Is genetics still metaphysical? Part V. Examples of conditions that lead to transformative insights

A commenter on this series asked what I thought that "a theory of biology should (realistically) aspire to predict?" The series (part 1 here) has discussed aspects of life sciences in which we don't currently seem to have the kind of unifying underlying theory found in other physical sciences. I'm not convinced that many people even recognize the problem.

I couched the issues in the context of asking whether the 'gene' concept was metaphysical or was more demonstrably or rigorously concrete.  I don't think it is concrete, and I do think many areas of the life sciences are based on internal generic statistical or sampling comparison of one sort of data against another (e.g., genetic variants found in cases vs controls in a search for genetic causes of disease), rather than comparing data against some prior specific theory of causation other than vacuously true assertions like 'genes may contribute to risk of disease'.  I don't think there's an obvious current answer to my view that we need a better theory of biology, nor of course that I have that answer.   

I did suggest in this series that perhaps we should not expect biology to have the same kind of theory found in physics, because our current understanding doesn't (or at least shouldn't) lead us to expect the same kind of cause-effect replicability.  Evolution--which was one of the sort of basic revolutionary insights in the history of science, and is about life, specifically asserts that life got the way it is by not being replicable (e.g., in one process, by natural selection among different--non-replicate--individuals).  But that's also a very vanilla comment.

I'll try to answer the commenter's question in this and the next post.  I'll do it in a kind of 'meta' or very generic way, through the device of presenting examples of the kind of knowledge landscape that has stimulated new, deeply synthesizing insight in various areas of science.

1.  Relativity
History generally credits Galileo for the first modern understanding that some aspects of motion appear differently from different points of view.  A classic case was of a ship gliding into the port of Genoa: if someone inside the ship dropped a ball it would land at his feet, just as it would for someone on land.  But someone on land watching the sailor through a window would see the ball move not just down but also along an angled path toward the port, the hypotenuse of a right triangle, which is longer than the straight-down distance.  But if the two observations of the same event were quantitatively different, which was 'true'?  Eventually, Einstein extended this question using images such as trains and railroad stations: a passenger who switched on two lightbulbs, one each at opposite ends of a train, would see both flashes at the same time.  But a person at a station the train was passing through would see the rearmost flash before the frontward one.  So what does this say about simultaneity?

These and many other examples showed that, unlike Isaac Newton's view of space and time as existing in an absolute sense, they depend on one's point of view, in the sense that if you adjust for that, all observers will see the same laws of Nature at work.  Einstein was working in the Swiss patent office and at the time there were problems inventors were trying to solve in keeping coordinated time--this affected European railroads, but also telecommunication, marine transport and so on. Thinking synthetically about various aspects of the problem led Einstein later to show that a similar answer applied to acceleration and a fundamentally different, viewpoint-dependent, understanding of gravity as curvature in space and time itself, a deeply powerfully deeper understanding of the inherent structure of the universe.  A relativisitic viewpoint helped account for the nature and speed of light, aspects of both motion and momentum, of electromagnetism, the relationship between matter and energy, the composition of 'space', the nature of gravity, of time and space as a unified matrix of existence, the dynamics of the cosmos, and so on, all essentially in one go.

The mathematics is very complex (and beyond my understanding!).   But the idea itself was mainly based on rather simple observations (or thought experiments), and did not require extensive data or exotically remote theory, though it has been shown to fit very diverse phenomena better than former non-relativisitc views, and are required for aspects of modern life, as well as our wish to understand the cosmos and our place in it.  That's how we should think of a unifying synthesis. 

The insight that led to relativity as a modern concept, and that there is no one 'true' viewpoint ('reference frame'), is a logically simple one, but that united many different well-known facts and observations that had not been accounted for by the same underlying aspect of Nature.

2.  Geology and Plate Techtonics (Continental Drift)
Physics is very precise from a mathematical point of view, but transformative synthesis in human thinking does not require that sort of precision.  Two evolutionary examples will show this, and that principles or 'laws' of Nature can take various forms.  

The prevailing western view until the last couple of centuries, even among scientists, was that the cosmos had a point Creation, basically in its present form, a few thousand years ago.  But the age of exploration occasioned by better seagoing technology and a spirit of global investigation, found oddities, such as sea shells at high elevations, and fossils.  The orderly geographical nature of coral atolls, Pacific island chains, volcanic and earthquake-prone regions was discovered.  Remnants of very different climates than present ones in some locations were found.  Similarly looking biological species (and fossils) were found in disjoint parts of the world, such as South Africa, South America, and eventually Antarctica.  These were given various local, ad hoc one-off explanations.  There were hints in previous work, but an influential author was Alfred Wegener who wrote (e.g., from 1912--see Wikipedia: Alfred Wegener) about the global map, showing evidence of continental drift, the continents being remnants of a separating jigsaw puzzle, as shown in the first image here; the second shows additional evidence of what were strange similarities in distantly separated lands.  This knowledge had accumulated by the many world collectors and travelers during the Age of Exploration. Better maps showed that continents seemed sometimes to be 'fitted' to each other like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.  

Geological ages and continental movement (from Hallam, A Revolution in the Earth Sciences, 1973; see text)

Evidence for the continental jigsaw puzzle (source Wikipedia: Alfred Wegener, see text)

Also, if the world were young and static since some 'creation' event, these individual findings were hard to account for. This complemented ideas by early geologists like Hutton and Lyell around the turn of the 19th century. They noticed that deep time also was consistent with the idea of (pardon the pun) glacially slow observable changes in glaciers, river banks, and coastlines that had been documented since by geologists  Their idea of 'uniformitarianism' was that processes observable today occurred as well during the deep past, meaning that extrapolation was a valid way to make inferences.  Ad hoc isolated and unrelated explanations had generally been offered piecemeal for these sorts of facts.  Similar plants or animals on oceanically separated continents must have gotten there by rafting on detritus from rivers that had been borne to the sea.

Many very different kinds of evidence were then assembled and a profound insight was the result, which we today refer to by terms such as 'plate techtonics' or 'continental drift'.   There are now countless sources for the details, but one that I think is interesting is A Revolution in the Earth Sciences, by A. Hallam, published by Oxford Press in 1973, only a few years after what is basically the modern view had been convincingly accepted.  His account is interesting because we now know so much more that reinforces the idea, but it was as stunning a thought-change as was biological evolution in Darwin's time.  I was a graduate student at the time, and we experienced the Aha! realization that was taking place was that, before our very observational eyes so to speak, diverse facts were being fit under the same synthesizing explanation (even some of our faculty were still teaching old, forced, stable-earth explanations).

Among much else, magnetic orientation of geological formations, including symmetric stripes of magnetic reversals flanking the Mid-Atlantic Trench documented the sea-floor spreading that separated the broken-off continental fragments--the pieces of the jigsaw puzzle.  Mountain height and sea depth patterns gained new explanations on a geologic (and very deep time) scale, because the earth was accepted as being older than biblical accounts).  Atolls and the volcanic ring of fire are accounted for by continental motions.  

This was not a sudden one-factor brilliant finding, but rather the accumulation of centuries of slowly collected global data from the age of sail (corresponding to today's fervor for 'Big Data'?).  A key is that the local facts were not really accounted for by locally specific explanations, but were globally united as instances of the same general, globally underlying processes.  Coastlines, river gorges, mountain building, fossil-site locations, current evidence of very different past climates and so on were brought under the umbrella of one powerful, unifying theory.  It was the recognition of very disparate facts that could be synthesized that led to the general acceptance of the theory.  Indeed, subsequent and extensive global data, continue to this day to make the hypothesis of early advocates like Wegener pay off.

3.  Evolution itself
It is a 100% irrefutable explanation for life's diversity to say that God created all the species on Earth. But that is of no use in understanding the world, especially if we believe, as is quite obvious, that the world and the cosmos more broadly follows regular patterns or 'laws'.  Creationist views of life's diversity, of fossils, and so on, are all post hoc, special explanations for each instance. Each living species can be credited to a separate divine reason or event of creation.  But when world traveling became more common and practicable, many facts and patterns were observed that seemed to make such explanations lame and tautological at best.  For example, fossils resembled crude forms of species present today in the same area.  Groups of similar species are found living in a given region, with clusters of somewhat less similar species elsewhere. The structures of species, such as of vertebrates, or insects, showed similar organization, and one could extend this to deeper if more different patterns in other groups (e.g., that we now would call genera, phyla, and so on).  Basic aspects of inheritance seemed to apply to species, plant and animal alike.  If all species had been, say, on the same Ark, why were similar species so geographically clustered?

It dawned on investigators scanning the Victorian Age's global collections, and in particular Darwin and Wallace, that because offspring resemble their parents, though are not identical to them, and individuals and species have to feed on each other or compete for resources, that those that did better would proliferate more.  If they became isolated, they could diverge in form, and not only that but the traits of each species were suited to its circumstances, even if species fed off each other.  Over time this would also produce different, but related species in a given area.  New species were not seen directly to arise, but precedents from breeders' history showed the effects of selective reproduction, and geologists like Lyell had made biologists aware of the slow but steady nature of geological change.  If one accepted the idea that rather than the short history implied by biblical reading, life on earth instead had been here for a very long time, these otherwise very disparate facts about the nature of life and the reasons for its diversity might have a common 'uniformitarian' explanation--a real scientific explanation in terms of a shared causative process, rather than a series of unrelated creations: the synthesis of a world's worth of very diverse facts made the global pattern of life make causal and explanatory sense, in a way that it had never had before.

Of course the fact of evolution does not directly inform us about genetic causation, which has been the motivating topic of this series of posts.  We'll deal with this in our next post in the series.

Insight comes from facing a problem by synthesis related to pattern recognition
The common feature of these examples of scientific insight is that they involve synthesis derived from pattern recognition. There is a problem to be solved or something to be explained, and multiple facts that may not have seemed related and have been given local, ad hoc, one-off 'explanations'. Often the latter are forced or far-fetched, or 'lazy' (as in Creationism, because it required no understanding of the birds and the beasts). Or because the explanations are not based on any sort of real-world process, they cannot be tested and tempered, and improved.  And, unlike Creationist accounts, scientific accounts can be shown to be wrong, and hence our understanding improved.

In our examples of the conditions in which major scientific insights have occurred, someone or some few, looking at a wealth of disparate facts, or perhaps finding some new fact that is relevant to them, saw through the thicket of 'data', and found meaning.  The more a truly new idea strikes home, in each case, the more facts it incorporates, even facts not considered to be relevant.

Well!  If we don't have diverse, often seemingly disparate facts in genetics then nobody does!  But the situation now seems somewhat different from the above examples: indeed, with the precedents like those above, and several others including historic advances in chemistry, quantum physics, and astronomy, we seem to hasten to generalize, and claim our own synthesizing 'laws'.  But how well are we actually doing, and have we identified the right primary units of causation on which to do the same sort of synthesizing?  Or do we need to?

