As I took part in many discussions about the nurture versus nature debate, even on the ex-BBC board. I remember that lol beeble overthere spoke about epigenitics...for me  it was the first time I heard about it...and it is so recent anyhow...the alst twenty years...
It seems that environment can introduce elements which can interfer in parts of the genetic...as it is so difficult to explain I will show a small synopsis...
But in this documentary I learned a lot: (it is in French)...



It can be that it was shortly available on ARTE English, but now it is gone...
It starts with the enigma of why the queen appears among all the workers in a bee nest. and it seems that she was originally also a worker, but due to the occasional? longer feeding with gelée royale sshe becomes a queen and not the others...looking to her genetics one sees that some sequences are made free, sequences which were before dormant...and all that by the other feeding...in the documentary also if a trait is acquired by a certain environment, it lasts for at least for two generations...the actions of epigenitics are studied on monozygotic twins...and it proves that the genetics aren't a predestination...

They studied even in real, if I recall it well in the High North, a population during a lifetime deprived from food and adapted to it...and then came the good times again and the siblings started to eat abundantely again and the became ill with all kinds of illnesses...and when they put them again as their parents on a severe diet...they became healthy again...and there were two generations before people became average again...the same with smoking of the parents...the deficencies go over to the next one or tow generations...
Have to stop for this evening...some further links to discuss tomorrow...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epigenetics



https://science.howstuffworks.com/life/genetic/epigenetics2.htm


Kind regards, Paul.

The example of the Queen bee I don't really see as true epigenetics as the trait (queen-ness) is not of itself directly hereditary. Isn't it more like how the sex - or strictly the ratio of sexes within a population - of eggs or embryos is determined by environment? For example aphids (puceron in French) like the common greenfly you get on roses or the blackfly on broadbeans etc, can reproduce sexually (producing both males and females) or asexually (producing exclusively female clones). At cooler temperatures they reproduce sexually and produce both sexes, but as the temperature rises (and with more hours of daylight too, I think), they switch to asexual reproduction producing only females. Each new female in turn produces ready fertile, female-producing clones, and so you get a very, very rapid population increase (a single female can give rise to millions of offspring in a matter of just days). This is a short term strategy for survival (of the species) as it allows very rapid exploitation of food resources and to out-compete competitors, as plants are growing rapidly in the Summer months. The penalty is that the resultant population is all of identical clones which, lacking genetic variability is highly susceptible to disease etc, hence the need, once the period of prime plant-growth is over, to revert back to sexual reproduction to maintain long-term genetic variability.

The eggs of some amphibians and reptiles are similarly affected by the environment, primarily climate, though being longer-lived creatures (as individuals) the short term gain is likely not a strategy to exploit seasonally abundant food resources, but rather one of survival in reaction to environmental stress/decreasing resources. For example, with the rise in sea temperatures turtles around the Great Barrier Reef are tending to produce more females than males. One male may fertilise the eggs of many females, so in the short term, for species survival mothers are more valuable than fathers in maintaining the population. But in the long term this will inevitably lead to a reduction in genetic diversity within the population as a whole with all the attendant risks to the survival of the species.

But as I say I don't think that's really epigenetics ... so sorry for wittering on.

If I recall from the BBC boards' discussion, Paul, it all boiled down (as usual) to using the phrase correctly. In the scientifically proper use of the term there is no real "debate" in messageboard terms. If someone has learnt the word from some whacky American drivel concerning "genetics" in a crackpot publication or posted on YouTube then there is huge debate, and normally one in which those acquainted with the term's proper meaning absent themselves pretty quickly on grounds of preserving their sanity.

A bit like discussing "faith" actually. As long as the term means "intellectually justified belief in and reliance upon" then it shouldn't really be used in any religious context, or at least not without a huge requirement for the religious person to explain why they place "faith" (adaequatio intellectus nostri cum rei) in their "faith" (ad hoc). It is the "rei" bit they always skip over and hope no one has noticed.

