Is it possible today to estimate the risk for appearance of harmful substances due to genetic engineering?
Risk is the probability that some adverse effect (hazard) will occur in the future. Of course, no one can predict the future with perfect certainty. The degree of accuracy of a risk assessment is dependent on how much relevant information is available, the quality of that information and how well that information is interpreted. Thus, some risk assessments are more reliable than others. For example, because insurance companies have many years worth of information about automobile accidents, they can predict rather well the characteristics of drivers (using data on age, sex, type of car, and accident history) is most likely to be involved in an accident. On the other hand, because the physics of only a few major earthquakes have been monitored with sophisticated seismic equipment, and because there are debates about what physical signals are important indicators, it is not yet possible to predict the likelihood of a major occurrence. Specifically, it is not possible to assess the risk o
