FDA thinks DNA is a drug (or the FDA sucks reason #452)

[Antonio the Sixth]

It's a chemical product that has been made or altered by human activity. That makes it a drug.

To the human body, "modified" DNA is indistinguishable from "natural" (whatever that means) DNA.

Pretty sure that's false as a blanket statement.

nah, she's right. DNA is basically a long chain of four different repeating nucleotides (A G C and T). This is all DNA, including transgenically modified DNA (because all animals share the same structure of DNA). In the digestive tract, the DNA chains are immediately rippedup to their constituent ncleotides (which are further broken down). So the novel DNA combinations one can make from biotechnology become irrelevant.

But DNA is also the "code" that can change the biological composition of a living being, right? The reason why we have different species is because they have a different DNA that "builds" them in a certain way. So, in theory, it's perfectly possible that changing the DNA in some food will change its characteristics in some way. And since some species are edible and some aren't (and some are edible but less healthy to eat than others) it's perfectly possible that altering DNA will have a negative impact.

[dead0man]

Yes, except:
A.this is very very targeted manipulations we're talking about here.  It's not going to be poisonous because they aren't putting the genes for poison in.
2.even if by some unknown by science at this time mechanism somehow makes hornless milk cows highly toxic or whatever (which is totally impossible, but I'm humoring you here) they'd notice it in the texting

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

It's a chemical product that has been made or altered by human activity. That makes it a drug.

To the human body, "modified" DNA is indistinguishable from "natural" (whatever that means) DNA.

Pretty sure that's false as a blanket statement.

nah, she's right. DNA is basically a long chain of four different repeating nucleotides (A G C and T). This is all DNA, including transgenically modified DNA (because all animals share the same structure of DNA). In the digestive tract, the DNA chains are immediately rippedup to their constituent ncleotides (which are further broken down). So the novel DNA combinations one can make from biotechnology become irrelevant.

But DNA is also the "code" that can change the biological composition of a living being, right? The reason why we have different species is because they have a different DNA that "builds" them in a certain way. So, in theory, it's perfectly possible that changing the DNA in some food will change its characteristics in some way. And since some species are edible and some aren't (and some are edible but less healthy to eat than others) it's perfectly possible that altering DNA will have a negative impact.

Yes which is what I said in my first response to this thread. All DNA is is an instruction for making proteins, which could hypothetically be toxic (or more likely) allergenic.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Yes, except:
A.this is very very targeted manipulations we're talking about here.  It's not going to be poisonous because they aren't putting the genes for poison in.
2.even if by some unknown by science at this time mechanism somehow makes hornless milk cows highly toxic or whatever (which is totally impossible, but I'm humoring you here) they'd notice it in the texting

The FDA is there precisely to check and make sure that all those "totally impossible" things don't actually end up happening. Which, as we have seen, they sometimes do.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Yes, except:
A.this is very very targeted manipulations we're talking about here.  It's not going to be poisonous because they aren't putting the genes for poison in.
2.even if by some unknown by science at this time mechanism somehow makes hornless milk cows highly toxic or whatever (which is totally impossible, but I'm humoring you here) they'd notice it in the testing

It's not only highly toxic effects that need to be checked out.  DES is a classic example of a drug that while not immediately poisonous had considerable side effects.  Studies are showing that it may even be affecting the grandchildren of the women who took it during pregnancy.  What all having phytase inside the body of a pig does to a pig is something that definitely needs investigation in my opinion