, with tragic results. The prospect of worldwide distribution of GMO's is particularly troubling because they differ in several crucial respects from pollution by petrochemicals and radioactive substances. Unlike chemicals, GMOs can replicate themselves, thus producing potentially immense amounts. They can mutate (change) their genetic constitutions, and therefore, their properties. Furthermore they can disperse to other environments, either on their own, or by piggybacking on other organisms by becoming integrated into their DNA. It is quite likely that if some of them prove to have deleterious effects, it will be impossible to correct the situation, and put them back in Pandora's box. In this new world of GE, which we are entering so rapidly, the term caveat emptor (let the buyer beware) takes on a new and ominous meaning.
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THE HYBRIDIZATION OF HUMANS AND PLANT In March 2007 a report emerged that the first ever plant/human hybrid was to be approved for commercial scale cultivation. According to reports, the US authorities had given preliminary approval for the crop to be grown on a 3,000 acre plot in Kansas. The plant in question was rice, but it has been spliced with human DNA that would make it grow a protein found in both human breast milk and saliva. Ventria Bioscience, the California-based firm behind the crop, says the protein would be used to treat children with diarrhea. The decision by the US Department of Agriculture provoked an outcry from anti-GM campaigners because of concerns over contamination of the food chain, possible allergic reactions to the proteins, and a lack of knowledge on the impact such large scale cultivation might have. Others have registered ethical objections, a disinclination towards meddling with the building blocks of all life. But these are much harder to quantify, and legally impossible to use as a basis for restricting the import of the crop to the UK and Europe, once it has passed the required safety tests. Friends of the Earth said the development was very worrying. Campaigner Claire Oxborrow said genetically modified rice had already contaminated the food chain, and called on the government to take a stand against the drug companies. She said, "The government must urge the US to ban the production of drugs in food crops, It must also introduce tough measures to prevent illegal GM crops contaminating our food and ensure that biotech companies are liable for any damage their products cause."
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Ventrica argues that the risk is small: Kansas has no commercial rice farms, making contamination unlikely. In addition, it says it will use dedicated storage and processing facilities to handle the crop. The firm also says the pay off is worth what risk there might be. It says its own research showed that children suffering from dehydration caused by diarrhea recovered more quickly when given electrolytes mixed with the proteins it plans to grow in the rice. Genetically modified foods (GM foods, or biotech foods) are foods derived from genetically modified organisms (GMOs), such as genetically modified crops or genetically modified fish. GMOs have had specific changes introduced into their DNA by genetic engineering techniques. These techniques are much more precise[1] than mutagenesis (mutation breeding) where an organism is exposed to radiation or chemicals to create a non-specific but stable change. Other techniques by which humans modify food organisms include selective breeding; plant breeding, and animal breeding, and somaclonal variation. Commercial sale of genetically modified foods began in 1994, when Calgene first marketed its Flavr Savr delayed ripening tomato. Typically, genetically modified foods are transgenic plant products: soybean, corn, canola, rice, and cotton seed oil. These may have been engineered for faster growth, resistance to pathogens, production of extra nutrients, or any other beneficial purpose Genetically engineered plants are generated in a laboratory by altering their genetic makeup and are tested in the laboratory for desired qualities. This is usually done by adding one or more genes to a plant's genome using genetic engineering techniques. Most genetically modified plants are generated by the biolistic method (particle gun) or by Agrobacterium tumefaciens mediated transformation. Once MORE THAN HUMAN A PRODUCTION OF REMA MARKETING AND WWW.GLOBALREPORT2010.COM ©2012, All rights reserved
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satisfactory plants are produced, sufficient seeds are gathered, and the companies producing the seed need to apply for regulatory approval to field-test the seeds. If these field tests are successful, the company must seek regulatory approval for the crop to be marketed. Once that approval is obtained, the seeds are mass produced, and sold to farmers. The farmers produce genetically modified crops, which also contain the inserted gene and its protein product. The farmers then sell their crops as commodities into the food supply market, in countries where such sales are permitted. The first genetically modified plant was produced in 1983, using an antibiotic-resistant tobacco plant. In 1994, the transgenic Flavr Savr tomato was approved by the FDA for marketing in the US - the modification allowed the tomato to delay ripening after picking. In the US in 1995, the following transgenic crops received marketing approval: canola with modified oil composition (Calgene), Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) corn/maize (Ciba-Geigy), cotton resistant to the herbicide bromoxynil (Calgene), Bt cotton (Monsanto), Bt potatoes (Monsanto), soybeans resistant to the herbicide glyphosate (Monsanto), virus-resistant squash (Asgrow), and additional delayed ripening tomatoes (DNAP, Zeneca/Peto, and Monsanto). In 2000, with the production of golden rice, scientists genetically modified food to increase its nutrient value for the first time. As of 2011, the U.S. leads a list of multiple countries in the production of GM crops, and 25 GM crops had received regulatory approval to be grown commercially Maize (called corn, in the US) and cornmeal (ground dried maize) constitute a staple food in many regions of the world. Grown since 1997 in the United States and Canada, 86% of the US maize crop was genetically modified in 2010 and 32% of the worldwide maize crop was GM in 2011. In 2011, 49% of the total maize harvest was used for livestock feed (including the percentage from distillers grains), 27% went to ethanol production, 13% was exported, 4.1% of the US corn harvest was made into high fructose corn syrup, and the rest was used for other sweeteners, cornstarch, making alcohol for beverages, for cereal, and for seed - so less than 10% of the harvest was used for human food or drink. Corn goes into many foods, including whole kernel products, corn chips, breakfast cereals, corn oil (which in turn is used in many products) and many others. In 2010 The American Academy of Environmental Medicine issued a warning that the public should avoid genetically modified (GM) foods, stating, "There is more than a casual association between GM foods and adverse health effects. There is causation."
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A large number of studies and incidents have implicated GM foods in a wide variety of health problems, including accelerated aging, immune dysfunction, insulin disorders, organ damage and reproductive disruption. For example, female rats fed a diet of GM soy experienced a drastically higher infant death rate, and their surviving infants were smaller and less fertile than the offspring of rats fed on a non-GM soy diet. Male rats fed the GM soy had their testicles change from pink to blue, and the GM soy was also observed to damage the DNA of sperm and embryos. Fertility problems such as abortion, infertility, premature delivery, prolapsed uteri, infant death, and even delivery of unformed infants (bags of water) have been observed in farm animals fed GM cottonseed and corn. Animals consuming crops that have been genetically modified to produce the pesticide Bt (approved for human consumption in the United States) have died by the thousands, while animals grazing on a non-
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GM version of the same crops remained unharmed. Upon autopsies, researchers have found black patches in the animals' livers and intestines, internal bleeding and other signs of Bt poisoning. Farm workers in India have begun developing allergic reactions upon handling Bt corn, similar to the effects experienced by people exposed to Bt spraying. In addition to these risks, GM soy and corn contain significantly higher concentrations of allergens than unmodified varieties. Evidence also suggests that the genetic abnormalities of GM foods may transfer to bacteria in the human gut, thereby exposing people to their detrimental effects long after a food has been consumed. Yet in spite of all this evidence and the prevalence of GM crops in the U.S. food supply not a single clinical trial of any GM crop has ever been published. Canadian geneticist David Suzuki stated, "The experiments simply haven't been done and we now have become the guinea pigs…..Anyone that says, 'Oh, 13 we know that this is perfectly safe,' I say is either unbelievably stupid or deliberately lying."
