Response to a comment to "Prisoners"
Thanks for commenting about my post. I consider your comment so important that I will place my response as a new post, basically because it gives me freedom to put some links.
First of all, predestination is not involved in the theory I tried to explain. Our genes form us, that is a fact, they do not give us a destiny. Genes are just instructions to build proteins. That is why I carefully used the verbs "to order" and "to dictate". A gene is not an intelligent being so it cannot "want" something.
I understand the use of the word "outlandish" because many people will find the concepts I used as bizarre since they are not familiarized with molecular biology or genetics, however, the word "ludicrous" is not acceptable in the debate of a topic that is philosophically deep and that has profound impact in the understanding of our behaviors.
I do not see a problem with reductionism. We have to accept what we are and not believe what we want to be. Being humble is the very first tool we need to give our marveolus brain to understand our surroundings. Carl Sagan said 2 things: "I do not want to believe, I want to know" and "We are star's dust"
I am a physician and I can to tell you that assuring that someone will or will not have malaria or AIDS due to "life choices" is not exact. You could be the one who receives the 6 genetic mutations that protect humans from malaria and there is the mutation in the CCR5 gene that protects people form acquiring the HIV infection, and therefore AIDS. So genes are definitely involved in the protection from the diseases you mentioned
We are the product of our genes, they are not foreign to us or "virus" as you implied I said. Genes created our mind and our mind has to be aware of its own weaknesses in order to avoid autodestruction from our instincts. Education helps a lot in keeping away egoism, ethnocentrism, racism, etc...Species come and go. Genes remain. There are genes hundreds of millions years old and remember that in 1962 and 1983, the human race and its civilization was almost wiped out from the face of Earth after a couple of hundred thousand years of existence.
First of all, predestination is not involved in the theory I tried to explain. Our genes form us, that is a fact, they do not give us a destiny. Genes are just instructions to build proteins. That is why I carefully used the verbs "to order" and "to dictate". A gene is not an intelligent being so it cannot "want" something.
I understand the use of the word "outlandish" because many people will find the concepts I used as bizarre since they are not familiarized with molecular biology or genetics, however, the word "ludicrous" is not acceptable in the debate of a topic that is philosophically deep and that has profound impact in the understanding of our behaviors.
I do not see a problem with reductionism. We have to accept what we are and not believe what we want to be. Being humble is the very first tool we need to give our marveolus brain to understand our surroundings. Carl Sagan said 2 things: "I do not want to believe, I want to know" and "We are star's dust"
I am a physician and I can to tell you that assuring that someone will or will not have malaria or AIDS due to "life choices" is not exact. You could be the one who receives the 6 genetic mutations that protect humans from malaria and there is the mutation in the CCR5 gene that protects people form acquiring the HIV infection, and therefore AIDS. So genes are definitely involved in the protection from the diseases you mentioned
We are the product of our genes, they are not foreign to us or "virus" as you implied I said. Genes created our mind and our mind has to be aware of its own weaknesses in order to avoid autodestruction from our instincts. Education helps a lot in keeping away egoism, ethnocentrism, racism, etc...Species come and go. Genes remain. There are genes hundreds of millions years old and remember that in 1962 and 1983, the human race and its civilization was almost wiped out from the face of Earth after a couple of hundred thousand years of existence.
posted by Doctor Marco at 02:30
6 Comments:
It is precisely correct, Sarah. Our minds are very powerful...but only when they are free of bias. Bias is one od the forces that slowes down the gathering of knowledge and understanding
You can call me Marco
I am trying to find out where we are dissenting:
Bias and ignorance are powerful forces: I agree
Our minds are powerful tools: I agree
We have to be careful with their use: I agree
Our mental energy, thoughts and will affect ourselves and others greatly: I agree
This is why I am so interested in education, because it helps freeing the mind from ignorance and bias . When free, the mind would release all its power in order for us to live in a better world. The item in whic we might be dissenting, but I am not sure yet is in that we have an egoistic nature that we have to tame (educate). Let me know if I found the source of our disagreement.
Why is people so afraid of reality? I can have the desire to be an angel, but I know I will not be one. I can believe that I am immortal, but that does not mean I am. Something very diffrent is to set up a realistic goal in life. A can have the dream to become the best tennis player and I can work very hard for it, that is acceptable. I can want to be famous and I can work for it. Those dreams are realistic and acceptable, but they have nothing to do with what we are talking about.
1/3 000 000. It is what we can currently achieve. It might improve in the future or it might get worse if new variants of the HIV appear. There is nothing wrong with that number, its just reality. The number for hepatitis C is 1/100 000, so I would worry a little bit more about that one. I see you again used the word ludicrous, so I see no intention in you respecting my request. Do you always laugh about other people's point of view? Do you always do that, even when you discuss topics not belonging to your area of expertise?
Genes essentially code, but a code is just that if it would not be followed by certain processes. The process of transcription of DNA into RNA and the process of tranlation of RNA into protein are the process that convert a code into an order.In this case, an order is not a personification. I understand that not everyone here is aware of molecular biology or genetics so I do not find a problem in explaining the concepts.
Sarah:
"We have to accept what we are and not believe what we want to be."
I have found resistance to that concept. Being my mindset one that comes from the scientific method, it surprised me. Many people cannot separate what it is an unrealistic goal from something you can achieve through a lot of effort. My message was for those people
"Our minds are very powerful...but only when they are free of bias."
I will give you this one. Biased minds, CAN be very powerful and destructive. The power I tried to describe was the constructive power, not the destructive one. I just did not express it well
Tokilla:
In medicine we take into account those numbers, we call them rare, but we keep them in mind. They remind us that there is no perfect solution to any problem.
A gene will not "order you" to do anything. It is an order for a number of enzymes to produce a protein. We are made of proteins. Enzymes themselves are proteins. Enzymes, just as an example, make neurotransmitters, which create your thought process. The schizophrenic or the depressed lack some of those elements and hence their thought processes are impaired. However, 30 years ago psychiatric illnesses were "diseases of the soul", meaning that we knew little about them. So genes are involved even in thought process.
I like to express my thoughts and I appreciate debate. Thanks for having one with me
I highly recommend you the book "The Selfish Gene"
Hi Sarah
By unrealistic I am referring to things that we know cannot happen, that belong to the world of imagination. We are not going to beat gravity or death. We can control gravity and delay death. Please do not think that I do not have dreams or something like that. For instance, I believe in artificial intelligence and that robots will eventually acquire the ability to feel and to think as a human being. (Or better) You know about computers so you probably have an opinion about that. I believe in sapce travel from planet to planet, I believe in a peaceful, more educated humanity. I believe in a world almost free of disease thanks to genetic engineering and stem cell research. In order to reach all aour dremas, we have to know ourselves very well, in the same way we do a marketing study before starting a business.
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