Nature or Nurture?
Work on the farm house up here in Saranac is an ongoing effort. We made a lot of progress yesterday; most notably by not falling off the roof while trying to affix a zinc strip to try to beat a moss problem. Moss seems to be a popular roofing challenge up here. I have to admit that the falling option was in the forefront of my mind for much of the effort because: a) when you need a rope to get up a 4×1 incline to get to the 40 ft peak, falling seems a distinct possibility; b) letting gravity do the work was the trick I chose the last time I was up on a roof. Any way, the roof work was uneventful. I can’t say the same about our drive back to the farm house after setting up for today’s Delaney family reunion. We happened upon the local deer crossing during a rain storm. Yep, we got ourselves a deer. Luckily it was my brother’s rental; though I don’t suppose it made much difference to the poor deer. But what about nature and nurture?
There has been a long and ongoing debate about whether nature or nurture is responsible for everything from a child’s behavior to homosexuality. Well a couple of years ago the Institute for American Values published a report from the Commission on Children at Risk entitled, Hardwired to Connect which describes findings they say makes this debate obsolete. In fact, what they have found “by looking at, well, rats†(their prose not mine, but it sounds bloggish doesn’t it?) is that the nurturing environment actually affects gene transcription. What this means is that rats who were given “good mothering†experienced measurably greater emotional and psychological resilience. I know; how do you figure out whether a rat is emotionally resilient or not? Any way, the study group apparently did. The point was that this resilience could be passed on to subsequent generations by modifications in the rats’ DNA.
The similarities of the relevant rat and human hormonal systems together with the available human data led these researchers to conclude that these finding are applicable to human children. The ability of the genetic code in DNA to be corrupted by the environment is well known (for example with cancer). However, the ability for constructive changes of the DNA via the environment in this manner was previously unknown. Note that these changes are not random constructive changes but they are directly related to the nurturing environment.
This amazing finding correlates very well with John Paul the Great’s anthropology. This is how it would work. The unity of body and soul (called hylomorphism which comes from Aristotle through St. Thomas Aquinas) is such that the soul gives the body its shape. The body expresses the soul and is the mechanism by which the soul interacts with the world. But physical changes to the body also then necessarily modify the soul in some way (since the soul gives shape to the body). It is a two way street. So when a baby or young child is affected by the environment in some way; this affect can permanently change the child; this is especially true with nurturing the child. A young child must be loved and nurtured. If it is not, the affect is more than just psychological; it affects the way the genes transcribe themselves and so the effects can be passed on to its children. In other words, the environment can permanently modify the soul in such a way that it seems the soul records this change via the DNA. Thus nurture changes nature (of course not human nature, but I use the term in a less technical sense). One ramification: even if a so called “gay†gene is ever found one still cannot eliminate the possibility that it was a mistranscription due to a defective nurturing environment.
In a wholly unrelated, but still very interesting, finding: back at the turn of the millennia Zenit ran an article about a paper to be delivered at a Jubilee congress held at the Vatican entitled “At the Dawn of Human Life,” organized by the Institute of Gynecology and Obstetrics of the Catholic University of Rome. The paper reported that:
Mothers undergo permanent changes during pregnancy, in which they “inherit” some characteristics of the child they carry and, through the child, also receive some characteristics of the father. [I wonder if this is scary to any moms?]
This “communication†between the baby and mother occurs via stem cells, which have been found in the mothers 30 years after birth. These are believed to be permanent changes to the mother via her baby. There are many interesting ramifications for this, including the fact that so called “surrogate mothers†who “rent†their wombs will be “modified†for the rest of her life, by a being who is 100% genetically foreign to her.
Does anyone find this stuff as fascinating as I do?
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I found the article so interesting: it left me with a renewed sense of awe at creation, and the mystery of sexuality.
Comment by Anonymous — July 30, 2005 @ 4:38 am
Whoa!
Comment by Anonymous — July 30, 2005 @ 9:57 pm
Well, let me comment a bit on this post to clear up a few assumptions that David makes in his original post.
Let me clear up a few definitions first, so that we’re on the same page - since the terms “nuture” and “nature” are nebulous and therefore hard to work with.
“Nature” seems to mean the genetic material of an organism, or something that can be passed on to further generations (the DNA).
“Nuture” can be any environmental stress placed on the organism. Stresses do not have to be “stressful,” meaning that it doesn’t necessarily mean a bad situation, just something that will result in a change in the organism.
My case study for this comment will be bacteria, and I’ll generalize to try to keep this short.
In bacteria, external stresses can easily bring about a change in the DNA of the organism. Shining UV light or exposing bacteria to other mutagenic substances will work - biologists have used this to create strains of bacteria that have desired characteristics.
Also, if you grow bacteria that are not resistant to an antibiotic, say penicillin, in a petri dish and then expose them to penicillin, even though most of the bacteria will be killed, there will almost always be a few colonies that have developed resistance to this antibiotic (note: they don’t always have the same changes to the DNA made here!).
So, it stands to reason that a stress like nuturing a child (just an enivironmental thing that brings about a change) can affect the DNA, right? Well, it seems pretty far-fetched to me and here’s why.
It’s easy to change the DNA of a single cell. That’s why it’s easy to do it with bacteria. When you try to change the DNA of an entire organism, however, this becomes more difficult - indeed, nearly impossible.
While I would agree that nuturing a child a certain way may be able to change the way they express their DNA, this DOES NOT mean that the DNA has changed in any way. This is not, for example, a change in the nature.
So this hopefully will clear up any confusion here on the issue. I haven’t seen the studies (you can’t unless you pay for them on the linked site) on this. I can’t seem to find any papers in journals on the topic either (although I must admit I did a very limited search).
I would imagine that this “passing on to subsequent generations” that was observed was an artifact of the experiment (again, I’d have to see the data and the methods used).
Also David, you make the claim that: “The ability of the genetic code in DNA to be corrupted by the environment is well known (for example with cancer). However, the ability for constructive changes of the DNA via the environment in this manner was previously unknown.”
This is wrong on both accounts. Cancer does not always change the DNA of the cancerous cell (only if exposed to mutagens, etc.. and not always then). Not only that, but this is simply one cell in an entire organism - cancer isn’t propagated through generations like this, only a genetic pre-disposition. Also, using stresses to bring about a “good” change in organisms is absolutely known (just look at the bacterial studies above).
My point is that even though “nuturing” a child may be able to change the way they think and act (not necessarily by only changing the way DNA is expressed), it will probably not change the “nature” (DNA) of the child. Even if this were possible, you’d have to change every cell in the organism in the same way to effectively completely change the genetic makeup of the individual and allow this change to be passed on to future generations.
I hope that clears up some of the mis-information here. I remain skeptical of the claim that nuture has affected nature in the rat study until I see the actual report/data.
Comment by hunk finn — August 1, 2005 @ 11:37 am
Whoops. I meant to say “nurture” instead of “nuture.” I think I was a bit tired when I posted that comment. …Spelled it wrong all the way through!… wow.
Comment by hf — August 1, 2005 @ 1:09 pm