A scientist makes the case for the power of DNA

It seems that "genetics" is increasingly becoming the essentialism of the 21st century. Because you now sound silly if you use words like 'soul' or 'energy', people increasingly rely on 'genetics' or 'biology' to prove all sorts of political points or argue for public policies. As someone whose job is literally staring at and manipulating fasta files [1][2] all day, I find this newly found fascination people have with their own DNA (and others') deeply unsettling. People want it to be our 'source code', our 'blueprint', our video game character starting stats, any kind of proxy for one's soul, but there's so much more to the self than a dumb fasta file, we're only barely beginning to uncover it. And I'm not talking about the environment either (and by the way, the genetics/environment false dichotomy has been outdated for a while; whenever I hear things like 'nature/nurture' it makes me cringe). Epigenetics, microbiota, DNA spatial structure, all sorts of developmental stuff... these all contribute too, and have little to do with one's 'upgringing' or 'nurturing' as most people understand it.

It's all the more pervasive because some of the talking points are sort of true, but then people immediately jump to conclusions regarding social issues. Which in my view shows that people are not really interested in the science itself but are more looking into a way to map their mental model onto it so as to provide a socially acceptable justification of their opinions. This has been done for hundreds of years (from racialist theories to Lyssenkism to all kinds of foodstuffs lobbies) and I would very much like it if there weren't a resurgence of this kind of thinking in the current political climate.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FASTA_format

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FASTQ_format

I think there is an enormous danger in abuse of this knowledge. People simply don't understand the concepts and statistics very well.

The part about how heritability varies between countries is very important observation. A country successful at creating great opportunities for the majority of the population will measure very high heritability values because naturally most differences seen will be genetic if the environment is mostly optimal.

This hides the significance of the environment. E.g. height has a heritability of 90%, yet that is easy to misinterpret. Height in various populations have varied dramatically over time and that can primarily be explained by changes in the environment: health care and nutrition.

> Instead he advocates the use of such scores when choosing between candidates for a job.

What a ridiculous and offensive suggestion, widespread genetic discrimination. You don't have to be a scientist to understand why that's bad. Even if (or precisely if) some skills and proclivities are mostly inherited, that should not prevent people that managed to overcome their native shortcomings to find a fair place in society according to their actual, developed skills.

We already know for a fact that males are more aggressive, females have lower orientation skills and Asian kids are less agitated. The genetic markers are so strong there you can read them on the person's face, yet, discrimination on any of those gender or race characteristics should be repulsive to anyone.

There may be generic markers and genetic predisposition, but it's not because a person comes from a "long race of X" or "long family of Y". Even if that's true in fact it's wrong in policy. It's dangerous to consider some better than others.

Changes to family traits may be slow, but can be cultivated! We should encourage and help all families and communities to improve their environment to bring about positive changes in their lives and children's lives.

From TFA:

"These are problems of emphasis rather than accuracy. But in a field as ethically fraught as genetics, even that can be troubling. For instance, as Mr Plomin notes, the size of the genetic component of a particular trait—its “heritability”—varies between different populations. The heritability of educational attainment in Norway has increased since the second world war as the country widened access to health care and schools, flattening out environmental effects. That trend seems, worryingly, to have reversed in America in the 21st century. The irony is that the heritability of many traits rises if states do more to provide for all their citizens equally."

> Instead he advocates the use of such scores when choosing between candidates for a job.

I'm struggling to understand how this doesn't wind up being a proxy for racism/sexism and the other things we abhor when considering equal opportunity.

Gattaca here we come !! (We are already in 1984)..

Blueprint is the wrong analogy. Recipe book is more appropriate.