The nearest thing to an actual debate amongst people who know what they're talking about regarding epigenetics ("epi" meaning simply outside of) and gene behaviour is the as yet scientifically unresolved issue of the extent to which gene mutation leading to special differentiation can have origin in epigenetic causes. Some say it can all be ascribed to such cause, and some say that it's probably a mixture of this and other more proven selection processes regarding long-term environmental adaptation. The difference between that "debate" and ones you find on internet message boards etc is that this one is currently being tested scientifically so we can have reasonable "faith" in an answer being arrived at eventually, regardless of what unrelated claptrap has been "debated" elsewhere by people who don't even properly understand the concept and whose vocabulary is suspect anyway in many other respects to being rather semantically challenged.

Such a debate would be welcome here too, at least by me, but I'm afraid I'd be rather out of my depth and would prefer to read the erudite contributions from those who know what they're talking about rather than actually contribute much to it.

Meles meles wrote:

The example of the Queen bee I don't really see as true epigenetics as the trait (queen-ness) is not of itself directly hereditary. Isn't it more like how the sex - or strictly the ratio of sexes within a population - of eggs or embryos is determined by environment? For example aphids (puceron in French) like the common greenfly you get on roses or the blackfly on broadbeans etc, can reproduce sexually (producing both males and females) or asexually (producing exclusively female clones). At cooler temperatures they reproduce sexually and produce both sexes, but as the temperature rises (and with more hours of daylight too, I think), they switch to asexual reproduction producing only females. Each new female in turn produces ready fertile, female-producing clones, and so you get a very, very rapid population increase (a single female can give rise to millions of offspring in a matter of just days). This is a short term strategy for survival (of the species) as it allows very rapid exploitation of food resources and to out-compete competitors, as plants are growing rapidly in the Summer months. The penalty is that the resultant population is all of identical clones which, lacking genetic variability is highly susceptible to disease etc, hence the need, once the period of prime plant-growth is over, to revert back to sexual reproduction to maintain long-term genetic variability.

The eggs of some amphibians and reptiles are similarly affected by the environment, primarily climate, though being longer-lived creatures (as individuals) the short term gain is likely not a strategy to exploit seasonally abundant food resources, but rather one of survival in reaction to environmental stress/decreasing resources. For example, with the rise in sea temperatures turtles around the Great Barrier Reef are tending to produce more females than males. One male may fertilise the eggs of many females, so in the short term, for species survival mothers are more valuable than fathers in maintaining the population. But in the long term this will inevitably lead to a reduction in genetic diversity within the population as a whole with all the attendant risks to the survival of the species.

But as I say I don't think that's really epigenetics ... so sorry for wittering on.

Meles meles,

I have seen the documentary again, because I spoke from memory...
Meles meles, reading all of the scientific information now, I would rather say as nordmann that I am out of my depth...but nevertheless I tried to understand the information from this interesting in my eyes scientific documentary...
About the bees it is starting from the tenth minute...it is a pity that I didn't find it with English subtitles...I hope that your grasp of French is enough to follow the speaking as there are no French subtitles either...
it has to do with methylisation...there are active genes and extinguished ones...and that longer eating of the gelée royale makes this extinguished ones again active...
Not sure if epigenetics have to be necessary hereditable?
Some trustful? stuff for nordmann too...
https://www.britannica.com/science/epigenetics


What I retain from all this information is that there is still debate among scientists, but that it is very promising for the treatment of diseases, even schizofrenie...
The research is worldwide a hot topic, because it is that promising.

Kind regards, Paul.

nordmann wrote:

If I recall from the BBC boards' discussion, Paul, it all boiled down (as usual) to using the phrase correctly. In the scientifically proper use of the term there is no real "debate" in messageboard terms. If someone has learnt the word from some whacky American drivel concerning "genetics" in a crackpot publication or posted on YouTube then there is huge debate, and normally one in which those acquainted with the term's proper meaning absent themselves pretty quickly on grounds of preserving their sanity.

A bit like discussing "faith" actually. As long as the term means "intellectually justified belief in and reliance upon" then it shouldn't really be used in any religious context, or at least not without a huge requirement for the religious person to explain why they place "faith" (adaequatio intellectus nostri cum rei) in their "faith" (ad hoc). It is the "rei" bit they always skip over and hope no one has noticed.

