On 7/1/07, Doyle Saylor <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Greetings Economists, In an interesting development a study on the large scale by the United States National Human Genome Research Institute has challenged the current gene theory of one gene one function. I.e. the gay gene, the gene for diabetes, the patented wheat genes, et al. appear to be scientifically wrong. A complex network theory, interact, and overlap in ways not fully understood. See: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/01/business/yourmoney/01frame.html? ref=science
This article is far too simplistic and even inaccurate. The network theory of the gene has long been known (at least since the 1960's) from the famous work of Monod & Jacob. Similarly the Central Dogma has been repeatedly challenged over the years, including directly contradictory discoveries of reverse-transcriptase and epigenetic inheritance phenomena. But the Central Dogma has merely been refined, not discarded completely. These ideas have endured for at least 2 excellent reasons 1) They are still partially accurate. Just because many genes are part of networks does not mean all of them are. There are many important examples of single genes - which we can think of as a trivial kind of network. Perhaps the best known examples are the sickle-cell anemia gene and the insulin gene. 2) The gene concept has enormous power as a metaphor. An excellent not-too-technical presentation of this idea is in Evelyn Keller's "The Century of the Gene" where the author (who is a physicist turned feminist-historian of biology) traces the history of the gene metaphor through the 20'th century and argues for retiring the term altogether because it has outlived its usefulness. -raghu.
