Assumptions prove ignorance

By: James V. Kohl | Published on: December 31, 2015

Testing Einstein’s Equivalence Principle With Fast Radio Bursts
Excerpt:

Assuming as a lower limit that the time delays are caused mainly by the gravitational potential of the Milky Way, we prove that fast radio bursts (FRBs) of cosmological origin can be used to constrain the EEP with high accuracy.

My comment: Theoretical physicists are allowed to start with assumptions and link them to theories via what they consider to be proof of their assumptions. Unfortunately, the proof of their assumptions cannot be linked from atoms to ecosystems in the context of what is known about biologically-based cause and effect. Extending findings, which were based on assumptions about how the biophysically constrained energy-dependent changes that link hydrogen-atom transfer in DNA base pairs to RNA-mediated cell type differentiation in all cell types of of individuals of all living genera, links one mystery to another.
See:  Mysterious radio signals from space discovered to be a much better test of Einstein’s General Relativity theory
Excerpt: 

Fast Radio Bursts are super-brief blasts of energy—lasting just a few milliseconds. Until now, only about a dozen Fast Radio Bursts have been detected on Earth. They appear to be caused by mysterious events beyond our Milky Way Galaxy, and possibly even beyond the Local Group of galaxies that includes the Milky Way.

My comment: On Earth, experimental evidence of biologically-based cause and effect links the de novo creation of olfactory receptor genes from atoms to ecosystems via epigenetically-effect differences in c-fos expression.  Mysterious events beyond the galaxies seem less relevant because no one is going to link them to what is known about top-down causation in the context of healthy longevity or pathology.
See instead:  Stimulus-specific combinatorial functionality of neuronal c-fos enhancers
Excerpt:

The c-fos gene (also known as Fos) is induced by a broad range of stimuli and is a reliable marker for neural activity. Its induction mechanism and available reporter mouse lines are based exclusively on c-fos promoter activity. Here we demonstrate that multiple enhancers surrounding the c-fos gene are crucial for ensuring robust c-fos response to various stimuli.

See also: DNA methylation changes in plasticity genes accompany the formation and maintenance of memory
Excerpt:  

…our data provide evidence for a molecular framework of memory acquisition and maintenance, wherein DNA methylation could alter the expression and splicing of genes involved in functional plasticity and synaptic wiring.

My comment: When the corresponding author refused to send me a pdf reprint of this article, he provided an example of how publishers and some researcher refuse to share information that results from government-funded research. Most of the funding comes, albeit indirectly, from the proponents with key positions in the evolution industry or in the big bang cosmology industry. Most of them have dedicated themselves to preventing any paradigm shift that might be enabled by collaboration or the multidisciplinary approach that is required to link atoms to ecosystems on Earth. Their careers have been funded via incentives to tout assumptions and then attempt to prove them with experimental evidence, which is typically divorced from anything that might link it to biologically-based cause and effect. If a paradigm shift can be stalled, their careers in different disciplines are ensured.
For example, see: The Paradigm Shifters: Overthrowing the ‘Hegemony of the Culture of Darwin’
Description:

Major scientists from a dozen countries present evidence that a paradigm shift is underway or has already taken place, replacing neo-Darwinism (the standard model of evolution based on natural selection following the accumulation of random genetic mutations) with a vastly richer evolutionary synthesis than previously thought possible.

My comment: Each of the interviews attests to the role that different experts have played in preventing the paradigm shift that science fiction author Greg Bear placed into the context of two novels that were reviewed in Nature:
Evolution rising from the grave
Excerpt:

The pioneering thinkers of yesterday are the devoted traditionalists of today. New ideas enter science grudgingly. New paradigms are resisted with a vengeance.

Living with the Neanderthals
Excerpt:

 Today’s wild speculations might not make it into tomorrow’s textbooks, but Bear’s ability to tell a good story is surpassed only by his enthusiasm for the advancing edge of molecular biology.

