Biotech Century

One of the main points of Jeremy Rifkin's argument in the article "Biotech Century" is that it is too difficult to "assess all of the potential impacts that a genetically engineered organism might have on the Earth's ecosystem." The practice of genetic modification is something that we know very little about. We do not know what the consequences of these actions could be, but we do know that there is a small chance that they could be drastic. Releasing genetically modified organisms into the environment is like releasing a drug to the market without having tested it first to find out what the potential unknown side effects could be. The drug manufacturers would know that the drug usually cured or treated the disease, but they would not know anything else. Without this information, they could harm people without meaning to.

This situation is a mirror to the situation that genetic engineering creates for the world's ecosystems. We should strive to learn much more before we try to use tinkering and trial-and-error genetic engineering to our advangtage. Rifkin claims, "While there is only a small chance of triggering an environmental explosion, if it does, the consequences could be significant and irreversible."