14 ms·

The Holocaust epigenetics study was over-interpreted

92 points by tokenadult 11y ago

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
1arity 11y ago
Whether it was "over-interpreted" or not -- some stressors methylate genes, and those mutations are passed on to descendants. Does surviving the holocaust count as a stressor? Yes. Would going through that probably involve a bundle of stressors, of which some are likely to produce epigenetic mutations? Likely. The author of this article is in the business of writing papers that are anti-trans-generational epigenetic inheritance. The author either doesn't believe it is possible, or doesn't believe to have seen evidence for it yet. It's a useful counterpoint to the majority opinion, tho it's very much the opinion of someone peddling a particular line that happens to be the line their in the business of writing papers about. The most interesting thing in this study was that the descendants of those who had experienced the holocaust seemed to have become more immune to the stressors their ancestors faced. That's a pretty clear case of the genome responding by becoming more fit, the occurrence of which has evolutionary advantage.
- madaxe_again 11y ago
  I wonder what an similar survey of the genetics of Palestinians living under occupation for five decades would show - and whether the epigenetic effect not only makes people more "fit" for dealing with trauma, but perhaps desensitised when it comes to inflicting trauma on others.
  - tome 11y ago
    That snide comment seems unnecessary.
  - tormeh 11y ago
    As bad as the Israeli occupation is, it's not even in the same order of magnitude in terms of per-human suffering.
    - leaveyou 11y ago
      How did you measure the suffering ? If you just guesstimate the magnitude of the suffering I try a guesstimation too: In my opinion 4.5 years of intense suffering are in the same order of magnitude with 45 years of not so intense suffering. Unless some suffering is way more important than other suffering. I don't know.
      - deleted 11y ago
        [deleted]
      - deleted 11y ago
        [deleted]
      - Retric 11y ago
        Depends on scale, 3x or 100x both fail the 4.5 to 45 test. PS: The reality is it's mostly propaganda right now, if things where as bad as generally portrayed you would see a lot of immigration. (ex: syrian refugees)
        sanderjd 11y ago
        What evidence are you basing your reality on? Have you been there? Is there some on-the-ground reporting you trust that presents that view? Or are you only extrapolating from the relative lack of refugees? If so, there are lots of potential confounding variables, the most obvious being the relative tightness of borders in different areas.
      - omonra 11y ago
        You might also count the % or # of non-combatant population that was intentionally killed. I also think that if palestinians were really suffering, they would agree to the terms offered to them. Repeatedly. The fact that they keep refusing to live in peace shows that things aren't all that bad. Here is one fact - they are one of the most obese people on the planet: http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=238_1406451164 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=238_1406451164.
- stdbrouw 11y ago
  > Does surviving the holocaust count as a stressor? Yes. Would going through that probably involve a bundle of stressors, of which some are likely to produce epigenetic mutations? Likely. So because the conclusion of the original study is probably sort-of-maybe okay-ish, we can excuse the shoddy research that was performed to get to that conclusion? I don't think that's how science works. The final paragraph of the post reads > Every week there are uninterpretable epigenetics studies published, the Holocaust study is merely one of many, these authors are merely following prevailing beliefs in over-interpreting their data. However, every such study damages the ‘brand’ of epigenetics a little more. If we want human disease epigenetics to be sustainable as a field of research, we have got to start to do substantially better in designing, executing, interpreting, reviewing and funding these studies. Being afraid that bad research might damage the reputation of the entire field of epigenetics doesn't seem like something I'd worry about too much if I didn't believe in epigenetics as a valid object of scientific study.
  - nextos 11y ago
    While the study might not be well designed and interpreted, may I ask why you don't believe in epigenetics?
    - tomhoward 11y ago
      may I ask why you don't believe in epigenetics? That's not a question based in science. It's not about beliefs, it's about evidence. Speaking for myself, I've taken a strong interest in epigenetics due to my own health experiences and general curiosity. I find some of the hypotheses around epigenetics to be compelling, including that of generational inheritance of trauma, which is at issue here. But hard data is lacking, and I hope to see more rigorous studies that produce more solid evidence that can enable us to better understand the issue. Someone who hasn't heavily researched epigenetics or any other topic is perfectly entitled to take the null hypothesis position and demand better evidence before adopting a different position.
      - k__ 11y ago
        Epigenetics sound more like another way of mutation to me.
- x0054 11y ago
  The original article is using a sample group which is just much too small to make any reasonable statistical correlation, and in it's conclusion is making claims about causation without even being able to prove correlation.
- Mikushi 11y ago
  The only clear case is that of bad science.
- sharkbot 11y ago
  I would suggest a change to your first sentence: "some stressors methylate genes, and those same genes may be methylated in descendants." It is not a "mutation", at least not in the sense of a stable and heritable gene change. DNA methylation can be reversed, hence it is considered an epigenetic change, rather than a genetic change. The controversy over epigenetics seems to be about how long an epigenetic change can remain in a series of offspring, and how much of an impact an epigenetic change can have on the genetic material, the only long-term mechanism of heredity that we know of. Caveat: IANABiologist
- daemonk 11y ago
  There are good reasons to not think trans-generational epigenetic inheritance is possible though. The main piece of evidence is the reprogramming that occurs after fertilization where epigenetic marks are erased and re-established. You could maybe argue that that epigenetic machinery was transferred trans-generationally during cell division to help in re-establishing specific epigenetic marks, but that's not really an "informational" inheritance.
stefantalpalaru 11y ago
Politics is much more efficient than hard science at getting you research grants, so the researchers adapt their proposals and ultimately their results to the market.
gkya 11y ago
After seeing this sort of research, I sometimes think that we are drowning in an excess amount of scientific information regarding more humane things. I think that such approach will not let us understand ourselves better.
- astazangasta 11y ago