The nearest thing to an actual debate amongst people who know what they're talking about regarding epigenetics ("epi" meaning simply outside of) and gene behaviour is the as yet scientifically unresolved issue of the extent to which gene mutation leading to special differentiation can have origin in epigenetic causes. Some say it can all be ascribed to such cause, and some say that it's probably a mixture of this and other more proven selection processes regarding long-term environmental adaptation. The difference between that "debate" and ones you find on internet message boards etc is that this one is currently being tested scientifically so we can have reasonable "faith" in an answer being arrived at eventually, regardless of what unrelated claptrap has been "debated" elsewhere by people who don't even properly understand the concept and whose vocabulary is suspect anyway in many other respects to being rather semantically challenged.

Such a debate would be welcome here too, at least by me, but I'm afraid I'd be rather out of my depth and would prefer to read the erudite contributions from those who know what they're talking about rather than actually contribute much to it.

nordmann,

"If someone has learnt the word from some whacky American drivel concerning "genetics" in a crackpot publication or posted on YouTube then there is huge debate, and normally one in which those acquainted with the term's proper meaning absent themselves pretty quickly on grounds of preserving their sanity."

nordmann, you have such an "expressive" language...
But I found it such an interesting French language documentary that I wanted to know more about it. But as you say it is perhaps too scientifical stuff to have an easy grasp of it...
Take now the link that I provided
https://science.howstuffworks.com/life/genetic/epigenetics2.htm
" Scientists have even re-evaluated theories they had previously discredited, such as those of 18th-century scientist Jean-Baptiste Lamarck. While recent findings don't completely support Lamarck's theory that the necks of giraffes elongated over the course of generations of reaching for food, some of the evidence is certainly Lamarckian."
"some of the evidence is certainly Lamarckian."
That's dangerous stuff, certainly in an American context. I don't say that you have not that many honest and scientific Americans, but some as the Creationists are really nuts. And they, I suppose with American money, tried to convert some "nuchtere Hollanders" (level-headed Dutchmen) recently to start it in The Netherlands too...
Some rebuking of the Lamarckian aspect...
https://www.quora.com/Whats-the-difference-between-epigenetics-and-Lamarckism

I hope you will preserve your sanity...

Kind regards from Paul.

nordmann wrote:

A bit like discussing "faith" actually. As long as the term means "intellectually justified belief in and reliance upon" then it shouldn't really be used in any religious context, or at least not without a huge requirement for the religious person to explain why they place "faith" (adaequatio intellectus nostri cum rei) in their "faith" (ad hoc). It is the "rei" bit they always skip over and hope no one has noticed.

Wasn't that phrase used in the 1998 encyclical, Fides et Ratio?


The encyclical posits that faith and reason are not only compatible, but essential together. Faith without reason, he (His Holiness, or whichever Cardinal produced the encyclical) argues, leads to superstition. Reason without faith leads to nihilism and relativism.

"Fact?" or  "truths?" or "truth?" - we do need to define terms here - and preferably do it in English. What does "conformity" actually mean? Or "mind" for that matter? And to whom do the minds belong? Who are the "we" of the "our"? Quite a few things actually we could happily skip over here - not just the rei bit.

But madness does that way lie...

And this not the thread - is there one and if there is, should it be avoided like the plague?

I am well out of my depth with most things these days, certainly all this - and have no idea what "epigenetics" means, as will be obvious from the following - my contribution to the present discussion:

"Faith without reason, he (His Holiness, or whichever Cardinal produced the encyclical) argues, leads to superstition. Reason without faith leads to nihilism and relativism. "

Only if one does not define faith using normal semantic rules of interpretation (or even interpretations of interpretation). This is still the ad hoc version of the term's usage crying out for qualification therefore, unintelligible to anyone who does not share the same ad hoc conceit and a qualification which - as said - the religious mind is intrinsically loath to provide.

"Reason without faith leads to nihilism and relativism."

