Posted on 06/16/2006 9:32:09 AM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
CHICAGO -- Last September, Bruce Lahn, a professor of human genetics at the University of Chicago, stood before a packed lecture hall and reported the results of a new DNA analysis: He had found signs of recent evolution in the brains of some people, but not of others.
It was a triumphant moment for the young scientist. He was up for tenure and his research was being featured in back-to-back articles in the country's most prestigious science journal. Yet today, Dr. Lahn says he is moving away from the research. "It's getting too controversial," he says.
Dr. Lahn had touched a raw nerve in science: race and intelligence.
What Dr. Lahn told his audience was that genetic changes over the past several thousand years might be linked to brain size and intelligence. He flashed maps that showed the changes had taken hold and spread widely in Europe, Asia and the Americas, but weren't common in sub-Saharan Africa.
Web sites and magazines promoting white "racialism" quickly seized on Dr. Lahn's suggestive scientific snapshot. One magazine that blames black and Hispanic people for social ills hailed his discovery as "the moment the antiracists and egalitarians have dreaded."
Dr. Lahn has drawn sharp fire from other leading genetics researchers. They say the genetic differences he found may not signify any recent evolution -- and even if they do, it is too big a leap to suggest any link to intelligence. "This is not the place you want to report a weak association that might or might not stand up," says Francis Collins, director of the genome program at the National Institutes of Health.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
As I recall (and you had to be paying close attention to find it), sub-Sahara was TWO standard deviations down. African-americans were (roughly) one standard deviation down, but that gap was narrowing. At least that's what I recall.
Does pork or bacon make you smarter?
Just in case I'll have bacon with my Big Macs.
How does he explain the spread of the newly mutated gene? Mostly these spread by diffusion; even considering air-travel. Are there travel patterns that go around Africa?
I liked the part where he said it occurred about 5,600 years ago. Hmmmmm.....what is special about that date....
Shalom!
Depends on how you define "religion." Ann Coulter's on to something. Of course that new "religion" dates as far back as Rousseau and the Enlightenment deification of pure reason. There seems to be a need for Ultimate Authority in us all whether or not we acknowledge it by name.
I agree that the modern politicization of science is both hypocritical and dangerous.
There was very little diffusion few thousand years ago, [his putative dating]. Indo-European counterclockwise swing did happen in that time frame, but did not impact on the East Asians, and surely did not impact on the population of the Americas. That's why I question his timing - from Occam's principle it would be so much simpler to date that mutation [or the whole cascade of them] to as yet undifferentiated out-of-Africa group [100-110 to ca.40 Kyrs before the present]. More, such time conveniently pre-dates the settlement of the Americas.
Shades of Schockley!!!
Could be any number of reasons. I'm not a geneticist, but possibilities include:
1) Environmental triggers play a role in the frequency of mutation, and are present to different degrees in sub-Saharan Africa than elsewhere; this mechanism could even hold for racial sub-Saharans who have lived in other parts of the world for many generations, since exposure to particular environmental factors (e.g. types and/or quantities of food) are in part driven by individual choice, which may in turn be driven by a huge number of genetic factors, some of which ar more prevalent in some racial groups than in other.
2) Other genetic factors which are more prevalent in non-sub-Saharans promote the frequency of the mutation;
3) I don't know anything about the specific gene this researcher has identified, but many genes which are especially prone to mutation (including the Fragile X gene) involve repeated series of nucleotide triplets which can produce a normal outcome with various numbers of triplets, but beyond a certain number are a) more likely to produce some small but measurable variation in the organism, and b) more prone to mutate further by adding even more extra copies of the triplet, thus producing a marked variation in the organism. In the case of Fragile X, for example, the pre-mutation form of the gene involves a greater than normal number of repetitions of the triplet, but still produces a barely perceptible (or often imperceptible) drag on cognitive function; the full mutation form involves even more copies of the triplet and produces significant mental retardation. Below is an abstract of a medical journal article regarding racial group variations in Fragile X genes, which gives a clue as to how certain groups can have greater susceptibility to a particular type of gene mutation than other groups. The gist is that there can be huge number of variations of a "normal" gene, and certain of those variations may be more prevalent in certain racial/ethnic groups.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=10915764&dopt=Abstract
The cryptic CGG repeat responsible for the fragile X syndrome, located in the 5'-UTR of FMR1, is unique compared with the many other triplet repeat-causing [sic -- this should read "caused", not "causing"] diseases, making it ideal for identifying factors involved in repeat expansion that may be common to other triplet repeat diseases. To date, a number of factors have been identified which may influence repeat instability, including the number and position of interspersed AGGs, length of the 3' pure CGG repeat and haplotype background. However, nearly all such data were derived from studies of Caucasians. Using a large African-American population, we present the only comprehensive examination of factors associated with CGG repeat instability in a non-Caucasian population. Among Caucasians, susceptible alleles were thought to come from those in the intermediate repeat range (41-60 repeats); however, we find that susceptible alleles may come from a larger repeat pool (35-60 repeats) and are better defined by their pure CGG repeat and/or -presence of only one AGG interruption. These results demonstrate the existence of different susceptible alleles among world populations and may account for the similar prevalence of the fragile X syndrome in African-Americans compared with Caucasians despite the lower frequency of inter-mediate sized alleles in the African-American population. Finally, we show that repeat structures among unaffected African-Americans with the most frequent fragile X haplotype background are either pure or contain a single distal interruption. We propose that the lack of a proximal most interruption is a novel factor involved in CGG repeat instability.
Oink oink
Completely remedied no, completely forgiven yes. There is no cure for sin (yet), it is a terminal condition we struggle with tell the day we die. Belief in Jesus Christ does not protect us from the earthly consequences of our sins, only from God’s righteous judgment and there is no curve, this is pass or fail. You will either be judged for your own actions or for Christ’s. With love I recommend option B.
"Thou shalt not complicate". - William of Occam.
I see religion (certain types -- not jihadism!) as a generally positive factor in individual outcomes, capable of boosting the performance of whatever genetic endowment a particular individual may have, but not of completely overriding it. Be forewarned, though, that there is mounting evidence that certain genetic factors make individuals either more or less inclined to be religious.
http://washingtontimes.com/world/20041114-111404-8087r.htm
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A46793-2004Nov12?language=printer
Could be due to the prevalence of technology.
Does pork or bacon make you smarter?
That is why Jews are so darned dumb./sarcasm
So THAT'S why I have a genius level IQ.
Gonna have to thank Mom for feeding me lots of bacon for breakfast in my younger years.
That is why Jews are so darned dumb./sarcasm
Does one exception negate the "rule?"
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.