Dr. Francis S. Collins
Posted on 03/16/2007 7:15:39 AM PDT by scripter
[Title slightly abbreviated to fit]
Francis S. Collins, one of the world's leading scientists who works at the cutting edge of DNA research, concluded that "there is an inescapable component of heritability to many human behavioral traits." However, he adds, "for virtually none of them, is heredity ever close to predictive."
Dr. Francis S. Collins |
The heritability estimates for personality traits were varied: General Cognitive Ability (50%), Extroversion (54%), Agreeableness (42%), Conscientiousness (49%), Neuroticism (48%), Openness (57%), Aggression (38%) and Traditionalism (54%).
Such estimates of heritability are based upon unbiased, careful analyses of studies conducted with identical twins. The studies lead to the conclusion that heredity is important in many of these personality traits. It is important however, to note that even in such studies with identical twins, that heritability is not to be confused as inevitability.
As Dr. Collins would agree, environment can influence gene expression, and free will determines the response to whatever predispositions might be present.
Dr. Collins succinctly reviewed the research on homosexuality and offers the following:
"An area of particularly strong public interest is the genetic basis of homosexuality. Evidence from twin studies does in fact support the conclusion that heritable factors play a role in male homosexuality. However, the likelihood that the identical twin of a homosexual male will also be gay is about 20% (compared with 2-4 percent of males in the general population), indicating that sexual orientation is genetically influenced but not hardwired by DNA, and that whatever genes are involved represent predispositions, not predeterminations [emphasis added]."
The heritability estimates for homosexuality is substantially lower than General Cognitive Ability, Extroversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Neuroticism, Openness, Aggression and Traditionalism!
Dr. Collins noted that environment--particularly childhood experiences--as well as the role of free will and choice affect us all in profound ways. As researchers discover increasing levels of molecular detail about inherited factors that underlie our personalities, it's critical that such data be used to illuminate the issues, not provide support to ideologues.
Citing such dangers, Dr. Collins referred to the book written by activist Dean Hamer, who declared the discovery of the "God gene" (this same author also is associated with "discovering the gay gene").
Dr. Collins noted that the "evidence" in Hamer's book "grabbed headlines," but was "wildly overstated."
A reviewer in Scientific American suggested that Hamer's book on the "God gene" should have been titled, "A Gene That Accounts for Less than One Percent of the Variance Found in Scores on Psychological Questionnaires Designed to Measure a Factor Called Self-Transcendence, Which Can Signify Everything from Belonging to the Green Party to Believing in ESP, According to One Unpublished, Unreplicated Study."
Unfortunately, much of the research in areas such as homosexuality has been misrepresented; not only in the media, but also by the scientists themselves through a tendency to overestimate the quantitative contribution of their findings.
Regarding the contributions of genetics to areas such as homosexuality, Dr. Collins concluded, "Yes, we have all been dealt a particular set of cards, and the cards will eventually be revealed. But how we play the hand is up to us."
I agree.
Reference:
Collins, Francis S. (2006). The Language of God, A Scientist Presents Evidence For Belief. New York: Free Press.
I've heard that before but didn't know Rush had mentioned it. I don't get much of an opportunity to listen to Rush these days.
Suppose you were convinced that homosexuality IS innate.
Would that make any difference in your opinions about what should or should not be done?
bookmark
"Homersexuallity is a behavior."
Besides.... what did Homer ever do to you?
(sorry...I had to do it....LOL)
Unless I am mistaken, that is a reference to a recent South Park episode. A very very vile one. (even for South Park)
For some researchers, how we play the hand is less important than how many players are at the table.
He's more likely to anger straights.
" sexual orientation is genetically influenced but not hardwired by DNA"
If sexual orientation is only twenty percent hardwired, then a straight exposed to homosexuality has a one in five chance of going gay! Gay for a day? Well, maybe just once a week...
if there had been a "gay gene" it would have faded out, since it would not have left any descendents. Then it would have appeared again, and died out, and appeared again, and died out. In fact, it would have appeared and died out one time for each new gay person. So that's a stupid idea.
I'm going to email him about it from his 24/7 mail.
I disagree.
If it is not a behaviour, what is it?
In nine years of working in the mental health field, I have met many homosexuals and had an opportunity to ask questions that would not be appropriate in causal conversation. The most significant is "Have you ever been abused in any way?" Granted, I am not dealing with the mentally healthiest segment of the gay population, but in my practice, I have never come across a gay man who was not sexually abused by another gay man at some point during his boyhood or adolescence. If homosexuality were a genetic trait, you would think I would have come across at least one gay man who could honestly say "No, I have never been abused", but I haven't. I gave up believing that homosexuality was genetic a long time ago.
Bookmarked.
Probably much more complicated than any one single cause.
A certain gene might increase the probability 4 fold, while a certain level of hormone A at just the right time or lobe of the brain may increase probability several fold.
You would need a map of all the different factors and still you will likely only come up with a certain set of probabilities. Not to mention that I suspect the causes are not all physical. As much as the GLBT groups don't want to admit it. There is a virtual statistical certainty that some live a GLBT life by choice.
With regard to "twin studies" ...
There are, I believe, a couple hundred identical twin who were separated at birth. These people have been studied to the point of exhaustion. But, given the low incidence of homosexuality, these twins don't constitute a large enough sample to say anything definitively about genetics versus environment.
Looking at fraternal twins separated at birth is the same thing as looking at siblings separated at birth. You can get a larger, and statistically meaningful sample, using fraternal twins or siblings separated at birth, at the cost, obviously, of inexact genetic matching.
Leaving aside the problems with "separated at birth" studies, studies of fraternal twins/siblings who are separated at birth tell us that genetics influence sexual orientation, but are far from controlling, which means that the results of these studies are rejected out of hand by those insisting, alternately, that homosexuality is either 100% or 0% genetic-based.
The argument that homosexuality is 100% genetic-based is about a lot more than the sinfulness of homosexuality. If homosexuality is less than 100% genetic-based, then gay-adoption is problematic.
To the extent that we influence the adoption decision, we would want children to be raised by both a male and a female role model, preferably (1) their birth-parents, or (2) close relatives such as an aunt or uncle in a traditional marriage (as traditionally was provided by naming such people as the god-parents of your children), or (3) by a non-related couple in a traditional marriage or a single close relative such as an aunt or an uncle.
Only after exhausting the above possibilities, should you consider adoption by a single non-relative to raising the child in a group home with male and female role models provided "by committee."
In terms of the culture war, this is what elections are all about (which is not to diminish the importance of free-market economics and a government with the strength and resolve needed to defend us against criminals and foreign enemies).
I think the current and next generation of children are our most important resource. I think they are worth the time it takes to get involved, make a difference and tell the world that nobody is born a homosexual. You want to know the importance of getting the truth out on homosexuality? Think of the current and next generation of children.
The radicals pushing the homosexual agenda have been saying for years homosexuals were born that way. They've been saying for years a gay gene exists. Yet not a single credible scientist supports the gay gene theory nor that anybody is born a homosexual.
No scientific evidence exists to support homosexuality (behavior) is genetic. None. Nada. Goose egg. Zilch.
Yet GLSEN is in government schools pushing the radical homosexual agenda, telling impressionable children that homosexuals are born that way. Sometimes GLSEN will ask children "how do you know you wouldn't like homosexuality if you've never tried it?"
GLSEN encourages homosexual experimentation and from what science tells us, homosexual is one of the most destructive lifestyles to encourage.
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