And this is the part that lends the lie to the original sentiment as intended to be understood. Reason without faith in fact cannot exist since faith implies a reasoned proposition of reliable dependency upon a precept, fact or other intelligibly experienced phenomenon. The ability to place faith in something reason states deserves it is proof of reason in action. On the other hand reason without "faith" as determined by the religious mind can of course exist (in fact demonstrably can be proven to exist), and while it may lead to nihilism (nothing wrong with a healthy dose of nihilism now and again, mind you) or (horror of horror) relativism, it can also lead to science, intelligent deduction, realism and a host of other goodies. What the religious mind abhors (and especially one housed in a higher church cranium) is that it woefully fails to control mental processes conducted by others under any of these categories, and probably even by themselves.

A very dishonest platitude, in other words, especially if the mind that concocted it understands the above. A very pointless platitude if they don't, at least to people who place faith in reason.

EDIT: I meant to point out of course that the semantic obfuscation as described above does not exist for no reason. And if one examines closely the reasons it is allowed to persist then one goes a long way towards understanding why epigenetics, amongst many concepts which have been backward-engineered semantically and which only sometimes can be rescued by science from total absurdity, have appeared to be discussed. Absolute reason alone would never have produced them, and until the unreasonable facets to their meaning are eliminated then resultant debate and discussion is bound to be circular, inconclusive and pointless. Epigenetics, at least, could be rescued semantically by intelligent, reasonable people. Religious faith on the other hand - despite the best efforts of intelligence over millennia - is a lost cause when it comes to intelligibility (which is just as the religious mind likes it).

nordmann wrote:

Only if one does not define faith using normal semantic rules of interpretation...

Exactly - which is where I am at the moment. I don't so define it. It that allowed? The Stoics - masters of reason - understood that "faith" can indeed have many interpretations, or at least I think they did. I always feel so completely out of my depth trying to discuss things with you. But I keep batting away - never learn. (Actually that isn't true - I do learn, probably why I do it.)

But I do not wish to derail Paul's new thread, and as I know and understand nothing about epigenetics, will shut up now on this thread.

Sorry about the giraffes, Paul. Quite irrelevant, but I thought it was funny (well, I did at the time I posted it).

Temp wrote:

Exactly - which is where I am at the moment. I don't so define it. It that allowed?

There is no absolute rule that says one cannot define anything one wants any way one wants. Semantically, that's why we're in the mess we're in of course. The root of the resultant problem - as any stoic would also readily agree - is when one then tries to converse with someone else. At best (as exemplified by YouTube content and especially comments below the videos) the result of such a unilateral approach to meaning is that one is completely unintelligible to everyone, which at least protects the assaulted semantic concept to a degree and preserves it for others to approach more responsibly. At worst of course is when two unintelligible people think they have agreed - that's where true disaster lies.

I'm not sure you're right that Stoics held a universal view on interpreting faith. They were as prone as any of their peers to adopting semantically loose ad hoc concepts whenever it suited them (much talk of "souls", "spirit" etc, just as today). What Stoics had going for them however was their obsession with the "Liar Paradox" (the catchphrase "dico me mentiri" can almost be used these days as a Google search term to identify most extant Stoic writings, so popular was it). This boils down to a simple proposition "If I am speaking falsely, and I admit I am speaking falsely, then am I speaking falsely?". It might sound like a simple logic or language poser but to Stoics it was huge - whether the answer is "yes" or "no" both allow expression to supersede intrinsic truth, which of course by definition then apparently allows religious belief, not just of your own favourite religion but of all. Cicero opted to use this as evidence for the fact that all religion was therefore suspect - the inability to distinguish between the different strands meant that all the strands were invalid. Marcus A. on the other hand saw it as proof that religion has a valid role, namely as expression of inner thoughts, moods and doubts which cannot find external expression. His reason went further and said that no one should profess their religion publicly as a result (he would have executed Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses door-to-door emissaries with extreme prejudice, I think). But his main point was that once it was crystallised in external expression then it in fact lost its meaning to the individual as well as its role. It wasn't in fact religion any more, it was something quite other pretending to be communicable  - and in this he had a very valid point in my view.

