Some starving hack got it in the neck. From Nature News:
Researcher under fire for New Yorker epigenetics article
A story about epigenetics in the 2 May issue of The New Yorker has been sharply criticized for inaccurately describing how genes are regulated. The article by Siddhartha Mukherjee — a physician, cancer researcher and award-winning author at Columbia University in New York — examines how environmental factors can change the activity of genes without altering the DNA sequence. Jerry Coyne, an evolutionary ecologist at the University of Chicago in Illinois, posted two widely discussed blog posts calling the piece “superficial and misleading”, largely because it ignored key aspects of gene regulation. Other researchers quoted in the blog posts called the piece “horribly damaging” and “a truly painful read”. Mukherjee responded by publishing a point-by-point rebuttal online. Speaking to Nature, he says he now realizes that he erred by omitting key areas of the science, but that he didn’t mean to mislead. “I sincerely thought that I had done it justice,” he says.
Mukherjee’s article, ‘Same But Different’, takes a personal view of epigenetics — a term whose definition is highly contentious in the field. The story features his mother and aunt, identical twins who have distinct personalities. Mukherjee, who won a Pulitzer Prize in 2011 for his best-selling book The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer (Scribner, 2010), writes that identical twins differ because: “Chance events — injuries, infections, infatuations; the haunting trill of that particular nocturne — impinge on one twin and not on the other.More.
Sure. So?*
Oh, wait…
The New Yorker is standing by its honest writer. But Manhattan cocktails will not defeat Darwin thugs. Mukherjee’s been warned by the thugs that he “stepped on a land mine. ”
To understand why Darwin’s boys have a problem with epigenetics, see Epigenetic change: Lamarck, wake up, you’re wanted in the conference room!
The reality Darwin’s boys inhabit does not include epigenetics. That settles it if all you want is Manhattans.
* Trivia: O’Leary for News grew up in the largest baby boom in the Western world, which of course meant encountering lots of twins, including identicals. Curiously, the big problem was parents who enforced identicalness because it was cute. But the twins rebelled. Teachers fought back by putting the twins in separate classrooms. Nothing was like the cute pictures. But the pictures are cute. Maybe the science, not so much.
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why belittle the writer by calling him a ‘starving hack’? It appears that he is neither.
Soundburger at 1, in some circles, “starving hack” is a term of distinction. Someone with a solid story Mr. Big don’t like.
Darwin thugs warning Mukherjee that he “stepped on a land mine” means very little today. The house of cards known as Darwinism is being blown apart by modern science. It was easy to promote Darwinism when the cell was thought to be just a lump of jelly-like substance, but today we know better. Darwinism has been exposed as a pseudo science built on atheistic philosophical assumptions. It is a dying secular religion. Good riddance!
This must be a different reality to the one I live in. Here evolutionary biologists live in a reality that is OK with epigenetics, and the criticisms of the article were mainly that it ignored several important epigenetic effects.
as to:
This statement is humorous. First off, there is no ‘reality’ for Darwinists. Given Darwinian premises everything becomes illusory for the Darwinist.
In fact, given materialistic premises, not only are our interpretations of reality held to be somewhat flawed, but even our perceptions of reality itself are shown to be untrustworthy and thus ‘illusory’ given materialistic premises.
Moreover, as Nancy Pearcey alluded to in her article, given the materialistic premises of Darwinian evolution, not only are our perceptions of reality itself held to be illusory, but even our sense of self, i.e. the belief that we really exist as real persons, which is the most sure thing we can know about reality, becomes illusory too.
In other words, given the materialistic premises of Darwinian evolution, there really is no such person named Richard Dawkins, or Jerry Coyne, or etc.. etc.., there is only an illusion of a brain who thinks, (if illusions could think), that it is a person named Richard Dawkins or Jerry Coyne or etc.. etc..
Thus, it is quite humorous for a Darwinist to speak about the ‘reality’ that ‘he’ lives in for ‘he’ himself, given his Darwinian premises, becomes an illusion. Moreover, ‘he’ becomes an illusion whose perceptions of reality are illusory.
And why in blue blazes should anyone trust what illusions having illusions say about reality?
