op ed

A recurring theme in science fiction stories is the conflict between emotional humans, and emotionless alien menaces.

Well, sometimes, getting in touch with your feelings can be taken a *little* too far...

Well, it's that time of the year again: the bean counters (or is that rice counters?) in North Korea are going through the books and taking note of the budget deficit, so the Exalted Leader has to go out and rattle his saber in order to get the rest of the sane world to pony up some hush money and help him meet his shortfall. When the Gross Domestic Product of your country is terror, this is what you do.

Genetic engineering gives us the ability to compact decades of selective breeding into a few short years, to produce plants and animals with superior qualities, or even with traits from completely different organisms which it would not be possible to introduce by natural means.
 
How is this bad?

Sometimes the price of innovation is death.  Thousands of pioneers over the centuries have been willing to pay that price in the hopes of finding a better future for themselves and their progeny.  They pushed the frontiers back in an attempt to seize the future.
 
Why are we so unwilling to follow their example?  Why has manned space exploration become far too expensive for us?