[HN Gopher] Human gene linked to bigger brains was born from see... ___________________________________________________________________ Human gene linked to bigger brains was born from seemingly useless DNA Author : rolph Score : 150 points Date : 2023-01-06 14:51 UTC (8 hours ago) (HTM) web link (www.science.org) (TXT) w3m dump (www.science.org) | acqbu wrote: | seemingly - is the key word here | | is this research done by the same people that expect us to | believe that the universe simply exploded into existence? | clint wrote: | What an amazingly stupid post lol | xyzelement wrote: | [flagged] | giantg2 wrote: | "Human gene linked to bigger brains was born from seemingly | useless DNA" | | Considering how we've managed to use those bigger brains, that | DNA still seems useless. | | It would be interesting to use seemingly unused DNA to express | genes. But I also wonder if these truly lack a function, or if we | just don't know the function. | xeromal wrote: | This brings up a question for me. Does brain size always | correlate to intelligence? I see a dolphin brain that looks very | human and I think that it does, but then I see how smart crows | are and I'd honestly say that they're smarter than my dog in most | ways. | cscurmudgeon wrote: | One analogy is computers: bigger is not more powerful, | structure matters more. | Breadmaker wrote: | http://www.xenology.info/Xeno/3.3.htm some correlation atleast. | buywarbonds wrote: | No. A tiger is not 10x smarter than a house cat. | feet wrote: | That assumes the correlation would be linear | joe__f wrote: | Don't you want to look for something like brain/body mass ratio | and see how that correlates with intelligence? | coyotespike wrote: | Yes to a first approximation this is a good heuristic! | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain%E2%80%93body_mass_ratio | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Encephalization_quotient | sieste wrote: | Not exactly an answer to your question, but a few studies | report a weak positive correlation (around .3) between head | size and IQ in humans. | | https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=corr... | svnt wrote: | But several in your search, including the twin study, report | no correlation, and others report correlation only within | race and sex groups. | clnq wrote: | If there's a weak correlation in a population, finding no | correlation in some subpopulations and a stronger | correlation in others is expected. | | For example, a very weak correlation between GPA and job | performance exists. In some disciplines, like law, the | correlation is strong. In other fields, like extreme | medicine, there is no correlation. | astrange wrote: | Are there studies on GPAs of extreme medics? ...Why? | | (And how much education did they have? The field includes | people who have and haven't gone to medical school, I | assume.) | clnq wrote: | No, this was meant to be an intuitive example of weak | correlation. It could have been about a correlation | between the redness of a fruit and its sweetness. For the | entire population of fruit, it is weakly correlated. For | some apples, it is strongly correlated. And for tomatoes, | there is no correlation. | | Extreme medicine, which includes field, mountain, and | battlefield medicine, is a specialization of general | medicine. You can study it as a part of various programs. | I studied it as a specialization in a general | practitioner's MSc program in Central Europe. Depending | on the region, it is probably possible to specialize in | extreme medicine as a nurse or an EMT. | | There was a wide range of GPAs in that program because | success was measured by a narrow range of criteria that | did not include things usually considered "academic | aptitude" - mainly the ability to follow resuscitation | algorithms in simulations precisely. Some of the things | we were scored by automatically were time to ECG, time to | defibrillation, correct callouts to the team, intubation | depth and time, and chest compression depth and rate. And | failing to execute a particular algorithm meant immediate | failure. Every other imperfection immediately meant a | reduced score, and scoring was entirely metric-based in | simulators, not open to human interpretation. | | Scoring just 45% of the possible grade on tests was | considered excellent. You had to demonstrate very high | competency to pass. Mediocre knowledge of algorithms or | skills in resuscitation was unacceptable because that | would severely worsen the outcomes of actual patients. | | If you either cared about your GPA or were primarily | motivated by your GPA at school or university, it was | clear that this would be a very difficult specialization | for you. It was more for people who excelled in algorithm | following, composure under stress, and perseverance; and | those who wanted a high skill ceiling. | bpodgursky wrote: | Within generally similar animals, brain size is correlated with | intelligence. Across different branches of the tree, it's | harder to compare. | | Bigger bird brains ~= smarter birds. Bigger dog brains ~= | smarter dogs. But you can't directly compare dogs and birds in | that way. | kanzure wrote: | It's the absolute number of cortical neurons, not the size of | the brain. | | "Brains matter, bodies maybe not: the case for examining | neuron numbers irrespective of body size" https://nyaspubs.on | linelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1749-... | | "No