Dr. Francis S. Collins
Posted on 03/16/2007 7:15:39 AM PDT by scripter
[Title slightly abbreviated to fit]
Francis S. Collins, one of the world's leading scientists who works at the cutting edge of DNA research, concluded that "there is an inescapable component of heritability to many human behavioral traits." However, he adds, "for virtually none of them, is heredity ever close to predictive."
Dr. Francis S. Collins |
The heritability estimates for personality traits were varied: General Cognitive Ability (50%), Extroversion (54%), Agreeableness (42%), Conscientiousness (49%), Neuroticism (48%), Openness (57%), Aggression (38%) and Traditionalism (54%).
Such estimates of heritability are based upon unbiased, careful analyses of studies conducted with identical twins. The studies lead to the conclusion that heredity is important in many of these personality traits. It is important however, to note that even in such studies with identical twins, that heritability is not to be confused as inevitability.
As Dr. Collins would agree, environment can influence gene expression, and free will determines the response to whatever predispositions might be present.
Dr. Collins succinctly reviewed the research on homosexuality and offers the following:
"An area of particularly strong public interest is the genetic basis of homosexuality. Evidence from twin studies does in fact support the conclusion that heritable factors play a role in male homosexuality. However, the likelihood that the identical twin of a homosexual male will also be gay is about 20% (compared with 2-4 percent of males in the general population), indicating that sexual orientation is genetically influenced but not hardwired by DNA, and that whatever genes are involved represent predispositions, not predeterminations [emphasis added]."
The heritability estimates for homosexuality is substantially lower than General Cognitive Ability, Extroversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Neuroticism, Openness, Aggression and Traditionalism!
Dr. Collins noted that environment--particularly childhood experiences--as well as the role of free will and choice affect us all in profound ways. As researchers discover increasing levels of molecular detail about inherited factors that underlie our personalities, it's critical that such data be used to illuminate the issues, not provide support to ideologues.
Citing such dangers, Dr. Collins referred to the book written by activist Dean Hamer, who declared the discovery of the "God gene" (this same author also is associated with "discovering the gay gene").
Dr. Collins noted that the "evidence" in Hamer's book "grabbed headlines," but was "wildly overstated."
A reviewer in Scientific American suggested that Hamer's book on the "God gene" should have been titled, "A Gene That Accounts for Less than One Percent of the Variance Found in Scores on Psychological Questionnaires Designed to Measure a Factor Called Self-Transcendence, Which Can Signify Everything from Belonging to the Green Party to Believing in ESP, According to One Unpublished, Unreplicated Study."
Unfortunately, much of the research in areas such as homosexuality has been misrepresented; not only in the media, but also by the scientists themselves through a tendency to overestimate the quantitative contribution of their findings.
Regarding the contributions of genetics to areas such as homosexuality, Dr. Collins concluded, "Yes, we have all been dealt a particular set of cards, and the cards will eventually be revealed. But how we play the hand is up to us."
I agree.
Reference:
Collins, Francis S. (2006). The Language of God, A Scientist Presents Evidence For Belief. New York: Free Press.
"a virtual statistical certainty"
Heh. I'm thinking fake but accurate.
Don't tell Boortz that.
He loves to make fun of people that object to the sanctification of homosexuality. Just check out his new book.
So Barak Obama finds John Edwards cute because . . .
Thanks. I've never seen the show but have heard mixed reviews of it.
Don't know. Don't care. Don't care to know. Makes no difference in the end.
Can you prove without any doubt it is behaviour?
Even if you could... what difference would it make?
Don't know, don't care............
I would agree that you don't know and don't care and have not spend any intelligent energy on doing so.
Gay adoption is problematic period... Recent study from the netherlands basically proved this one, confirmed what all thinking and honest people know.
In the netherlands there is no social stigma to being homosexual, or to children raised by them, yet children raised by such couples were found to be at much higher risk for all sorts of problems.
Even if they could (they can't) but even if they could prove a 100% genetic link to homosexuality, homosexual adoption is dangerous and hazardous to children.
Thank you, but I don't engage in arguments involving a false premise.
If X (where X is true), then Y. Such a thing can be debated.
If not X (where X is true), then Y. Such a thing cannot be debated.
This is indeed a complicated and involved issue. Still, the head of the Human Genome Project apparently disagrees with you and has stated homosexuality is not hardwired. Even scientists who are homosexual disagree with you. The major factor, according to credible scientists, is the environment in which children are raised, and that aligns with the growing number of ex-gays.
I don't even know what that means.
Laughably untrue.
You better go to the dictionary and look up the word "heritable". It means "inherited" which means "born with" - not "acquired". Some people are born funny, some people are born smart, some people are born mean and some people are born queer and this scientist says that "evidence from twin studies does in fact support" that. Granted - he feels that the "predisposition" is what is inherited - but that is exactly what makes people queer - the "predisposition" to be queer. You can change the meaning of his words to mean "hostile to the born gay argument" - but that is not what the man said:
"An area of particularly strong public interest is the genetic basis of homosexuality. Evidence from twin studies does in fact support the conclusion that heritable factors play a role in male homosexuality.
By the way - many of these twin studies were done on twins separated at birth - so the "environmental" argument does not hold water.
Note to self:
1.check trap door
2.tease crocks
Then by all means support your statement.
I'm quite familiar with the subject. I suggest you read my profile to find numerous articles on the subject as it appears you are confused. One article in my profile will help: The Gay Gene? Pay particular attention to the summary.
In other words, look at the monster who killed that little girl in Florida. He was, no doubt, "born that way".
What difference does that make to what we do with him?.
Alcoholism runs in families. There may be a genetic component.
That does not mean we should allow DUI.
If your view of homosexual behavior is biblical, why does the origin of the behavior matter?
I think you missed the point. Receiving a squirt of testosterone in your brain during gestation is what tells you you are a male, not a gene. If you do not get this squirt of testosterone in your brain during gestation, you brain develops into a female brain.
Now, while this might clearly explain why some children want to have sex change operations, because they do not think they are of the correct gender, by itself it does not explain why individuals with incorrect brain gender assignment would be homosexuals.
Except in the case of animals that are mammals, they are. All of them. All of the time. Animals act based on their brain gender assignment. What their genitals are means nothing compared to what their brains are.
So why should humans be different? To say so, you have to extrapolate an even stranger psychology, what amounts to "male lesbians"; which would be a gender male, but with a female brain, which is itself homosexual, which is why he is attracted to females. This is crapola.
But back to genes. While a gene does not by itself determines sexual brain assignment, it *can*, most definitely, be the switch as to whether that squirt of testosterone is *correctly* given to males, and not to females.
And the resulting squirt of testosterone is all important.
Thanks for posting this scripter.
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