 I'll do my feeble best to offer some thoughts on this in the final part of this series.

Is genetics still metaphysical? Part IV: The 'specifisticity' of life

I had not intended a 4th post in the series (part 1 is here) about whether genetics is 'metaphysical', and what that might mean in our search to understand biological causation.  However, I just listened to a very good** discussion of the Copernican 'revolution' in understanding the movement we observe in the skies, and its relevance to scientific inference generally.  That led me to write this follow-up.

Copernicus showed that viewing the Sun rather than the Earth as the center of the known universe seemed more natural and in some ways easier than the prior Ptolemaic system.  Of course, the issues were deeper because they were relevant to theological explanations of existence, in which the Earth was the center of God's creation.

The Ptolemaic system that dated back to the classical era had led to the discovery that planets did not orbit the earth in simple circles; instead, to predict their position one had to invoke 'epicycles', short occasional small circular detours in planetary paths.  By placing the Sun at the center of celestial motions, the Copernican system was somewhat simpler, though it had its own equivalent of epicycles and wasn't entirely more obvious.  The important follow-up that did simplify things was Kepler's showing that the orbits were ellipses rather than circles.  This was much easier and more natural, even if also imperfect**, and indeed Tycho Brahe had shown ways to make Earth-centered planetary predictions that basically matched those of Copernicus, by having the moon and planets circle the Earth but the Sun circle the Earth, in a sense salvaging a geocentric cosmos.

The BBC program's discussion concerned the fact that at some point, truth becomes as much philosophical  as it is scientific. Matters of computational convenience were not necessarily about what view is 'true'.  Indeed, we may never be able to know absolute truth, and indeed that concept may be inherently philosophical, as pointed out on the program by the philosopher of science Massimo Pigliucci.  Thus, none of the competing planetary computational approaches necessarily need be 'true': each had its own level of complexity and limits of accuracy.  These days science takes the heliocentric system as obviously 'true', and in particular, that theological assertions that the Earth is the center of the universe is wrong.

More relevant to this post, however, I think that at some point every science becomes an axiomatic system, built upon terms and relationships that are defined but not examined or examinable in any further depth.  In classical geometry, for example, such terms include 'point' or 'line', and I think that currently, the 'electron' is like that: it is not clearly a 'thing' nor a 'wave' and if it is 'energy' that, too, is something whose effect can be defined observationally but whose essence is not further explored.  In a sense, the ultimate nature of these fundamentals is 'metaphysical' that is, is above the physical, something whose 'true' reality or essence we cannot see, at least in our current stage of a science.

Mathematics is an axiomatic system, based on entities like numbers and relationships like equality, addition, and so on.  We deduce things from these primary entities or prove their relative properties, but we can go a very long way in physics and cosmology using mathematics and the various principles and assumptions that we currently make.   We don't need to ask what an electron or electromagnetic wave 'is' in order to make precise use of it in building a model of physical existence, whether or not some day we will be able to probe such things more deeply.

If this is the basis of science, isn't the same true of the biological equivalent of what are currently considered its primary 'things'--that is, 'genes'?  I think not.

Genetics and metaphysics in a comparative context
In the previous posts in this series, I asked whether genetics (and by extension, evolution) was still essentially metaphysical.  Since the term 'gene' (and its historical antecedents) was defined by observable facts, such as patterns of inheritance, it was assumed to be a real entity, even if nothing was known or, at the time, knowable about its essence.  That was in the realm of speculation but, like electrons or geometrical points perhaps, it was at least assumed to be a kind of real 'thing' because it seemed to behave is if it were.  But what kind of thing was purely speculative and at best indirectly supported by evidence of its putative causal result, the directly observable traits of organisms.

As we tried to explain in this series, the idea of a 'gene' historically grew out of Mendel's work with carefully selected traits in peas, which he chose specifically as being useful for plant improvement. The resulting metaphoric or metaphysical notion of life's primary causal element (at the time, perhaps, literally comparable to atomic 'elements'--indicated by Mendel's use of that word) led to a perhaps unprecedentedly productive research strategy, which yielded the discovery of RNA and DNA itself, that particular regions of DNA code for the structure of proteins.

However, to a much under-appreciated extent, that very success itself led us to discover that no 'gene'--no bit of DNA--acts on its own, that only sometimes is a given coding stretch used to produce a given protein because of context-specific variable exon usage; that the code only works when other types of DNA-based codes are used to control the expression of the gene; that the code is sometimes altered after transcription; and much, much more. Indeed, it seems very possible that important or even fundamental aspects of what DNA does remain unknown.

We've dealt with some of these issues in many other posts.  In particular, the 'gene' is currently not a fundamental concept comparable to 'point', 'electron', 'square root', and so on.  It is not something that is a fundamental, irreducible causal element whose internal nature or identity cannot be probed more deeply. Unlike points and electrons, not all genes are identical; indeed no two genes are. A gene is not a primary causal unit in the same sense.  Earlier in this series we quoted a new suggested definition of 'gene' that makes this point by inadvertently being so useless that it might as well not have been suggested.

Today, except for some restricted, usually vague and often conveniently self-serving situations, we do not have a good concept of what a gene 'is'--or even if life is based on some such concept.  First, we define genes in terms of biological 'functions', that is, some purportedly causative outcomes that we like to measure, like the production of skin or eyes, or intelligence, or disease.  One thing that is relevant and does seem very clear is that aspects of DNA have functions that are fundamentally due to interaction, or even that interaction is all that DNA function is about.  The word ('gene') no longer unambiguously refers to a clear kind of basic element: its referents have to be defined ad hoc. The same purported unit has different causative aspects in different experimental and natural contexts.  It is also not a proper fundamental unit because in today's usages a 'gene' has internal components (in DNA sequence, modification by other chemicals etc.).  In some selective situations the word has utility (e.g., referring to the BRCA1 gene in a causative context related to breast cancer), but even that is typically limited, and worse, limited to a typically unknown and/or variable extent. These statements reflect the success of the science to date, but also show how deep our need for conceptual reform really is.

Life is specifisitic 
It was probably understatement on our part to have ended the 3rd element of this series by saying that the 'gene' is still, and perhaps essentially, a metaphysical concept.  That's because it's not really clear, yet, whether it even is a coherent concept, much less whether it, or any fundamental unit of causation applies to life in the way such concepts (may) apply to physics and chemistry.  In a sense, perhaps similar to the views of Einstein and Ernst Mach that we touched on in part I of this series, the fundamental units of life are relationships, not things.  This may be similar to the issue in physics about when or whether or how reality is made of waves or things.  But there would be more, because of the fact that unlike physics, the fundamental units are not replicable the way electrons are.

Perhaps a different unique-context-centered causative concept is needed for understanding the essential nature of life: a  fundamental 'specifismology'.  At this stage of our knowledge, in particular in relation to prediction, and also in the political economy of contemporary science, we are far from that level of of understanding. But we've said that many times before!

It is in the nature of science that how and when we'll get a break of deeper insight, no one can say.
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**You would probably enjoy this podcast or online-stream.  It is from the BBC Radio 4 science program series, Discovery.  The discussion of Copernicus and his work is very interesting, but as a science program, the Beeb committed at least a minor error in a kind of de facto assumption that there is some sort of underlying truth in this aspect of cosmology and the history concerns which measurement approach is most accurate or easiest.  That is essentially a Newtonian view, of space as having an absolute reference frame for which one tries to find the easiest computational system. That's what 'the Solar System' means: we place the Sun at the origin of 3-dimensional linear coordinates.  However, in post-Einstein relativistic times we now accept that there is no reference frame from which to decide which view is 'true'; heliocentric models are simply more practicably useful.  Whether the relativistic nature of reference frames applies to biology in a seriously relevant way is a separate, but interesting question.

In Man's Evolution, Woman Evolve Too

Evolution is true but people with large followings should fear the cultural consequences of their adaptive tales. I'm talking specifically about people who explain human evolution and even more specifically about this:

https://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2016/12/14/the-ideological-opposition-to-biological-truth/.

[Please go there and grapple with it if you wish, or just go there, get the gist and come back.]

It's not that Jerry Coyne's facts aren't necessarily facts, or whatever. It's that this point of view is too simple and is obviously biased toward some stories, ignoring others. And this particular one he shares in this post has been the same old story for a long long time.

What about the other side of the body size sexual dimorphism story?

What about the women?

Selection could well be the reason they stop growing before men and why they end up having smaller bodies than men, on average.

Perhaps men can make babies while growing, but perhaps women can't. Energetically, metabolically. So reproduction wins over growth. We reach sexual maturity and stop growing. Is that just a coincidence?

Why doesn't this (and other tales) fit alongside the big-aggressive-males-take-all explanation for sexual dimorphism? #evolution

Not only is it absent, but selection on women's bodies be the driving force (if such a thing could be identified) and, yet, it's as if women don't exist at all in these tales except as objects for males to fight over or to fuck (but *thankfully* there's that female choice!).

Knowledgeable people aren't objecting to facts, as Coyne suggests. They're objecting to biased story-telling and its annoying and harmful consequences, which Coyne doesn't acknowledge or grapple with in his piece.

Check out the discussion that ensued starting here:

Evolution is true but people with large followings should fear the cultural consequences of their adaptive tales. https://t.co/VMtOGBbtH5

— Holly Dunsworth (@HollyDunsworth) December 16, 2016

UPDATE: Last night Jesse Singal at NYMag wrote a thoughtful piece about it: http://nymag.com/scienceofus/2016/12/not-all-critiques-of-evolutionary-psychology-are-the-same.html 

Is genetics still metaphysical? Part III. Or could that be right after all?

In the two prior parts of this little series (I and II), we've discussed the way in which unknown, putatively causative entities were invoked to explain their purported consequences, even if the agent itself could not be seen or its essence characterized.  Atoms and an all-pervasive ether are examples. In the last two centuries, many scientists followed some of the principles laid down in the prior Enlightenment period, and were intensely empirical, to avoid untrammeled speculation.  Others followed long tradition and speculated about the underlying essentials of Nature that could account for the empiricists' observations. Of course, in reality I think most scientists, and even strongly religious people, believed that Nature was law-like: there were universally true underlying causative principles.  The idea of empiricism was to escape the unconstrained speculation that was the inheritance even from the classical times (and, of course, from dogmatic religious explanations of Nature).  Repeated observation was the key to finding Nature's patterns, which could only be understood indirectly.  I'm oversimplifying, but this was largely the situation in 19th and early 20th century physics and it became true of historical sciences like geology, and in biology during the same time.

At these stages in the sciences, free-wheeling speculation was denigrated as delving in metaphysics, because only systematic empiricism--actual data!--could reveal how Nature worked. I've used the term 'metaphysics' because in the post-Enlightenment era it has had and been used in a pejorative sense.  On the other hand, if one cannot make generalizations, that is, infer Nature's 'laws', then one cannot really turn retrospective observation into prospective prediction.

