I think one thing people are worried about is simply unintended consequences.

Humans have always had confidence of mastery over nature and more often than not we screw it up.

I think people are using irrational thought processes to come to nonsensical conclusions. The anti-GMO business is feeling over reason.

Saying that you don't trust a scientist with only a tenuous grasp (because that is all we have) of what nutrition is or should be (and what things might be harmful over 10-30 years) to make grand and sweeping changes to how an organism works is not feeling over reason. It is a different form of risk-management, one that you might not agree with (and that's fine).

What if, instead of replacing the Gros Michel back when it got wiped out, we had been able to replace it with a GMO Gros Michel instead of the Cavendish. Why would a GMO Gros Michel seem more risky than the Cavendish- a completely different varietal, that is almost certainly more unlike the Gros Michel, nutritionally, than a GMO Gros Michel.

We switched the entire planet over from Gros Michel to Cavendish with basically no studies of nutritional impact or whatever, and it was fine. They're both bananas, bananas are basically similar to each other, they taste a bit different but they're fine.

Why be more afraid of a GMO Cavendish than whichever other varietal gets pulled out this time? A GMO Cavendish would be less change.

I think part of the problem is with what people are assuming.

There is in fact a large, obvious population of people who are emotionally scared of GMOs. Unfortunately, that group has given anybody who question GMOs a bad name.

This kind of thing is unfortunately true for many things in life.

And ironically, if what I am saying is true, it is the grandparent who, while accusing of irrational reasoning, has not reasoned this out.

Whenever I see anyone attempt to defend their anti-GMO positions, they inevitably devolve into vague "well, it might be bad". Since this is literally true of ANYTHING new, the focus on GMOs is being driven by some irrational subtext.

The point I outlined in my post is one that I have seen people who are not vocal advocates of GMO utter. It's a perfectly regular piece of reasoning and not "irrational subtext". I'd go so far as to say the irrational subtext here might be the fact that it is seen as some sort of personal failing to question something which would be very convenient if it was entirely safe (and was known to be safe).

Just because it is convenient and it works well in the areas that we can measure well does not mean it is actually safe or that we should embrace it uncritically.

No, it's an irrational subtext, since it "proves too much". Taken at face value, it stops all technological change. Since technological change has been enormously successful, the argument is obviously bullshit.

The sly move is to try to apply this "don't do it" principle to only GMOs (or some limited set of hot button topics that includes GMOs). This selective application is where the unreason slips in.

You have reduced my reasoning to ridiculousness by extrapolating it to a degree that I find to be frankly insane. My point was that we do not understand the field well and thus should not make sweeping changes because we can't understand the consequences. My next point was that this is a coherent stance even if it gets in the way of easy progress.

Frankly from your response I cannot find a reason to change my mind on this, because you have mostly avoided the subject by attacking my reasoning with your own flawed logic. I find it ironic that you are saying that people who advocate a more conservative stance on GMO are unreasoning or spouting "obvious bullshit" when what is in fact happening is that you are doing exactly what I already addressed: Being upset that this reasoning stops progress in a field you don't understand well, because it is inconvenient.