relative expansion of the number of prefrontal neurons in | primate and human evolution" | https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.1610178113 | | "The human brain in numbers: A linearly scaled-up primate | brain" https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2776484/ | | "The elephant brain in numbers" https://www.frontiersin.org/a | rticles/10.3389/fnana.2014.0004... | bpodgursky wrote: | Yeah, I don't think that's in contrast to what I said. | | Neural architectures are very similar between closely | related species, and differ wildly between birds and | whales. | fossuser wrote: | It's an interesting question and the answer is also pretty | interesting: | https://obscuredinosaurfacts.com/post/2022/11/30/bird-brains... | | There are a few factors and that post gives a nice overview. | kick_in_the_dor wrote: | I haven't yet read the main article at that link, but its | opening links to another long blogpost on whatbuywhy.com | about the human brain and it's fascinating! Highly | recommended: https://waitbutwhy.com/2017/04/neuralink.html | xeromal wrote: | Thanks! I've always been curious. Just opened this up. | polski-g wrote: | Within a species, yes. There is a 0.41 correlation between | brain size and intelligence in humans, for example. | bmitc wrote: | Dolphins and orcas specifically actually have higher density of | folds in their brains than human brains in addition to being | big. | | The book _Deep Thinkers: Inside the Minds of Whales, Dolphins, | and Porpoises_ is quite good. | astrange wrote: | Plus, they have water cooling. | svnt wrote: | No because the structure and function of the organ is at least | as important as the size. Size (or rather some bound of | neuron/glial count + complexity) is more in the necessary-but- | not-sufficient category. | | Secondly the question is not well-posed enough to answer | accurately. What is intelligence, in this case? | | The cytoarchitecture of brain parcels/regions varies | significantly. If you have a giant cerebellum you are not going | to seem very smart to us, but you may have a very large brain. | At the other end, people have lived normal (if perhaps | internally simpler) lives with tiny fractions of a typical | neocortex. [0] | | 0 : https://www.sciencealert.com/a-man-who-lives- | without-90-of-h... | f6v wrote: | I'd rather ask about body/brain ratio and % energy consumed by | a brain. | hutzlibu wrote: | "Does brain size always correlate to intelligence?" | | Not really, otherwise whales and elephants would be way | smarter, than us. | | Well, some people say, they are, but it does not show in our | intelligence tests. | | And birds brains evolved differently than those of mammals, so | maybe they are more efficient with their relative small brain? | Because yeah, they are definitely smarter than dogs, who have a | bigger brain. | prox wrote: | "For instance, on the planet Earth, man had always assumed | that he was more intelligent than dolphins because he had | achieved so much--the wheel, New York, wars and so on--whilst | all the dolphins had ever done was muck about in the water | having a good time. But conversely, the dolphins had always | believed that they were far more intelligent than man--for | precisely the same reasons." - Douglas Adams | xen2xen1 wrote: | This quote is always in the back of my head anytime brain | size or intelligence is discussed, and is especially when | dolphins are mentioned. And, he has a point. | prox wrote: | As I reflect on the quote more and more, I believe the | dolphins have the right idea. | hutzlibu wrote: | But apparently the dolphins in hitchhikers guide to the | galaxy did a bit more, than just having a good time in the | water - because unlike the humans, they managed to find a | way to leave the earth, when it was destroyed. (Book 4) | | And this is not further explained in the book, but it | likely sounds like technology. And when you want to have | and use technology, you have to do more than just splashing | around.. | prox wrote: | Since dolphins evolved a couple of times, they might had | that tech lying around just in case. The point stands, | dolphins use their tech so they can muck about in the | water. Humans to compete in a rat race and for survival | in its essence. Which come to think of it, is absolutely | absurd if for any intelligent species. So we aren't that | smart. | hutzlibu wrote: | "So we aren't that smart." | | Well, when you consider that we react to global crisis | like a pandemic with more confrontation, than cooperation | (there was no real exchange of technology between west | and east and patents and licencing were still more | important, than producing enough vaccines) and to the | climate crisis rather with more wars over whats left of | the ressources, than to unite and solve the problems - | no, we are not. | | We are smart enough to see, what could be possible, but | unable to overcome primitive power struggles. | vlunkr wrote: | That's some pretty serious cherry picking | bmitc wrote: | > Not really, otherwise whales and elephants would be way | smarter, than us. | | How do you know that? I mentioned this in another comment, | but dolphins and orcas have more folds in their brain than we | do, and folding is associated with greater processing power | and higher function. Additionally, the areas of their and | whales' brains associated with emotional intelligence are | much larger relative to the rest of their brain than the same | areas in