By the turn of the century, we had Darwin's attempt at Newtonian law-like invocation of natural selection as a universal force for change in life, and we had Mendel's legacy that said that causative elements, that were dubbed 'genes', underlay the traits of Nature's creatures.  But a 'gene' had never actually been 'seen', or directly identified until well into the 20th century. What, after all, was a 'gene'? Some sort of thing?  A particle?  An action?  How could 'it' account for traits as well as their evolution?  To many, the gene was a convenient concept that was perhaps casually and schematically useful, but not helpful in any direct way.  Much has changed, or at least seems to have changed since then!

Genetics is today considered a mainline science, well beyond the descriptive beetle-collecting style of the 19th century.  We now routinely claim to identify life's causative elements as distinct, discrete segments of DNA sequence, and a gene is routinely treated as causing purportedly 'precisely' understandable effects.  If raw Big Data empiricism is the Justification du Jour for open-ended mega-funding, the implicit justifying idea is that genomics is predictive the way gravity and relativity and electromagnetism are--if only we had enough data!  Only with Big Data can we identify these distinct, discrete causal entities, characterize their individual effects and use that for prediction, based on some implicit theory or law of biological causation.  It's real science, not metaphysics!

But even with today's knowledge, how true is that?

The inherent importance of context-dependency and alternative paths
It seems obvious that biological causation is essentially relative in nature: it fundamentally involves context and relationships.  Treating genes as individual, discrete causal agents really is a form of metaphysical reification, not least because it clearly ignores what we know about genetics itself. As we saw earlier, today there is no such thing as 'the' gene, much less one we can define as the discrete unit of biological function.  Biological function seems inherently about interactions.  The gene remains in that sense, to this day, a metaphysical concept--perhaps even in the pejorative sense, because we know better!

We do know what some 'genes' are: sequences coding for protein or mature RNA structure.  But we also know that much of DNA has function unrelated to the stereotypical gene.  A gene has multiple exons and often differently spliced (among many other things, including antisense RNA post-transcription regulation, and RNA editing), combined with other 'genes' to contribute to some function.  A given DNA coding sequence often is used in different contexts in which 'its' function depends on local context-specific combinations with other 'genes'.  There are regulatory DNA sequences, sequences related to the packaging and processing of DNA, and much more.  And this is just the tip of the current knowledge iceberg; that is, we know there's the rest of the iceberg not yet known to us.

Indeed, regardless of what is said and caveats offered here and there as escape clauses, in practice it is routinely assumed that genes are independent, discrete agents with additive functional effects, even though this additivity is a crude result of applying generic statistical rather than causal models, mostly to whole organisms rather than individual cells or gene products themselves.  Our methods of statistical inference are not causal models as a rule but really only indicate whether, more probably than not, in a given kind of sample and context a gene actually 'does' anything to what we've chosen to measure. Yes, Virginia, the gene concept really is to a great extent still metaphysical.

But isn't genomic empiricism enough?  Why bother with metaphysics (or whatever less pejorative-sounding term you prefer)? Isn't it enough to identify 'genes', however we do it, and estimate their functions empirically, regardless of what genes actually 'are'?  No, not at all.  As we noted yesterday, without an underlying theory, we may sometimes be able to make generic statistical 'fits' to retrospective data, but it is obvious, even in some of the clearest supposedly single-gene cases, that we do not have strong bases for extrapolating such findings in direct causal or predictive terms.  We may speak as if we know what we're talking about, but those who promise otherwise are sailing as close to the wind as possible.

That genetics today is still rather metaphysical, and rests heavily on fancifully phrased but basically plain empiricism, does not gainsay that fact that we are doing much more than just empiricism, in many areas, and we try to do that even in Big Promise biomedicine.  We do know a lot about functions of DNA segments.  We are making clear progress in understanding and combatting diseases and so on.  But we also know, as a general statement, that even in closely studied contexts, most organisms have alternative pathways to similar outcomes and the same mutation introduced into different backgrounds (in humans, because the causal probabilities vary greatly and are generally low, and in different strains of laboratory animals) often has different effects.  We already know from even the strongest kind of genetic effects (e.g., BRCA1 mutations and breast cancer) that extrapolation of future risk from retrospective data-fitting can be grossly inaccurate.  So our progress is typically a lot cruder than our claims about it.

An excuse that is implicit and sometimes explicit is that today's Big Data 'precision, personalized' medicine, and much of evolutionary inference, are for the same age-old argument good simply because they are based on facts, on pure empiricism, not resting on any fancy effete intellectual snobs' theorizing:  We know genes cause disease (and everything else) and we know natural selection causes our traits.  And those in Darwinian medicine know that everything can be explained by the 'force' of natural selection.  So just let us collect Big Data and invoke these 'theories' superficially as justification, and mint our predictions!

But--could it be that the empiricists are right, despite not realizing why?  Could it be that the idea that there is an underlying theory or law-like causal reality, of which Big Data empiricism provides only imperfect reflections, really is, in many ways, only a hope, but not a reality?

Or is life essentially empirical--without a continuous underlying causal fabric?
What if Einstein's dream of a True Nature, that doesn't play dice with causation, was a nightmare.  In biology, in particular, could it be that there isn't a single underlying, much less smooth and deterministic, natural law?  Maybe there isn't any causal element of the sort being invoked by terms like 'gene'.  If an essential aspect of life is its lack of law-like replicability, the living world may be essentially metaphysical in the usual sense of there being no 'true' laws or causative particles as such. Perhaps better stated, the natural laws of life may essentially be that life does not following any particular law, but is determined by universally unique local ad hoc conditions.  Life is, after all, the product of evolution and if our ideas about evolution are correct, it is a process of diversification rather than unity, of local ad hoc conditions rather than universal ones.

To the extent this is the reality, ideas like genes may be largely metaphysical in the common sense of the term.  Empiricism may in fact be the best way to see what's going on.  This isn't much solace, however, because if that's the case then promises of accurate predictability from existing data may be culpably misleading, even false in the sense that a proper understanding of life would be that such predictions won't work to a knowable extent.

I personally think that a major problem is our reliance on statistical analysis and its significance criteria, that we can easily apply but that have at best only very indirect relationship to any underlying causal fabric, and that 'indirect' means largely unknowably indirect. Statistics in this situation is essentially about probabilistic comparisons, and has little or often no basis in causal theory, that is, in the reason for observed differences.  Statistics work very well for inference when properly distributed factors, such as measurement errors, are laid upon some properly framed theoretically expected result.  But when we have no theory and must rely on internal comparisons and data fitting, as between cases and controls, then we often have no way to know what part of our results has to do with sampling etc. and where any underlying natural laws, might be in the empirical mix--if such laws even exist.

Given this situation, the promise of 'precision' can be seen starkly as a marketing ploy rather than knowledgeable science.  It's a distraction to the public but also to the science itself, and that is the worst thing that can happen to legitimate science.  For example, if we can't really predict based on any serious-level theory, we can't tell how erroneous future predictions will be relative to existing retrospective data-fitting so we can't, largely even in principle, know how much this Big Data romance will approximate any real risk truths, because true risks (of some disease or phenotype) may not exist as such or may depend on things, like environmental exposures and behavior, that cannot be known empirically (and perhaps not even in theory), again, even in principle.

Rethinking is necessary, but in our current System of careerism and funding, we're not really even trying to lay out a playing field that will stimulate the required innovation in thought.  Big Data advocates sometimes openly, without any sense of embarrassment, say that serendipity will lead those with Big Data actually to find something important.  But deep insight may not be stimulated as long as we aren't even aware that we're eschewing theory basically in favor of pure extrapolated empiricism--and that we have scant theory even to build on.

There are those of us who feel that a lot more attention and new kinds of thinking need to be paid to the deeper question of how living Nature 'is' rather than very shaky empiricism that is easy, if costly, to implement but whose implications are hard to evaluate. Again, based on current understanding, it is quite plausible that life, based on evolution which is in turn based on difference rather than replicability, simply is not a phenomenon that obeys natural law in the way oxygen atoms, gravity, and even particle entanglement do.

To the extent that is the case, we are still in a metaphysical age, and there may be no way out of it.

Is genetics still metaphysical? Part II. Is that wrong?

What is the role of theory vs empiricism in science?  How do these distinctions apply to genetics?

Yesterday, we discussed some of the history of contesting views on the subject.  Much of the division occurred before there was systematically theoretical biology.  In particular, when creationism, or divine creative acts rather than strictly material processes, was the main explanation for life and its diversity, the issues were contended in the burgeoning physical sciences, with its dramatic technological advances, and experimental settings, and where mathematics was a well-established part of the science and its measurement aspects.

Around the turn of the 20th century, Darwinian evolution was an hypothesis that not even all the leading biologists could accept.  Inheritance was fundamental to any evolutionary view, and inherited somethings seemed obviously to be responsible for the development of organisms from single cells (fertilized eggs). Mendel had shown examples of discretely inherited traits, but not all traits were like that.  Ideas about what the inherited units were (Darwin called them gemmules, Mendel called them Elements, and hereafter I'll use the modern term 'genes') were simply guesses (or just words).  They were stand-ins for what was assumed to exist, but in the absence of their direct identification they were, essentially, only metaphysical or hypothetical constructs.

The cloak of identity had serious implications.  For example, evolution is about inherited variation, but genes as known in Darwin's time and most of the later 19th century didn't seem to change over generations, except perhaps due to grotesquely nonviable effects called 'mutations'.  How could these 'genes', whatever they were, be related to evolution, which is inherently about change and relative positive effects leading to selection among organisms that carried them?

Many critics thought the gene was just a metaphysical concept, that is, used for something imagined, that could not in a serious way be related to the empirical facts about inherited traits. The data were real, but the alleged causal agent, the 'gene', was an unseen construct, yet there was a lot of dogma about genes.  Many felt that the life sciences should stick to what could be empirically shown, and shy away from metaphysical speculation.  As we saw yesterday, this contention between empiricism and theory was a serious part of the debate about fundamental physics at the time.

That was more than a century ago, however, and today almost everyone, including authors of textbooks and most biologists themselves, asserts that we definitely do know what a gene is, in great detail, and it is of course as real as rain and there's nothing 'metaphysical' about it.  To claim that genes are just imagined entities whose existential reality cannot be shown would today be held to be not just ignorant, but downright moronic.  After all, we spend billions of dollars each year studying genes and what they do!  We churn out a tsunami of papers about genes and their properties, and we are promised genetically based 'precision' medicine, and many other genetic miracles besides, that will be based on identifying 'genes for' traits and diseases, that is enumerable individual genes that cause almost any trait of interest, be it physical, developmental, or behavioral.  That's why we're plowing full budget ahead to collect all sorts of Big Data in genetics and related areas.  If we know what a gene is then the bigger the data the better, no?

