For people who don't like the idea of tampering with genes at all, the idea of eating genetically altered food is downright horrifying. Yet even the proconsumer FDA Commissioner David Kessler sided with an Administration decision, announced last week, that some bio-engineered fruits and vegetables will be allowed on the market without pre-testing, and without a warning label.
Genetic engineering involves adding or subtracting characteristics from an organism by either suppressing the action of a specific gene or by adding a gene from another plant, or even an animal. A few years ago, in an extreme example, scientists spliced a gene...