Redesigning Life?: The Worldwide Challenge to Genetic Engineering - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0773521445 ISBN 13: 9780773521445

Publisher: McGill Queens Univ, 2001

Synopsis

New discoveries in biotechnology are often touted as the answer to many contemporary problems. Genetic engineering, animal cloning, and reproductive technologies are promoted as the keys to a brighter future, while genetic engineers promise more productive agriculture, medical miracles, and solutions to environmental problems. But increasing numbers of farmers, scientists, and concerned citizens disagree. There is growing evidence that genetically engineered foods are hazardous to our health and to the environment. Farmers all over the world are encountering an increasingly monopolized seed and agrichemical industry. Animal cloning and human genetic engineering raise troubling ethical questions and genes from plants, animals, and humans have become objects to be bought, sold, and patented by private interests. Worldwide resistance to genetic engineering and other biotechnologies has brought these issues to the forefront of public controversy.Contributors include Beth Burrows (Edmonds Institute), Mitchel Cohen (freelance writer and activist, US), Martha Crouch (formerly of Indiana University), Marcy Darnovsky (Sonoma State University), Michael Dorsey (environmental justice activist), Steve Emmott (Green delegation to the European Parliament), Alix Fano (Campaign for Responsible Transplantation, NY), Jennifer Ferrara (freelance writer, CA), Chaia Heller (Institute for Social Ecology, VT), David King (GenEthics News, UK), Jack Kloppenburg (University of Wisconsin), Orin Langelle (Native Forest Network), Zoë C. Meleo-Erwin (activist and researcher, PA), Barbara Katz Rothman (City University of New York), Sonja Schmitz (doctoral candidate, University of Vermont), Thomas G. Schweiger (Greenpeace International), Sarah Sexton (The Corner House, UK), Robin Seydel (La Montañita Food Co-op, NM), Hope Shand (Rural Advancement Foundation International, Canada), Lucy Sharratt (Sierra Club of Canada), Vandana Shiva (Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology, India), Ricarda Steinbrecher (Econexus, UK), Victoria Tauli-Corpuz (Tebtebba Foundation, Philippines), Jim Thomas (Greenpeace UK), Brian Tokar, Kimberly Wilson (Greenpeace USA).

About this title

About the Author

Brian Tokar has been an activist since the 1970s, and is currently a faculty member at Goddard College and the Institute for Social Ecology in Vermont.

Review

In this wide-ranging collection, scientists and activists discuss the pressing issues growing out of the wanton commercialization of the life sciences. With clear and up-to-date examples, the authors illustrate the dangers inherent in the unfettered manipulation of plant, animal and human biology for health and societal well-being. Ruth Hubbard, Professor Emerita of Biology at Harvard University, Board Member of the Council for Responsible Genetics, and author of Exploding the Gene Myth.

Edition details

• Publisher: McGill Queens Univ
• Publication date: 2001
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0773521445
• ISBN 13: 9780773521445
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 384
• Editor: Tokar Brian