Or could it be that much of this is marketing that invokes essentially metaphysical entities to cover what, despite good PR to the contrary, remains just empiricism?  And if it is just empiricism, why the 'just'?  Isn't it good that, whatever genes 'are', if we can measure them in some way we can predict what they do and live to ripe old ages with nary a health problem?  Can't we in fact make do with what is largely pure empiricism, without being distracted by any underlying law of biological causation, or the true nature of these causative entities--and deliver the miraculous promises? The answer might be a definitive no!

The metaphysical aspects of genes, still today
In essence, genes are not things, they are not always discrete DNA sequence entities with discrete functions, and they are not independently separable causative agents.  Instead, even the term 'gene' remains a vague, generically defined one.  We went through decades in the 20th century believing that a gene was a distinct bit of DNA sequence, carrying protein code. But it is not so simple.  Indeed, it is not simple at all. 

It is now recognized by those who want to pay attention to reality, that the concept of the 'gene' is still very problematic, and to the extent that assertions are made about 'genes' they are metaphysical assertions, no matter how clothed in the rhetoric of empiricism they may be.  For example, many DNA regions code for functional RNA rather than protein.  Much DNA function has to do with expression of these coding regions.  Many coding regions are used in different ways (for example, different exon splicing) in different circumstances.  Some DNA regions act only when they are chemically modified by non-DNA molecules (and gene expression works exclusively in that way). Some of 'our' DNA is in microbes that are colonizing us.  And 'traits' as we measure them are the result of many--often hundreds or more--DNA elements, and of interactions among cells.  Each cell's DNA is different at least in some details from that of its neighbors (due to somatic mutation, etc.).  And then there is 'the' environment!  This is central to our biological state but typically not accurately measurable.

Some discussion about these issues can be seen in a report of a conference on the gene concept in 2011 at the Santa Fe Institute.  Even earlier, in 2007 when it seemed we had really learned about genomes, hardly suspecting how much more there was (and is) still to be learned, a review in Genome Research was defined in an almost useless way as follows: 

Finally, we propose a tentative update to the definition of a gene: A gene is a union of genomic sequences encoding a coherent set of potentially overlapping functional products. Our definition sidesteps the complexities of regulation and transcription by removing the former altogether from the definition and arguing that final, functional gene products (rather than intermediate transcripts) should be used to group together entities associated with a single gene. It also manifests how integral the concept of biological function is in defining genes.

Really?!  Is that a definition or an academically couched but empty kicking of the can down the road while seeming to be knowledgeable and authoritative?  Or is it simply so empty as to be risible?

There are many now who advocate a 'Third Way' that in a rather generic sense of advocating less dogma and more integrative and indeed innovative or integrative approaches.  But even this doesn't say what the Third Way actually is, though one thing for sure is that it's every Third Way member's favorite way of coopting the concept of biological causation as his or her own.  I'm being cynical, and I'm associated with the Third Way myself and believe that serious rethinking about biological causation and evolution is in order, but that doesn't seem to be too unfair a way to characterize the Third Way's characterization of mainline genome-centered or perhaps genome-obsessed thinking. At least, it acknowledges that we don't just have 'genes' and 'environment', but that biological causality is based fundamentally on interactions of many different kinds. 

DNA is basically an inert molecule on its own

In genetic terminology, DNA is basically an inert molecule.  That is, whatever you want to call genes act in a context-specific way, and this goes beyond what is known as cis interactions among local DNA elements (like regulatory sequences flanking coding sequences) along a given strand. Instead, genetic function is largely a trans phenomenon, requiring interaction among many or even countless other parts of DNA on the different chromosomes in the cell.  And often if not typically, nothing happens until the coded product--RNA or protein--itself is modified by or interacts with other compounds in the cell (and responds to external things the cell detects).

Beyond even that complexity provides comparable evolutionary or physiological complexity.  There are many, perhaps often also countless alternative biological pathways to essentially the same empirical result (say, height or blood pressure or intelligence).  These causally equivalent combinations, if we can even use the term 'causal', are many and un-enumerated, and perhaps un-enumerable.  The alternatives may be biochemically different, but if it they confer essentially no difference in terms of natural selection, they are evolutionarily as well as physiologically equivalent. Indeed, the fact is that every cell, and hence every organism is different in regard to the 'causal' bases of traits.  We may be able to define and hence measure some result, such as blood pressure or reproductive fitness; but to speak of causes as if they are individually distinct or discrete entities is still essentially being metaphysical. Yet, for various sociocultural and economic reasons, we seem unwilling to acknowledge this.

You might object by saying that in fact most geneticists, from Francis Collins down to the peons who plead for his funding support, are being essentially empirical and not indulging in theory.  Yes, they drop words like 'gene' and 'epigenome' and 'microbiome' or 'network' or 'system', but this are on or over the edge of metaphysics (speculative guessing).  Many who feed at the NIH (and NSF) trough might proudly proclaim that they are in fact not dealing with airy-fairy theory, but simply delivering empirical and hence practical, useful results.  They do genomewide mapping because, or even proudly declaring, they have no causative theory for this disease or that behavioral trait.  Usually, however, they confound statistical significance with formal theory, even if they don't so declare explicitly.

For example, most studies of genotypes and genetic variation relative to traits like disease, are based on internal comparisons (cases vs control, tall vs short, smart vs not-smart, criminal vs non-criminal, addictive vs sober, etc.).  They don't rest on any sort of theory except that they do implicitly identify entities like 'genes'.  Often this is so metaphysical as to be rather useless, but it is only right to acknowledge that these results are occasionally supported by finding an indicated 'gene' (DNA sequence element), whose manipulation or variation can be shown to have molecular function relevant to the trait, at least under some experimental conditions.  But this causative involvement is usually quite statistical, providing only weak causative effects, rather than in any clear sense deterministic.  We are enabled by this largely pure empiricism to argue that the association we saw in our retrospective study is what we'll see prospectively as causation in the future.  And we now know enough to know that when it seems to work it is (as, indeed, in Mendel's own time) it's only the simplest tip of the causative iceberg.

We are tempted to believe, and to suggest, that this 'gene' (or genetic variant, an even cruder attempt at identifying a causative element) will be predictive of, say, a future disease at least in some above-average sense. That is, even if we don't know the exact amount of associated risk.  But even that is not always the case: the associated risks are usually small and data-specific and often vary hugely from study to study, over time, or among populations.  That means, for example, that people--typically by far most people--carrying the risk variant will not get the associated disease! It may often do nothing when put into, say, a transgenic mouse.  The reason has to be context, but we usually have scant idea about those contexts (even when they are environmental, where the story is very similar). That is a profound but far under-appreciated (or under-acknowledged) fact with very widespread empirical support!

Indeed, the defense of pure empiricism is one of convenience, funding-wise among other reasons; but perhaps with today's knowledge all we can do if we are wedded to Big Data science and public promises of 'precision' genomic prediction.  When or if we have a proper theory, a generalization about Nature, we can not only test our empirical data agains the theory's predictions, but also use the theory to predict new, future outcomes with a convincing level of, yes, precision. Prediction is our goal and the promises (and, notably, research funding) rest on prediction, not just description. So, as Einstein (and Darwin) felt, an underlying theory of Nature makes data make sense. Without it we are just making hopeful guesses.  Anyone who thinks we have such a theory based on all the public rhetoric by scientists is, like most of the scientists themselves, confusing empiricism with theory, and description with understanding. Those who are thoughtful know very well that they are doing this, but can't confess it publicly.  Retired people (like me) are often less inhibited!

Or could there perhaps be another way to think about this, in which genetics as currently understood remains largely metaphysical, that genetics is real but we simply don't yet have an adequate way of thinking that will unite empiricism to some underlying global reality, some theory in the proper scientific sense?

Tomorrow we'll address the possibility that genetics is inherently metaphysical in that there isn't any tractably useful universal natural law out there to be discovered.

Is genetics still metaphysical? Part I. Some general history.

In very broad terms, modern science has had debates about two basic kinds of approaches to understanding the world.  To over-simplify, they are the empirical and the theoretical approaches. Some argue that we can know only what we can detect with our sensory systems (and machines to extend them), but we can never know what general causal principles account for those data, or even if such real, true principles exist. Others view science's essential job as not just accumulating collections of data, which are necessarily imperfect, but to use such observations to build a picture of the true, or perfect underlying regularity--the 'laws' of Nature.

In the former case we just have to make measurements and try to show the ways in which comparable situations lead to comparable outcomes.  In the latter, we want what we call 'theory', that is, perfect generalizations that tell us how a given situation will turn out, and what the causal reasons are.  The standard assumption of the physical sciences is that Nature is, indeed, universally law-like.  Variables like the gravitational constant and the speed of light really are universally, precisely constant.

These are age-old differences, often 'just' philosophical, but they're quite important.  Comparably important are the still-unanswered question as to whether any phenomena in Nature is irreducibly probabilistic rather than deterministic, or whether probabilistic aspects of Nature really just reflect our imperfect sampling and measurement. This is the important distinction between epistemology--how we know things, and ontology--how things really are.  Can we ever tell the difference?

Empiricism is in some ways the easy part.  We just go out and make measurements and let them accumulate so we can generalize about them.  That's a lot of slogging to get the data, but all you have to do is be systematic and careful.  Don't give me airy generalizations, just the facts, please!

In other ways, theory is the easy part.  All you have to do is sit in your armchair, as the proverbial denigratory model has it, and make up something that sounds exotic (or even mathematically intricate) and claim you know how Nature 'is'.  Data are imperfect, so don't bother me about that! There are long traditions in both kinds of approach, and to a great extent it's only been the past few hundred years in which there has been melding of these two basic approaches.

Often, theory hypothesizes some fundamental objects whose properties and actions can only be seen indirectly, as they are manifest in measurable phenomena. Here there is a delicate boundary between what is essentially 'metaphysical' as opposed to real.  Many object to the use of metaphysical concepts and claims as being essentially untestable, and argue that only empiricism is real and should be taken seriously.  In the 19th and early 20th centuries, as technology revealed more and more about unseen Nature, things that were not yet seen directly but that could be hypothesized and assigned to things we could measure, we taken as true by some but denigrated as metaphysical by pure empiricists.

These distinctions were never that clear, in my view (even if they provided jobs for philosophers to write about).  Empiricism is retrospective but understanding requires some sorts of predictability, which is prospective.  If we cannot reliably generalize, if the same conditions don't always lead to the same result, how can the observing the former lead us to the latter?  Predictive power is largely what we want out of science, even if it's just to confirm our understanding of Nature's laws.

