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Word Gems exploring self-realization, sacred personhood, and full humanity
Perry Marshall's an electrical engineer / computer programmer
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Editor's note: The following is from Perry Marshall's book, Evolution 2.0: Breaking the Deadlock between Darwin and Design
“DNA was still poorly understood in the 1940s, but scientists clearly understood that each cell contained genetic material…” Dr. Barbara McClintock observed damaged chromosomes in her microscope. She learned that some cells, unable to repair chromosomal damage, “activated previously latent parts of the [plant] genome. They succeeded in patching damaged DNA with a new kind of genetic element – a transposable element. Their movement is called ‘Transposition.’ … In 1951 she presented her findings to scientific gathering. The reaction of the audience began as “stony silence” but then became “hostility.” Editor’s note: From the beginning, the Darwin Monopoly viewed McClintock’s research as threatening to their world-view of gradualism. Here was evidence that cells can radically alter themselves without natural selection and without eons of time. It also means that genetic changes are not random as such but can be targeted and specific responses to the needs of the cell. It's evolution in "real time." You could actually see some of this under the microscope. Dr. McClintock received the Nobel Prize in 1983 for her seminal work, but her discovery was largely ignored or substantially minimized. “A cell editing its own DNA is like a writer with 20 … Word documents open all at the same time, rapidly shuffling pictures, words, and tables back and forth. That’s what’s happening when a protozoan splices its own DNA into 100,000 pieces and rearranges them.” TRANSPOSITION + NATURAL SELECTION + TIME = EVOLUTION “If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down.” Charles Darwin McClintock’s discovering becomes a serious nail in the coffin of Darwinism, but it also raises new questions: How does the cell know what to do and how to reconstruct its DNA in this new and different manner? Where’s the blueprint for that?
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