our brain are. Their brains are very, very | interesting. For example, they keep one brain hemisphere | active during sleep since they are conscious breathers, and | they actually alternate which hemisphere is kept awake. | | Whales, dolphins, and orcas are damn smart, and I think | there's evidence enough that we cannot conclude that they | aren't more intelligent than us. Although they lack | technological development, this is due to their living | environment and physiobiology and not due to their | intelligence. Orcas in particular have achieved complete | dominance of their environment, aside from human activity, | and are geographically widespread with diverse cultures. | There are many cases where orcas actually use humans as | tools, even training humans to help them in hunts (and not | the other way around). | taneq wrote: | Sorry to be crass but I'd assume intelligence is somewhat | correlated with mastery of the physical world (I mean if it | weren't we wouldn't care about things like AI alignment) | and while cetaceans are clever mammals they're not very | good at avoiding being soup. I sympathize with them, but if | they were "way smarter than us" we would be running and | hiding instead of debating how nicely we should treat them. | bmitc wrote: | I already addressed that though. Operating under the | hypothetical and assumption that humans could survive in | the ocean, humans couldn't develop technology and written | history and knowledge in the ocean without having done so | on land first, even with our hand dexterity, much less | with fins. | | Humans existed a long time before proper technology | development, and those humans were just as intelligent as | modern ones. The ability to create technology is not a | requirement for higher intelligence. | | Even then, orcas do use tools, what they have access to. | Without technology, humans stand no chance against an | orca, and that goes for any animal in the ocean, from | blue whales to great white sharks. | SkyBelow wrote: | >Humans existed a long time before proper technology | development, and those humans were just as intelligent as | modern ones. The ability to create technology is not a | requirement for higher intelligence. | | Is that actually true? In cases of feral or severely | neglected children who lack any exposure to human | language, isn't there an impediment that prevents them | learning more complex language later in life that exceeds | anything that could be attributed to reduced brain | development due to nutrition? | | World wide hasn't intelligence been increasing, and while | part of that is due to better nutrition, another part is | due to better childhood conditions to enable | intelligence? Exposures to the technology of language, | written language, and similar at a young age seem to lead | to an increased capacity for intelligence later in life. | bmitc wrote: | Isn't it true? Hominids and Homo sapiens were around | millions and hundreds of thousands of years, | respectively, before technology more advanced than basic | tools showed up. And written history seems even shorter | than that. | | I'm not for sure what feral or neglected children has to | do with this. | | To address your later point, intelligence does not equal | knowledge. Any increase in intelligence in a person's | life seems to be intralifetime and doesn't spill over to | further generations. Increasing intelligence through diet | and behaviors and such are just mechanisms for exposing | the underlying intelligence that's already there. | SkyBelow wrote: | >To address your later point, intelligence does not equal | knowledge. | | This is just one of the many paths to the fundamental | question that plagues this sort of topic, what is | intelligence. Is intelligence the capacity for gaining | knowledge or having actually gained knowledge? Or maybe | not directly related to knowledge at all, though the | previous question was more about the capacity to gain vs | the gaining than it was about knowledge. | | It is known that the capacity a single individual changes | based on what they were exposed to (feral/neglected | children being the extreme negative cases, I'm not as | well read on extreme positive cases). But perhaps we | aren't talking about an individua's capacity and instead | we are talking some baseline genetic average capacity for | a larger group that doesn't take into account | environmental cases pushing it to either extreme? But in | such a case have we not defined intelligence so that | technology's impact is excluded a priori? | svnt wrote: | Then we should expect cetaceans to have developed long | verbal/oral lineages, especially as their medium is much | better for transmitting sound. | | We see dialects, to an extent, in orcas, but we do not | see the human behaviors we might expect. | | The problem, I think, is in the pure consideration of it | as intelligence. This is a limited view. | kridsdale1 wrote: | You're implying something is only showing intelligence if | it shows complexity (long linguistic demonstrations here) | | Isn't it more intelligence to convey all the information | that you need to with the highest efficiency? | | We rate a poet who can convey tremendous meaning in few | lines as superior to someone who is long winded and their | writing is full of bullshit and tropes conveying nothing | but using many words. | yieldcrv wrote: | that's an assumption that more intelligence means that | they would have to be motivated by