Or related interest to accurately perceiving ‘reality’, in the following study, researchers who had a bias against Near Death Experiences being real, set out to prove that they were merely hallucinations of the brain by setting up a clever questionnaire that could differentiate which memories a person had were real and which memories a person had were merely imaginary.
They did not expect the results they got:
A few testimonies as to the ‘more real than real’ aspect of NDEs:
Also of related interest to epigenetics, and completely contrary to materialistic thought, ‘mind’ has been now been shown to be able to reach all the way down to the genetic level of out bodies and have pronounced, ‘epigenetic’ effects on the gene expression of our bodies:
And contrary to the ‘reality’ that Darwinists live in. A ‘reality’ that is apparently ‘OK with epigenetics’, the fact of the matter is that epigenetics should soundly falsify neo-Darwinism as a ‘scientific’ theory;
The reason why epigenetics does not falsify Neo-Darwinism as a scientific theory is because Neo-Darwinism was never a scientific theory in the first place but was, and is, merely a pseudo-science with no rigid falsification criteria. A rigid falsification criteria to allow Darwinian evolution to be tested. A falsification criteria as all other proper theories of science, including Intelligent Design, have.
The main reason why Darwinian evolution is more properly thought of as a pseudo-science instead of a proper science is because Darwinian evolution has no rigid mathematical basis, like other overarching physical theories of science do. A rigid mathematical basis in order to potentially falsify it (in fact, in so far as math can be applied to Darwinian claims, mathematics constantly shows us that Darwinian evolution is astronomically unlikely),,
Of related interest to Karl Popper:
Yoo hoo to Bob O’H at 4: That guy would not have “stepped on a land mine” if your alternative reality coincided much with the real one. Nature would not have written about this. No one big would be listening to Jerry Coyne.
This is all just Darwin’s Boys’ way of telling New Yorker that the extended synthesis is not Cool.
So it comes down to a question of who decides what is Cool? Darwin’s Boys or the New Yorker? Make mine double double.
See also an explanation of why the sea is boiling hot.
Darwin’s theory in a nutshell:
1. All life shares a common ancestry.
2. The various forms of life arose via descent with modification, by natural selection acting on heritable variation.
Epigenetics is but a source of variability. To the extent that epigenetic effects are heritable, they are completely compatible with Darwin. Those effects that are not heritable are irrelevant when it comes to the matter of descent with modification. This is why informed people read inane screeds about the incompatibilities of epigenetics and Darwin and wonder about the author(s).
As for the article in the New Yorker, I found it to be a good, entertaining read, and I appreciated the attempt to personalize the exciting research of the hilighted scientists. People who get bent out of shape because transcriptional and more canonical forms of posttranscriptional control are not mentioned are being silly, to be frank.
News @ 8 – really? Are you an expert on epigenetics, and thus able to understand whether the writer was representing the field fairly?
Honestly – we don’t have a problem with epigenetics. I’m part of a Special Programme in Germany researching rapid adaptation, and some of the projects are looking at epigenetics. And nobody has complained about them.
‘we don’t have a problem with epigenetics’
And that is exactly THE primary problem with Darwinian evolution. You guys NEVER have any problem with any finding that runs contrary to basic Darwinian presuppositions no matter how contrary the finding might run to basic Darwinian presuppositions.
No, ba77. We never have any problem with learning about the real world. Biology is about explaining the real world, and we are learning new things about it all the time. Because of that we have to update our explanations of the real world.
We do science. It advances, so must we. we have already discarded many of Darwin’s presuppositions (e.g. theories of inheritance).
It’s inconceivable to me that development of an organism to adulthood, can occur without a representation of the finished product of the adult organism in the DNA, to guide the development. There must be a 3D DNA world.
Epi-genetics is just 1 more pointer to the reality of this DNA world, among the many.
The existence of human imagination shows that it is possible for such worlds to exist in nature. Isn’t our human imagination based of a DNA world?
Other pointers than just common sense include,
– that evidence of the guy who invented the hiv medicine indicating that DNA has a radio receive send function
– Rowlands and Hill showing that the mathematical ordering in biology is the same as that of physics
– feeling a phantom leg, after the leg has been removed by surgery.
– the way tissue regenerates without close contact with DNA
I did not say the problem was with Darwinists learning new stuff. I said THE primary problem with Darwinian evolution is that it is a unfalsifiable pseudo-science.