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CHINESE FINDINGS PUTS PRESSURE ON GM FOOD In early 2012 a report emerged in which Chinese researchers have found small pieces of rice ribonucleic acid (RNA) in the blood and organs of humans who eat rice. The Nanjing University-based team showed that this genetic material will bind to receptors in human liver cells and influence the uptake of cholesterol from the blood. The type of RNA in question is called microRNA (abbreviated to miRNA) due to its small size. MiRNAs have been studied extensively since their discovery ten years ago, and have been implicated as players in several human diseases including cancer, Alzheimer's, and diabetes. They usually function by turning down or shutting down certain genes. The Chinese research provides the first in vivo example of ingested plant miRNA surviving digestion and influencing human cell function in this way. Should the research survive scientific scrutiny, a serious hurdle, it could prove a game changer in many fields. It would mean that we're eating not just vitamins, protein, and fuel, but gene regulators as well. That knowledge could deepen our understanding of many fields, including cross-species communication, co-evolution, and predator-prey relationships. It could illuminate new mechanisms for some metabolic disorders and perhaps explain how some herbal and modern medicines function. This study had nothing to do with genetically modified (GM) food, but it could have implications on that front. The work shows a pathway by which new food products, such as GM foods, could influence human health in previously unanticipated ways.
Monsanto's website 14 states, "There is no need for, or value in testing the safety of GM foods in humans." This viewpoint, while good for business, is built on an understanding of genetics circa 1960. It follows what's called the "Central Dogma" of genetics, which postulates a one-way chain of command between DNA and the cells DNA governs. The Central Dogma resembles the process of ordering a pizza. The DNA codes for the kind of pizza it wants, and orders it. The RNA is the order slip, which communicates the specifics of that pizza to the cook. The finished and delivered pizza is analogous to the protein that DNA codes for. MORE THAN HUMAN A PRODUCTION OF REMA MARKETING AND WWW.GLOBALREPORT2010.COM ©2012, All rights reserved
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We've known for decades that the Central Dogma, though basically correct, is overly simplistic. For example: MiRNAs that don't code for anything, pizza or otherwise, travel within cells silencing genes that are being expressed. So while one piece of DNA is ordering a pizza, it could also be bombarding the pizzeria with RNA signals that can cancel the delivery of other pizzas ordered by other bits of DNA. Researchers have been using this phenomena to their advantage in the form of small, engineered RNA strands that are virtually identical to miRNA. In a technique called RNA interference, or RNA knockdown, these small bits of RNA are used to turn off, or "knock down," certain genes. RNA knockdown was first used commercially in 1994 to create the Flavor Savr, a tomato with increased shelf life. In 2007, several research teams began reporting success at engineering plant RNA to kill insect predators, by knocking down certain genes. As reported in MIT's Technology Review on November 5, 2007, researchers in China used RNA knockdown to make cotton plants that silence a gene that allows cotton bollworms to process the toxin gossypol, which occurs naturally in cotton. Bollworms that eat the genetically engineered cotton can't make their toxin-processing proteins, and they die. Humans and insects have a lot in common, genetically. If miRNA can in fact survive the gut then it's entirely possible that miRNA intended to influence insect gene regulation could also affect humans. Monsanto's claim that human toxicology tests are unwarranted is based on the doctrine of "substantial equivalence." According to substantial equivalence, comparisons between GM and non-GM crops need only investigate the end products of DNA expression. New DNA is not considered a threat in any other way. "So long as the introduced protein is determined to be safe, food from GM crops determined to be substantially equivalent is not expected to pose any health risks," reads Monsanto's website. 14 In other words, as long as the final product, the pizza, as it were, is non-toxic, the introduced DNA isn't any different and doesn't pose a problem. For what it's worth, if that principle were applied to intellectual property law, many of Monsanto's patents would probably be null and void. Chen-Yu Zhang, the lead researcher on the Chinese RNA study, has made no comment regarding the implications of his work for the debate over the safety of GM food. Nonetheless, these discoveries help give shape to concerns about substantial equivalence that have been raised for years from within the scientific community. In 1999, a group of scientists wrote a letter titled "Beyond Substantial Equivalence" to the prestigious journal Nature. In the letter, Erik Millstone et. al. called substantial equivalence "a pseudo-scientific concept" that is "inherently anti-scientific because it was created primarily to provide an excuse for not requiring biochemical or toxicological tests." To these charges, Monsanto responded: "The concept of substantial equivalence was elaborated by international scientific and regulatory experts convened by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in 1991, well before any biotechnology products were ready for market."
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This response is less a rebuttal than a testimonial to Monsanto's prowess at handling regulatory affairs. Of course the term was established before any products were ready for the market. Doing so was a prerequisite to the global commercialization of GM crops. It created a legal framework for selling GM foods anywhere in the world that substantial equivalence was accepted. By the time substantial equivalence was adopted, Monsanto had already developed numerous GM crops and was actively grooming them for market. The OECD's 34 member nations could be described as largely rich, white, developed, and sympathetic to big business. The group's current mission is to spread economic development to the rest of the world. And while the mission has yet to be accomplished, OECD has helped Monsanto spread substantial equivalence globally. Many GM fans will point out that if we do toxicity tests on GM foods, we should also have to do toxicity testing on every other kind of food in the world. But we've already done the testing on the existing plants. We tested them the hard way, by eating strange things and dying, or almost dying, over thousands of years. That's how we've figured out which plants are poisonous. And over the course of each of our lifetimes we've learned which foods we're allergic to. All of the non-GM breeds and hybrid species that we eat have been shaped by the genetic variability offered by parents whose genes were similar enough that they could mate, graft, or test tube baby their way to an offspring that resembled them. Monsanto isn't doing itself any PR favors by claiming "no need for, or value in testing the safety of GM foods in humans." Admittedly, such testing can be difficult to construct who really wants to volunteer to eat a bunch of GM corn just to see what happens? At the same time, if companies like Monsanto want to use processes like RNA interference to make plants that can kill insects via genetic pathways that might resemble our own, some kind of testing has to happen. A good place to start would be the testing of introduced DNA for other effects, miRNA-mediated or otherwise, beyond the specific proteins they code for. But the status quo, according to Monsanto's website, is: “There is no need to test the safety of DNA introduced into GM crops. DNA (and resulting RNA) is present in almost all foods. DNA is non-toxic and the presence of DNA, in and of itself, presents no hazard.”
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Given what we know, that stance is arrogant. Time will tell if it's reckless. There are computational methods of investigating whether unintended RNAs are likely to be knocking down any human genes. But thanks to this position, the best we can do is hope they're using them. Given it's opposition to the labeling of GM foods as well, it seems clear that Monsanto wants you to close your eyes, open your mouth, and swallow. It's time for Monsanto to acknowledge that there's more to DNA than the proteins it codes for -- even if it's for no other reason than the fact that RNA alone is a lot more complicated that Watson and Crick could ever have imagined.