But what they were all doing of course was side-stepping the fundamental problem with religion - it abhors semantic lucidity and in fact sees it very much as the enemy. Stoics came a cropper because such lucidity was something they craved after in all other respects but crucially held back when it came to religion. They were superseded later by more scientific minds and approaches, but are rightly seen at least as a giant step in that direction in antiquity.

nordmann wrote:

Marcus A. on the other hand saw it as proof that religion has a valid role, namely as expression of inner thoughts, moods and doubts which cannot find external expression. His reason went further and said that no one should profess their religion publicly as a result (he would have executed Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses door-to-door emissaries with extreme prejudice, I think). But his main point was that once it was crystallised in external expression then it in fact lost its meaning to the individual as well as its role. It wasn't in fact religion any more, it was something quite other pretending to be communicable - and in this he had a very valid point in my view.

I know he did. And that is exactly the view of Marcus B. (Borg) - and mine, although we would probably not order any executions (well, Borg wouldn't). It actually costs a lot to admit that (about religion, I mean, not the ordering of executions).

Thank you for bothering to reply - excellent and thought-provoking post, even if your comments about people manipulating language did make me squirm a bit.

PS You really should post some YouTubes - you'd make a fortune (well, a few bob at least). We need good teachers these days.

But stuff stoics and semantics .... what's the correct answer to the question in Temp's post, "What is the strongest force on Earth?", assuming it was not intented as one of those open-ended questions to pick out the really smart, or smart-alec, students, like "Is Heaven expanding?", or "Is Hell exothermic?"

Forces are vectors having both magnitude and direction ... I take the question to be what is the greatest magnitude of a force on Earth. Since the previous question concerned geology one might assume the answer is gravity, and since it says "on Earth" I suppose one can take that to mean at the Earth's surface, although that's not entirely clear. But the force of gravity, defined as the mass on an object mutiplied by the acceleration, ie  F = m x a , clearly means that the force depends on the mass of the body being accelerated. So the force exerted by dropping a pebble is inevitable much less than dropping a brick, which is less than a falling Boeing 747, etc ... And the force exerted by  falling pebble is much less than that of one thrown at the ground. Furthermore since the question is couched in the present tense it can't mean the greatest force that has ever been applied at the Earth's surface ... so that rules out, say, the enormous meteorite that fell to Earth 67 million years ago and wiped out the dinosaurs. So I guess the answer isn't gravity.

Perhaps it is meant to be tacken literally and so the answer is "the strong nuclear force", one of the four known fundamental interactions, with the others being electromagnetism, the weak interaction, and gravitation. At the range of 10 ⁻¹⁵m (1 femtometer), the strong force is approximately 137 times as strong as electromagnetism, a million times as strong as the weak interaction, and 1038 times as strong as gravitation (so again the answer cannot be gravity). The strong nuclear force holds most ordinary matter together because it confines quarks into hadron particles such as the proton and neutron. In addition, the strong force binds neutrons and protons to create atomic nuclei. Most of the mass of a common proton or neutron is the result of the strong force field energy - the individual quarks provide only about 1% of the mass of a proton. And yet, while it is strong, the magnitude of the individual forces between sub-atomic particles is small.

What then, I wonder, IS the correct answer?

Well, let's hope for all our sakes it is love and not any of the other options.

MM wrote:

But stuff stoics and semantics...  

But what with? You are the expert on such stuff, MM!  

Stuff a Stoic - have to be something with sage in it, I suppose.

Temp wrote:

Stuff a Stoic - have to be something with sage in it, I suppose.

Wow! Bravo!

Stoics all think they know their onions - just goes to show 'em!

Meles meles - it's certainly "gravity" they're after, given that it's American Eleventh Grade (3rd Year Junior High) as far as I remember from when it was doing the rounds. But I agree with Temp - the question is really so stupid that I can't see any problem with the kid's answer at all.

Paul, going back briefly to your OP ... I've now watched that French ARTE program, and to me it seems quite good, certainly not "some whacky American drivel concerning 'genetics' in a crackpot publication or posted on YouTube", to quote Nordmann.