revenge and vengeance | as opposed to that being a distinctly human flaw | bmitc wrote: | This is a good point, and it reminds me of something. I | do wonder if the ability to be content is a sign of | higher intelligence. Humans are decidedly discontented, | and I can't help but be curious about that being a | possible showcase of our ignorance. | [deleted] | hutzlibu wrote: | "How do you know that? " | | I do not know it. I am not an expert and had only limited, | (but fascinating) contact with them. | | But I would assume, if they would be "way smarter", than | they could and would find ways of communicating with us. As | far as I know, the research shows that they can | communcicate towards each other quite well, but not towards | us beyond very basic things. | | But of course that reminds me of an old joke: | | A donkey and a dog on a farm are talking to each other in | the evening and the donkey complains that he has so much | work to do, but would like to become a writer. The dog | asks: why don't you tell the farmer? The donkey answers, | are you crazy? If he finds out, I can read and write, I | will also have to do his bookkeeping. | | Meaning, maybe whales and co. could communicate with us, | but choose not to. But if this would be the case, their | reasoning would have to include some very astonishing | things, as whales are still hunted - which they likely | could almost completely stop by telling us exactly that. | 0xBABAD00C wrote: | > Whales, dolphins, and orcas are damn smart, and I think | there's evidence enough that we cannot conclude that they | aren't more intelligent than us. | | Where's this evidence? What exactly does "more intelligent" | mean to you? Do you think a dolphin can learn to play e.g. | Chess? I doubt you can teach them to play even tic-tac-toe. | Zamicol wrote: | Maybe whales are "smarter" than us. How can we empirically | test whale intelligence? Their technological abilities are | obviously inferior, but I wouldn't be surprised if they were | surprisingly intelligent in other ways. I'm trumpet dumb, | that doesn't mean I'm not "overall smarter" or "niche | smarter" than some people who play trumpet. | JamesBarney wrote: | Birds have evolved to have very space efficient neurons, due to | their weight constraints. | suzzer99 wrote: | Interestingly, the biggest bird of all, the ostrich, might | also be the dumbest. Or at least ostriches are in the | conversation with pigeons and turkeys. | taneq wrote: | Birds are smarter per unit of brain matter than mammals and it | baffles me why more people aren't intrigued by this. | catskul2 wrote: | Which people are not intrigued by this? | terminal_d wrote: | https://pumpkinperson.com/2019/01/04/what-is-the-correlation... | | https://pumpkinperson.com/2019/08/15/increasing-u-s-head-siz... | | Last link has a formula to calculate cranial volume. | | Animal intelligence is vastly underplayed. Ants seem to be a | very intelligent creature but they're little more than part of | nature to us. We're similarly adapted to our environment, and | those animals are adapted to our patterns and mentation by | virtue of millennia of close contact / purposeful genetic | pushes (eg, dogs) | perth wrote: | I've read there's decent correlation on a few scientific | journals on Google scholar. Namely, that while head size | doesn't guarantee intelligence, if you are predisposed to | intelligence you can't be as smart as someone else who is | predisposed to intelligence but has a larger head. | | See: the spatial packing problem in human brains | cjbgkagh wrote: | Birds have a higher neuron density. Each neuron is a mini | Turing machine running on DNA instructions so they could also | have better instinctual software. | dcow wrote: | Not sure if that analogy holds exactly. Neurons don't | "compute", they simply emit a signal that depends on how | "saturated" they currently are, right? | Choco31415 wrote: | That simplifies neurons a bit too much. There are a variety | of neuron types including mirror neurons and pyramid | neurons. These can feature more or less branching even. | dcow wrote: | My point is they operate more like gates. They aren't | mini Turing machines. | [deleted] | Choco31415 wrote: | You are correct. Neurons are not Turing machines. | However, they are complex enough that they can be Turing | machines so it can be fun to call them that. | | I didn't expect this topic to be so controversial to be | honest. I'm not surprised though. | dcow wrote: | I fully admit I may be underinformed. I had thought, | though, that neurons were not sophisticated in the way a | Turing machine is and much more akin to memristors. | However, that may be a memristor tinted view of the | world. | [deleted] | rolph wrote: | neurons have gates, these gates interconnect and form | logic networks. | | these are histeretic, programable, and dynamic. | | the neuronal body state, the electro-osmotic environment, | the past history of state are primary effectors of | structure,and function resultant in the logic. | [deleted] | cjbgkagh wrote: | Feel free to research it. The 'saturated' analogy is overly | simplistic and elides the incredible complexity of what's | actually going on. | dcow wrote: | But neurons certainly aren't mini Turing machines, | either? Happy to inform myself more if you can point me | in the right direction. | svnt wrote: | Cells perform a staggering number of parallel | computations. Neurons are cells, and perform these same | calculations and more