Until fairly recently, these issues have mainly been housed in the physical sciences, but since Linnaeus' time, but especially after Darwin and Wallace, the issues have applied to biology as well.
In this brief series we'll try to explore whether or how we can think of biology as the result of such universal laws or whether all we can do is make observations and rough causal generations about them. What is the place for strong causal theory in biology, or are empiricism and very general notions of process enough?

An example from the early prime era in modern science is the 'atom'.  Matter was conceived as being composed of these unseen particles, that accounted for the weight and properties of chemicals, and whose movement accounted for the weight, temperature, and pressure in gases.  Similar kinds of issues related to electromagnetism: what 'was' it?

An important late 19th-early 20th century example had to do with the existence of 'ether' as the medium through which electromagnetic radiation moved.  Ether could not be seen or felt but wavelike radiation had to be waves in something, didn't it?  Late-century tests failed to find it (e.g., the famous Michelson-Morely experiment).  In well-known interchanges at the time, figures like Ernst Mach, Albert Einstein and Max Planck thought about and debated whether there was a 'real' underlying general 'fabric' of Nature or whether specific empirical data simply showed us enough, and trying to delve deeper was dealing in metaphysics.  Many felt that was simply not justified--measurement or empiricism was what science could hope for.  On the other hand some, like Einstein, were convinced that Nature had a universal, and real underlying reality of which measurements were reflections.  He felt that theory, and in this case mathematics, could reveal or even 'intuit' Nature's underlying fabric.  An interesting article by Amanda Gefter in Nautilus science magazine deals with some of this history, with useful references.

So what about biology?
Biology had been largely a descriptive or even theological field before it became a modern science. But then came Darwin and his idea of evolution.  He viewed natural selection as a kind of Newtonian universal force.  Was it a type of explanation fitted simply around the empirical data that had been collected by Naturalists, or did it constitute some form of universal theory of life as Darwin asserted? Selection as a force had to work through some 'medium' or elements of inheritance.   His causal elements ('gemmules') were (like Lamarck's before him) entirely invented to 'fit' what was being observed about the evolution of diversity.  Indeed, he modeled natural selection itself after intentional agricultural selection because the latter could be demonstrated by human intent, while the former was generally far too slow to observe directly.  But there had to be some 'units' of inheritance for it to work, so he essentially invented them out of thin air.  Even in the early 20th century, 'genes' (as they became known) were largely hypothesized units for whose physical nature--or even reality--there was only indirect empirical evidence.

Assuming these discrete causal particles could enable the force, natural selection, to work on adaptive change was much like assuming that electromagnetic radiation needed ether to do its job.  Since differential reproductive success is observable, one can always define it to be the result of selection and to assume some gene(s) to be responsible. The test for relative success is, after all, only a statistical one with subjective decision-making criteria (like significance level) in empirical data.  In that sense, natural selection is a very  metaphysical notion because after the fact we can always empirically observe what has succeeded over time, or what functions have evolved, and call that the result of selection.  Such an explanation can hardly be falsified.  What is the reality of the underlying force, that Darwin likened to gravity?  Since it is always dependent on changing local conditions, what sort of a 'law' is it anyway?  And if it's basically metaphysical, should we reject it?

Mendelian genetics as metaphysics
If selection is a process, like gravity, it had to work on objects.  Because individual organisms are temporary (they all die), the objects in question had to be transmitted from parent to offspring.  That transmission was also found, by Mendel's experiment, to be a regular kind of process.  Mendel's causative 'elements', that we now call 'genes', appeared in his carefully chosen pea experiments to be transmitted as discrete things.  They fit the discretely causative world of the energized new field of atomic chemistry (see my Evolutionary Anthropology article on Mendel), with its idea that a chemical is made up of a particular kind of atom (thought by some to be multiples of hydrogen at the time), and Mendel's statistical tests showed a reasonably good fit to that discrete-unit worldview (indeed accusations that he or his assistants cheated may reflect his acceptance of discrete underlying but unseen and hence metaphysical, elements). But what were these genes?  In what serious sense did they exist as things rather than just an imaginary but essentially unconstrained variables conjured up to account for actual observations--of some sorts of inheritance, that of discretely varying traits--whose actual nature was entirely inaccessible?

These questions became very important in the debate about how evolution worked, since evolution required inheritance of favored states.  But what Mendelian analysis, the only 'genetic' analysis available at the time, showed was that the causal genes' effects did not change, and they only were shown to fit discretely varying traits, not the quantitative traits of Darwinian evolution.  For these reasons even many mainline evolutionary biologists felt that genes, whatever they were, couldn't account for evolution after all.  Maybe geneticists were indulging in metaphysics.

This was similar to the situation that engaged Einstein, Ernst Mach, and others about physics, but when it came to biology, the difference between empiricism and metaphysics became, literally, quite lethal!  The tragic impact of Profim Lysenko in the Soviet Union was due to a direct rejection by the scientific power structure that he established based on promises of rapid adaptation in plants, for example to the long, frozen Soviet winters, without adaptive 'genes' having to arise by evolution's slow pace.  As I summarized in another Ev. Anth article, it was in part the alleged 'metaphysical' nature of 'genes' in the early 20th century that Lysenko used to reject what most of us would call real science, and put in place an agricultural regime that failed, with mortally disastrous consequences. Along the way, Lysenko with Stalin's help purge many skilled Soviet geneticists, leading many of them to tragic ends. The mass starvation of the era of Lysenkoist agriculture in the USSR may in part have been the result of this view of theoretical science (of course, Lysenko had his own theory, which basically didn't work as it was as much wishful thinking as science).

But how wrong was it to think of genes as metaphysical concepts at the time?  Mendel had showed inheritance patterns that seemed to behave, statistically, as if they were caused by specific particles. But he knew many if not most traits did not follow the same pattern.  Darwin knew of Mendel's work (and he of Darwin's), but neither thought the other's theories were relevant to his own interests.

But in the first part of the 20th century, the great experimental geneticist TH Morgan used Mendelian ideas in careful breeding experiments to locate 'genes' relative to each other on chromosomes.  Even he was an empiricist and avowedly didn't really deal with what genes 'were', just how their causal agency was arranged.

Mendel's work also provided a research experimental approach that led via Morgan and others to the discovery of DNA and its protein coding sequences.  We call those sequences 'genes' and research has documented what they are and how they work in great detail.  In that sense, and despite early vague guesses about their nature, for most of a century one could assert that genes were in fact quite real, not metaphysical, entities at all.  Not only that, but genes were the causal basis of biological traits and their evolution!

But things have turned out not to be so simple or straightforward.  Our concept of 'the gene' is in rather great flux, in some ways each instance needing its own ad hoc treatment.  Is a regulatory element a 'gene', for example, or a modified epigenetic bit of DNA?  Is the 'gene' as still often taught in textbooks still in fact largely a metaphysical concept whose stereotypical properties are convenient but not nearly as informative as is the commonly presented view, even in the scientific literature?

Are we still resting on empiricism, invoking genetic and evolutionary theory as a cover but, often without realizing it, fishing for an adequate underlying theory of biological causation, that would correspond to the seamless reality Einstein (and Darwin, for that matter) felt characterized Nature? Is the gene, like Procrustes, being surgically adapted after the fact, to fit our desired tidy definition?  Is claiming a theory on which genetic-based predictions can be 'precise' a false if self-comforting claim, as a marketing tool by NIH, when in fact we don't have the kind of true underlying theory of life that Einstein dreamed of for physics and the cosmos?

We'll deal with that in our next posts.

In Trump's America, can evolutionary thinking help us?

Ten of my students bravely took advantage of my offer to post their recent thoughts to The Mermaid's Tale. I pasted those ten writings below. Be sure to read all the way through to last one, number 10. Here's what they responded to:

Extra Credit Assignment 

Anthropology 201: Human Origins and Evolution

What does evolution* have to do with our current cultural and/or political climate pre- and post-Trump’s election?

Or

What insight can evolutionary thinking bring to bear on our current cultural and/or political climate pre- and post-Trump’s election?

Or

Can evolutionary thinking help us?

*the definition(s) of evolution that we use in this course, not the poetic use

In at least 300 words, answer one of those questions up there (or something related that I didn’t spell out explicitly but that compels you to write). Whatever you write, be sure to apply your understanding of evolution to some sort of analysis of what has transpired during the presidential campaigns and/or since the election of Trump to be President of the United States of America, or be sure to apply your understanding of evolution to draft some aspect of the way forward. Guidelines: Although I’m asking you to write only a page at minimum (300 words minimum), begin with an introduction, make sure each sentence logically follows the one before, and then provide something in the way of a conclusion. Check your spelling and grammar. Write coherently. Demonstrate that you understand evolution, or don’t demonstrate that you don’t understand it properly. Finally, this is a chance to rant if you wish, but if you do you must rant coherently and excellently.

Responses

1

The Perception of Evolution in our Society

The recent presidential race has taken the entire world by surprise to say the least. For the longest time, the entire world was hoping that the Trump campaign would be a joke, that the bubbling hatred and xenophobia would fade away, that the hate crimes would decrease. People are shocked at the response, left astounded, wondering (as SNL poked fun at) ‘is America really racist?’. Some attribute Trump’s win to his unconventional approach and tactics. Some argue he’s a babbling baboon who doesn’t have any so-called ‘tactics’. And there are some who will go to their graves swearing that Trump will be a success with his “kick-ass attitude”. What shocked me the most, however, was not what Trump was saying, but rather the reaction to his words. 

People have been using Trump’s words and beliefs to justify hate crimes. There is no doubt that white superiority beliefs have been, and will probably continue to be, on the rise since Trump first ran for presidency. The false claims behind these hateful thought processes have been justified by evolution. Simply put, the belief of natural selection has led some to believe that the white race is more evolved than other races, therefore the best race. This thought process stems from the 19th century, when European nations ventured to other parts of the world and deemed the locals primitive savages. As Angela Davis explains in an interview with Anna Deavere Smith, race was invented to justify racism. (Race isn't real although it's implications in racism are, but ethnicity is real, which is what accounts for the diversity in humans). 

Evolution, when thought of in this manner, damages relationships to people. Because it is thought of as simply survival of the fittest, people may view themselves as the ‘fittest’, and others as inferior due their origin. However, evolution is more than just natural selection and helpless women clinging to only the kick-ass men. Evolution is a lot more complex, and gives us insight to our rich past which is only a minute fraction of the Earth’s beautiful history; it is not a justification for bigotry and racism. 

Evolution, when properly understood, helps us simply because it allows us to question and seek answers instead of feeding on ignorance. It gives us an appreciation of how far we’ve come, how much we’ve changed, how much we can change. 