But surely the basic idea that many genes, while still inherited, just sit in the genome without causing any effect, until, or if, they are "activated" (usually by a chemical trigger) is well known. For example a chicken's genome contains all the information for the bird to produce teeth as well as feathers. While those genes coding for feathers are routinely activated during the course of embryonic development, those for teeth never usually are, ... but they can be by introducing certain chemicals, whereupon the embryo proceeds to develop as a chick with true, dentine-coated proto-teeth. Furthermore it is also now well-established that at a microbial level, bacteria can swap some of their genetic material with others they encounter, thereby getting their genetic code not just from their parent but direct from other 'individuals'. It is also known that viruses can edit themselves in and out of the genomes of higher animals, ourselves included, ... which is the basis of most of modern gene therapy. With the ideas of epigenetics it seems the step can actually go further and that genes are not just inherited, as they would be anyway, but that the induced genetic trigger can be passed on to the offspring too, much in the same way as mutations are inherited.  It's  all very interesting and I don't claim to understand how it works although I have been vaguely aware of this for many years in the general scientific press (like New Scientist).

Epigenetic inheritance, as discussed in that ARTE documentary, is an exciting field of study but it's not sending the scientific community, or evolutionary biologists into states of confusion. Far from it. Darwinian selection still holds as the fundamental driver of evolution. But on the way through the eons of time this system has found interesting little asides and ways that it can work slightly differently. Unsurprisingly things are often less obvious than our school upbringing of lions chasing antelopes, or tall giraffes reaching the best leaves, but it's all no less part of the model of evolution which Darwin so comprehensively began. Epigenetic inheritance is no different ... just a new nuance, which provides a challenge to delve deeper in understanding how these systems actually work, an understanding that I alas do not have.

I wasn't actually referring directly to Paul's linked video - or at least hadn't meant to - simply bemoaning where an alarmingly increasing number of people derive their "education" these days. Sorry, Paul, if you understood otherwise.

I agree with you, Meles meles, that the programme offers little new by way of explaining epigenetic behaviour, though I would welcome a similar treatment of the debate I alluded to (which is briefly tackled in one of Richard Dawkins' books too and is at least a matter of disagreement within evolutionary biology) concerning just how much it contributes to actual evolutionary (as opposed to purely adaptational) processes within species.

Meles meles,

thanks for having done the trouble to watch the documentary.

"Epigenetic inheritance, as discussed in that ARTE documentary, is an exciting field of study but it's not sending the scientific community, or evolutionary biologists into states of confusion. Far from it. Darwinian selection still holds as the fundamental driver of evolution. But on the way through the eons of time this system has found interesting little asides and ways that it can work slightly differently. Unsurprisingly things are often less obvious than our school upbringing of lions chasing antelopes, or tall giraffes reaching the best leaves, but it's all no less part of the model of evolution which Darwin so comprehensively began. Epigenetic inheritance is no different ... just a new nuance, which provides a challenge to delve deeper in understanding how these systems actually work, an understanding that I alas do not have."

"it's not sending the scientific community, or evolutionary biologists into states of confusion"

That's right as it is already known for sometime (1940?), but it is only in the last years, seventies, eighties that it is better understood by the increase of knowledge of for instance the human genome.

"Darwinian selection still holds as the fundamental driver of evolution."

That's right too, if I understand it well, Darwinian evolution is the longtime evolution of the survival of the fittest, the most adapted to that specific environment, while those with the most adapted to the environment DNA, survive more than the others and can pass their DNA to the next generations, while the unadapted die out...and now I am not sure anymore of my argumentation: epigenetics act only during one or two generations...but I don't see the answer "why" directly in the documentary...have to view it perhaps once again...

Kind regards from Paul.

nordmann wrote:

I wasn't actually referring directly to Paul's linked video - or at least hadn't meant to - simply bemoaning where an alarmingly increasing number of people derive their "education" these days. Sorry, Paul, if you understood otherwise.

I agree with you, Meles meles, that the programme offers little new by way of explaining epigenetic behaviour, though I would welcome a similar treatment of the debate I alluded to (which is briefly tackled in one of Richard Dawkins' books too and is at least a matter of disagreement within evolutionary biology) concerning just how much it contributes to actual evolutionary (as opposed to purely adaptational) processes within species.

Yes, we have still a lot to learn nordmann, and I hope that the scientists in the foreseeable future will find the answers.

Kind regards from Paul.