The Pentagon is studying whether insects can be enlisted to combat crop loss during agricultural emergencies.
The bugs would carry genetically engineered viruses that could be deployed rapidly if critical crops such as corn or wheat became vulnerable to a drought, a natural blight or a sudden attack by a biological weapon.
The concept envisions the viruses making genetic modifications that protect the plants immediately, during a single growing season.
The program, funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), has a warm and fuzzy name: 'Insect Allies'. But some critics find the whole thing creepy.
A team of skeptical scientists and legal scholars published an article in the journal Science on Thursday arguing that the Insect Allies program opens a "Pandora's box" and involves technology that "may be widely perceived as an effort to develop biological agents for hostile purposes and their means of delivery"...
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2 comments:
An army of insects infused with genetically engineered viruses. This is great idea. I mean what could possibly go wrong? It might cause some confusion at first if all ants, you know, become army ants. And maybe the praying mantis will have to be renamed the Chaplin mantis. Still, it shows that DARPA, the folks who with help of Al Gore brought us the internet, are still there trying out new ideas. I say go for it. Our tax dollars well-spent. Well, actually somebody way in the future's tax dollars since the federal government is running on borrowed money. The national debt is currently $21.6 trillion. That is because the Don't Tax, Do Spend Party is in power. I guess that is better than the Tax and Spend Party being in power. But I am waiting for there to be a Don't Tax, Don't Spend, Don't Create a Bio-engineered Insect Army Party. Wait a second, maybe there already is. I think it begins with letter 'L'.
Yes, but all of us 'L's are already considered to be insects.
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