- Anonymous

--------------------

 1 This interview was performed verbatim by the talented performer Anna Deavere Smith in her play Fires in the Mirror, 1992

 2 A reference to a book Donald Trump wrote, the name of which I do not know

**

2

After Donald Trump had won the 2016 election, it is clear that something influenced his winning. Not only did he make himself an enemy of many Americans, but he also portrayed himself in a negative manner. But maybe his rude comments are part of political evolution. Society is always undergoing change. These changes can be a result of evolution. Technology is getting more advanced; medicine is advancing so it would only make sense that politics are changing too.

Evolution occurs when there is a mutation in an individual of a species. If this variation helps the individual whether that be sexual, in the environment or competing against other individuals, then the trait has a better chance of being passed on. The mutation could or could not be passed onto the offspring. But if the mutation ends up being beneficial over time it will be found in the majority of the species’ genes. Donald Trump being elected for president is equivalent to a mutation in politics. Trump could be good for the country. He could fix the financial state of the country, help the unemployed get jobs, help people in poverty and so much more. If he does well in his first term, then he could be reelected, and if he continues to do beneficial things for the country than someone with similar views of Trump could be elected after. Trump could be the "mutation" that changes United States politics.

Donald Trump could also be a mutation that does harm, has no effect on competition (in this case other countries), or just does not get passed along. Like in evolution some mutations go away. Trump and his absurd ideas may go away and not continue through future generations. In this case, the species stays the same. Trump being impeached or not reelected would keep American politics the same.

No one will know if Trump (the mutation) will evolve American politics. Some mutations are good, other mutations are bad and others have no effect. Only time will tell how Trump will evolve American politics.

- Andraya Ferraro

**

3

Can evolutionary–thinking help us? 

            The term and belief in “evolution” has served as the basis for many arguments over the last hundreds of years. When combined with differences in opinion along the topics of religious, scientific, and political ways of thought, it seems everybody is going toe to toe to prove that they have all the one true answer. Everybody on earth is entitled to his or her opinion, but this doesn’t mean that everybody should voice it. The problem nowadays is that too many people are going off ranting and rioting with their one minded way of thinking, and not putting in the effort to do their homework first.  If one is attempting to win an argument with someone else, the very least that they could do is completely understand everything there is to know about the subject. If more people did the proper research before voicing their opinions, then there would be much more productive and educational debates that would not become a detriment to public viewers. 

            Growing up in the world of private catholic education has definitely given me some bias when it comes to science versus religion. This is in no way stating that my belief in God overpowers the facts brought forward by scientific discovery. Rather that I chose to believe in what the Bible says, as well as what science has to say about the creation of earth, man, and the world as we see it. Part of being a confirmed catholic is to accept truths that science states, and interpret in our own way. For instance, true Catholicism does not teach that at a certain time on earth, a single man and woman roamed the earth alone. The Bible is not a piece of literature that is meant to be interpreted literally, instead it is supposed to be interpreted as a collection of stories that have a much deeper and symbolic message; but trying to understand everything written in the Bible is a strenuous and extensive research in of itself. Unfortunately, there is always room for error in everything that man does. There are those that take everything in the Bible word for word and refute most of what science has come to either prove or disprove in regards to their religion. Fortunately enough for myself I was able to witness a truly fascinating and eye opening debate amongst Creationist Ken Ham, and pop culture icon and renowned scientist Bill Nye. In the debate, each opponent had a certain time to plead their case to the audience in an attempt to prove that they have the correct answers. The questions asked dealt with the existence of God, the plausibility of Noah’s Ark, the age of the earth, and many more.  While each opponent has a high level of education and “proper” background, it was very fascinating to see that whenever one of them was called out on something, they acted like children trying to be the correct one. 

            How does this relate to political matters today? Well with all the country tearing itself up over the past presidential election, I fear that not too many people would be concerned right now with comeuppance of man arising from other species. Right now groups are confusing the difference between protesting and rioting. Perhaps the theory of evolution is not what we need to focus on right now, but more of the thinking behind it. In the world of science, you have to be able to have an open mind. You cannot simply label something as the truth and then totally disregard everything else people say. Currently, people are naming President Elect Trump as an egotistical, racist and overall bad man. But for all of those that preach to be people who love one another but feel an extreme hatred towards Trump, why is it right for them to hate and wrong for him? People have already died in violent protests between Trump supporters and non-supporters. This waste of human life can all be avoided if people are willing to set aside their differences and focus on what they have in common; the desire for peace. Do I personally believe in everything that Donald Trump supports? Not necessarily. Do I believe in some of what he has to say? Yes. Is he the most evil man ever to be created and run a country? No. Finally, do I believe that Donald Trump will be a good President? Yes. Already, that last comment can start to send negative emotions towards my character, but here me out. As part of a religion that believes in accepting everyone for what they believe in, I try to find the positives about this political situation, and continue to have an open mind and accept the reality that Trump is president, and that is the end of it. He is a very successful businessman, and potentially going to run the country in a very different way. Change can be scary, but it is necessary for progress in the modern world, so it is time for everyone to enter the New Year with a new president, and fresh mindset. So can evolutionary thinking help us? Only if we are willing to accept the unknown but take new risks for the development and betterment of society as a whole. 

- Anonymous

**

4

Can Evolutionary-Thinking Help Us Post Election?

President Elect, Donald Trump. This result shocked many in the nation, leaving many critics to call the nation “The Divided States of America”. This change is something that many Americans felt the country needed, whether they support president elect Donald Trump or not. Many have adopted the saying, “it’s going to get worse before it gets better”. This saying can be related to evolutionary thinking, and how change over time can occur, and how something can start off as a simple form, but then develop into something more complex.

These election results needed to happen, because we as a nation needed to see how divided we were. As a Muslim American, I am not at all happy with the election results, and can only be thankful that I live in South Kingstown, Rhode Island, where many of my neighbors and fellow citizens feel the same way, or else I might have a harder time living in America. I feel like now that we know so many people in our nation have a certain feeling towards certain things, these things can be addressed, and it can help to educate all of our citizens. Evolutionary thinking can help us understand this, because it started off as something very simple, a man who was running for president, with certain rhetoric that was very anti many things, but now it has changed into something much more complex, that will cause us to hopefully, change for the better as a nation after these 4 years are up. Had Hillary Clinton won, our nation would have been 100% better off yes, but at least now we know how many of our fellow citizens actually feel this way. If I happen to meet someone who voted and currently supports Trump, I will be more friendly and engaging, and probably debunk some of the ideas they might have about Muslims, which hopefully cause them to think that Muslim isn’t as bad as the media portrays them to be, and maybe even tell their friends! While I understand that it’s not fair for us minorities to be judged on a single person's action who may be from that particular minority, that is the way it goes in this country. If every time a Trump supporter met an African American, a Muslim, a Latino, a gay person, etc, their views on that person and minority in general might change for the better. While this is not fair that for an individual who is a minority, because they are representing their entire minority based on their own actions, it is how society has formed ideas about minorities. As minorities, we can strive to do this because we now know, that so many people support this man and his rhetoric, so if we can debunk and educate them, just in the slightest way, an idea in the simplest form changing to something more complex, we may be able to change their view about certain things, and by the end of the 4 years, we can become the UNITED States of America again.

This is a very optimistic view to look at things, but unfortunately, there is no going back and changing the results to what we wish they could be. As a nation, we are in this together, and hopefully we can see some changes for the better, and unity. It has already unified many people around the nation, many people find themselves sticking up with minorities and people directly affected by Trump’s rhetoric, so if we can just expand that unity to those who might be in support of that rhetoric, we could be a united nation again.

- Yasmin Hussein

**

5

Global Warming has been a persistent problem with our planet since the dawn of the Ice Age. Global Warming is the process of Earth’s surface temperature rising, causing warmer climates and destruction of regions of the world such as Antarctica. The process of Earth’s rising temperature is natural, but since the presence of human life and the Industrial Age, the process has been sped up. Greenhouse gases are the main cause of Global Warming and us humans are the ones responsible for this catastrophe.

Humans emit more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than the rate plants and the ocean can absorb it. Because of the emittance of these gases, destruction has occurred all over the world, from the North Pole to the Great Barrier Reef. There is no way to reverse Global Warming but there are ways to slow down and halt the mess we have made. Sadly however, with our new President-elect Donald Trump, there isn’t much future for repair to happen.

The Great Barrier Reef is known as one of the Seven Wonders of the World and its lifespan has existed from 25 million BC until today. There has been much controversy over declaring the Reef dead, but in all reality it’s just dying it’s not actually dead… yet. With all of the plastics and trash being thrown into the ocean, on top of all those oil spills and the rise in temperature of the Earth, will take extensive resources to fight for the life of the reef- but it is not impossible. However, with Trump’s execution of the Environmental Protection Agency, it may be.

From the beginning of Trump’s presidential campaign until now, he has been an advocate of dismantling the EPA, stating “they do a disgrace…” because attempting to save the environment is a disgrace right? Anywho, although it is unlikely for him to abolish the EPA completely, a lack of funds he wouldn’t provide for them could cause their end just as easily. President Barack Obama has been an advocate for many issues, from gay rights to black rights to saving the earth, he may as well just be known as a social issue God. He has been very efficient on helping pass laws to better the Earth and is attempting to pass a vehicle greenhouse gas rule before his term in office ends. Personally I think this just goes to show the priorities of our two presidents… One is trying to save the economy while one is trying to save the economy AND the earth. Earlier this year Obama and the Supreme Court administered the Clean Power Plan to help reduce carbon pollution from power plants. Trump refusing to fund the EPA just reverses everything Obama has strived for since he got into office and it is also a big step back in evolution.

The earth has existed for 4.5 billion years, and us humans have maybe existed on this planet for a mere 200,000 years. Somehow from the Industrial Age (about the 1800s) to now, we have been able to raise the earth's temperature, destroy the Great Barrier Reef and let the polar bears go nearly extinct. In the sense of human evolution, we will not have enough time to evolve to fit earth’s changing climate at the rate we have begun to change it. Plants and animals thrived for thousands of years before the first trace of a human was ever discovered, and without the emittance of greenhouse gases it still took them years to adapt to their given circumstances. Humans are not enabled to live in gaseous or aquatic climates. At the rate China keeps emitting gases into the air, their main cities will be declared unbreathable. With the rising sea levels, land mass will shrink and mass overpopulation can occur due to lack of land.

Not to say all of this destruction could occur because of Trump, and all my scenarios are just theories, but we as humble peasants to the earth have to pay our respects and that means taking care of her and attempt to save her in every way we can. The earth isn’t just home to humans, but plants and animals and fish and all future offspring- unless we reject protecting it.

-Chase Reynolds

References

"Donald Trump on Environment." Donald Trump on Environment. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 Dec. 2016.

**

6

To understand the results of the recent election, we must start at the very beginning of the story. About 200 kya the anatomically modern humans appeared due to mutations, genetic drift, and natural selection. From these humans, and through hundreds of thousands of years of genetic changes, you, me, and coincidently Donald Trump came into the picture. While all of this is happening, the society we live in today developed as well. For the purpose of this story we will focus on the political system we have today. Fast forward about two hundred years of history; wars, presidents, taxes, and laws, and here we are. It is now 2016 and the United States of America has elected Donald Trump to represent and lead our country of about 300 million people diverse in their cultures, education, and political views.