  We need to broaden our epistemological horizons. The other day I was reading the wikipedia article on physical attractiveness; it is mostly a litany of controlled studies isolating various physical variables. This is rapidly becoming the only way we know how to think.
  - gkya 11y ago
    > [... The scientific method] is rapidly becoming the only way we know how to think. And for better or worse, it's not a way to think, it's a way to know and prove.
    - 0xdeadbeefbabe 11y ago
      Can fashion, politics, philosophy, or religion help scientists decide what to prove or what to know? Or is that also within the purview of science?
      - gkya 11y ago
        Science is a method for getting to know the universe. Fashion and politics are unrelated. Philosophy, religion and science are the most common ways to acquire knowledge. In religion, the source is the myth. In philosophy, the source is the thought. When philosophy needed a method to get to know for better the nature, it begat science. Science produces raw data. Philosophy, or any other method of thinking for that matter, are to interpret what science collects. But paraphrasingly-quoting Socrates via Plato, in Alchibiades II 144a and 146-147, without the knowledge of the good from the bad, information otherwise is useless, and maybe pericolous. And, it's not established that Mathematics be a science, so, shall we dismiss it[1]? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematics#Definitions_of_mathematics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematics#Definitions_of_mat...
squozzer 11y ago
I am still fascinated by the possibility of genetic memory, but also heartened by the existence of skeptics. Looking forward to the debate, assuming it's a healthy one.
katelynsills 11y ago
"I really don’t like criticising colleagues, a tendency I’m guessing we all share in science." This. This is everything that's wrong about modern science.
- brighteyes 11y ago
  I think there is plenty else that is wrong. For example: * Corporate influence via funding studies (and not publishing the failures), as well as hiring away top researchers (e.g. Hinton by Google) * The tenure system is vanishing, with more and more staff turning into non-tenured "associates", and fewer and fewer young hopefuls finding a successful career in science. * Promotions are based on dubious publication metrics.
throwaway1967 11y ago
The Holocaust, despite retroactively considered to have lasted from 1933 until 1945, should really be considered to have started only in 1941 when the meaning of "Final Solution" is argued to have changed from liquidation (i.e. expulsion to the marshy parts of Russia, as Hitler put it) to innocenticide, as 1941 is argued to be the first year that gas chambers went operational. Concentration camps that allegedly had these gas chambers were, in the beginning, all camps; after international investigation on the American-liberated camps, all the testimonies making the case that there were gas chambers in those camps were pushed aside, and it was revealed that they were all fantasies. Indeed, today it is accepted that there were no gas chambers in any American-liberated concentration camp, despite detailed descriptions of their operations, including trapdoor floors that would fling open to dispose of the bodies, not to mention other fantastical methods of human disposal (electrified floors, pedal-powered killing machines, etc) that despite all credible testimony, turned out to be false. In the end, only those camps that were liberated and immediately destroyed and rebuilt by the Soviets, are today said to have had gas chambers. The evidence, however, once taken out of its political context, is scarce. Historians and researchers that have attempted to find out the details of the procedures of those methods of killing involving gas chambers have perforce arrived at much lower numbers of estimated deaths due to constraints that only become apparent once one is forced to think of all the logistics involved in such an underfunded operation that could be readily exposed by the Red Cross who was in every camp and given free reign to come and go, and whose communications with the outside world were not intercepted nor subject to vetting prior to transmission. Auschwitz is the best example of ongoing research on the face of political resistance. Its death toll has plummeted from 4 million to as low as the official reports by the Red Cross which despite seeming incredibly low, nonetheless are time and again confirmed against independent measurements and estimates (like the communication between camps and their leadership which was intercepted by the British and released to the public much after the war and the subsequent show trials. Another example of ongoing research into Auschwitz is that the room that is now shown to be a gas chamber in the Auschwitz Museum, was actually uncovered to be a Soviet reconstruction, as admitted by then head of the museum, in an investigative piece of journalism by Jewish researcher David Cole. Nowadays, despite immense political censorship and general public ignorance due to several reasons, including media influence, Jewish emancipation, public inertia and confirmation bias, and so on, research continues. At the forefront of this research it is possible to find evidence that during Jewish liquidation (i.e. expulsion) some might have been chaperoned by Soviets once far enough East, and then sent to Siberia where they were slaughtered. There still remains details to be accounted for. Throughout these years since the Holocaust, several archives opened up, in a piecemeal fashion, all the way into the 1990s and a bit beyond. Every time one archive openings were announced, most historians would anticipate that better, more direct evidence for the existence and operation of gas chambers would finally surface and vindicate their pre-conceived conclusions. And every single time after the opening and visitations by the most illustrious of historians, they would come out empty-handed, disappointed that the newly available evidence could not be used to resuscitate the notion that gas chambers were used to commit innocenticide. Hence the need to rely on numerous movie releases and museums across the world to spread the message, as it is not a scientific message that can be passed from one person to another with "just the fact, ma'am" and none of the narrative that presupposes the facts. If you care to get your feet wet and plunge into this research yourself, look no further than Raul Hilberg on video admitting that he never vetted the estimated number of deaths from gas chambers, instead relying on the numbers that he heard during his own education and elevating those numbers to official status with the seal of approval that his name imparts. Indeed, not much of the whole mainstream Holocaust narrative can stand alone if stripped of its defenders, the personalities that give color to this story. In this sense, it is like Psychoanalysis in that a group of people with preconceived ideas of a narrative will shun outsiders and dissenters and shame them while upholding an illusory moral ground supported by the ideas and agenda of a radical group of influential thinkers who will stop at nothing to "better the world" through any means necessary.