Darwinian Evolution is a Unfalsifiable Pseudo-Science (i.e. no demarcation/falsification criteria)– Mathematics – video
https://www.facebook.com/philip.cunningham.73/videos/vb.100000088262100/1132659110080354/?type=2&theater
1. DNA can contain a lot of information, but is it conceivable that DNA contains, besides everything else, a 3D representation of the brain which includes some 100 trillion nerve connections?
2. How does a representation of the adult organism in DNA help, during embryonic development, if central overview and central command is lacking?
If you say it is impossible to make a representation of the brain in the DNA world, then aren’t you equally saying it is impossible for DNA to make a physical brain?
The DNA world theory is mostly a theory about how the DNA is organized. Evolution theory predicts a jumbled mess of instructions littered with junk DNA. DNA world theory predicts DNA to be ordered according to the requirements of the DNA world.
According to evolution theory the boeing 747 is produced with stacks of post it notes , without any overall blueprint of the boeing 747, without a 3D model.
Command would be from the DNA worlds obviously. So it means the DNA in each cell is equally the center of command.
Yes. Besides the 3D information it also lacks overview and control for such a task.
Without a command level above the level of DNA in individual cells, embryo development makes sense to you?
Well then you are talking something else than evolution theory and creation theory. Some structuralist theory that the forms of organisms are inherent to the main structure of mathematics???
The DNA world is the command level, the DNA world is not the same thing as the DNA. The computercode for the 3D game is not the same as the 3D game. There is no obvious need for a command level on top of that, although there might be.
DNA can communicate, it sends out a radio signal, there is evidence of this. That is the control and overview.
All sorts of things can be explained with DNA worlds theory, like some genetically based fear of snakes or spiders. A representation of a spider or a snake in the DNA world is more or less easily explained.
Arthur Hunt: Epigenetics is but a source of variability.
LoL!
Ah, OK. At least we’re in a better position than physics, who cling to theories that were falsified shortly after they were proposed (in at last one case – kinetic theory – in the work that proposes it).
To claim that Darwinian evolution is in a ‘better position’ than physics reveals either a profound ignorance of physics, and of science in general, or a ‘person’ that is willing to tell any lie in order to try to protect his own dogmatic belief in Darwinian evolution.
My bet is on the latter.
Physicists have thrown every test they can imagine at General Relativity, Quantum Electrodynamics, and Quantum Theory with each theory becoming confirmed to more and more levels of accuracy. (to within measurement accuracy)
etc.. etc.. etc..
On the other hand, (besides have no rigid mathematical basis), Darwinists blatantly ignore empirical results that falsify Darwinian claims (as well as blatantly ignoring the math that falsifies Darwinian claims):
bornagain77: Physicists have thrown every test they can imagine at General Relativity, Quantum Electrodynamics, and Quantum Theory with each theory becoming confirmed to more and more levels of accuracy.
Well, except for the fact that General Relativity and Quantum Theory are incompatible, both theories breaking down, such as at a black hole singularity.
My comment was slightly tongue in cheek – I was making the serious point that falsification doesn’t work on historical grounds (it doesn’t work on philosophical grounds either, BTW). As a matter of history, there have been a lot of falsifications of physics that are currently accepted. Basically, serious philosophers of science don’t now use falsification as a demarcation criterion.
Zachriel, (whom should rightly be banned from UD for his repeated trollish behavior), instead of honestly admitting that Darwinian evolution is a unfalsifiable pseudo-science that is impervious to experimental testing and shortcomings, and is thus no better than tea-leaf reading,
The unbanned troll, instead of being honest to the situation with Darwinism, instead tries to focus on the ‘timeless’ singularities of blackholes where the equations that precisely describe what is happening within space-time break down. And to thus undermine two of the most successful theories ever in the history of science.,,,
The unbanned troll stated:
And why exactly should anyone, especially a atheistic troll, expect an equation that was specifically formulated to describe what is happening within space-time to describe what is happening outside space-time, i.e. within the ‘timeless’ singularity of a blackhole? It does not follow! Regardless of that ‘expected’ shortcoming of the math of General Relativity, none-the-less, the equations of General Relativity actually ‘predicted’ the existence of blackholes long before they were verified by experimental observation.