Eight years ago the American people elected our first African American president Barack Obama. After 8 years of serving and protecting our country, our progression has seemingly stopped. In the aftermath of the primary election, he stated at Rutgers University’s 250th commencement, “Progress doesn’t travel in a straight line.”... “It remains uneven and at times, for every two steps forward, it feels like we take one step back.” This election is our step back.

America chose a man who wants to send people back to countries where there are wars and violence based on their religion. Someone who shows little understanding of science and diplomacy. Someone who talks over women to assert his dominance and childishly argue when things don’t go his way. This is the man this country chose to lead our country, so now we must deal with it.

In the aftermath, we must make an effort to begin our two steps forward. To do this, we should think evolutionarily. As we have seen in our study of human evolution things can only go forward. Time is in constant motion and thankfully, we are in constant change. In our time here on earth there will be glitches or mutations-- some good and some bad both that can change the course of history. To many people this election is a bad mutation but we can find solace in the fact that we as a society can continue to select for change and a return to acceptance and respect of all peoples, places, and things. Through this, good change will come. We may have to fight for it but if we work hard and are dedicated, change will come.

- Kate Fish

**

7

Can evolutionary thinking help us?

Evolutionary thinking is being aware that we live in an ever changing world, understanding what came before us, and how we are interconnected with all other living things on this planet. When studying evolution, you unravel the history of yourself.

Learning about evolution is an eye opening, and at the same time, humbling experience. You learn your similarities with other mammals, and your unlikely historical connection with fish. An aspect of respect is gained when you learn that you have a connection to the fish in the sea and the primates of the jungle. You are a collaborative consequence of little parts of past species tweaked and tinkered with until Homo sapiens “popped up”. Though you are made up of little parts from other species just changed a bit, we are truly a unique species. We’re actually total aliens compared to the rest of the species on this planet. None of them have conquered and dispersed over the entire earth as intensively as we have. We have created an entire virtual reality of how to live and what we do. Humans are the weirdest things the earth has ever seen. We build shiny buildings and go to big boxes filled with stuff to get our food. We get so wrapped up in these lives we’ve created that we forget what is actually important: our close relationships with those we love, what we put in our bodies, being healthful and happy, having a sense of purpose, sustaining this planet. Thankfully, thinking evolutionarily can help us.

One thing is very clear in evolution: everything is a process. Change takes time. This kind of thinking can help humans out.

Many of have this sort of anxiety that plagues us, myself included, “I’m not doing enough” “I’m not doing it fast enough” whatever “it” may be. “It” could be getting your dream job, finding your soul mate, your sense of purpose, doing your homework, or making friends. I feel it all the time, part of it being we’re too hard on ourselves. The push to be better is fantastic but the negative doubt, not so much. In evolution, change happens over generations and generations, sometimes a species splits off, and tries something adapted from another. Evolution is experimental, it’s seeing what works. That is a good way of thinking about your life, you have to experiment, try things out, take risks. Creatures that do not adapt, die. Trusting that everything will happen in time is reassuring, it will make us more patient and peaceful. Now this isn’t to say to just sit around on your behind all day expect to magically start earning a million dollars a year. It takes work, risk taking, trying new things, adapting the old, putting effort in, and patience. Be diligent, work for it, but be forgiving, it’s a process not perfection.

You are a mish mosh of adaptations from fishes fins to reptile's jaws. Knowing you weren’t birthed from gods is humbling. You are just another species that sprouted out of this earth. You have occupied a sliver of time on this floating rock, and we’re not doing a very good job sustaining it (but that is for another rant). The point is that learning about how you’re just the result of evolution, just like everything living thing on this earth, is humbling. It’s the feeling when you look out into the ocean or up into the stars and realize how small you actually are. You are a grain of sand in the desert, but a grain of sand that is like no other. No living thing will ever be exactly like you, your exact DNA and genome has never existed and will never exist again. This kind of thinking inspires the kind of thinking people have when they find out they’re gonna die soon, that why not?

Why not go sky diving? Why not risk opening a business? You only live once anyways, why not try? It’s better to have tried and failed than never have experienced it at all. Why be average when you can be the one to make a difference? More people thinking like this is better for the common good in that they’re living fully, they’re trying, they’re growing. This makes happy people, and happy people want more happy people. It all starts a reaction, like a ripple effect. Truly happy people have no hate in their heart, they aren’t racist, they say “heck yea gays can marry each other, who am I to say they can’t? Who am I to prevent others’ happiness? Why would I want to do that?!” This leads to a group of progressive people, people who believe in equality, they believe people have the right to be happy. They believe that before we should worry about being millionaires, we should first make sure everyone has clean water to drink, food to eat for every meal, and a safe place to rest their heads at night. These are very basic needs that we should have but so so many people lack.

Recently, here in the United States we had an election to vote on who would become our president this January after Obama’s second term. Obama was the first Black man to be elected in the United States.

This was a step in the right direction, with there being a push to a more equal viewing of people of color. Many people deny there is a race problem in the United States, though we have gained great leaps in rights of people of color in the United States, many people still perceive people of color as less than them. They think they’re less educated, lazy, dangerous criminals, etc. Claims that have virtually no evidence. In fact there is more evidence of just the opposite of these claims. Even so this racist bias is a common perception among many people in the United States. However, we thought we were moving away from this archaic thinking with no basis when we elected a black man as president in 2008. However, this recent election proved just the opposite.

A man named Donald Trump, a TV star, millionaire, failed business owner, ran a campaign that horrified the nation. Throughout his campaign he repeatedly declared racist, sexist comments/opinions, stated things as horrid as “grab her[women in general] by the pussy”. He was accused of sexual assault by over ten women. One of his main policies was to build a wall between the United the States and Mexico. He called all Muslims terrorists. And said that climate change was a hoax created by the Chinese to slow down American production. And he won. On November 9, 2016 the morning after the election, I awoke to find out this ignorant, arrogant, crazy, narcissistical, evil man had been elected by the American people to be our leader. I was heart broken. I sobbed. I was distraught the entire day. Not only was I disgusted by this man, but I had lost hope in the American people. How could so many people stand by him? Support him when his beliefs were the most unprogressive thing since before the Civil Rights movement? Millions of people believed in his words, millions shared the racist beliefs that he shouted on the TV screens. This was an exposure of the hatred in the hearts of the Americans. I sat in reflection, and after some time, and a plethora of optimistic words from my peers, I regained my faith, not in Americans, but in humanity.

Evolution opens eyes to understand life more fully. There are in-betweens, not just one or the other. It demonstrates that every living thing is a strike of luck that it exists. There are so many things that could go wrong, from conception to birth to growing into an adult, yet there they are, breathing and living life like it’s no big deal. But it is a big deal, in fact it should be considered a miracle. A single mutation could have left you without an arm. If the tiny bundle of cells that would become you attached to your mother's fallopian tubes instead of her uterus you and likely her wouldn’t be alive. Life is a miracle, no matter what color your skin or where you’re from in the world. All life should be respected because it exists, same goes for how you should be respected. This kind thinking seems utopian but it really isn’t. If people thought this way, gave respect to others, and didn’t blame others for their problems, we would live in a much better world. I’m not saying understanding evolution is the answer, but it might just be the key that opens minds.

- Alexa Bracken

**

8

Evolutionary thinking has caused us as humans to move forward throughout time and space. To keep doing better every day and to make the most out of our existence, we must continue to learn and grow as individuals and human beings. Every single life is precious. It is amazing to be alive on planet Earth because the likelihood that your particular DNA makeup got paired together to create you is astounding and you should celebrate your existence each day.

            Yet the world is a vast place, filled with so many people that can make you feel inferior. There are so many people out there, and many are suffering and worse off than you. How can your life matter compared to theirs? Well it does. Everyone’s lives matter. How can you make the most of your time on Earth? Make somebody else’s day better. Instead of trying to tear someone else down, build them up. If someone is already down, reach out your hand and help them up. We’re here for such a short period of time; we need to do the most we can while we can. Make an impact on someone else’s life. No matter how small that might be; little actions go a long way. Just a simple smile and a friendly face can make someone’s day.

            After the election of Donald Trump as president, most of America is crying out for help. Not only did America elect Trump into office, America elected misogyny. Racism. Sexism. Homophobia. Hate. America elected hate. After everything we have fought for as a country: freedom, basic rights, legalizing gay marriage in every state, etc. Now it feels like we are going back in time, going against our evolutionary thinking. We are not growing with this backward thinking. What happened to America, land of the free, home of the brave?

            We deserve to have our freedom back, and our freedom includes a sense of safety living in our own country. Many citizens do not feel safe with Trump as our president. If our own president can say and do such terrible things, then citizens will feel like it is okay for them to say and do these things as well. What can we do? We can stick together. Push forward together as one. The election has left our nation divided, our titles, skin, and appearance speaking for us, rather than our hearts and our minds. Forget skin color, gender, religion, sexual orientation, and race; because we are all one race: the human race. Yes, we have our differences, but we are all the same on the inside. Didn’t elementary school teach is that it’s what’s on the inside that matters? So let’s revert back and remember that we are all just human beings trying to make the most out of our existence and live our lives.

            So let’s live our lives together. In peace and harmony. Think about the future and how we can better our country and ourselves for our children and our children’s children. Because when it is all said and done, we will all end up back in the Earth's soil, together. So let's be united above ground first.

- Sunny Davis

**

9

The Election of Trump and Evolution

How can the election of Donald Trump be explained using evolutionary thinking? I had so many emotions and so many thoughts about this election and about this assignment that it took a while for them to settle enough to write something cohesive that tied in evolution.  I gained some inspiration from Trump himself and from an interview with Jon Stewart.

In a passage from one of Trump’s books (which Trump probably had more than a little help writing), he essentially puts himself up on a pedestal as the pinnacle of evolution. Apparently obnoxious men like himself (especially himself) are the crowning glory of humanity. Error number one, evolution doesn’t seem to have a goal in mind. He also says that women always go for strong men who can provide for them and that they always have and always will. In addition he asserted that primitive men didn’t care about what others thought of them. This passage is just another example of his narcissism, sexism, and general cluelessness. Do some women go for men who can provide for them, often unconsciously? Yes. Do they always? No. Sometimes women chose a kind man over a strong provider, sometimes they get both, and sometimes they remain single because a woman can stand on her on two feet. Love is more elusive than evolution. Women are just as encephalized as men and are capable of making choices, not just being blindly led by primitive instincts. He implies that there has been no change over time, which is the opposite of what evolution is.

