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Christianity and Genetic Engineering: science or serendipity-the case of the GE salmon

Back when it was still a point of debate (2002) I picked up a pamphlet from the counter top of our local health food store which stated on its cover:

"WARNING: THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION IS IN THE PROCESS OF APPROVING THE FIRST
GENETICALLY ENGINEERED FISH. IF APPROVED, THESE FISH WILL BE ALLOWED TO

SWIM IN OPEN WATERS AND BE SOLD IN SUPER MARKETS WITHOUT ANY MANDATORY
LABELING."

These pamphlets had been put out for circulation by The Center for Food
Safety (www.centerforfoodsafety.org), one of a number of such organizations
which are concerned with genetically engineered organisms being allowed to
enter into our food chain for human consumption and into the environment at
large-and rightfully so.

The genetically engineered salmon is not a recent development. I became
aware of it in 1999 when the news of its development earned it the name of
"frankenfish" in the media. Since that time some 30 other genetically
engineered fishes have been developed worldwide among which is included a
red carp which has been developed in China which is capable of producing
human growth hormone for extraction (i.e. it is a goldfish with the human
DNA segment responsible for the production of human growth hormone spliced
into its genetic makeup).

The genetically engineered (GE) salmon has been developed for its
tremendously accelerated growth rate-it grows at a rate which is 30 times
faster than that of a natural salmon-and for its eventual enormous size-a
natural salmon tops out at around 150 pounds whereas the GE salmon can
reach 450 pounds!

Now I might have chosen the word "designed" rather than "developed" as it
refers to the GE salmon but such is not exactly the case. In the beginning
the goal of the biotech scientists was not to "design" a salmon which grew
30 times faster and 3 times bigger than a natural salmon. This was the
unintentional result of an intent to "design" a salmon for a far different
reason.

The super-grow GE salmon unintentionally came into being when biotech
scientists were intending to develop a cold-tolerant salmon. In order to
develop a cold-tolerant salmon they spliced into the salmon the DNA segment
from a flounder-a fish totally unrelated to the salmon (the two species
could not crossbreed naturally) which can withstand subfreezing
temperatures-that they thought was responsible for the cold-tolerance of
the flounder in the hope of ending up with a salmon which could tolerate
far colder waters than the

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