Small Wonder

After September 11, 2001, Barbara Kingsolver worked on essays as a form of catharsis. Some of the essays are presented here as well as some older essays. Some are extremely personal (one is nearly an autobiography.) She admired the unity in the response to 9/11, but was also troubled by the hatred that arose.

I found the essay discussing evolution and genetic engineering very well written. She called out those criticizing the health effects of genetic engineering as illogical. Instead, the problem is with the resilience of crops. Evolution has led to a great diversity even in a single species. As we engineer crops to have a few desired traits, we can end up with a strong monoculture. These leaves our crops subject to unknown diseases. 

Future genetic engineering can try to fight this. But we are stuck with a continual fight. With natural evolution, there are many redundant traits that are present, but not needed. Once the stress comes to the system, these may begin to dominate. This serves as an "insurance policy". (For instance, in Arizona, there are "desert annuals" that will wait to germinate later. This allows for resilience in case there is a lack of water.) Another issue is that many plants are genetically engineered to include natural pesticides. This ends up spreading and killing off beneficial pollinators. Because the crops are widespread, the damage is also. 

These issues are with genetic engineering in the "best case". There are also further problems with the implementation. Some seeds are made intentionally to require purchasing new seeds every year. They also end up requiring more purchases of fertilizer and pesticides. This can cause big issues.