Thank you for the reading! I didn’t know that your genes could be affected by your environment. I haven’t had a chance to read the article yet, but do you know if this would lend any credence to the nature vs nurture argument when it comes to personality, and whether socio-psychological factors in the environment can affect gene expression?
It isn’t really nature vs nurture, it’s nature interacting with nurture. Steve Jones, the biologist explained it beautifully with reference to Siamese cats:
Siamese cats are light brown with dark brown fur at the tips of their ears, feet and tail. But if you raise one in a very warm environment, they will be light brown all over. A very cold environment, they will be dark brown all over. There’s a gene switching the fur colour but its action depends on the temperature.
There are many different ways genes and environment interact, there’s no real ‘argument’ here. It is simply true and, because genes and environment are often so closely linked, it’s often complicated and sometimes impossible to tease out what’s causing what.
There exists such a thing as gene-environment Interaction. The older twins get, generally the more different they are becoming.
This article is behind a paywall, but provides some more information.
Edit, here is a better link.
Thank you for the reading! I didn’t know that your genes could be affected by your environment. I haven’t had a chance to read the article yet, but do you know if this would lend any credence to the nature vs nurture argument when it comes to personality, and whether socio-psychological factors in the environment can affect gene expression?
It isn’t really nature vs nurture, it’s nature interacting with nurture. Steve Jones, the biologist explained it beautifully with reference to Siamese cats:
Siamese cats are light brown with dark brown fur at the tips of their ears, feet and tail. But if you raise one in a very warm environment, they will be light brown all over. A very cold environment, they will be dark brown all over. There’s a gene switching the fur colour but its action depends on the temperature.
There are many different ways genes and environment interact, there’s no real ‘argument’ here. It is simply true and, because genes and environment are often so closely linked, it’s often complicated and sometimes impossible to tease out what’s causing what.
This is the field of epigenetics. We all have a lot of genes, but the environment and past family trauma can determine which genes are on or off.