in addition to emitting spikes. | Spikes, rather than being the major form of computation, | appear instead to be a means of maintaining | synchronization. | dcow wrote: | I quite honestly did not think of it this way. But it | makes some sense. I always thought cells perform, for | lack of a better term, _self-maintenance_ operations | independently from their macro function (the receiving | and emitting of spikes, in this case). I did not think of | the internal operations of a cell being connected to the | macro function in any sophisticated or meaningful way. I | would love to inform myself better on this topic since it | is not by area of expertise, and I have an admittedly | cursory understanding. | cjbgkagh wrote: | I do think the field of psychopharmacology is probably | sufficient to give an appreciation of the complexity | involved at the same time as being useful to the | practical understanding of how medications (and food) | change behavior. It's also well studied and there are | good books. I think Dr Stahl's books are the university | standard. Like a lot of science though I think much of it | is 'current best guess'. | | For information on the modifying DNA expression in | neurons that's under epigenetics and not as well studied. | hackinthebochs wrote: | Neurons definitely compute. The dendrites that aggregate | signals to initiate an action potential are not just simple | summations but complex arrangements of signal promoters and | inhibitors. The complexity of a pyramidal neuron is | equivalent to a 5-8 layer artificial NN. | | https://www.quantamagazine.org/how-computationally- | complex-i... | | https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S08966273 | 2... | cjbgkagh wrote: | And that result is just from a computer simulation of a | neuron that focuses on the dendrites and doesn't appear | to extensively model the nucleus. | | "Unfortunately, it's currently impossible for | neuroscientists to record the full input-output function | of a real neuron, so there's likely more going on that | the model of a biological neuron isn't capturing. In | other words, real neurons might be even more complex." | dekhn wrote: | I only downvoted you because "each neuron is a mini Turing | machine running on DNA instructions" isn't a very helpful | observation except at the most abstract level. | cjbgkagh wrote: | In my extensive research of neurons (as an | independent/citizen scientist) it looks like the closest | analogy to me. Neuron behavior is not only mediated by DNA | but neurons can also write changes back into DNA, not to | mention the nucleus soup that acts a bit like registers. I | work on small molecule peptide medicine that changes gene | expression in the neurons and other to glia cells to treat | medical conditions. | taneq wrote: | Do you have any evidence for this? Sounds interesting if | so. | cjbgkagh wrote: | The general field is Epigenetics (gene expression based | on environment), and within that there is research on how | peptides act as modulators by silencing and un-silencing | different genes. You can get a list of known bioactive | peptides by reading it from the DNA or by using mass | spectrometry (there's a proper name for this but it | escapes me atm). So putting the two together you can have | quite a bit of external control over gene expression. | rolph wrote: | HPLC [1] or Electrophoresy [2] would be instrumental in | isolating peptides based on mobility, and molecular mass. | | [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High- | performance_liquid_chroma... | | [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrophoresis | cjbgkagh wrote: | I was thinking of MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry devices | used in Protiomics research. It's a bit out of my field | but I think it's an improvement to HPLC. | dekhn wrote: | Probably GC-MS? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_chromat | ography%E2%80%93mas... Dunno how that would isolate the | sample, rather than just analyzing it though | cjbgkagh wrote: | I'm not involved in the process of acquiring the 'omics | data. I just analyze it and read papers from other people | analyzing it. I think MALDI-TOF is the gold standard for | proteomics. | rolph wrote: | mass based deflection and deposition. | | isolation,and analysis are two different activities, many | instruments are capable of both modalities, depending on | technique. | | the problem is selecting a procedure that will not induce | confounding artefacts of chemical, or physical | interaction w the subject molecular entity. | jacquesm wrote: | This isn't even wrong. Seriously, if you want to do | science get educated, your statements on this subject ("I | should add that I've taken to do my own research because | I little faith in the actual scientists to do a good job, | and the faith that I have left is diminishing.") make me | discard your output as 'likely noise' rather than signal. | If you want to be taken seriously then you should make a | minimal effort to try to understand what it is that you | are talking about, as it is you come across as a kook and | that likely isn't your intention. | cjbgkagh wrote: | I don't work alone, I do work with scientists who I think | are good. When I speak in generalizations it is just that | a generalization. Science has been subtly redefined from | a methodology to 'what a scientist does' and scientists | these days produce papers. | edgyquant wrote: | Please attack something