DNA genes don't define 'race'
http://www.businessinsider.com/what-genetic-testing-can-tell-you-about-race-or-ancestry-2015-11?r=US&IR=T&IR=T
Excerpt: "Many scientists have criticized the idea of using genomic data to talk about ancestry.
..."You cannot look at an individual's DNA and read it like a book or a map of a journey," the group concluded.
By the same token, and perhaps more importantly, Dermitzakis dismissed the idea of using genetics to define "race."
There's a dark history of using genetics to talk about race. As Adam Rutherford (a former geneticist and now a writer) points out at The Guardian, one of the pioneers of the study of human genetics, Francis Galton, was also one of the creators of the eugenics movement. But since then, the study of genetics has exposed exactly why "race" is not a biological concept.
One Redditor asked Dermitzakis if the presence of certain genetic traits in certain parts of the world — traits that make fast-twitch muscle fibers common in a population in West Africa, or traits that made it easier for people in Nepal to adapt to high altitudes — defined "races" of people. The questioner wanted to know if there were racist implications in genetics that led to potential stereotyping of groups of people.
Dermitzakis said that trying to fit groups of people into "races" was biologically inaccurate in the first place.
"There are no races but individuals that sometimes are more related to each other than to others," he said. "If you see it that way then all data will make more sense."
The fact that certain characteristics exist in a certain area just means that those traits have been passed on frequently in that area. Because of those markers, genetic differences can be used to track the movements of populations around the globe, but there's no one genetic signal that makes anyone a different race.
As population geneticist John Novembre explained it in a later Reddit AMA: "There simply hasn’t been enough time since we spread across the globe for extensive differences to have accumulated across the genome."
(My comment: Time will not result in accumulation across the genome, time means degradation.)
Novembre says that "race to me, as I see it used in the world today and in US census categories, is something much more driven by historical legacy than biological understanding — it stems from a legacy based on judging a small number of external characteristics that hide the great amount of genetic similarity that exists under the surface."
The great irony of genetics, Rutherford writes, is that it is the very field that disproved the beliefs of some of its racially-prejudiced early practitioners. Instead of showing how different we are, we've learned that from a biological standpoint, we're 99.9% the same."
My comment: The DNA genes are no drivers or controllers. They are followers. Life is not driven by gene sequences, but genes are driven by lifestyle and geographical place of living. Skin color is not determined by gene sequences but epigenetic control of gene expression. Genetically identical monozygotic twins might have different colors of skin, eyes and hair. Traits are not determined by DNA gene sequences, instead, they will be set on places during embryonic development by non coding RNA molecules, such as lncRNAs and miRNAs. The number of functioning lncRNA molecules in human sperm exceeds the number of protein encoding genes in our DNA. The theory of evolution is the most serious heresy of our time. Don't be deceived.
By the same token, and perhaps more importantly, Dermitzakis dismissed the idea of using genetics to define "race."
There's a dark history of using genetics to talk about race. As Adam Rutherford (a former geneticist and now a writer) points out at The Guardian, one of the pioneers of the study of human genetics, Francis Galton, was also one of the creators of the eugenics movement. But since then, the study of genetics has exposed exactly why "race" is not a biological concept.
Dermitzakis said that trying to fit groups of people into "races" was biologically inaccurate in the first place.
"There are no races but individuals that sometimes are more related to each other than to others," he said. "If you see it that way then all data will make more sense."
The fact that certain characteristics exist in a certain area just means that those traits have been passed on frequently in that area. Because of those markers, genetic differences can be used to track the movements of populations around the globe, but there's no one genetic signal that makes anyone a different race.
As population geneticist John Novembre explained it in a later Reddit AMA: "There simply hasn’t been enough time since we spread across the globe for extensive differences to have accumulated across the genome."
(My comment: Time will not result in accumulation across the genome, time means degradation.)
Novembre says that "race to me, as I see it used in the world today and in US census categories, is something much more driven by historical legacy than biological understanding — it stems from a legacy based on judging a small number of external characteristics that hide the great amount of genetic similarity that exists under the surface."
The great irony of genetics, Rutherford writes, is that it is the very field that disproved the beliefs of some of its racially-prejudiced early practitioners. Instead of showing how different we are, we've learned that from a biological standpoint, we're 99.9% the same."
My comment: The DNA genes are no drivers or controllers. They are followers. Life is not driven by gene sequences, but genes are driven by lifestyle and geographical place of living. Skin color is not determined by gene sequences but epigenetic control of gene expression. Genetically identical monozygotic twins might have different colors of skin, eyes and hair. Traits are not determined by DNA gene sequences, instead, they will be set on places during embryonic development by non coding RNA molecules, such as lncRNAs and miRNAs. The number of functioning lncRNA molecules in human sperm exceeds the number of protein encoding genes in our DNA. The theory of evolution is the most serious heresy of our time. Don't be deceived.