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GENETIC ENGINEERS REPORT Earth Open Source is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to assuring the sustainability, security, and safety of the global food system. They published the results of recent research in a new study “GMO Myths and Truths.” The myth, they say, is that GM foods have been proven safe. The truth is that there are hidden dangers which corporate-funded research has not yet adequately investigated. What makes this report unusual is that it was authored not by the usual food activists and environmentalists, but by two well known genetic engineers with help from an investigative reporter. The team conducted an exhaustive survey of hundreds of peer-reviewed scientific studies and concluded not only that GM food crops pose significant, if largely under-evaluated, health risks, but that they have so far failed to deliver on their promise to increase crop yields and lower herbicide and pesticide use. The authors argue, moreover, that there are already safer environmentally friendly ways to grow more food for the planet’s exploding population. By focusing on the false panacea of genetic modification as a way to feed the world’s hungry, vital research dollars have been siphoned away from more promising lower-tech approaches to increasing the efficiency of the global food system. The report’s authors include Dr Michael Antoniou of King's College London School of Medicine in the UK, who helped to develop genetic engineering for medical applications, and John Fagan, a biomedical researcher and expert in food system sustainability and GMO testing, who returned $614,000 in grant money to the National Institutes of Health in 1994 because of his concerns about the safety and ethics of genetic modification. The paper is also contributed to by Claire Robinson, research director of Earth Open Source.
Seventy percent of the foods that Americans purchase in the supermarket contain ingredients (mostly corn, soy and canola oil) that are genetically modified. The food industry, and often the media, assure us that there is a scientific consensus that GM foods are equivalent nutritionally to foods that have not been modified and not a danger to those who consume them. But it is just not true that all scientists agree. Given the uncertainties in the field and the lack of long-term health studies, some groups like the American Academy of Environmental Medicine and the Union of Concerned Scientists have called for labeling of GM foods.
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Here are some of the conclusions of the report: •
Genetically modifying crops, which involves the transfer of genes between biologically unrelated species, is not an extension of traditional plant hybridization, but a radical departure which can produce new toxins or allergens in food that are unlikely to be spotted in current regulatory checks.
•
GM foods have not been adequately safety tested. There has been no long term research, and the few short term studies have been inadequate. In many cases proprietary restrictions put in place by biotech companies like Monsanto have prevented independent research by scientists not connected to the corporations which are making claims about their safety.
•
Animal studies of the effects of GM foods have disclosed clear signs of toxicity– notably disturbances in liver and kidney function and immune responses.
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Over 75% of genetical modification are to to increase crop tolerance of herbicides. Where these crops are grown there has been a massive increases in herbicide use.
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Over half of GM crops are engineered to withstand application of Monsanto’s best selling Roundup. Contrary to the company’s claims Roundup is not safe at the levels it is being use, but has been found to be associated with miscarriage, birth defects, neurological development
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problems, DNA damage, and certain types of cancer. A public health crisis has occurred in GM soy-producing regions of South America, where people exposed to spraying with Roundup and other agrochemicals report escalating rates of birth defects and cancer. •
There is insufficient evidence that the BT toxin engineered into the plant structure of corn and cotton (whose seeds are used in food oil production) is safe for human consumption. Bt crops have been found to have toxic effects on laboratory animals in feeding trials. These toxins have also been found circulating in the blood of pregnant women in Canada and in the blood supply to their foetuses.
•
GM crops have not been shown to offer higher crop yields, enhanced nutritional value or greater drought tolerance, as they have been hyped to do. The products of conventional breeding continue to outstrip GM in all of these arenas.
•
Conventionally bred, locally adapted crops, used in combination with environmentally sustainable farming practices, offer a safer, cheaper and more efficient way to ensure global food security than genetic modification.
Crop genetic engineering as practiced today is a crude, imprecise, and outmoded technology,” says the report's coauthor John Fagan. “Recent advances point to better ways of using our knowledge of genomics to improve food crops, that do not involve GM." Selling patented genetically modified seeds, and the agro-chemicals designed to be used with them, has earned biotech giants like Monsanto, Dupont, Bayer and Syngenta untold billions of dollars in the past two decades. But what is good for these corporate bottom lines may not be good for human health, or the integrity of the environment.
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UNDERSTANDING THE GENETIC MIXING VARIATIONS Although the media and legislation discuss human/animal hybrids, most of the time they are really talking about human/animal cybrids and so we need to make clear definitions between the main four different types of genetic mixing possibilities between animals and humans.
CYBRIDS Stem-cell scientists would prefer to study cloned embryos that are 100 percent human, but there is a huge obstacle. Thousands upon thousands of eggs will be needed, and women happy to donate their eggs for research are hard to find. The alternative is to use animal eggs, even though the embryos will still contain the mitochondrial DNA that floats in the existing animal cells' cytoplasm. That's why these entities are also called "cybrids" rather than hybrids. Cybrids are formed when the DNA nucleus of an egg from one species (animals) is removed and filled with the DNA nuclues of another species (human). This type of combination is done in vitro (in a cell medium)This mimics the technology of cloning, except one is using nuclear material from one species and a cell from a different species. The term cybrid comes from the combination of “cytoplasmic hybrid” because the genetic material in this new embryo is 99.9% of the nuclear species and 0.01% of the species that donated the egg.
Most genetic material is found in the nucleus, but a little bit is left in the cytoplasm of the egg so even when removing the DNA from the animal egg still a little bit of DNA is still existent in the cytoplasm (a fluidy medium that surrounds the DNA nucleus). Scientists have been able to insert human genetics (a nucleus) into a cow’s egg (an enucleated egg). The resulting embryo survived for twelve days. Other experiments have involved inserting human genetic material into a frog’s egg and into a rabbit’s egg. Neither of these survived beyond a week and never reached the blastocyst stage. MORE THAN HUMAN A PRODUCTION OF REMA MARKETING AND WWW.GLOBALREPORT2010.COM ©2012, All rights reserved
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Cybrids are a relatively benign form of inter species research that involves a less complex mingling of cells than do chimeras (where cells exist side by side) or hybrids (where nuclear DNA is mixed between species). Researchers say that the eggs used to create cybrids are little more than "carriers of human DNA information". A cybrid would have a "full human genome;' and all cells would have the same human genes. The animal cytoplasm would contribute only mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), which has a separate genome and is the source of the cell's energy.
The exact relationship of the human and nonhuman DNA material in the same cell is open to question. Some scientists believe the presence of nonhuman cytoplasmic mtDNA would have a significant impact in light of the vital biochemical role mtDNA plays in cell development and the fact that defects in mtDNA lead to serious illnesses. Others believe that animal mtDNA would "mak very little contribution to the actual information content of the final cell”. Moreover because some human mtDNA would be attached to the human DNA nucleus, the egg would have mitochondria from two species. As a result some believe that the nonhuman mitochondria would likely fade away, depending on the species and whether investigators tried to add to or reduce their presence A major premise for the development of Cybrid is that the use of animal eggs is inexpensive and easily available for research on therapeutic somatic cell nucleur transfer (SCNT). Where an IVF clinic would "struggle to collect" ten to twenty donated eggs in a week, "hundreds of cow oocytes (eggs) can be obtained from a single slaughterhouse every day" Investigators have studied the creation of Cybrids between nonhuman species and have transferred DNA nucleuses from sheep, pigs, monkeys, rats, buffalo, and mice to enucleated cow eggs and have transferred nuclei from monkeys, cats, and chickens to enucleated rabbit eggs. Most of these studies resulted in blastocysts. A blastocyst can be defined as follows.