See also: The Darwin Code: Intelligent Design without God
Excerpt: 

The great determiner of variation, we have been instructed–though not by Darwin–was random change, sealed by success and multiplication of the individual and its genes. But the closer we look at DNA, RNA, genes, and non-gene mechanisms, the less we find random change in a dominant role.
In our ignorance, we once assigned vast lengths of the code to a junkyard of selfish and useless repetition, too often assuming that what we could not immediately read or decipher was not worthy of study.

My comment: Each of the experts that Suzan Mazur portrays in the context of Paradigm Shifters has failed to recognize what occurred 30 years ago, when Greg Bear first wrote about RNA-mediated cell type differentiation in “Blood Music.”
By the time of the reviews in Nature, it had become clear that Greg Bear had both started and finished the paradigm shift by linking nutrient-dependent RNA-mediated cell type differentiation to the pheromone-controlled physiology of reproduction and a new ecologically adapted human sub-species.
For example, in the early 90’s, Robert L. Moss linked pheromones to c-fos and gene expression in the hormone-secreting nerve cells of the brain that link food odors and pheromones to the physiology of reproduction via feedback loops in all vertebrates and invertebrates.
See: “Gonadotropin releasing hormone and human sexual behavior” in Neuropeptides and Psychiatric Disorders
Excerpt:

The universality of the GnRH-induced behavioral response in the nonhuman species (from lizard to monkey) and the endocrine-pituitary actions of GnRH in pituitary secretion of LH and FSH, couples with the possible relationship between human sexual behavior deficits and gonadotropin dysfunction, provided good justification to proceed with further investigation into the behavioral effects of GnRH on human sexual behavior. (p. 61)

See also: Feedback loops link odor and pheromone signaling with reproduction
Excerpt:

At least 10,000 neurons in 26 different brain areas appear to transmit signals directly to GnRH neurons.  GnRH neurons appear to transmit signals to as many as 30,000 or more neurons in 34 brain areas, consistent with previous studies showing GnRH+ fibers and GnRH receptors in multiple brain regions. These results may reflect a strategy wherein GnRH neurons can modify diverse functions in order to coordinate the internal state of the animal and its behavior with reproduction in order to optimize reproductive success.

My comment: None of the expert paradigm shifters that Suzan Mazur has interviewed have done what Robert L. Moss, Teresa Binstock, Linda Buck, and Anna Di Cosmo have done. Taken together, they have linked olfaction and pheromones from atoms to ecosystems in species from microbes to humans via the conserved molecular mechanisms of RNA-mediated cell type differentiation. The conserved molecular mechanisms have now been linked from nutrient-dependent microRNAs and adhesion proteins to supercoiled DNA that protects organized genomes from virus-driven entropy.
When someone claims that others are paradigm shifters without mention of those who have come from inside and from outside academia and actually caused the shift, they are part of the problem. I expected that after Suzan Mazur learned that the role of viruses had been ignored by evolutionary theorists, that she would exclude their works from consideration. Instead, she has included Eugene Koonin in her book about The Paradigm Shifters. Perhaps I’ll read her book to find out if she is joking.
Perhaps not! At the next annual meeting of AAAS, Bruce McEwen and others will link stress-perturbed behaviors to life history transitions by as little as one nutrient energy-dependent base pair substitution, which links honeybee model organism of nutrient-dependent pheromone-controlled RNA-mediated cell type differentiation to humans.
See for examples: Nutrient-dependent/pheromone-controlled adaptive evolution: a model
Excerpt:

The honeybee already serves as a model organism for studying human immunity, disease resistance, allergic reaction, circadian rhythms, antibiotic resistance, the development of the brain and behavior, mental health, longevity, diseases of the X chromosome, learning and memory, as well as conditioned responses to sensory stimuli (Kohl, 2012).

My comment: It will be interesting to see how much longer it takes evolutionary theorists who think they are experts to shift their thoughts about ridiculous theories to thoughts about biologically-based fact.
 


Subscribe
Notify of
guest
0 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments

Want more on the same topic?

Swipe/Drag Left and Right To Browse Related Posts: