Guy Hoelzer wrote:
> in article cbumkd$1qlo$1{at}darwin.ediacara.org, ekurtz99{at}WhoKnowsWhere.com at
> ekurtz99{at}WhoKnowsWhere.com wrote on 6/30/04 8:35 AM:
> 
> 
>>Robert Karl Stonjek wrote:
>>
>>>How good is our genome?
>>>
>>> Philosophical Transactions: Biological Sciences
>>>fobike://rsl/rtb
>>>January 29, 2004, vol. 359, no. 1441,   pp. 95-98(4)
>>>l/rtb/2004/00000359/00001441
>>>Weill J-C.[1]; Radman M.[1]
>>>
>>>[1] Faculte de Medecine Necker Enfants-Malades, Université de Paris-V,
>>>Paris, France
>>>
>>>Abstract:
>>>Our genome has evolved to perpetuate itself through the
maintenance of the
>>>species via an uninterrupted chain of reproductive somas.
>>
>>The genome is an entity capable of looking to the future?
> 
> 
> Interestingly, the answer is yes.  That is why natural selection is able to
> cause adaptive genomic evolution.  The mechanisms of genetics result in the
> encoding of the past into the genome, which effectively allows it to predict
> the future.  If the past, or memories thereof, was too poor at predicting
> the future, then heritable changes within populations in response to natural
> selection would not result in adaptive evolution.  It would just amplify the
> noise.

You mean some mutations, some recombinations, some translocations and 
some chromosomal rearrangements are more probable than others as a 
result of a genomic memory of what worked in the past?

>>>Accordingly,
>>>evolution is not concerned with diseases occurring after the soma's
>>>reproductive stage.
>>
>>There is no such person as "evolution". Attributing agency to a
>>completely natural process causes no end of confusion, especially among
>>the scientifically uninformed, eg journalists.
> 
> I don't disagree with your plea for careful wording, but it does seem a bit
> like quibbling here.  You could, for example, think of evolution as a
> process, rather than merely a pattern (outcome of processes).  Dissipative
> processes, like convection (and I argue evolution), are generally
> indistinguishable from their entified dynamical structures (e.g., a
> convection cell).  Such process/structures can have agency, and one might
> argue that evolution/bioshpere is such a process structure.

Anything that has agency can decide to do or not to do a certain thing. 
That is what agency means. Can "convection" decide whether or not it 
wants to get warmer air into the upper bedrooms of your house?

>>>Following Richard Dawkins, we would like to reassert
>>>that we indeed live as disposable somas, slaves of our germline
genome, but
>>>could soon start rebelling against such slavery.
>>
>>If the authors are infatuated with metaphors, they should become poets
>>in their spare time, and restrict themselves to technical language when
>>writing about biology.
>>
>>
>>>Cancer and its relation to
>>>the TP53 gene may offer a paradigmatic example. The observation that the
>>>latency period in cancer can be prolonged in mice by increasing
the number
>>>of TP53 genes in their genome, suggests that sooner or later we
will have to
>>>address the question of heritable disease avoidance via the
manipulation of
>>>the human germline.
>>
>>True; but new?
> 
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Guy
> 
>
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