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“After egg retrieval, the fertilised egg may develop into an embryo over a period of three days in the laboratory. The embryo typically divides into between 6-8 cells. A blastocyst, by comparison, is an embryo that has
advanced to the five or 6-day stage; which means the embryo has divided many more times into many more cells over this period. Blastocysts have a very thin outer shell thus potentially increasing the odds of implantation into
the uterine cavity. Most of the blastocyst contains a fluid cavity and it is possible to see the cells which will become the baby and those which will make up the placenta. While the majority of fertilised eggs will develop into a three-day old embryo, only perhaps 40% of these embryos will develop
into a blastocyst. Therefore, blastocysts are considered to be a more “select” group of embryos with a higher chance of pregnancy.”
For example, in transferring mouse cell nuclei to cow eggs, researchers in South Korea produced three blastocysts. Researchers in the United Kingdom reported the following interspecies (nonhuman) cybrids that have developed to the blastocyst stage: "horse donor cell and cow oocyte, monkey donor cell and rabbit oocyte, various mammalian species and cow oocyte, mountain bongo antelope donor cell and cow oocyte, buffalo donor cell and cow oocyte, dog donor cell and yak or cow oocyte".
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Less has been published regarding the combination of human cells and animal eggs. In 2003 Chinese researchers reported combining nuclei from human skin cells and rabbit eggs to develop one hundred embryos and several stem-cell lines that had not yet been tested for stability and the capacity for "indefinite growth". Selecting the best species for cybrids depends on accessibility and compatibility with human development. Rabbit embryos, for example, have a developmental pace similar to that of humans. What are the ethical consequences of this mixing. To mix human and nonhuman biological material at this early stage may "begin to undermine the whole distinction between human and nonhuman animals for which a different understanding of dignity exists" Similarly, the Christian Action Research and Education organization in the United Kingdom has argued against cybrids because they believe the blurring of human-nonhuman boundaries in research would "demean what is fully human by degrading the life in question with animal content" The Christian Medical Fellowship based its conclusion that using animal eggs would be immoral on religious grounds. Referring to the biblical concept of "according to their kinds;' the Fellowship writes that "humans are the only animals made `in the image of God;" so a higher ethical standard is needed for them. 17 The UK Human Fertilization Act (The HFE Act) 18 has asserted that an embryo with a full human genome should be treated as a live human embryo "unless it could be clearly proved that the embryo could never be viable" The HFE Act and Parliament determined that the cybrid is a human embryo because it has a full human genome and because the nonhuman mitochondrial contribution would fade early in embryonic development. British experts however are divided on whether a cyrbid could be a viable embryo, as in possessing the normal potential to develop given the right environment. Furthermore it would be illegal in the United MORE THAN HUMAN A PRODUCTION OF REMA MARKETING AND WWW.GLOBALREPORT2010.COM ©2012, All rights reserved
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Kingdom to transfer the embryo to a woman’s uterus to actually test this out Still, cloning studies indicate that embryos resulting from nuclear transfer are "typically abnormal and often die during development" even if they yield apparently normal inner cell masses. The scientific belief is that embryos created through with human nuclei and animal eggs are "rarely... capable of developing to term;"
TRANSGENICS Unlike the creation of Cybrids where the nucleus of the host egg is removed to allow the insertion of a nucleus from a different organism to then create an embryo, transgenics is a totally different approach.
Transgenics refers to the splicing of genes where foreign DNA from one animal is inserted into the DNA of another animal which is already at least at embryo stage. However only a few genes can be added before the embryo collapses, providing self-limitations for this technique. This is normally done to in order to introduce or delete specific physical characteristics. If DNA is "stably incorporated" into the animal host gene, then the animal and its offspring "will possess an altered physical characteristic (phenotype). For instance, normal mice cannot be infected with polio virus. They lack the cell-surface molecule that, in humans, serves as the receptor for the virus. So normal mice cannot serve as an inexpensive, easilymanipulated model, for studying the disease. However, transgenic mice expressing the human gene for the polio virus receptor can be infected by polio virus and even develop paralysis and other pathological characteristics of the disease in humans. Scientists have inserted human genes into pigs to create human insulin for diabetes patients. Scientists have also attempted to replace damaged human heart valves with animal heart valves. This is using MORE THAN HUMAN A PRODUCTION OF REMA MARKETING AND WWW.GLOBALREPORT2010.COM ©2012, All rights reserved
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animal parts in a mechanistic sense, and is known as xenotransplantation. Another example is where transgenics has been used to splice spider genes and import them into goat embryos so the spider genes will express a protein for silk in the goats' mammary glands, which then appears in the goats' milk. This silk is stronger than silk from worms, and using the milk is an easier way to secure the silk protein than to harvest silk from spiders naturally because of the physical make up of spiders. Other examples of transgenics involving animals and humans include transgenic chickens which express human proteins in their egg whites for pharmaceutical use, and goats have been altered to express a human protein in their milk to induce thickening of blood. Transgenic animals are not routinely referred to as `hybrids' but do contain a mix of DNA. Most transgenic studies focus on transfer splicing human genes into animal single cell embryos. However should it has been known that should research requires for the transfer splicing of animal genes into human single cell embryos then would this be acceptable under many countries medical laws providing the embryo is not then implanted into a human uterus and destroyed after a certain number of days.
CHIMERAS The image of the mythological chimera, a "symbolic monster composed of incongruous parts;' orients our minds to the idea of mixed parts coddled together. Although chimeras in ancient Greece were regarded as "dangerous, formidable, and powerful beasts, representing fantastic yet uncivilized and chaotic forces in nature that confronted mankind;' chimeras in art today present more benign personas. Thomas Grunfeld's Misfit (St. Bernard), a painting of a placid St. Bernard with a sheep's head, is regarded as a "classic chimera". Similarly, Stephan Balkenhol's Three Hybrids, 1995 features three wood animal/men with the heads of a cow, a mouse, and a hawk and the bodies of humans (Balkenhol 1995). Even though the artist calls them hybrids, his creatures resemble the image of chimeras as cut and pasted beings. Far from monstrous, they wear corduroy trousers and project amiable dispositions.
Just as chimeras have different meanings in the world of art, so too do they convey different meanings in the world of science, with molecular biologists, geneticists, cell biologists, embryologists, and other academic specialists attaching somewhat different definitions.
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Broadly speaking a chimera is an organism with cells from "different embryonic origins" or, similarly, "an organism composed of cells derived from at least two genetically different zygotes," which could be from the same or different species. Chimeras are formed when the cells of one species are added to the embryo of another species. This results in an animal that has distinct parts from one species or the other. This has actually been done in the lab with a goat and sheep. The resulting animal called a geep did survive and had an odd appearance, with hairy goat and woolly sheep patches arising in a "hodgepodge" fashion on its coat representing two genetically distinct sets of cells. Its creator, Steen Willadsen, observed: "The animal behaved like a goat, but did not quite smell like one, and preferred the company of sheep. Its sheep cells were male but the sex of its goat cells was not known. It proved fertile in many matings with ewes [female 19 sheep] but has not, so far, with does [female goats]"
Much of the objection to Human – Animal Chimera research ISR is that it could lead to the creation of beings with both human and nonhuman features leading to a moral and ethical issue about how one determines whether the chimera is more human than animal or more animal than human. If a chimera were developed with observable interspecies features, it would leave people "baffled" and "fearful" if they did not know whether the being was human or what their responsibilities would be toward the being.
