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Regula_Guy t1_j3jdclq wrote

Amazing how many people are commenting without having read the article. The discovery wasn’t a new line of wheat, that companies are going to price gouge on, it was a gene which can be leveraged for improved breeding in the future.

Additionally, it’s amazing how prevalent the narrative is that “you have to get new seed every year, isn’t that evil?” is… you should consider that your seed after harvest is going to be different on a genetic level from what you planted (just like how you’re not a clone of your parents, the wheat isn’t either). So sure you could reuse seed from harvest, but then you risk having plants susceptible to disease, drought, and lower yield. Being cynical doesn’t make you informed.

I beg everyone to stop providing cynical uninformed commentary to things they don’t even bother to read or try to understand. Just because characters on TV are oftentimes cynical and knowledgeable doesn’t mean being cynical makes you knowledgeable, you still have to read things to get the information, not just make quippy remarks. Please just read beyond the headline.

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2ndHandTardis t1_j3kyr7u wrote

"Being cynical doesn’t make you informed"

Ever... Fucking... Green.....

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Rombledore t1_j3ltcw1 wrote

>I beg everyone to stop providing cynical uninformed commentary to things they don’t even bother to read or try to understand.

boy, do i have something to show you that will make you depressed.

presents social media

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DarkColdFusion t1_j3loyaz wrote

>you should consider that your seed after harvest is going to be different on a genetic level from what you planted (just like how you’re not a clone of your parents, the wheat isn’t either). So sure you could reuse seed from harvest, but then you risk having plants susceptible to disease, drought, and lower yield. Being cynical doesn’t make you informed.

It's like people have missed the past century of farming improvement. And they basically just want a reason to steer the conversation to band wagon hate on GMOs and Monsanto.

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TummyDrums t1_j3mppti wrote

>So sure you could reuse seed from harvest, but then you risk having plants susceptible to disease, drought, and lower yield.

Granted I'm not super knowledgeable about this stuff, but wouldn't harvested seed with slight genetic differences make it less susceptible to disease as compared to homogenous seed that you buy from the producer every year that is exactly the same? If a disease hits your crop with all identical seeds, its going to kill everything, whereas if there is some natural genetic differences in your seeds it might make some of it just different enough to not be as affected by the disease. In theory anyway.

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Regula_Guy t1_j3mvc3y wrote

Having genetic diversity reduces chances of widespread plague when the pathogen ends up circumventing the resistance, but crops are often bred to have certain resistances to pathogens/insects, so if you risk having those resistances bred out. Additionally that variation in the f1 generation isn’t guaranteed to have any better genetics for dealing with the pathogen and risks having worse yield, worse tolerances to other environmental factors, etc. It’s like betting on Achilles or 100 untrained villagers, sure Achilles heel is a weakness, but he’s stronger and nearly invincible (hyperbole) compared to the mixed bag you’re getting with the villagers. You’re probably thinking of bananas being wiped out which is a bit of a different case, since wheat can be bred at a faster rate and is seasonal whereas banana trees aren’t as rapidly bred to deal with resistances/tolerances and the plants aren’t seasonal. If 30 of your 10,000 plants survive because they just so happened to have a better resistance by circumstance that you can’t guarantee you’re still at a massive loss, whereas if you go with the more productive line, you know you’ll get 15% more yield if there is no plague, but if there is then you might only have like 10 plants that survive.

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MyNameIsRobPaulson t1_j3kt5ko wrote

No lazy cynicism = intelligence!

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TalkativeVoyeur t1_j3qdz22 wrote

I'm confused, did you mean "no, lazy cynicism = intelligence" or did you mean that just ridding yourself of cynicism makes you smarter (I guess it would if you could do it you could have done a lot of self growth 🤔)

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JKJ420 t1_j3lid9h wrote

Unfortunately this sub has descended into exactly what you describe. Every post gets ton of comments from idiots and other idiots upvote them, so the worst comments are on top. Obviously this is a moderation problem, but I don't see it changing any time soon.

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juxtoppose t1_j3l2iem wrote

Your right but there is nothing stopping someone wandering through their field of corn and picking the stalks with the biggest most numerous seed , however that might not matter much with the price of fertiliser since the nutrients for this miracle corn has to come from somewhere.

Save your old corn folks as it might be all that will grow on your farm.

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