So how did we get here? How did we elect such an ignorant buffoon? According to Jon Stewart we are not a fundamentally different country than we were before the election. He also said that the United States is unique in that we are a multi-ethnic democracy. Stewart claims we are battling thousands of years of tribal history and behavior and that what we are doing is not easy. Essentially the United States of America is a huge social experiment.

I would argue that while our physical evolution may have very little to do with our current political situation our social and cultural evolution does.We have certainly come a long way from living in small tribal groups and sheltering in caves.  Humanity through the ages has not only created government but we have invented numerous forms of government. Democracy is relatively young. We are still struggling with key issues like how to truly give everyone a voice. Ours is such a populous country that it is easy to feel unheard. Many people don’t vote because they erroneously don’t think their vote will have an impact. In this election many people were disgusted by both major candidates and so in protest they either didn’t vote or voted for a third party candidate. Numerous Americans are feeling insecure for a multitude of reasons. They wanted to try something different.

Our nation has evolved since its birth in the 1700s. How do we protect and remain true to the monumental and sacred document that is our constitution while being realistic about modern issues? We are much more connected globally than we were then. Many nations are very interested in American politics. This is probably in part because we are a wealthy powerful nation but perhaps it is also because of the grand social experiment that we are conducting. The person sitting in the oval office has a lot of influence on our reputation in the world. I hope that we can stay fundamentally loyal to the core values of liberty and justice for all that our nation was founded upon through a Trump administration and prove to our neighbors that a diverse people can live united.

I pray that this is just a growing pain and that we will learn from this choice. I am encouraged that Trump did not win the popular vote despite the fact that he did succeed with the Electoral College because this means that there are still many Americans who oppose bigotry and divisiveness. There are many who have moved past this idea that we must compete for survival. Not even everyone who voted for Trump is hateful and ignorant just because they voted for someone who is.

I hope that we as a dynamic evolving people realize that it does not have to be us vs. them and that this beautiful melting pot democracy we have created can work and thrive and grow. We can stand strong together.

- Katherine Serra

Interview:  http://www.vice.com/read/jon-stewart-trump-charlie-rose-america-vgtrn.

**

10

Serenity Over Exceptionalism

On election night I fell asleep watching a digital map of America slowly change from pale red states to the color of blood. When I woke up, the sky was neutral gray and I headed to class. This year is my second go around at higher education. My first attempt involved me being young and naive and doing what I thought was required to become a successful member of society. Not only was I wrong, I failed miserably. Partly because making mistakes is an integral part of growth. Partly because I was in the midst of an opioid addiction that nearly killed me. However, I did not die.

Now, I am back with direction and purpose—to become a published writer. Also, I have ten years clean. The first published book I write will hopefully offer a form of inspiration to any addicts out there in the trenches. That is my own evolution in the poetic sense of the word. My slow change over time. I know how to fight—both literally and figuratively—against something that controls me. I know how to identify a problem from within and overcome it for the better. The solution, however, doesn’t necessarily arise right away. Moments of clarity are seldom amidst the chaos of it all. Just for today, I know that I will not go back to my old ways and every day I become a better version of myself. Every tomorrow is a gray sky being broken open by sunlight that shines down on the world because that is all it knows how to do. 

Everyone is always dismantling utopian ideas as idealist garbage or unrealistic. I do know this, had I settled for a lesser evil in terms of my addiction, I would be dead. It would not work. I know that I went from a life of chaos, to finding the closest thing to serenity that could possibly exist in my life—peace within myself.

My country is one that settles for evil in both the lesser and simpler definition. Settling for lesser evil is on par with replacing one addiction with another. Here is a pill to get off a pill. This lesser evil ideology is a byproduct of fascism—regardless of the binary opposition we are forced to accept and choose within the two-party political system here in the United States where the popular vote is meaningless.

Democracy is homonym. Some say it is dying. Some say it is dead. Some say it never even existed. When we pull back and look at our country as a whole—we are seemingly one fascistic unit. When we detach ourselves from political affiliation we have to ability to see both Hillary and Trump as victims. Regardless of how skewed and negative their ideologies or motives both might be. They are products of the system. And we allow that to happen because we too are products of this system. Two parties feeding off one another perpetually in the name of the holy American Empire under corporate control. The divisiveness between our parties—or any parties—is war within itself. We are hesitant to admit we have a problem that cannot be solved by two-party politics. We are addicted to capitalism, misogyny, racism, drugs, fossil fuels, fear, hate, violence, war—to name a few. More over, we are addicted to binary opposition and all of the aforementioned stem from the nonchalant acceptance of always having an enemy. Binary oppositions appear in everywhere. Democrat/Republican, female/male, black/white, gay/straight, war/peace. That dash is a divide driving our insanity. Labeling who we are and are not, pitting us against each other in terms of race, gender, sexual preference, religion, political affiliation, and countless other divisions. We are a nation constantly at war even during peacetime.

On this spring-like December day, while I watch an ice cream truck circling the block, I think how can this change. For these things to change, we must rely on our individualities as a collective. In her 1941 essay, “Thoughts On Peace In An Air Raid,” Virginia Woolf proposed a new idea of peace. She wrote, “We must think peace into existence.” The thought itself is beautiful in its simplicity. We must think peace into existence. Say that out loud, slowly. We must make peace a part of our genes. A trait that is passed down to our next generations through inheritance. Thinking peace into existence means it is something that does not exist at this current moment in time. So no, it is not Hillary Clinton. So no, it certainly is not Donald Trump. Reform is not revolution. Reform is not evolution either. Reform is like writing “small change over time” on a chalkboard a thousand times only to erase it at the end of every day. Reform is the old way that does not work. It is an attribute to neofascism. We cannot start to nail wood onto a house that is in the process of burning to the ground and expect to get somewhere. Fire will do what it knows how to do—burn. We know what does not work in America. From the subtle transitions of power in Presidencies, the Supreme Court, the House, wherever—we are bound to microfascistic ways. Continuations of what the other did wrong. One problem leading to another. An endless cycle called addiction.

Constitutionally incapable is a term used in Alcoholics Anonymous. It refers to individuals that cannot recover from addiction. They are essentially morally and physically “bankrupt” to the point where treatment is worthless. As depressing as it is to say, they lack the self-awareness to actually change. I do think we are at that threshold as a country. My country, your country, our country—more over, our planet. However, I do not see us as a constitutionally incapable individual. We are a nation—a collective of individuality and singularity. A brain connected through the internet that can rewire itself to think peacefully. All genders, races, ages, sexual preferences, religions. If we are truly the greatest country in world—as so many of us claim—then why not set an example for the rest of it. Not in a sense that we are any more civilized than another, but simply in the sense that we recognize a problem and do something about it. A more elegant way of putting it would be to embrace serenity over exceptionalism.

One that acknowledges and disbands the systematic oppression of races within our country, one that helps pull women up to where they always should have been, one that helps build a world rather than an empire, one that feeds and clothes the impoverished instead of stockpiling weapons, one that must be brutally aware of how finite our time on this planet is and how are resources are not infinite, one that does not see any of the aforementioned as means of monetary gain. I understand that the world is imperfect which means the voting process will also be imperfect. Some go as far as to say voting a lesser evil is practical—however which way we spin it. I view that statement as one who refuses to admit they have a problem even if they are well aware. The telltale sign of addiction.

What will it take for peace to truly exist in this world? To break the violent cycle we have created for ourselves? In terms of evolutionary thinking, we are so unique. It took so much for me to get to where I am to type this very sentence, and equally, for you to read it. The odds for each of our singular existences are 1 in 10 followed by 2,685,000 zeros. Yet we dismiss that. Evolution helps us to understand where we came from. And also, gives us some insight to see where we are going.  

Evolution—in the biological sense—explains that all life on Earth shares a common ancestor. That means every man, woman, and child on this planet is related. And not in the poetic sense of the word. Through small change over time we have developed into bipedal (walking upright) products of encephalization (having big brains). Our brain size has given us the opportunity to evolve socially into the civilizations we see today. Underneath our own layers of individuality, we all have the same gray brains, white bones, and red blood. Inwardly, we are all the same. Though the world is obviously not equal. Somehow we have become a world that accepts binary opposition as normal. That proposes one side will always be more exceptional than the other. A violent act within itself. The course we are on is one bound towards inevitable destruction. In the kind words of John Lennon, “Violence begets violence.” 

Our greater social skills have landed us in the position we are in today. Perhaps they can be viewed as a double-edged sword. What I propose is this, first, admitting we have a problem. Getting to that point will prove trying enough. Our country is very settled in its ways. Making that first plunge into recovery is never easy. From there—our slow change over time—our evolution will materialize. One day at a time, one person at a time. The ability to realize the old ways are not working will inevitably come to fruition through the continued degradation of whatever it is we call our country. And as our country slowly starts to turn, we can use our greater social skills for greatness to teach our offspring the right way to live. 

Are we not inherently good from birth? Are we not inherently altruistic? We are taught binary opposition from the social structures that bind and divide us. Once we make peace with ourselves, we can move on to making peace with the world. Again, in the eloquent words of Woolf, “We must think peace into existence.” I am not saying that it is that easy, but at the same time, I am. A choice between a life of chaos or serenity. One final act of binary opposition. I do not have exact solutions or some scientific plan to dissolve the state, disarm the world, and battle climate change. Though all are achievable from the deconstruction of binary opposition.

When I got clean, I did not think about how I would slowly piece my life together in the coming years. It just happened. I knew that my life had become unmanageable and I reached a point where I had enough clarity to walkaway. It took me a long time to realize that I was not only harming myself, but everyone around me. Several failed attempts and a complete loss of hope included. I was caught in the lesser evil ideology waiting to die. Practicality does not exist in that place. Nor does it exist here. No matter what we tell ourselves to sleep at night.

We are bound to microfascist ways. Meaning, at this current point in time, we desire the very things that control and oppress us. Neoliberlism turning to neofascism. We divide our country with these binary oppositions which are acts of war. Opposing sides will always think they are the more civilized and dominant than the other side. In turn, causing us to see everything as two sides, perpetuating competition instead of cooperation. Instead of agreeing to disagree and continuing this endless cycle, we must think through our differences. We must think peace into existence. We must embrace serenity over exceptionalism. From there, thought can compensate the loss of weaponry to build the world and beyond, defining our evolution past our bipedal footsteps on this planet. Otherwise, we will always be at war, not only with ourselves, but with the world in which we live—micro to macro.

Within this Trump presidency I do not see all gray skies. I do see rock bottom, and from there, a moment of clarity. A burnt down house, and from the smoldering foundation, a new blueprint. Peace going from an undefinable word to being filled with definitions. I am looking up at the sky right now, and it is in fact gray, though the sun is still shining through the clouds even if we cannot see it because that is all it knows how to do. And in terms of nature, we will evolve because that is all we know how to do.

- Sean Hayes