HYBRIDS True Hybrids are embryos formed when the gametes (egg and sperm) that fuse are from different species. For example a human/chimp hybrid would be formed from the combining of a human egg with a chimpanzee sperm, or vice versa. These true hybrids create a new entity or species. Scientists claim that so far hybrids that have grown to full maturity and survived are hybrids within the same kinds. During the 1800s, where breeders in India interbred tigers and lions as gifts for English monarchs. Because such animals live in different parts of the world, they would not normally mate. Approximately a dozen ligers, the offspring of a male lion and female tiger exist in the world today, including a half-ton feline reputed to be the "biggest cat in the world". The Indian government outlawed interspecies breeding of large cats in 1985 after pressure from wildlife protection groups. Other cat hybrids include the jaglion, leotig, and liguar. MORE THAN HUMAN A PRODUCTION OF REMA MARKETING AND WWW.GLOBALREPORT2010.COM ©2012, All rights reserved
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In nature animal/animal hybrids that do exist tend to be less fit than their parents. With a liger as seen above, the genetic balance unravels. A liger looks like a giant lion with muted stripes but like their tiger ancestors, ligers like swimming. This goes against the nature of a lion but is what makes creature special. However a liger would have a reduced survival rate in the wild because its significant size (“gigantism”) is caused by a growth hormone gene which for an unknown reason stays activated much longer than it would in either a Lion or Tiger. The size and weight of a Liger would reduce its survival in the wild where speed and sustainability of speed is a major requirement for successful hunting. Additionally most liger hybrids are sterile. There has never been a case of a sterile male and only a few reported cases of sterile female ligers. The communication abilities of the animals may be affected, inasmuch as "tigers `cuff, lions roar. Some observers speculate that ligers may have behavioral problems, such as confusion and depression from inheriting the social nature of the lion and the solitary nature of the tiger. A familiar example brought about by breeding is a mule, which is produced from horse and donkey gametes. The mule, is the offspring of a male donkey and a female horse (a hinny is the offspring of a male horse and a female donkey). The horse and donkey share a genus (Equus), but they are from different species. Other hybrid matings of hoofed animals include the zonkey (zebra/donkey), zebroid (zebra/horse), zetland (zebra/pony), yakow (cow/yak), and cama (camel/llama).
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Artificial insemination and in vitro fertilization (IVF) are normaly used to produce animal-animal hybrids as normally different mating cues and rituals prevent copulation. However these methods cannot always overcome physiological characteristics of animals of different species, such as different numbers of chromosomes, which make some interspecies reproduction impossible or where infertility can arise. When it comes to the issue of creating animal/human hybrids it is interesting to know that this was attempted in 1982 by French fertility doctors who used hamster eggs to evaluate the ability of human male sperm to penetrate the eggs. The hamster eggs, which are kept in culture were penetrated by the sperm creating an entity called, a "humster;" a fertilized one-cell egg (zygote). Under law the hamster had to be destroyed before it divided into two cells. The test was all part of research seeking to cure infertility. Humsters have accompanied hybrid regulations in the United Kingdom as a footnote or comment with an asterisk, starting in 1984 when the Warnock Commission carved an exception for the humster test by recommending that "trans-species fertilization" could be licensed if used to alleviate infertility or subfertility, as long as the "development of any hybrid [is] terminated at the two cell stage" The HFE Act 1990 adopted this principle by allowing the test in facilities licensed to perform it provided that "the result of the mixed gametes is destroyed when the test is complete (and definitely no later than the two cell stage)". The HFE Act 2008 then expanded further by allowing the mixing of human and animal eggs or sperm as long as the resulting entity was not allowed to develop beyond fourteen days or be transferred to a human or animal uterus. Many researchers convey the message that the creation of animal and human hybrid has no real medical benefit since the hybrids are not allowed to develop beyond early pre-implantation stages. The feeling is that if there were some reason to combine human and nonhuman biological properties, this would be done by other methods such as transgenics, not by hybridization. Nevertheless, perhaps in order to protect flexibility in research, the U.K. House of Commons defeated a proposed ban on the creation of human-nonhuman hybrids in 2008. However what if a human/animal hybrid was transferred to a woman’s uterus for further development like the hybrid embryo of a human and a chimpanzee. The being would be a humanzee (if the father is human) or chimphuman (if the mother is human). The offspring born from chimp and human parents could inherit any mixture of genes from each parent, just as human offspring regularly do. In human procreation, one cannot predict whether a child will inherit the musical ability of the mother or the deep voice of the father. The same would apply for a humanzee. Assuming a humanzee would be more human-like than chimp-like, one could not predict whether the child would huf-huf to communicate like the chimpanzee or inherit a more modulated speaking voice from the human parent. Would the child's arms be longer, like the calf-length arms of the chimpanzee parent, or shorter, like the arms of the human parent? Would the child engage in lip smacking or the lip flip characteristic of chimpanzees when excited? Traits depend on which genes are dominant, how the genes interrelate, their pattern of expression, and how they interact with environmental influences. Also, the effects of imprinting are uncertain. Here genes may or may not be expressed, depending on which parent provided the dominant gene. Just as the
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paternal/maternal parentage for animal hybrids affects the outcome (e.g., the tigon with a tiger father and lion mother and the liger with a lion father and a tiger mother), so might the outcome differ depending on whether the chimp gamete was from a male (chimphuman) or from a female (humanzee)
According to geneticists, hybrid primates do not portend well for a chimp-human mixture. For example, investigators who studied the offspring of interbreeding in the wild between gelada monkeys (Theropithecus gelada) and hamadryas baboons (Papio hamadryas) found that the offspring were "large but developmentally normal" and fell midway between the two parent species in "skull and tooth form and to a lesser extent in postcranial proportions”. Although the offspring were apparently healthy, they had a hybrid appearance, which would not augur well for the offspring of a chimpanzee and human. A study of seventeen hybrid offspring between Papio and Macaca genera and Theropithecus genera showed mixed features of all offspring. As described by the investigators: "Hybrids between the Papio and Macaca genera resembled baboons according to the body build and colour of eyes, but according to the form of head, face, hair colour, sexual skin and ischial callosities they resembled macaques."
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The offspring of Papio and Theropithecus were fertile, but those between Macaca and Papio were not. There are stories of humans known as “Almas” in the Caucasus region and “Yeren” in China who seem to more resemble some form of hybrid human. For instance the Chinese case is probably the most legitimate and has been the source of great interest and has been fully documented.
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10 CONSEQUENCES OF MIXING ANIMAL AND HUMAN DNA
1. LEGAL CONSEQUENCES There are several legal issues to consider, but probably the most troubling is whether the entity produced should fall under human or animal legislation. Several questions follow this, such as “What percentage of the being needs to be human to fall under human legislation? What if the human/animal entity began as 30% human and 70% animal, but the human cells grew faster and the entity ended up being 70% human and 30% animal?” Some researchers have stated a preference for erring on the side of caution and giving the entity the protection and dignity entitled to a human being, however this is only a protective declaration and does not solve the myriad legal issues surrounding the creation of this new entity.
