ABSTRACT
A view related to the one just described, but which is more properly an environmental objection and may play a more significant role in the controversy about GM crops, asserts the intrinsic badness not of the process of genetic modification itself, but of the release of genetically modified material into the environment. It holds that the environment is degraded or devalued by the mere presence of genetically modified material, independently of any perceptible effects. This view is discussed in the Nuffield report, and appears to be a necessary underpinning for the stance of Greenpeace and others that, while contained use of GM organisms (GMOs) is acceptable, the inevitability of genes escaping from GM crops into the wider environment ('genetic pollution') is, independently of any further consequences, sufficient ground for halting their use and engaging in civil disobedience to destroy existing crops.7
