precautionary principle. As articulated by Raffensperger and many others, the precautionary principle basically argues that science and industry must fully assess the impact of their activities before they impose them upon the public and the environment. Societies around the world have begun to incorporate some version of the principle into law, hoping to rein in bioengineering and other new technologies.

That science should objectively prove the safety of its own inventions might seem like common sense, but that’s not how most science operates today.

For decades, the scientific and medical community has accepted that a certain amount of pollution and disease is just the price we have to pay for modern life. This is called the "risk paradigm," and it essentially means that it is society’s burden to prove that new technologies and industrial processes are harmful, usually one chemical or technology at a time. The risk paradigm assumes that there are "acceptable" levels of contamination the earth and our bodies can supposedly assimilate. It also allows a small, self-interested elite to set these levels, undistracted by the "irrational" fears and demands of the public. The "science" behind it is driven by large commercial interests and can hardly be considered either impartial or in the public interest. Viewed with any distance at all, the risk paradigm is at best a high-stakes game of biological roulette with all the chambers loaded.There is a global effort afoot today to replace the risk paradigm with the precautionary principle, which is based on a recognition of science’s limits in fully predicting consequences and possible harm. The precautionary principle acknowledges that all life is interconnected. It shifts the burden of proof (and liability) to the parties promoting potentially harmful technologies, and limits their use to experiments until they are proven truly safe.The idea is not new—a version of it first appeared in U.S. law back in 1958 in the Delaney Amendment, which governed pesticide residues in food and set standards for environmental impact statements. Nor is it radical. At its essence, the principle harks back to grandma’s admonitions that "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure," that we’re "better safe than sorry." The model is already used, in theory, for the drug industry, which is legally bound to prove drugs safe and effective prior to their use. Critics call it anti-scientific; they say it limits trade and stifles innovation. Ecological medicine advocates disagree."The precautionary principle actually sheds a bright light on science," says Dr. Ted Schettler, science director of SEHN. "It doesn’t tell us what to do, but it does tell you what to look at." Germany and Sweden have incorporated the principle into certain environmental policies. The United Nations Biosafety Protocol includes it as part of new guidelines for regulating trade in genetically modified products, its first appearance in an international treaty.