“I think it’s such an important work. It is an exciting book covering new ground and represents by far the best available anti Darwinian /pro Lamarckian  review,  bringing together many lines of evidence and building a very powerful case. It deserves the widest possible readership.”  

Michael Denton, Human geneticist, author of Evolution: A Theory in Crisis and Nature’s Destiny.

In Soma, Dr Robyn Lindley provides us with an easy to understand and quite sobering account of what the new genetics is telling us. There is now extant scientific evidence suggesting that nature has evolved a number of molecular mechanisms for some acquired characters to be inherited. It seems that Lamarck was right after all!

“You are what your parents ate. Well sometimes”

“Environmental stress can trigger changes in the way our genes are expressed, and the changes can be inherited by offspring.”

“The effects of providing a stimulating and enriched environment for young female mice can benefit future generations.”

“The effects of smoking and chemicals in the work place can cause sperm damage for generations to come.”

“Even subtle behaviours can be inherited by offspring.”

…and much more!

Learn why scientists now believe that acquired inheritance effects are real. We ignore the consequences at our peril.

“This is a scholarly and passionate work… Although written for the lay reader, this book should be read by all who teach genetics.  The extensive references and footnotes will be appreciated.”

Roger Letts Dawkins, Chairman, Research Director and Founder of the C. Y. O’Connor ERADE Village Foundation, Australia.

Available at amazon.com, and other online sites gloablly and some selected book stores.

Author Dr Robyn Lindley is a multidisciplinary academic and author specialising in new technology innovation studies and the human impact of new technologies. She is currently the CEO of Tillbrook Nominees Pty Ltd and Hon. CEO of the C.Y. O’Connor Education Research Development and Employment (ERADE) Village Foundation. Located near Perth, in Western Australia, the CYO ERADE Village is a public benevolent institute that promotes and supports research in molecular biology, bioinformatics, and evolutionary biology. She lives in the CYO ERADE Village with her husband Ted Steele. She was author of Smartcard Innovation and a co-author of Lamarck’s Signature published by Allen & Unwin and Perseus Books. At the time it was published it provoked considerable debate and inspired a television documentary.

Available at amazon.com and selected book stores from August 2010.

CreateSpace, an Amazon Company. Printed in North America. Copyright 2009.

Foreword

Evolutionary theory is rapidly approaching a new crisis point. In the context of the new genetics, it is becoming evident that an evolutionary view based on random mutations and survival of the fittest has run its course. While the forces of natural selection do play an important role in evolution, they are only a part of the emerging picture. The massive volumes of molecular and genetic data harvested over the last decade or so are telling us that some strangely Lamarckian phenomena are also playing a crucial role in our evolution.

The new genetics is demanding that we form a more sophisticated world view, based on a synthesis of the Darwinian idea of natural selection, and the distinctly Lamarckian idea that changes acquired during our lifetime are inherited.

This book considers the role of Lamarckian inheritance effects in the context of the new genetics and how that is forcing us to change our views on evolution and our lives. I wanted to write about this because I want people to understand that there is now extant scientific evidence suggesting that nature has evolved a number of molecular mechanisms for us to consciously direct our own evolutionary future. We ignore this at our peril.

It begins with a brief introduction to the history of our ideas on acquired inheritance. It describes how our genes really work, and it brings to life the current plethora of scientific evidence suggesting that every moment of our existence we can potentially alter the makeup of our heritable material.

I have also re-opened some of the thornier debates associated with the idea of Lamarckian inheritance. In the context of the new genetics, these fundamentally alter our understanding about ourselves, and our survival as a species as we reach a new pivotal point punctuating our own evolution.

*  *  *

Having written Lamarck’s Signature with Ted Steele and Bob Blanden in 1997,  it occurred to me that there is a need to write about the far bigger picture now emerging from the new genetics. In Lamarck’s Signature, we focused on the immune system and the complex bio-molecular pathways used to enable us to mount an effective immunological response to almost any foreign pathogen. Once an effective antibody is produced, some of the new DNA sequence changes responsible for encoding it may be copied into our DNA. The updated information is then inherited by subsequent generations. However, even after biologists recognised this, it was still widely believed that the process of updating the variable regions of antibody genes did not apply to other families of genes, and so the wider Lamarckian implications were largely ignored.

