Throughout history, humans have relied on animals and plants for sustenance. Our bodies have developed to properly digest a large variety of these naturally occurring substances.
The body understands how to excrete portions of a given food that might be hazardous to us, as well as to isolate the nutrients we need for health.
These complex relationships evolved over tens of thousands of years -- so what do you think might happen if all of a sudden our food supply displayed a dramatically different atomic formation that our body could not recognize?
This is exactly what is going on in laboratories throughout the country. Genetically modified foods are the product of scientific intervention in the natural growth process.
Scientists have found ways of isolating or synthesizing particular genes from certain foods, animals and plants, then inserting them into the genome of another organism to harness the perceived benefits of the original specimen.
We have managed, through this science, to create a tomato that ripens in dark trucks, raspberries that don't rot during shipment, apples that grow to twice their normal size, and more. However, genetic engineering is not an exact science.
Our understanding of the specific interactions of certain portions of the genome -- eventually, one sequence may be necessary to block the effects of another dangerous one or a sequence may activate an essential process -- allows scientists to perhaps unintentionally create hazardous foods that show up on our grocery shelves.GM foods are sometimes touted as the "food of the future."
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