2. SOCIETAL CONSEQUENCES The formation of an entity that is both animal and human raises questions of personhood and challenges our definition of humanness. These beings will inevitably be met with challenges that go beyond identification with a minority group. Would protections such as the Fourteenth Amendment apply to these creatures, and how human would they have to be for them to possess rights and privileges? Would society want to grant them rights and privileges? Would the military want to create a human/ape hybrid soldier in hopes that they would be bigger, stronger, and easier to feed? Given human history, the temptation to relegate these beings to a lower class would be inevitable. There are risks associated with diseases that may cross the species barrier. As research has already shown, we have several examples of diseases crossing the species barrier including swine flu and bird flu. We also know that these diseases can sometimes be more harmful or even fatal to one species than they were to another. If an entity is part human and part animal, and a disease is very contagious among either type of animal it shares characteristics with, it will likely infect the hybrid. At this point, the disease may adapt to human DNA, posing a great health threat to all humans, not just hybrids.
3. SPIRITUAL CONSEQUENCES Do these procedures violate the sanctity of human life? Several thoughts: •
Humans are created in God’s image (Genesis 1:26); and it is our DNA which reflects the image of God
•
We were created separately (Genesis 1:25, 26). We were created differently than the animals (“Let the earth bring forth living creatures…” Genesis 1:24; “then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature” Genesis 2:7);
•
We humans were given dominion over the animals (Genesis 1:29, 30). Therefore, these procedures do seem to violate the sanctity of human life as revealed in Scripture.
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Are scientists attempting to bridge the gap in created kinds? God directly created animals according to their kind, and it is implied in the flood account that He intended for them to reproduce according to their kind (Genesis 1:21; Genesis 8:17). The Bible indicates that man has dignity and worth. If we try to create a being that might be less-thanhuman by combining it with animal cells or gametes, this would diminish such God-given qualities. It is from a naturalistic perspective that people believe animals are better than man because they seem to be stronger, faster, or heartier. This is not the Biblical perspective. Do these procedures have something in common with bestiality? One could argue that the creation of human/animal hybrids may constitute an instance of bestiality. Biblically, bestiality is a type of fornication with animals; it is a type of intimacy that perverts the real intimacy that God designed between a husband and wife. I find bestiality to be a particularly distasteful subject, and perhaps we get an indication of God’s distaste for this since it is a sin that was punishable by death (Exodus. 22:19; Leviticus. 18:23; Leviticus. 20:15, 16; Deuteronomy. 27:21). Procreation and consummation are not distinctly separate in the Bible. It is only through modern technology that procreation can occur in the laboratory apart from consummation. I think an argument could be made that procreation with human and animal gametes is a connection with animals that man was not meant to experience.
4. WORKAROUND CONSEQUENCES So many times whether one is referring to hybrids or cybrids which involve the mixing of human and animal we hear that the possible creation of nightmarish monsters is negated by the fact that under government law the embryo is limited in terms of its development because •
There is a limited time given to researchers to conduct their review of the created embryo whether a numerical number of days or how many times the embryonic cell can divide and
•
The law does not allow for the resulting half human animal hybrid/cybrid to be implanted into the uterus of either an animal or a human because of the possible risk that could pose to the mother carrier and also the risk of the unknown
Researchers state that the maternal-fetal interaction is physiological and psychological, and it would be "repugnant" to experiment with a relationship between a human fetus and a nonhuman gestational mother. This would be extremely risky (if not impossible) for the developing fetus and animal surrogate, most likely a nonhuman primate. Researchers claim that amongst other challenges such as a mix match of chromosomes, the placental tissue of the mother and fetus would not match, and the size of the uterine space would be at odds with fetal size. It would raise "clear issues of animal welfare" The reverse move-transferring an animal embryo to a woman's uterus for the purpose of procreationwould be incredibly risky to the woman and have no justification. No conceivable reason exists to put a woman into the position of being a surrogate mother to a nonhuman animal even if this were physiologically possible. Moreover, public sentiment against either type of surrogacy would be distinctly hostile. The HFE Act 2008 bars transfer of any non permitted gametes or embryos (including nonhuman) to a woman's uterus. It also bars transfer of human admixed embryos to an animal MORE THAN HUMAN A PRODUCTION OF REMA MARKETING AND WWW.GLOBALREPORT2010.COM ©2012, All rights reserved
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However despite these assurances there have been grave concerns about the following workarounds. •
Research being proposed by Transhumanists for the medical establishment to create and harvest a synthetic uterus (ector to allow for an exploratory insight to see what would happen if an animal/human hybrid embryo attached itself to a uterus and was allowed to developed to full maturity. Transhumanists believe that with a synthetic uterus the argument of there being possible harm to a mother carrier would be negated.
•
Furthermore the creation of a Synthetic Uterus would open up a whole new commercial arena where the wealthy could purchase hybrids because the synthetic uterus would provide the facility to harvest human hybrids. Rogue medical establishments seeking funding to expand on their research and development would be overly keen to participate in such commercial adventures.
•
To address the metaphysical bonding that takes place between a mother and her growing fetus researchers would ensure that the birthing centers where these synthetic uteruses would reside would be exposed to recordings of the mothers voice on a constant basis, others suggest that the synthetic uteruses would also be mobilized since a mothers mobility is an important contribution to the development of a fetus. Essentially researchers would seek to provide the most uterus friendly environment to cater for the natural development of an embryo
•
Not all countries have the same restrictions and regulations when it comes to creating hybrids. This means that rogue scientists and rogue medical establishments could move their bases offshore to countries with limited regulation in order to expedite the creation of full term hybrids. The lack of a universal worldwide Hybrid Embryo Act creates significant disadvantages at restraining over zealous researchers
5. OFFSPRING CONSEQUENCES. Another area of concern are the welfare rights of the animals involved. The severity of the impact depends on a number of factors, such as the biological properties of the target protein, where in the body the transgenes are expressed, and the degree of expression of the transgene. At one end of the spectrum, the animal could have "inert proteins synthesized at a low level in a limited number of specific tissues insulated from the bloodstream." At the other end the animal could have "a condition in which a biologically highly active protein is synthesized in large amounts in many tissues with abundant access to the bloodstream". An example of the latter is the "Beltsville pig;' which was genetically modified as an embryo at the USDA research center in Beltsville, MD to produce human growth hormone. Although the primary goal was achieved i.e. the pig produced human growth hormone, the intervention had unanticipated impacts on the pig's metabolism. One person observed that the pig was "excessively hairy, lethargic, riddled with arthritis, apparently impotent, and slightly cross-eyed ... [and] the pig could hardly stand up". With genetic modifications, as with cloning, the impact may not be known for years. Moreover, one can get a "`sudden' introduction of a distant gene in a new organism;' which contrasts to traditional methods of selective breeding that reveal problems at an earlier stage and enable corrective action. A report from Denmark indicated that 21 percent of strains of genetically modified animals experienced minor MORE THAN HUMAN A PRODUCTION OF REMA MARKETING AND WWW.GLOBALREPORT2010.COM ©2012, All rights reserved
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discomfort, 30 percent experienced increases in mortality and disease, and 15 percent experienced severe discomfort. With the large range of genetic modification studies, there is no simple picture of the well-being of genetically altered animals because the impact depends on which genes are altered or knocked out. The impact could be virtually nil, or it could be severe, as in a mouse born without a growth factor receptor gene that leaves the mouse with severe skeletal defects or other major abnormalities. In addition not all mutations show themselves in a clear way. In short, mutation studies have unpredictable and variable impacts on animal welfare.