To understand the science involved in the processes that result in updating some of the variable regions of antibody genes, the reader was presented with facts as they emerged from a deeply historical and scientific perspective. Along the way, the reader was required to grasp a number of fairly sophisticated concepts using specialist terminology. The feedback suggested that this was ‘pretty heavy going’ for most readers new to the field.

Since we wrote Lamarck’s Signature much more gen-etic sequence information has become available, thanks to several large genome sequencing projects, and some dedicated genomic analyses. Armed with a whole new generation of fast sequencing technologies for analysing genetic data, we are now beginning to understand that our genes hold many more Lamarckian secrets. We are beginning to understand the sheer complexity of the genetic machinery at work every moment of our life in terms of the highly regulated pathways, and the molecular machinery interacting with our genes. A three-dimensional picture of a highly re-configurable genome responding to environmental feedback is what is emerging.

What we are also discovering is that many aspects of our own lives can have a lasting impact on our evolution as a species. What we eat, what diseases we develop, how we behave to our young and to each other, and what we do can all alter our genome. Even your cigarettes or sunbaking can leave a specific genetic marker behind in your genes. So there we have it, Lamarckian forces are at work, and we are only just beginning to understand how this occurs, and what it means.

For those that wish to access the original scientific papers and other works used as a primary source, references and notes are included. A Glossary of the key scientific terms is also included. I have limited the number of scientific terms used so that the science itself is more accessible for general readers. For readers not familiar with the field, a single diagram is included in the Appendix, Figure 1. While the science underlying many of the concepts we rely on is complex, this is the only reference map necessary to begin the journey of discovering just how fluid our genes are.

Towards the end of the book, I have also allowed myself to be drawn into a world of consciously directed evolution that transcends the limitations of current evolutionary thought. By drawing on our understanding of the fluid nature of our heritable material and the choices presented to us by gene technologies, we are able to choose our future evolution as a species. One of the main implications of accepting a Lamarckian world view is that each of us has the ability to play a role in directing our evolutionary future. This is a world that is much deeper, and it demands a new sense of self.

The journey of transcendence has also taken me to the edge of Alice’s Looking Glass where I am confronted with a new self-image. The new self-image with which I am confronted is one of freedom: acceptance of the elements of acquired inheritance sets me free from the genetic determinism with which I had been indoctrinated. I become more open to consciously conceiving and directing my own evolution, and that of my children. As I pass into this world, my old ‘sense of self’ is not altered. It is shattered!

 

Table of Contents

Foreword

1. Early ideas on acquired inheritance

2. Some heritable genetic transfer effects

My son looks like my wife’s ex-husband
Pekin ducklings
A pink iridescent glo-chihuahu
Gene therapy
Gene transfer and adaptive mutation in microbes
GM crops, super weeds and super bugs

3. Sperm mediated gene transfer effects

Genetic hitchhikers on the surface of sperm
Smoking can cause sperm damage
Health risk and evolutionary consequences

4. The fluid nature of our hereditary material

Why DNA alone doesn’t tell us much
Making RNA from DNA
Making protein from mRNA
The universe of RNAs
The cell factory
Updating our DNA
A missing link?
Rearranging our genes
Our genes as a ‘living code’

5. Acquired inheritance effects in the

immune system

Early experiments
The immune system in action
Recognition and response
Creating new immune system genes
Acquired inheritance in koalas infected
with an AIDS-like retrovirus
The immune system is not blind

6. Epigenetics: the footprints on our DNA

The same DNA—but oh so different!
You are what your parents eat—sometimes!
More mice tails
Epigenetic inheritance of disease
The mule and the hinny
Why the canary builds a nest in springtime

7. Memories in molecules

How good was your childhood?
Synaptic plasticity and learning to swim
The next Holy Grail
Short term and long term memory storage

8. Lamarck’s night of doubt

Why are some fossils missing in the evolutionary record?
So many miraculous accidents in design
When does information become a ‘fact’?
Resurrecting Lamarck
The Emerging Evolutionary Paradigm

9. Evolutionary learning logic

Evolutionary learning logic in the immune system
Learning to smell the cheese
Genes learning to take on a new role
A Lamarckian view of learning language
Learning and instinct
Learning and intelligence
Lamarckism and societal change
What makes us human?

10. Conscious evolution

Evolutionary thought and conscious evolution
Genetic Responsibility
Introducing HomoSap2
Technology and conscious evolution
Genetic discrimination
So where to from here?

Acknowledgements

Appendix

Glossary

Index

References and notes