1727

Spinach teaches Spanish teachers Spinoza

1728

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1729

This is wonderful. If we can just get the populace to not freak about gene edited plant food it would be great to help with yield, maybe not great nitro content, and increasing levels of CO2 in the atmosphere,

1730

I ain’t putting that communist rice in my kids!

1731

I am skeptical the irrational rejection of GMO foods will stop any time soon.

1732

OMG what if the rice is also vaccinated!!

1733

We already have rich assholes opposing the use of GMO’s like Golden Rice, which would save the eyesight and lives of literally millions of children by addressing vitamin A deficiency. Despite the fact that they have literally zero scientific reasons to doubt the safety of the crop.

But you know… it’s got genes in it!

1734

I think the thing to be careful about with GMO foods is not the GMO, but the ownership and patents. Monsanto has been… less than helpful in this regard.

1735

Good novel by an excellent writer (Paolo Bacigalupi) about this issue:

The Windup Girl

1736

I feel you may have quoted the wrong person, unless the Windup Girl had more telescopes than I remember :)

1737

Oops, this was supposed to be the GMO reference.

1738

Windup Girls was interesting in that it was about GMO from a Third World-ish perspective. Almost felt like Robert Silverberg’s Majipoor, except with more detailed nerd stuff.

1739

A black-footed ferret has been cloned, a first for a U.S. endangered species
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/black-footed-ferret-clone-conservation-milestone

A black-footed ferret that died more than 30 years ago has been cloned using preserved cells, which could help inject diversity into the inbred, endangered population.

This new clone is a genetic copy of a wild female named Willa, who died in the mid-1980s in Wyoming and has no living descendants. Her cells have been cryopreserved at the Frozen Zoo, a program of San Diego Zoo Global that has collected samples from some 1,100 rare and endangered species worldwide. Researchers hope to breed Elizabeth Ann and introduce her offspring into the wild to inject much-needed genetic diversity into the population.

Elizabeth Ann is not the first endangered species to be cloned from a long-dead individual. Revive and Restore, the San Diego Zoo, and Viagen previously collaborated to clone an endangered Przewalski’s horse, born in August 2020.

1741

I thought this was a pretty interesting article. We’ve long known that cephalopods are (relatively speaking) highly intelligent creatures. Interesting to learn that they can exhibit self control as well.

1742

I do not underestimate animal intelligence.

It’s but I do overestimate human intelligence.

1743

Scientists train cephalopods to send emails to spinach.

1744

+1

1745

You’d think so, but sadly that isn’t it. They’ll toss out Monsanto, but then follow it with something like “who knows what it will do to you?!!@?!?!?!@?!?!?!!?” So it’s not about the patents. It’s about GMOs. Patents are usually just an excuse.

I have issues with Monsanto and patents. I have no issues with GMOs in general.
I’ve been assured this somehow makes me both stupid and a sheeple among many other things.

Anti-GMO people and anti-vax people are basically a Venn Diagram that’s just a circle.

1746

You can say that again. These are idiots who don’t understand that we’ve been modifying genetics for hundreds/thousands of years. Their dog or cat is a perfect example of it, as are seedless watermelons and grapes.

1747

I have a seedless yohuahua. But it wasn’t genetics. It was a vet. :)

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