Not sure what this is trying to say, but this seems to conflate genetic modification with selective breeding!
Selective breeding is a form of genetic modification. That’s what it’s trying to say.
By the individual definitions of the words, yes. However in actual use, genetically modified means modification through direct methods such as chemical agents, enzymes, or electroporation.
Edit:
This isn’t my opinion. Here is an article in Nature: https://www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/genetically-modified-organisms-gmos-transgenic-crops-and-732/
You can selectively breed rabbits for 1000 years and not get a glow in the dark rabbit that can be made in a week in a lab.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/13/glow-in-dark-rabbits-scientists
Sure, but you could selectively breed rabbits for 1,000,000 years and get a glow in the dark rabbit; GFP is just a protein like any other - if you painstakingly selectively breed for a specific DNA sequence, you’ll eventually get it regardless of your starting genetic pool. Classic selective breeding is a form of genetic modification - modern genetic modification methods are just way faster.
I agree that we don’t currently know enough about genetics to utilize genetic modification without unforeseen side effects, and so there should be limitations on what we’re able to genetically modify until we can show that we understand it well enough to meaningfully minimize potential issues, but those same issues occur with selective breeding - they’re, again, just slower.