that user said that is unfactual | instead of engaging with his stance on other matters | jacquesm wrote: | I don't like your phrasing this as the need to attack | something unfactual or not, and it's not 'other matters' | it is precisely this matter: to come up with stuff that | goes against established science in a way that makes it | difficult, if not impossible to argue with. | dekhn wrote: | Even if it's self-modifying, can continue state, etc, the | Turing machine analogy is a bit of a stretch. And the | current mainstream considers the primary function of | neurons to be their information-transmitting capability, | rather than their self-modifying ability. | | Don't let my negative attitude keep you from doing | research- I just think that epigenetics has been a bit | overblown as a functional mechanism, or its just too hard | to prove anything useful with experiments. Personally, if | I was working on this I'd focus much more on neural | differentiation during neurogenesis, rather than self- | modification during "runtime". | cjbgkagh wrote: | I'm aware of how attractive the information-transmitting | analogy is given the elegance of the theory. A few simple | rules when combined form an infinitely complex emergent | behavior able to sufficiently explain all observations; | what's not to love about it. | | I'm focusing on the epigenetic aspect of neurons due the | possibility of the ME/CFS/LongCovid family of conditions | being due to silencing of certain genes. The brain is | closely linked with the immune system and I think the so | while these present as immune conditions I believe it | starts out more as a neural condition, maybe microglia. | In addition it makes sense to focus on this area more as | I can't consciously restructure the neurons in my brain | but I can introduce peptides that change gene | expressions. | jacquesm wrote: | This makes no sense in the way neurons work as far as I | understand it. RNA 'instructions' are processed by the | Ribosome to make proteins, it isn't software in a machine | code sense but more of molecular specification for a piece of | material to be produced. | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ribosome | rolph wrote: | in the strictest sense DNA doesnt make anything. | | the interaction between DNA and polymerase class nucleo- | polymers result in assembly of sequence conservative | polymers. | | for the most part this is RNAclass material, but includes | DNA during replication and error correction events | cjbgkagh wrote: | DNA does more than make proteins... | jacquesm wrote: | DNA doesn't make proteins at all... | cjbgkagh wrote: | Fine, DNA contains the instructions for much more than | the production of proteins | dekhn wrote: | "Template" is a better term than instructions. | User23 wrote: | Dogs have been bred for docility not intelligence. Their wild | cousins, wolves, are considerably more intelligent, they're | just prone to get bored and engage in undesirable behaviors. | I'm told that it's very easy to teach a tame wolf tricks, but | they quickly lose interest in obviously pointless activities, | especially as they mature. | taneq wrote: | So wolves have ADHD, right. :P | svnt wrote: | If you think about it, ADHD behaviors would likely be much | more adaptive in the wild than non-ADHD. It is possible | ADHD stems from genetic regression. | tigerlily wrote: | What are you trying to say? | svnt wrote: | It is possible that the selective processes that led to | "modern" brains are essentially a process of self- | domestication, and certain "diagnoses" are just | reflections of diversity in that process. | | If society collapsed I think it would be more beneficial | to be ADHD than not. | emmelaich wrote: | I've seen studies relating hyperactivity to Neanderthal | and older genes. | | They persist because not enough time has passed to mutate | them out. | taneq wrote: | Not them but just guessing... that most ADHD traits are | only 'disordered' if you expect humans to be able to sit | still, shut up, and focus exclusively on what you tell | them to focus on for 8 hours a day? | mensetmanusman wrote: | 'Junk' or 'useless' DNA is such silly nomenclature, because | obviously we will learn more in the unlimited future, and we know | so little about biology now that proclaiming anything useless is | short-sighted to the max. | thriftwy wrote: | This one is quite suspicious. | | Imagine you're the proverbial alien tasked with introducing | sentient life on Earth without arising much suspicion. Replacing | useless DNA with de novo genes (of high correlation) would likely | be your favorite approach. | | Whereas I'm not even sure that a million of generations is | sufficient to evolve new genes from scratch (i.e. not via | duplication or fixing) | | Wheteas | graderjs wrote: | I've always suspected the junk DNA is where the morphogenetic | algorithms are kept. Published science just doesn't know how to | decode most of morphogenesis for now. | thriftwy wrote: | We actually do know that, proteins which control expression of | other genes handle the morphology. There's a gene for a left | side, for example. | | But the relevant thing is, they control expression by binding | to pieces of non-coding DNA, which can be considered "junk" by | strict definitions. So most genes are prepended by a block of | if-statements. | ly3xqhl8g9 wrote: | DNA specifies proteins, anatomy is not there. Something much | more interesting must be going on [1]. | | [1] Morphogenesis