6. CREATING SUPER HUMANS Questions also arise about modifications being Would the ability to manipulate the human genome in the laboratory by splicing in, say, genes associated with an animal's night vision, lead to the transfer of manipulated embryos for procreation? Lively debate accompanies questions about the ethics of modifying the human germ line, and the question of splicing "animal genes" such as those that improve visual acuity to human embryos would fall under deliberations about inherita.. Animals, or at least some animals, seem to have greater modes of perception and the ability to see into the supernatural realm that humans are incapable of perceiving (i.e. Numbers 22:22-35). We see this many times in animals "sixth sense" to earthquakes or storms, as well, and so the creation of super humans shares a synergy with Transhumanists attempt to merge humans with animals so they can see into the supernatural realm.
7. PROVIDING OPPORTUNITIES FOR THE HOMOSEXUAL COMMUNITY This is not so much related to animal/human genetic mixing as it is to the fact that creation of synthetic uteruses could also open up another channel which is relevant to same sex marriage couples. Same sex marriage couples have drawn significant interest in genetic engineering because if technology is able to move to the stage where embryos could be developed in synthetic uteruses then it would mean that same sex marriage couples would be able to have children. The creation of a synthetic uterus is known as ectorine technology and is a concept that has been observed in movies such as the Matrix where human beings are grown and pillaged for nutritional purposes.
8. POSSIBLE RECHANGING OF FORENSIC PRACTICES The Birckbeck law school in the United Kingdom is one of the world’s best law schools on earth for crime scene analysis and the training of crime scene investigators (CSI). They put out a press release in 2010 in which they stated that they would need to design future classes for crime scene analysis in which the crime has been committed by something which is own partly human. They said everything we know about profiling and forensics might not apply if you tracking down a serial rapist that is part wolf because the way the individual might think and its rationale, mindset, instinct and decision making might be totally different to that expected for a normal human being.
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9. GENETICALLY MODIFIED ANIMALS IN THE ENVIRONMENT Imagine you are in a restaurant eating goat cheese and not realizing that it contains human DNA you don’t what the impact it would have on your body. This brings in another huge risk especially again where we have rogue doctors and rogue laboratories that are unregulated. What do they do with animals that they have made changes to. Do they allow these animals to go back into the world or are there possibilities where animals could somehow escape such facilities. Is it possible that these animals some how mate with others and then develop a new generation of animals carrying the genetic alterations which are then captured, nurtured and slaughtered for food which is then sold to food hyper markets.
10. THE PHARMACETUICAL AGENDA One of the biggest challenges facing the pharmaceutical industry is the cost, time and resources involved in trying to move developing drugs through the clinical trial process to the stage where the drug is approved for licensing. Once drugs enter the market they then have a short shelf life to enjoy before competitors can then start copying and rebranding the same active ingredients that make up the drug. Pharmaceutical companies also face the risk that the licensing could be delayed or at worst declined based on how the regulatory bodies assess the clinical trial results in assessing the viability and risk of the product going onto the market. There is a significant cost of receiving approval for drugs to moved through the different stages of clinical trials especially into phase II trials where unproven drugs are then introduced to test human populations. However if pharmaceutical companies could test their drugs in animals which have been injected with human DNA and create a human animal chimera, then they could get a work around in testing their unproven drugs see how the human element of the chimera or transgenic animal responds without having to receive the same level of regulatory approval as for phase II clinical trials.
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DARPA: THE NEW WORLD ORDER TECHNOLOGY FRONT The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is an agency of the United States Department of Defense responsible for the development of new technologies for use by the military. DARPA has been responsible for funding the development of many technologies which have had a major effect on the world, including computer networking, as well as NLS, which was both the first hypertext system, and an important precursor to the contemporary ubiquitous graphical user interface.
Its original name was simply Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA), but it was renamed to "DARPA" (for Defense) in March 1972, then renamed "ARPA" again in February 1993, and then renamed "DARPA" again in March 1996. DARPA’s original mission, established in 1958, was to prevent technological surprise like the launch of Sputnik, which signaled that the Soviets had beaten the U.S. into space. The mission statement has evolved over time. Today, DARPA’s mission is still to prevent technological surprise to the US, but also to create technological surprise for our enemies. DARPA is independent from other more conventional military R&D and reports directly to senior Department of Defense management. DARPA has around 240 personnel (about 140 technical) directly managing a $3.2 billion budget. These figures are "on average" since DARPA focuses on short-term (two to four-year) projects run by small, purpose-built teams. DARPA is known as one of the key technology arms of the New World Order because of its funding and investment into data mining and social networking companies, for the purpose of human profiling and behavioral modeling. An interesting article appeared in May 2012 about DARPA’s involvement with genetic engineering. DARPA, the Pentagon’s far-out research arm, has kicked off a program designed to take the conventions of manufacturing and apply them to living cells. Think of it like an assembly line, but one that would churn out modified biological matter — man-made organisms — instead of cars or computer parts. The program, called “Living Foundries,” was first announced by the agency last year. Now, DARPA’s handed out seven research awards worth $15.5 million to six different companies and institutions. Among them are several DARPA favorites, including the University of Texas at Austin and the California Institute of Technology. Two contracts were also issued to the J. Craig Venter Institute. Dr. Venter is something of a biology superstar: He was among the first scientists to sequence a human genome, and his institute was, in 2010, the first to create a cell with entirely synthetic genome. “Living Foundries” aspires to turn the slow, messy process of genetic engineering into a streamlined and standardized one. Of course, the field is already a burgeoning one: Scientists have tweaked cells in order to develop renewable petroleum and spider silk that’s tough as steel. And a host of companies are investigating the pharmaceutical and agricultural promise lurking — with some tinkering, of course — inside living cells.
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But those breakthroughs, while exciting, have also been time-consuming and expensive. As DARPA notes, even the most cutting-edge synthetic biology projects “often take 7+ years and tens to hundreds of millions of dollars” to complete. Venter’s synthetic cell project, for example, cost an estimated $40 million. Synthetic biology, as DARPA notes, has the potential to yield “new materials, novel capabilities, fuel and medicines” — everything from fuels to solar cells to vaccines could be produced by engineering different living cells. But the agency isn’t content to wait seven years for each new innovation. In fact, they want the capability for “on-demand production” of whatever bio-product suits the military’s immediate needs. To do it, DARPA will need to revamp the process of bio-engineering — from the initial design of a new material, to its construction, to its subsequent efficacy evaluation. The starting point, and one that agency-funded researchers will have to create, is a library of “modular genetic parts”: Standardized biological units that can be assembled in different ways — like LEGO — to create different materials.
