Memories pass between generations

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We’ll be hearing about this from UD. Might as well play with it here.

http://www.bbc.com/news/health-25156510

In the smell-aversion study, is it thought that either some of the odour ends up in the bloodstream which affected sperm production or that a signal from the brain was sent to the sperm to alter DNA.

15 thoughts on “Memories pass between generations”

  2. Odour into bloodstream? unlikely.
    signal from brain changing things? Well if so its not evolving by mutations. Its innate triggering which is fine with creationism.

  3. Uh oh, this isn’t good for your side at all.

    Let’s see, who was it, petrushka I think who was all ready to put the nail in the coffin of Lamarckism? Whoops!

    You know, even Dawkins recently admitted that if memories truly are passed on through generations, than he would have to change his whole world view. Holy shit, Dawkins is going to be a creationist! I wonder when he is going to make his big announcement.

    Or, let me guess, as Allan would say, its not a problem for evolution. Nothing to see here. We already knew all about this…..

    This should be fun, I look forward to Joe Felsenstein rationalizing it away with a bunch of symbols. ‘Well, you see, if you take the co-efficient of N, divided by the number of smells available to a population, and square that with the root (as Kimura clearly showed) of the sub-index of average frequencies of complex vs. none complex available search references…its exactly as evolution predicts!!” Once again evolution has been verified.

  5. phoodoo:

    Let’s see, who was it, petrushka I think who was all ready to put the nail in the coffin of Lamarckism?Whoops!

    Trollin 1..

    phoodoo:

    You know, even Dawkins recently admitted ….

    Trollin 2..

    phoodoo:

    Or, let me guess, as Allan would say, …..

    Trollin 3…

    phoodoo:
    This should be fun, I look forward to Joe Felsenstein …

    Trollin 4..

    I wonder, what would phoodoo say? Not what words would he put in somebody else’s mouth? What would phoodoo conclude?

    phoodoo:

    Once again evolution has been verified.

    Memories inherited? How could that not involve evolution? What’s YOUR EXPLANATION, phoodoo?

    Present a case, please.. Don’t be like Adapa..

  6. Easier.

    Could in principle happen by epigenetics. But it’ll have to be shown how — just because some intergenerational transmission could happen does not mean that any proposed case is real. Someone’s acquired preference for Budweiser is not necessarily going to be transmitted just because in theory it might be.

    Opponents of evolutionary biology just *love* to say that “because epigenetics” all evolutionary biology has to be redone. However they do not understand (or deliberately ignore) all the evidence that epigenetic marks revert after 3-4 generations.

    That means that differences between species, for example, can’t just be due to epigenetics. The Denyse O’Learys of this world haven’t figured that out.

  7. phoodoo,

    Or, let me guess, as Allan would say, its not a problem for evolution. Nothing to see here.

    Well, anticipated, phoodoo. You seem remarkably keen to dismiss 150 years of the genetical theory on the basis of one possible ‘pseudo-Lamarckian’ phenomenon. Confirmation bias, much?

    You may like to give some consideration as to how the entirety of an organism’s experiences are prevented from getting through to the next generation – how come it’s just the experience the researchers were looking at? And, given that an organism has 2 parents, 4 grandparents, etc, which ancestor’s experiences take precedence – and how does the experience avoid being diluted through the generations?

  8. Allan Miller,

    “how come it’s just the experience the researchers were looking at?”

    I have no idea what you are trying to say here.

    Are you saying that these results are not a surprise.

    Or are you saying that even if these results are real, it is no problem for evolution?

    Or are you saying the results aren’t real, so never mind?

  9. phoodoo: Are you saying that these results are not a surprise.

    Epigenetics is not new. The experiment would not have been done if the results were not anticipated. (Sometimes anticipated results are not found, which is why people do the experiment.)

  10. phoodoo,

    Me: “how come it’s just the experience the researchers were looking at?”

    P: I have no idea what you are trying to say here.

    Organisms experience a vast amout of input in their lifetime. Perhaps the researchers just struck lucky, and found one of those very few experiences that had a mechanism of transfer. But why would there not be a generality of memory-transfers – the entirety of an organism’s experiences must have this potential. I don’t think there is the data storage capacity in a gamete to do an entire ‘brain-dump’ in this way, leave alone the difficulty of targetting this to a few billion gametes.

    Or are you saying that even if these results are real, it is no problem for evolution?

    I am also saying if these results are real it is not a problem for evolution.

    1) Most organisms do not have brains.
    2) Most evolution does not relate to brains.
    3) Selection and Drift still exist.
    4) Each generation, the average contribution of any ancestor to any current individual is diluted, at least until inbreeding rises. Evolutionary mechanisms take place over many generations. So you have the paradox that (for example) 16 great-great grandparents, 8 great-grandparents, 4 grandparents and 2 parents’ lifetime experiences need to be integrated into the set of their descendants.

    This has virtually no potential to be an evolutionary process. The ‘particulate’ entities forming the genome are undiluted – they either survive or are lost. This gives them a generational persistence. .

    Or are you saying the results aren’t real, so never mind?

    I seriously doubt that these results are real. I would be interested to know the mechanism if they are.

  11. The problem with this is that such cases of environmental changes in DNA are always temporary, for they’re not coded in the DNA and thus cannot persist forever. And if they’re temporary, they cannot cause long-term adaptive evolution. In fact, there is not a single known case of any organismal trait based on environmentally-induced change of DNA that has persisted for more than a few generations. And we know of no adaptive change based on such a process. In contrast, there are lots of case of evolutionary changes and adaptations based on heritable, non-environmentally-induced changes in DNA—that is, “conventional” changes caused by mutations.

    http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2014/11/24/does-evolution-need-a-revolution/

  12. petrushka,

    Oh well, If Jerry Coyne says so!

    I can show you pages and pages of critiques of Jerry Coyne’s work, do you think I can have these added on to his Wikipedia homepage for accuracy?

    How about if I just call him a fanatical atheist preacher, who ignores facts to push his atheist agenda, and bully other qualified scientists through targeted underhanded campaigns of insults?

    That edit should be allowed to his page, don’t you agree?

  13. phoodoo,

    Wikipedia, here, too?

    phoodoo: How about if I just call him a fanatical atheist preacher

    How about you stating something you are FOR and not against? How about you arguing based on evidence and not subjects?

    Why don’t you explain the consequences of inherited memories on evolution or Id or whatever?

  15. phoodoo:
    Guillermoe,

    The evidence is that Coyne is a religiously motivated scientific hack, I am FOR having that added to his Wikipedia page.

    Ad writing that here is supposed to get it done? Or are you just an imbecile crying in the wrong place?

    And what relevance does it have against evolution being a great scientific theory and ID being a wonderful crap?

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