Earlier today I tweeted about a breakthrough by some Australian scientists after they created the first ever artificial life. It’s the world’s first fully synthetic cell, controlled by man-made DNA. But that’s not what this post is about. No. It only took a few hours, but the wowzers are already out in force trying to put a premature end to this breakthrough and once again slow down science.
The reasons they’re using to try and stop it are their completely unfounded fears, and completely fictitious invisible friends.
“You’ve got to be very careful when you willy-nilly send something into the environment and you can’t control its spread.” “And you can’t control a bacteria spread once you release it.”
said Ann Simpsons from UTS.
Someone’s watched one too many zombie movies. That’s the plot device for how the zombies form in numerous movies, as an escaped man-made bacteria/virus. Eep!
Other anonymous critics who are too scared to even associate their names with it invoked their favourite invisible friend in the sky as well, claiming Venter is playing God.
More anonymous critics who again were even more scared to even associate their names with their hysterical and unfounded claims made calls that it could be used for bio-terrorism. What, like all the terrorists worldwide using bio-warfare now, like the chemical weapons that were being produced which led up to the second Iraq War? Oh wait, there were none! How silly of me!
This is all nothing more than hysterics. These people don’t seem to have any idea of the science behind it, they’re just using their own paranoia and ignorance to scream, shout, get public opinion behind them and kill off science before it has a chance to show its worth. This kind of things greatly pisses me off and I really hope this work can survive through it.
“The technology is not for sale, the cells are not for sale,” “We are trying to use this technology to advance vaccine protection, we are trying to use it to advance the basic understanding of cellular life.”
Venter told the BBC
Bastard Sheep 
Thanks for reporting on this tremendous breakthrough, It certainly will be grist for the scientific wowser mill. Thatś only because the human condition is often overwhelmed by a fear of the unknown.
I have been known to support the ´Friends Of The Earth´ of whom Georgia Miller, spoke out, saying:
¨There was a risk that synthetic organisms could harm the environment or be used for malicious purposes.¨
But, the very same sort of thing was touted in the day that the modern printing press was invented. And then, what of these statements would not have been true of electricity at the time it was harnessed? I am sure many of us still remember the catastrophic disasters that microwave ovens were going to wreak upon us, by meddling with ¨things we don´t understand.¨
I have only one comment for the ´things we don´t understand´ lobby. SPEAK FOR YOURSELF.