Naked Science Forum
Life Sciences => Physiology & Medicine => Topic started by: Titanscape on 31/08/2009 09:03:10
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If the Nazi Germans had killed and killed off all persons labeled inherently unfit in Germany, would depression, schizophrenia, diabetes, sociopathy... re-emerge in the following generations, or would they be a clear community, free of inherent illnesses?
How does a inherent illness begin anyway?
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People carry recessive genes (http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/askasci/mole00/mole00158.htm), usually deleterious, which are passed on to future generations, some of whom could develop a disorder as a result.
i.e. people carry the genes for disease although they themselves do not suffer from it: the disorder is in their genotype but not in their phenotype.
BTW don't think sociopathic behaviour is a genetic disorder, I think it is environmental: caused by negligent and abusive primary "carers" during a child's formative years.
How does a inherent illness begin anyway?
Because organisms evolve by a random process of mutation. (Organisms, including humans, were not designed).
Some of the genetic mutations are harmful (cause disease), a few are beneficial (make the organism better suited to its environment).
The increased chance of survival of those with beneficial mutations is what causes evolution, (natural selection (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_selection)).
We are the descendants of a long line of successful mutants.
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Non of the diseases mentioned above are purely genetical/hereditary.
Although both mayor depression, schyzophrenia, type 1 diabetes and sociopathy has some level of genetic background, but in most cases this explains much less then 50% of the variance.
All of these illnesses have a huge number of theories about the causes, genetics can't explain everithing.
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If the Nazi Germans had killed and killed off all persons labeled inherently unfit in Germany, would depression, schizophrenia, diabetes, sociopathy... re-emerge in the following generations, or would they be a clear community, free of inherent illnesses?
How does a inherent illness begin anyway?
Yes, they would have because eugenics is about as flawed as it comes.
As pwee mentioned there is evidence of a genetic link to some diseases,but it is more or a predisposition than a causal link.
Eugenics was once popular and widely-accepted in this country, with hundreds of thousands of people forcibly sterilized for being 'poor' or 'feeble-minded', Yes even being poor was seen as something genetic.
Inherent illness I am assuming you mean hereditary or genetic illness passed on from parent to child?
Without going heavily into the genetics of it,it usually starts with a genetic mutation, sometimes it can be one base pair deletion, or insertion which causes,for example, a different amino acid to be produced, or a faulty protein structure. This in turn can affect how a specific gene is expressed, or how other biochemical reactions happen. Sometimes it happens by a missense or nonsense reading of the gene, meaning the genetic code is 'read' incorrectly again causing a change in gene expression and associated biochemical reactions. Best way I can describe it is having a 1000 piece jigsaw, and finding that one piece of the trees on the right hand side doesn't fit that well, but while it doesn't affect anything round it, you eventually find the piece of sky over the other side won't
fit at all.
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1000 piece jigsaw, and finding that one piece of the trees on the right hand side doesn't fit that well, but while it doesn't affect anything round it, you eventually find the piece of sky over the other side won't
fit at all.
just for some crazy off topic stuff.
yeah 1000 peice jigsaws are really hard. i'm currently doing this one.
(https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Ffarm4.static.flickr.com%2F3448%2F3347643131_ae0591f406.jpg%3Fv%3D0&hash=0536b86b3070badd44f4c880a2b9b92c)
it's pretty tough. spent about 6 hrs so far and got about half way through it.
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Oh yeah, that looks pretty darn hard, the giraffe, camel, horse, tiger, kangaroo, they're all basically the same colour!! [:0]
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Fortunately it has lots of details.
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Jigsaw joke:
After completing a 20 piece jigsaw puzzle, this blonde calls here friend and announces that she's the smartest person in the world.
The friend obviously asks why, and blonde says: "I just completed a jigsaw puzzle in 18 months, while on the box it says '2 to 4 years'"
On-topic: A specific genetic disease can be stopped, by killing all patients and carriers and destroying their deposits at the sperm bank. BUT, nothing prevents the disease from coming back by a similar mutation in an otherwise healthy person.
In the genome, there are what's called 'mutation hotspots'. These are locations that are more sensitive to mutation than others. These hotspots promote evolution, and if such hotspots occur in coding DNA, there's an increased chance for a genetic defect giving rise to a phenotypic disease, but also an increased chance for coding a more efficient protein, giving the carrier a tiny evolutionary advantage.
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n the genome, there are what's called 'mutation hotspots'. These are locations that are more sensitive to mutation than others. These hotspots promote evolution, and if such hotspots occur in coding DNA, there's an increased chance for a genetic defect giving rise to a phenotypic disease, but also an increased chance for coding a more efficient protein, giving the carrier a tiny evolutionary advantage.
And there was me telling it in terms of a jigsaw puzzle... [V] [;)]