Moreover, the fact that the equations of General Relativity (and quantum mechanics) breakdown at blackholes is actually an argument for Theism:
The main conflict of reconciling General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics appears to arise from the inability of either theory to successfully deal with the Zero/Infinity conflict that crops up in different places of each theory:
Moreover, the extreme ‘mathematical difficulty’ of reconciling General Relativity with Quantum Mechanics, because of the zero/infinity conflict, into the much sought after ‘Theory of Everything’ was actually somewhat foreseeable from previous work earlier in the 20th century, in mathematics, by Godel. In fact, it was by studying the ‘logic of infinity’ itself that Godel was able to finally derive the proof for his ‘incompleteness’ of mathematics theorem.
In fact, the belief that there should be a unification between General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics, or a ‘theory of everything’, does not follow from the math in the first place, but is instead a belief that is born purely out of Theistic presuppositions.
Steve William Fuller, who is a philosopher in the field of science and technology studies, puts the hidden, but blatant, Theistic presupposition that scientists, who are trying to find a ‘theory of everything’, have like this:
And indeed professor Steve Fuller is completely correct to say,,,,
The reason professor Steve Fuller is completely correct to say what he said is because there are an infinite number of true mathematical theorems that exist that cannot be proved from any finite system of axioms.
Though not directly addressing Godel’s incompleteness, none-the-less, Weinberg, an atheist who had a hand in formulating the ‘standard model’ in the 1960’s, basically agrees with Steve Fuller’s assessment that mathematical descriptions should be limited in their explanatory scope. He puts the situation like this:
Even Hawking himself agreed that Godel’s incompleteness proves that there will never truly be a purely mathematical ‘theory of everything’:
As to Weinberg’s question ‘why are the laws nature what they are rather than some other laws?’, Bruce Gordon answers that question rather bluntly, but clearly, here:
And when the Agent causality of Theists is rightly let ‘back’ into the picture of physics, as the Christian founders of modern science originally envisioned, (instead of the self refuting ‘blind’ causality of atheists),
,,when Agent causality, i.e. God, is rightly let back into the picture of physics, then a empirically backed unification between Quantum Theory and Relativity is readily achieved by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from death:
Verse and Music:
bornagain77: instead of honestly admitting that Darwinian evolution is a unfalsifiable pseudo-science that is impervious to experimental testing and shortcomings
The question concerned General Relativity and Quantum Theory, which are not compatible, meaning one or both are wrong in some aspect or another.
as to:
Only because of the corrupting influence of Darwinian evolution on science would ‘serious’ philosophers say anything like that:
Lakatos, although he tipped toed around the failure of Darwinism to have a rigid demarcation criteria which can be tested against, he was brave enough to state that a good scientific theory will make successful predictions in science and a bad theory will generate ‘epicycle theories’ to cover up embarrassing failed predictions.
Yet, by even that loose standard, i.e. ‘predictive power’, for demarcating a ‘scientific’ theory, even then Darwinian evolution fails big time to establish itself as being ‘scientific’:
Further note:
Mr. Arrington, once again I request that Zach be banned for trollish, dishonest, behavior.
bornagain77: once again
Once again you ignored a substantive response, preferring to shut down objections to your position.
The question concerned General Relativity and Quantum Theory. As all physicists are aware, there’s something wrong with gravitational theory.
Can you explain why epigenetics is incompatible with evolution?
AIUI, epigenetics concerns regulation of expression, which generally means phenotype and not inheritance. Many, perhaps most, epigenetic changes are under genetic, rather than environmental, control, so fall within conventional evolutionary theory.
As far as epigenetic inheritance is concerned, where this passes hypothetical environmental information on, this is actually much closer to Darwin’s view of the source of variation than the so-called Modern Synthesis.
So there is no particular objection to it on either score (though there is little evidence that the latter actually happens).
As far as I can see, the objections collated by Coyne are to an unproven mode of gene regulation, and not to evolutionary implications at all.
Is there a possibility this is a knee-jerk reaction on your part? Coyne does not solely blog about evolution.
The Insurmountable Problem of ‘Form” for Darwinian Explanations – video
https://www.facebook.com/philip.cunningham.73/videos/vb.100000088262100/1138468566166075/?type=2&theater