Gary Comstock, coordinator of the bioethics program at Iowa State, discussed the benefits of genetically modified foods at the Manna Institute for Plant Sciences 2001 Symposium at Tel Aviv University in Israel.

Comstock, professor of philosophy and religious studies, spoke in Tel Aviv earlier this month to a crowd of 250 people about how Jewish law affects the perception of genetically modified food.

Currently, Israel does not accept genetically modified food technology, which mixes different types of genes together, Comstock said. For example, he said, Israelites do not believe in cross-breeding oxen and horses.

“The purpose was to encourage discussion of moral values surrounding [this] new technology in agriculture,” Comstock said. Another purpose was to represent Iowa State in an international forum, he said.

In his speech, titled “Vexing Nature Concerning the Ethical Case Against Agricultural Biotechnology,” Comstock distinguished between intrinsic and extrinsic objections to this new technology.

Comstock introduced research by Dermot Hayes, professor of economics, in his speech.

“We were interested in what descriptions cause people to like technology,” Hayes said.

The results of Hayes’ research suggests that when consumers are presented with positive information about irradiated foods they accept the technology. When presented with negative information, consumers reject the technology, he said.

An ethical dilemma results as a result of these types of experiments, Hayes said.

“When you use the wrong words to describe genetically modified foods, you kill the technology and don’t get the benefits from scientific advances,” he said.

Hayes said that people give a lot of weight to word choice.

Comstock also said that telling people both positive and negative information can lead to the rejection of the technology, which can hurt developing countries.

According to Comstock, Vitamin A deficiency is the leading cause of blindness and malnutrition in the world.

“The potential for producing Vitamin A could save hundreds of thousands of children,” he said.

Hayes agrees with Comstock on the potential benefits of this technology, which can be potentially enormous despite the risks.

“We all know that a danger exists when driving cars, but we do it because of the benefits,” he said.