Conference hydra::dave_barry

1036.0. "Potatoes that commit suicide; tomatoes "healed" through prayer" by ORION::chayna.zko.dec.com::tamara::eppes (Nina Eppes) Tue Feb 18 1997 17:21

Dave Barry
February 16, 1997

Two dramatic recent developments have demonstrated, once again, why these are
such exciting times in which to be a vegetable.

For openers, scientists have finally realized one of humanity's oldest
dreams -- the dream of creating, in the laboratory, a potato that commits
suicide.

If you don't believe me you should dig out your Oct. 24, 1996, issue of
Machine Design magazine and check out the article on page 139, sent to me by
alert reader Mark Mielke, concerning work being done by leading potato
scientists in Cologne, which as you know is a city in France or Germany or
possibly Belgium.

But wherever it is, Cologne contains the Max Planck Plant Breeding Institute,
where scientists have been messing around with potato genes. Genes are little
items that are found in every living thing except Sen. Alfonse D'Amato. As
most of us recall from biology class, a gene can be either "dominant" or
"recessive," depending on which type of gene it is. With this knowledge and a
pair of very tiny pliers, scientists can alter the genetic structure of a
living thing, and the Cologne scientists have modified a potato so that, if it
catches a fungus disease, it will cause itself to die. (I did not follow the
technical details of how the potato does this, although we can probably rule
out firearms, because many states, despite the clear intent of the U.S.
Constitution, no longer allow vegetables to obtain handguns without a
"cooling-off" period.)

The question is: Is it morally right to make potatoes commit suicide? Potatoes
are, after all, living organisms that perform the same basic life functions as
humans -- growing, reproducing and purchasing state-lottery tickets. Can we
look a potato square in its eyes and say that we have the right to "play god"
this way? And once we do this to potatoes, what is to stop us from doing it to
other species? Every day, in TV commercials and magazine advertisements, we
see close-up color pictures of the feet of human beings who are suffering from
the heartbreak of toe fungus. Are we going to start putting suicidal potato
genes into these people? I hope so, because those pictures are disgusting.

We also need to give serious thought to the issue of radicchio. I don't know
about you, but I hate it when I order a salad, and instead of some nice, green
lettuce, I get these scrawny sprigs of radicchio, which is Italian for "tastes
so bad that even a starving goat spits it out." If we're going to make ANY
vegetable suicidal, this is where we should start.

But enough about killing vegetables. What about the other side? What about the
issue of healing vegetables, specifically tomatoes, through prayer? This issue
recently was the subject of an experiment, which I absolutely swear I am not
making up, conducted by Jay Ingram, who does a science show on the Discovery
Channel on Canadian TV. According to newspaper articles sent in by several
alert Canadian readers, the experiment involved six tubs of tomatoes, some of
which had been punctured and infected with tomato blight. Some of the tomatoes
were visited by healers, who, according to Ingram, directed "healing thoughts"
toward them. The public was also invited to "think powerful healing thoughts
when the tomatoes are periodically shown on your TV screens."

The results, according to the show's World Wide Web site
(http://www.stemnet.nf.ca/~yliu/tomato.html), were as follows:

"In the three tubs that had good thoughts sent to them, the average size of
the wound was virtually the same as the wounds on the tomatoes in the control
group. However, of the three tubs of tomatoes prayed for, one tub was
interesting in that the size of the wounds was the smallest of the six tubs.
What is the explanation for this? Is it simply biological variation? Or, is
there something else at work here? More tightly controlled experiments would
need to be conducted to explore this outcome."

So there you have it: A definite "We don't know" from the groundbreaking
Canadian tomato-prayer experiment. The Web site does not say what happened to
the tomatoes, but it would not surprise me in the least to see them on TV
advertising their new psychic hot line.

Meanwhile, all this research has aroused my scientific curiosity. I'm going to
go conduct a tightly controlled experiment to see what happens when you put
ketchup on fries. Pray for me.