Once that library is created, the agency wants researchers to come up with a set of “parts, regulators, devices and circuits” that can reliably yield various genetic systems. After that, they’ll also need “test platforms” to quickly evaluate new bio-materials. Think of it as a biological assembly line: Products are designed, pieced together using standardized tools and techniques, and then tested for efficacy. The process, once established, ought to massively accelerate the pace of bio-engineering — and cut costs. The agency’s asking researchers to “compress the biological design-build-test cycle by at least 10X in both time and cost,” while also “increasing the complexity of systems that can be designed and executed.”
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No doubt, DARPA’s making some big asks of the scientists tasked with this research. And not everyone’s convinced they’ll pull it off. “The biology will fight them,” Daniel Drell, a program manager with the U.S. Department of Energy, predicted last year. Which suggests it might be a few years, at least, before DARPA’s bio-creations try to fight us Additionally, DARPA has awarded an $8 million dollar contract to a company called Amyris to develop tools for expanding DARPAs industrial synthetic biology technology across biological platforms and cell types. The value of the contract is dependent on Amyris meeting technical milestones connected with the DARPA’s Living Foundries research program. Amyris is exploiting genetic engineering and screening technologies to generate yeast strains that can be used in established fermentation processes to convert plant-sourced sugars into desired hydrocarbon target molecules, including renewable fuels and specialty chemicals. Initial work resulted in microbial strains that generated artemisinic acid, a precursor of the antimalarial therapy artemisinin. The firm’s MORE THAN HUMAN A PRODUCTION OF REMA MARKETING AND WWW.GLOBALREPORT2010.COM ©2012, All rights reserved
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portfolio currently includes products based on the hydrocarbon Biofene (trans-β-farnasene).
It is important to note that DARPA is a military institution and so its underlining motives for genetic engineering is based on the creation of military weapons and supplementary devices. For instance many people are not aware that DARPA funded the creation of transgenic spider goats because they knew that spider silk is amazingly resilient, lightweight and very strong. However it is not easy to create a spider farm and harvest spiders for their silk. But they knew they could do this with goats hence the project involved creating transgenic goats that would create silk in its milk which DARPA could then harvest and use for creating lightweight bullet proof vests and cargo nets etc. The face of the U.S. military is radically changing. Technology is evolving faster today than ever before, and the U.S. military is determined to be at the cutting edge of applying futuristic technology. A lot of things that once were only in the world of science fiction are quickly making their way into the U.S. military. In fact, there are some projects in development that are so bizarre that it is kind of hard to believe that they are real. After all, creating soldiers with superhuman strength and endurance using pharmaceutical drugs, outfitting soldiers with exotic prosthetics and mechanical exoskeletons, implanting microchips directly into the brains of soldiers to give them an advantage in battle and editing the DNA of soldiers to make them the ultimate killing machines all seem more like something out of a really scary summer movie than real goals that the DARPA should be pursuing. But they are. DARPA explains one application for these new technologies this way.... “On the other end of the size scale, a primary goal is to apply microsystem techniques to soldier-protective biomedical systems. One example is an in-canal hearing protection device that will provide enhanced hearing capabilities in some settings, but be able to instantly muffle loud sounds of weapons fire. This one example will improve inter-personnel communications and at the same time drastically reduce the incidence of hearing loss in combat situations. For these examples and many more, the goal is to bring exceptionally potent technical approaches to bear on biological and biomedical applications where their capabilities will be significant force multipliers for the DoD”
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But DARPA is not alone in pursuing these bizarre new technologies. According to the U.S. Army's Future Soldier Initiative, the soldiers of the future might boost their brains with drugs and prosthetics, augment
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MORE THAN HUMAN PART 3: GENETIC ARMAGEDDON
their strength with mechanical exoskeletons, and have artificially intelligent "digital buddies" at their beck and call. The goal of these drugs, prosthetics and exoskeletons would be to give soldiers "superhuman" abilities that they would not otherwise possess. For example, the ability to effortlessly carry a very heavy weapon into battle would be a significant advantage on the battlefield. But will these changes go too far? In the pursuit of creating "ultimate killing machines", will we create monsters who show no hesitation and no remorse when killing other humans? Will we create beings that are half human/half machine that have no place in society once their battlefield careers are over? The US military’s future technology division is also reportedly eyeing tampering with soldiers’ genes, allowing them to go for days without food or sleep and re-grow limbs lost in battle or due to landmines. Scientists at DARPA are hoping to find a way to affect certain genes to make the human body do amazing things, like using body fat more efficiently, says British newspaper Sunday Express. The journalists talked to novelist Simon Conway, who was given a behind-the-scenes glimpse of DARPA’s research. Conway revealed the plans to make a genetically altered super soldiers and seems to have used his access as the inspiration for his newest book Rockcreek Park , which revolves around a dead body found in Washington, D.C. that appears to have superhuman qualities. About the research, Conway said… “If you can efficiently convert fat into energy you don’t need to feed your soldiers as often….So you can send them into battle in remote areas plump and they live off their own fat. It is all about improving efficiency of energy creation in the body. Soldiers would be able to run at Olympic speeds, carry large weights and go without sleep and 23 without food,”
Another possible chilling breakthrough is a drug that can make people go for hours without sleep and stay alert, Professor Joel Garreau, of Arizona State University told the tabloid. “It was tested by the US army on helicopter pilots. They found that after 40 hours, pilots actually had better concentration levels than if they had rested. It is much better than amphetamines, which affect decision making and have led to many so-called friendly fire incidents,”
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FOOTNOTES 1. http://fristcenter.org/calendar-exhibitions/detail/fairy-tales-monsters-and-the-genetic-imagination 2. http://www.patriciapiccinini.net/works/06Sculptures_2010-2011/ 3. http://artkritique.blogspot.co.uk/2009/05/on-patricia-piccinini.html 4. http://healthfreedoms.org/2009/08/27/dna-swap-could-cure-inherited-diseases 5. http://arstechnica.com/science/2009/02/we-are-becoming-a-new-species-we-are-becoming-homo-evolutis 6."Frankenstein for Cloning Tech" 25 Oct. 2005 7. Edmiston, John. "Has Science Gone Too Far With Cloning?" 25 Oct. 2005 8. Cloning Fact Sheet .Human Genome Project Information. 25 Oct. 2005 9. http://www.patheos.com/blogs/crossexamined/2011/12/word-of-the-day-systems-and-wicked-problems/ 10. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precautionary_principle 11. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-440302/The-rice-human-genes.html 12. http://www.naturalnews.com/028245_GM_food_side_effects.html 13. http://www.psrast.org/aaemwarn.htm 14. http://www.monsanto.com 15.http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2012/01/the-very-real-danger-of-genetically-modified-foods/251051 16. http://www.libraryindex.com/pages/2263/Cloning-REPRODUCTIVE-CLONING.html 17, http://www.cmf.org.uk 18. http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2008/22/contents 19. http://www.ansci.wisc.edu/jjp1/ansci_repro/misc/project_websites_07/wed07/goat_sheep_chimera/shouldwe.htm 20. Andrea Bonnicksen, Chimeras, Hybrids, and Interspecies Research: Politics and Policymaking, Georgetown University Press, 2009 21. http://www.foresight.org/nanodot/?p=5172 22. http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2010/02/darpas-new-plans-crowdsource-intel-immunize-nets-edit-dna 23. http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/339185/Tomorrow-s-sci-fi-army-that-won-t-need-food-or-sleep
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