as a Model for Computation and Basal | Cognition by Michael Levin | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZW73LgOM5Bw (Where is | Anatomical Information Specified - from 7:30 onwards) | 2-718-281-828 wrote: | brain size correspond to muscle mass in mammals. | kurthr wrote: | I think your point is that size correlates with size, but that | whales don't seem to be 10x the IQ of humans? | nobleach wrote: | I remember several years ago reading about "junk DNA" or "useless | DNA" in sequences. Even then, I was certain that it probably | wasn't "junk", we were just yet to understand it. I wish we'd | take that attitude a bit more with science journalism. "It | doesn't make sense..... YET". | kzuberi wrote: | For folks interested in understanding the subject of junk DNA a | bit better, there's an upcoming book [1] that might be worth | checking out. The authors blog seems also to be interesting on | this and related subjects. | | [1] https://utorontopress.com/9781487508593/whats-in-your- | genome... | nathias wrote: | people just need to understand that useless can become useful | and vice versa | jeremiep wrote: | Read "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions" recently, | science ignoring what it does not understand is far from a new | phenomenon. | | Science is fantastic to dig into areas it can already see, and | terrible at seeing new areas from the greater unknown. | aeonik wrote: | We studied "The History of Science in Society" by Andrew Ede | and Lesley Cormack, which left a big impression on me. | | ISBN-13: 978-1442634992, ISBN-10: 1442634995 | taneq wrote: | "Junk DNA" brought to you by the same geniuses that brought you | "we only use 10% of our brain cells" and "the heart is where | the spirit resides, the brain is just useless grey goo." | seydor wrote: | Those two are not of the same league | vbezhenar wrote: | Junk DNA is a junk DNA. It's not used in any way. We understand | it. | svnt wrote: | This is entirely untrue. | dekhn wrote: | There are parts that are almost certainly not under functional | selection and provide no benefit whatsoever- with Alu sequences | being the best candidate. Even in tthe case of Alu, they do | seem to have some vague effect on regulation of | transcription... although they're not what we would call | "genes" or "regulatory regions". | | In other cases, there are just lots and lots of duplicates of | the same genes over and over. Other parts appear to be forges | of gene creation- either through gene duplication and divergent | evolution, or through some other mysterious mechanism we don't | know yet. | | Certainly, we've had parts that looked like they were nothing | at all and ended up being very important, and other parts that | looked like they were incredibly important, but were really | just the side effect of some effective parasite. | | It's sort of not even an interesting debate any more, as most | of the initial positions everybody held were changed when we | interrogated more, and better data. | gaboot wrote: | There are also fairly strict limits, given human mutation and | reproductive rates, on the amount of information that can be | preserved in the genome. Most of the genome is therefore | meaningless (although not necessarily useless). As this | article points out, these regions allow for random creation | of novel proteins | jl6 wrote: | Even for the "no benefit whatsoever" parts, is it not | possible that they influence (and are possibly crucial to) | the rest of the system just by providing spacing between | other more-apparently-functional parts? | | I'm thinking by analogy of executable programs that have runs | of zeros. The zeros don't necessarily do anything, but remove | them and everything else is out of alignment. | dekhn wrote: | I am open to the idea that "boring duplicated regions" | performance some vague function through spacing. Some folks | have proposed doing experiments where the spacers are | removed, or replaced with other sequences, but they are | extremely hard experiments to properly do (in a way that | convinces the field). | | We already know that enhancers "work at a distance" and | it's not clear what "distance" exactly means, and it gets | into complicated 3D structure of the genome inside a cell; | see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enhancer_(genetics) | | Personally I think that the best way to think about the | genome is to unlearn most of the preconceptions you learned | in genetics and instead think about it in terms of | biophysics and development and machine learning: you'll | never realyl be able to understand the true function of | every little bit, but you cvan probably create an | approximate model that explains the vast majority of | biology with relatively few variables, and some deep models | that contain all the necessary statistics to model these | systems accurately. | MichaelZuo wrote: | It sounds like because there is a very complex 3D | structure that the 'spacing' function could actually be | extremely important. Far more so than zeros in machine | code. | gumby wrote: | You could make the same claim for structure padding in | memory. I wouldn't call that useless either. | dekhn wrote: | I love the analogy. Many times I think about the genome as | a bunch of machine code it's my job to reverse engineer. | That was a good part of my career- probably 20 years- | before I realized the problem was that it's much too hard | to actually "prove" anything