Posted on 05/13/2015 6:43:17 PM PDT by Kaslin
RUSH: From the UK Daily Mail. And I think this is -- well, I'll withhold my characterization of it, just give you the headline.
"Poor People’s DNA is Declining in Quality, Say Scientists: Study Reveals How Stressful Upbringings Damage Genes. Stress can leave damaging and lasting imprints on the genes of the urban poor. This is according to a new study that claims poor people's DNA is declining in quality as a result of difficult upbringings.
Now, is that even possible? DNA as a result of sociological circumstance? This story claims that not only is it likely, it's happening. "The results are based on the finding that people in disadvantaged environments have shorter telomeres -- DNA sequences that generally shrink with age -- than their advantaged peers. The study looked at the telomeres of poor and lower middle-class black, white, and Mexican residents of Detroit."
Now, again, telomeres, if I'm pronouncing that right, telomeres "are the protective caps on the ends of the strands of DNA called chromosomes, which house our genomes." And by now I know I've lost the people in Rio Linda, but I'm nevertheless gonna persevere here. "In young humans, telomeres are about 8,000-10,000 nucleotides long." (laughing) How long is a nucleotide, Snerdley? (laughing) And these nucleotides, they shorten with each cell division and as a result of stress.
"Previous research has found telomere length can reliably predict life expectancy in humans. The study found that low-income residents of Detroit, no matter their race, have shorter telomeres than the national average." length of a telomere. (interruption) It is. It's telomere inequality. It's chromosome inequality. It's nucleotide inequality brought on by living conditions inequality.
"Dr. Arline Geronimus, a visiting scholar at the Stanford Center for Advanced Study said in an interview with The Huffington Post," which should give you a lot insight here, "There are effects of living in high-poverty, racially segregated neighborhoods." I'll tell you, this is a first for me, that living in poor minority neighborhoods can make your DNA worse and in fact can telegraph your future. Now, some of you I'm sure will remember this, but you know my first reaction to this? And I had many. But my first reaction to this was that this story can now be trumpeted by the left to validate abortion among poor people.
I remember when I first started getting involved on the radio as a participant in the abortion debate, both locally in Sacramento and then nationally as this program went on the air, I began hearing all kinds of justifications for it. We heard, for example, that it's actually an illness, pregnancy is an illness and that it's unfair that women are saddled with this and sometimes abortion is a cure. Now, Snerdley, no calls on abortion. It's not what this is about. This is about the left seeking yet again to advance its agenda while dividing the people of this country on any kind of line they can, racial, economic, sociological, you name it. This is despicable.
We also heard that not only was pregnancy a sickness, but that a fetus was an unviable tissue mass, and we heard all kinds of excuses. One that we heard frequently was, "Well, would you want to bring a baby into that world," meaning one of poverty and dilapidation and thirst and socioeconomic disaster, and this prompted a number of us to start doing research into famous people and find out what their backgrounds were.
We found out a tremendous number of famous experts, people who had become stars in entertainment, stars of medicine, many of them had come from poverty. Many of them had survived poverty or very bad socioeconomic circumstances. And we were forced to do this because the left, in its continual perversion, was looking for any justification whatsoever for abortion and to call it something other than what it was. And when I saw this story, that DNA, that poverty and being poor and disadvantaged becomes part of who you are, becomes part of your DNA?
How do you escape your DNA, folks? Has anybody ever told you how to escape your DNA? You can't, right? Your DNA is who you are. Your genealogical history, that's who you are. Your genome is yours. No two DNAs are alike. DNA convicts people. DNA is a unique identifier unlike any other identifier we have. I've never heard anybody say that you can escape it. I've never heard anybody say that you can change it. I mean, not with behavior.
I know that some people say you can mess around with medicine, surgery, who knows what, splicing, I know that, but I'm talking just in terms of these people are saying that they're not doing anything medically to make this happen. They're just living continuously in poverty and that is affecting their DNA. You know how ridiculous this is? Until the last century, this is again part of the whole discussion of American exceptionalism.
Folks, I'm not making this up. Until the last century, just about everybody in the world came from poverty. The world! Everybody in the world came from, was born into poverty. Such was the average economic circumstance for most people, I mean the vast majority. The story of humanity from the beginning of time has been one of tyranny and bondage.
And now we are able to tweek the ever-deteriorating genome. The rich will upgrade their DNA. The rest of us will be left behind.
That is, of course, quite possible.
Though we are a long way from being able to make DNA changes without risking horrible unintended consequences.
However, the closer to actual physics, the closer to actual truth.
In which, by the way, God fits in quite nicely given mathematics.
(IMHO, of course.)
I’m going with TB over NYR 4-2 and CHI over ANA 4-3.
These two conference finals should be great.
My pics are Chi in 6, NY in 7.
Nice!
It has been a staple of genetics for generations that cosmic radiation and other causes can introduce genetic change; that viruses can do the same is a new discovery, but not one dispositive of either Mendel or Darwin, or affirmative of Lysenko's doctrine.
To point out that people are propounding Lysenkoism isn't "labeling" either Lysenkoism or its newest iteration. And yes, I'm beginning to repeat myself, so perhaps we should leave it here.
I doubt we really disagree. I was merely attempting to point out that stating a theory is X (Lysenkoist, racist, homophobic, misogynist, unchristian), even if true, does not make the theory untrue. Of itself, all the statement shows is that the theory is unpopular with certain groups.
If a theory is true, then it’s true no matter how we categorize it. Same if it’s false.
Or "below". Paging Mr. Wells, Mr. H.G. Wells, please use the white courtesy phone to call the service desk, Mr. Wells. </Off booming voice.> <Click!> <Fade in Muzak, "The Girl from Ipanema" >
As for the photo (nice find) it would give me the crawlies, just knowing that Stalin was looking down at the back of my neck like that.
From a purely material standpoint, almost every single person in western countries is considerably better off than the average just a century ago.
This theory reminds me of the claim that some Indian tribes and other groups are peculiarly susceptible genetically to obesity because they have a history of intermittent starvation, so their bodies store food when available with great efficiency.
What this ignores is that until a few centuries ago, intermittent starvation was universal among humans. And a few centuries is not enough to change genetic inheritance much.
More like "People with poor-quality DNA are engaging in excessive breeding..."
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