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Posted on 06/15/2002 6:44:53 PM PDT by gore3000
If any trait reflects the genes we inherit from our parents, surely it's hair color. Brunettes tend to have dark haired children, and an auburn beauty undoubtedly has a redhead among her ancestors. But hair gets its color from melanin, which is not made directly by genes. Instead, it's formed when the body's metabolism treats a molecule called tyrosine the way a toddler treats a Lego creation: breaking it into component parts. When there's enough copper in the diet, tyrosine breaks down and melanin darkens the tresses. When copper is in short supply, tyrosine doesn't decompose to yield melanin. New hair then grows in lighter, no matter what the genes say. Developmental psychologist David S. Moore of Pitzer College, Claremont, Calif. isn't a hair fetishist. But he loves this finding for one simple reason: It bolsters his contention that even traits we think of as irrevocably determined by our genes are, in fact, partly shaped by that grab bag of outside forces called environment. The sequencing of the human genome generated enough hyperbole for several lifetimes (President Clinton declared it revealed "the language in which God created life"). Genes depend on the environment to give them "go" or no "go" signals. Hence the title of his new book: "The Dependent Gene: The Fallacy of 'Nature vs Nurture.'" Anyone who follows that age-old debate will protest that no biologists worth their petri dish believe traits are determined by nature or nurture. Instead, "everyone knows" that what we become reflects the interaction of those two forces. But try finding studies that explore how that interaction supplies a trait in man or beast. "As I searched, I found that the vast majority of the studies give only lip service to the idea of gene-environment interaction," he told me . "Very few pin down the nuts and bolts of it." For the rare studies that do, the action is in what's called gene expression. Simply having a gene doesn't really count. People have some 34,000 genes - the same one in every cell (except eggs, sperm and red blood). But genes matter only if they are expressed, or turned on. Otherwise, insulin-coding genes in neurons, say, would flood the brain with that hormone, just as insulin-coding genes do in the pancreas. Genes switched off do nothing. In an early shot in the "dependent gene" battle, Ronald Glaser and colleagues at Ohio State found in 1990 that psychological stress can switch off genes. When first year medical students were super-stressed (during exams), genes in white blood cells that ordinarily produce molecules that recognize invaders did no such thing: Stress had turned on the genes, so the white blood cells had no receptors able to recognize foreign bacteria and viruses, let alone fight them. Loads of studies had fount that stress impairs the immune response, but this was the first to show that a major reason is diminished gene expression. Now there are hints that stress-induced changes in gene expression may explain long-lasting conditions, such as post traumatic stress disorder. Last week brought another example of how the environment affects gene expression. When Vibrio Cholerae (bacteria that cause cholera) pass through the human gut, 44 of their 3,357 genes are are turned up and 193 are turned down, a team led by Andrew Camilli of Tufts University reported in the journal Nature. Genes that let the bug swim toward or away from particular chemicals get dialed down; genes required for making amino acids and absorbing iron get turned up. Result: the bug becomes up to 700 times more infectious, which is how cholera epidemics start. "This work shows how a genetic blueprint is turned into a functioning organism," says geneticist Richard Young of the Whitehead Institute at M.I.T. His lab finds that environmental changes in temperature, salinity and food availability turn on or off fully two-thirds of the genes in yeast - way more than anyone guessed. "It's clear that genes that respond to the environment can change the phenotype [traits] of an organism," says Dr. Young.
Dr. Moore did.
No, this is not Lysenkoism. In lysenkoism the environment changes the genes. Here there is no change in genes. The human genome (and that of animals of course) adapts to the environment and reacts with it. You notice it all the time. If it is hot, you sweat to cool the body down. Plants are also affected by the environment. If they have a small pot, they will grow small, if they have a big pot, they will grow big. Same for goldfish. This is all part of the marvelous design of the Creator.
I think it clearly implies that you do not need genetic changes in order for organisms to adapt to their environment. The mechanism is already there in the genome to help organisms adapt to their environment. Think about it, you know it is true. For example, people that use their bodies for heavy work have stronger muscles than those who work in an office. Their genes did not change, they did not mutate, the body responded to their needs.
As far as the people you address in #2, I doubt most of them understand it.
Within reasonable limits. You can flap your arms all day and all night and your body will not respond by growing flight feathers...
Think about it. The more I read creationist nonsense the more bored I get.
Try a few jillion years. But you must also be trying to jump up or down trees.
I think you misunderstood the process. Copper allows the breakdown of tyrosine which darkens the tissues.
When there's enough copper in the diet, tyrosine breaks down and melanin darkens the tresses. When copper is in short supply, tyrosine doesn't decompose to yield melanin. New hair then grows in lighter, no matter what the genes say.
But I doubt the traits you noticed in the Irish are due to a lack of copper. After all, Irish policemen are a tradition.
LOL
I can see why evolutionists are going into denial. Scientific evidence against their theory keeps pouring out from everywhere. Of course thoughtful people already knew that evolution could not be the way organisms adapt to the environment. A few million years are nothing for evolutionists but the environment changes in a matter of hours sometimes, days at other times, and perhaps a few hundred years, so there never was any time for any species to adapt to the environment through genetic change. This experiment gives solid evidence as to how such adaptation occurs.
If you read the article, heck if you had just read the title, you would see that the author does not claim that everything an organism does is due to the environment. He does show that organisms are able to adapt to the environment and that there are mechanisms that help organisms adapt to it. Essentially he is saying that organisms are very resilient and robust and able to adapt - without genetic change. But in a way we always knew that. That is the whole idea behind vaccines - to help the organism adapt its immune system to be more resistant to certain illnesses.
Ya mean that if you swim all day in the water you will not grow fins? Why Darwinists have been saying that for 150 years. They have been teaching it to kids in schools. Now who would be so nasty as to lie to kids?
Heh, in a way. IOW, it's a trivial point! I was wondering why you went to the trouble of posting this, and I must say I wasn't too surprised to see what it was you thought you'd discovered. Omigod, genes' effects on the body can be subtle! Muscles can grow if they're used a lot! Diet can affect our bodies! Well, that just about nails the coffin for eeeevilution, eh wat?
OK, here's the takeaway lesson from the article: If our bodies couldn't adapt to the environment, we'd all die. But instead we're able to adapt to our changing environments enough to live to procreate another day. You're right: Environments can sometimes change very quickly, in a blink of an eye compared to evolutionary timespans. If our bodies couldn't adapt to a range of environments, we'd simply go extinct. In fact, the vast majority of species that have ever existed, have gone extinct. So in many cases evolution was indeed not fast enough. But of course you claim that it could never be fast enough for any species.
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