about systems like genomes. | andai wrote: | We need a few more copies of this gene before we can recognize | all the patterns ;) | VeninVidiaVicii wrote: | Hello, ChatGPT | rockinghigh wrote: | Non-coding sequences have been understood as having some | functions at least since the early 1990s. Because genome | expression is dynamic, tracking the exact mechanisms of action | of these sequences is challenging. | User23 wrote: | That was born of the widely held metaphysical position that | evolution is purposeless. Given that assumption one would | expect to find plenty of "junk" DNA. | [deleted] | Geezus-42 wrote: | I don't think that follows as well as you think. | | If the primary goal is survival based primarily on efficient | use of energy. A lot of evolution is about organisms becoming | more efficient by adapting to their environment. So then | keeping unnecessary junk around is inefficient and we would | expect orgasms that lose to would benefit and out breed the | others. | alpaca128 wrote: | Better adapted organisms are just that - better. Not | perfect, or free of inefficiencies. And even a perfectly | adapted organism might not be as good at adapting to | changes in the very long term compared to one with "junk" | DNA. Also, does unused junk in the DNA really hurt energy | efficiency? | User23 wrote: | Having our optic nerve run right through our retina | producing a blind spot in order to capture an upside down | and backwards image is pretty inefficient too. Evolution | doesn't maximize efficiency, it maximizes good-enough-to- | reproduce-ity. | retrac wrote: | I'm not sure where I encountered this hypothesis but I find it | compelling. As noted by many, junk DNA, acquired from viruses | and mutations and genome shuffling, is quite a puzzle. Why does | it persist? It takes energy to copy, and misreading it can | cause fatal or maladaptive mutations. From that perspective, it | shouldn't persist (with slowly accumulating drift) for billions | of years, as some shared junk sequences have across species. | But it does. | | Obviously, because it isn't junk; it is of value to the | organism. Even if it's not of any use right now, even if it's | completely biologically inactive at present. Because it is | still extremely high entropy information. They're remnants of | solutions other living systems once used, at some point, to | solve the problem of staying alive. | | If I were going to try and exploit genetic mutation to produce | novel solutions to biological problems, I would start from an | existing genome. In fact, I'd start with as much data, from as | many organisms, as I could get my hands on and store. Perhaps | we carry junk DNA because mutations in existing coded | sequences, even mutated, currently useless ones, are far more | likely to be functional, and so potentially a useful | adaptation, than literal randomness. It's life's portfolio of | solutions, badly photocopied little snippets accumulated over | the years, and we all carry it around for future generations | that might live in an environment where it's useful. | tedunangst wrote: | We should also consider that simply copying everything, even | the junk, leads to fewer errors than selectively trying to | identify only the good parts. | systems_glitch wrote: | Just like backups. | yAak wrote: | I feel like me keeping copies of all the code I've ever | written is a awkwardly good analogy here. | lowdose wrote: | Git commitments to your autocomplete library? | jean_tta wrote: | From the perspective of the gene it makes sense - genes that | are more sucesful at making offspring (aka getting copied) | should be expected to prosper through natural selection. | winter_blue wrote: | > It takes energy to copy, and misreading it can cause fatal | or maladaptive mutations | | Can maladaptive mutations really be caused by copying DNA | that's not used much (as far as we can tell, like the DNA for | endogenous retroviruses in our genome)? | bell-cot wrote: | Junk DNA, or near-junk DNA (active in theory, but with minimal | effects) both: | | - Is extremely difficult to remove, at a worthwhile scale, from | the genome of any large & long-lived organism | | - Can be thought of as a huge pile of tickets for the Extremely | Favorable Random Mutation lottery | folex wrote: | pile of tickets is a very nice metaphor | [deleted] | [deleted] | xyzzy4747 wrote: | The human genome is causing the planet to transition from a | beautiful paradise to a seemingly useless ever-growing pile of | trash and concrete. | [deleted] | fnordpiglet wrote: | Unsurprising our brains are cancerous mutations. Observing the | world it's clear we've done little net positive with them. | sassyonsunday wrote: | > The tragedy of a species becoming unfit for life by | overevolving one ability is not confined to humankind. Thus it | is thought, for instance, that certain deer in paleontological | times succumbed as they acquired overly-heavy horns. The | mutations must be considered blind, they work, are thrown | forth, without any contact of interest with their environment. | | > In depressive states, the mind may be seen in the image of | such an antler, in all its fantastic splendour pinning its | bearer to the ground. | | https://philosophynow.org/issues/45/The_Last_Messiah | seydor wrote: | I for one welcome our big brain mouse overlords. We frankly know | more about them than we know about ourselves. | [deleted] ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2023-01-06 23:00 UTC)