I have never seen a paper on CRISPR that can distinguish between selecting pre-existing mutants and actually modifying genes. I have read probably a dozen or so at this point, and it is amazing that they always fail to address this either in citations or actual data.<p>At first I thought it was an honest mistake, but now it would not surprise me if some of the main players know that their experiments with CRISPR have been misinterpreted. They are then pushing the gene &quot;modification&quot; label anyway because it is sexier.<p>After all, CRISPR has received an extremely unusual amount of media coverage over the last year or so, which raises red flags. I suspect a marketing effort is being directly funded. That is not a honest use of funds meant for research, especially that which is not meeting minimum scientific standards (ruling out other explanations for the results rather than just a null hypothesis).