so and so begat so and so
1 million years ago? There is not near enough begats in genesis to cover that long. Oh wait nm this is story was placed by Satan to test the faith of chosen.
Intelligence a genetic mistake
It’s not quite the “key to intelligence”, but a study published in the journal Cell at least offers a hint to how human brains changed post-hominid: a miscopied gene that seems to let the brain form more connections, faster. The paper finds that a gene dubbed SRGAP2 has, during cell divisions, been incompletely copied three …
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Tuesday 8th May 2012 10:42 GMT David Pollard
Re: so and so begat so and so
"What I want to know is how inorganic matter transubstantiates into living stuff. "
With such an ambitious goal you will need to study hard. Given that this year is his centenary, you might want to start with Alan Turing's 1951 paper, 'The Chemical Basis of Morphogenesis'.
http://www.dna.caltech.edu/courses/cs191/paperscs191/turing.pdf
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Tuesday 8th May 2012 07:34 GMT Mike Flex
Re: Didn't take long did it?
> Within 3 posts we get remarks on religion...
The first 3 posts (presumably all by the same person given the repetition of "Oh wait, nm") are all critical of religion yet there are no religious comments criticising the article.
Makes you wonder who is holding fixed views that ignore the available evidence.
Our anonymous coward could also do with brushing up their knowledge of Christianity if they want to criticise it in public. The subset of Christianity that holds to creationism tends not to overlap with the subset that holds to transubstantiation.
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Tuesday 8th May 2012 08:02 GMT JulianB
Re: Didn't take long did it?
Presumably asdf had a knee-jerk reaction to the fact that the article appeared in the Christian Science Monitor and felt no need to read further. It's probably worth pointing out that "Christian Science", in this sense, is well outside anything that could be considered mainstream Christianity.
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Tuesday 8th May 2012 08:19 GMT Graham Dawson
Re: Didn't take long did it?
El reg commentards seem to be losing their edge recently. I remember the days when anti-christian or anti-religion comments were actually witty and entertaining. Back then you could joust and debate and everyone went away feeling just dandy, maybe having even learned something in the process. Now all we get is plain old dehumanising hate which, as any fule kno, does nothing to advance a point of view.
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Tuesday 8th May 2012 17:23 GMT Mike Flex
Re: Didn't take long did it?
' ""Christian Science" ... is well outside anything that could be considered mainstream Christianity"
and, indeed, mainstream science.'
Both true, but the Christian Science Monitor is noted for not reflecting the views of its founder in its editorial coverage. (There is a daily article reflecting a Christian Science perspective.)
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Tuesday 8th May 2012 21:53 GMT Dave 126
@ Johnny Canuck
That is a very good question. However, in this case they didn't directly study 2.4 million y.o DNA but rather inferred the dates by studying our modern DNA.
Jake's answer is correct, ancient DNA has been extracted from teeth, but this isn't the case regarding this particular story.
Teeth are interesting in more recent archaeology as well, allowing scientists to determine if an individual was raised in one part of Europe before migrating to another part - if they were, say, married off to a distant King for political reasons - by means of examining their isotopic oxygen ratios (which doesn't change after they are formed)
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Tuesday 8th May 2012 13:30 GMT bonkers
Re: Interesting, but ...
common knowledge..?
Gene modifications can be dated by the number of errors they have accumulated since they arrived. Random errors are introduced at a constant rate, about 30ppb (parts per billion) per generation, and due to the redundancy in gene coding (64 states, 23 amino acids, one start 2 stop sequences iirc) most of these are harmless.
With a population of "tattered" copies (you and me) , you can deduce the original, and the average number of errors. Simple.
http://www.wellcome.ac.uk/News/2009/News/WTX056376.htm
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Tuesday 8th May 2012 17:52 GMT Anonymous Coward
@bonkers (Re: Interesting, but ...)
I doubt that it is common knowledge amongst the general population, but I can see how they can calculate the times from the evidence to hand. Re-reading the linked articles it seems plausible that that is how they did it. So, thanks for that.
My gripe, though, is that we have to deduce their method unless we're willing to pay up to read the full story. I'm not a cheapskate, but I'd go broke pretty quickly if I paid to view all the interesting stuff that is coming out.
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Tuesday 8th May 2012 19:08 GMT Mike Flex
Re: @bonkers (Interesting, but ...)
You can google for molecular clock for more information on this technique. The full paper uses it but doesn't explain it (it's not a tutorial paper - it's definitely written for an academic audience).
There's a bit more information in the University of Washington press release.
(If you see an article in the general media about some academic paper it may well have come from a press release published by one of the academic institutions involved, rather than directly from an academic journal.)
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Tuesday 8th May 2012 21:56 GMT Dave 126
Re: @bonkers (Interesting, but ...)
> I'm not a cheapskate, but I'd go broke pretty quickly if I paid to view all the interesting stuff that is coming out.
This is a concern even amongst scientists in any given field. There are so many journals that few institutions can afford to subscribe to all that are relevant to their specific discipline. There is some call for reform in the system.
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Tuesday 8th May 2012 08:15 GMT Graham Dawson
Re: Mutation
It's not the miscopying, it's the duplication. The genes in question were duplicated to other, unused parts of the genome where error correction doesn't prevent mutations from happening. Then later they were moved to a spot where they started to express again. Without that mechanism, mutations on genes get corrected out.
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Tuesday 8th May 2012 10:06 GMT Blofeld's Cat
Re: @Blofeld's Cat
"Is it laziness or a lack of self-confidence that makes a cat design a mouse trap?"
I suppose it's just a habit I picked up from my feeder while I was padding round this hollowed-out volcano and avoiding the hot-spots. I have no doubt that I could despatch a single mouse without difficulty, but threatening the entire musine population simultaneously takes a bit of work.
Larry Wall has the right idea about laziness.
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Tuesday 8th May 2012 07:42 GMT Mike Banahan
Algernon
@Graham Marsden - thank you for reminding me of one of the most moving short stories I've ever read.
For those to whom the reference is a bit obscure, look up the Hugo Award winning short story 'Flowers for Algernon', or at least read the Wikipedia entry if you are too lazy to read the story.
There's even an eery resonance with the subject of The Register's item.
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Tuesday 8th May 2012 09:13 GMT Anonymous Coward
In other words, while the research hasn’t demonstrated that the duplicated gene leads to smarter mice (or, necessarily, to smarter humans)
yet something tells me that the mice will make a more reasonable support calls.
P.S. The universe says that it except the challenge of making humans appear dumber
This topic is closed for new posts.
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