92 points by tokenadult 11y ago

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

Whether it was "over-interpreted" or not -- some stressors methylate genes, and those mutations are passed on to descendants. Does surviving the holocaust count as a stressor? Yes. Would going through that probably involve a bundle of stressors, of which some are likely to produce epigenetic mutations? Likely. The author of this article is in the business of writing papers that are anti-trans-generational epigenetic inheritance. The author either doesn't believe it is possible, or doesn't believe to have seen evidence for it yet. It's a useful counterpoint to the majority opinion, tho it's very much the opinion of someone peddling a particular line that happens to be the line their in the business of writing papers about. The most interesting thing in this study was that the descendants of those who had experienced the holocaust seemed to have become more immune to the stressors their ancestors faced. That's a pretty clear case of the genome responding by becoming more fit, the occurrence of which has evolutionary advantage.

madaxe_again 11y ago
I wonder what an similar survey of the genetics of Palestinians living under occupation for five decades would show - and whether the epigenetic effect not only makes people more "fit" for dealing with trauma, but perhaps desensitised when it comes to inflicting trauma on others.
- tome 11y ago
  That snide comment seems unnecessary.
- tormeh 11y ago
  As bad as the Israeli occupation is, it's not even in the same order of magnitude in terms of per-human suffering.
  - leaveyou 11y ago
    How did you measure the suffering ? If you just guesstimate the magnitude of the suffering I try a guesstimation too: In my opinion 4.5 years of intense suffering are in the same order of magnitude with 45 years of not so intense suffering. Unless some suffering is way more important than other suffering. I don't know.
    - deleted 11y ago
      [deleted]
    - deleted 11y ago
      [deleted]
    - Retric 11y ago
      Depends on scale, 3x or 100x both fail the 4.5 to 45 test. PS: The reality is it's mostly propaganda right now, if things where as bad as generally portrayed you would see a lot of immigration. (ex: syrian refugees)
      - sanderjd 11y ago
        What evidence are you basing your reality on? Have you been there? Is there some on-the-ground reporting you trust that presents that view? Or are you only extrapolating from the relative lack of refugees? If so, there are lots of potential confounding variables, the most obvious being the relative tightness of borders in different areas.
    - omonra 11y ago
      You might also count the % or # of non-combatant population that was intentionally killed. I also think that if palestinians were really suffering, they would agree to the terms offered to them. Repeatedly. The fact that they keep refusing to live in peace shows that things aren't all that bad. Here is one fact - they are one of the most obese people on the planet: http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=238_1406451164 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=238_1406451164.
stdbrouw 11y ago
> Does surviving the holocaust count as a stressor? Yes. Would going through that probably involve a bundle of stressors, of which some are likely to produce epigenetic mutations? Likely. So because the conclusion of the original study is probably sort-of-maybe okay-ish, we can excuse the shoddy research that was performed to get to that conclusion? I don't think that's how science works. The final paragraph of the post reads > Every week there are uninterpretable epigenetics studies published, the Holocaust study is merely one of many, these authors are merely following prevailing beliefs in over-interpreting their data. However, every such study damages the ‘brand’ of epigenetics a little more. If we want human disease epigenetics to be sustainable as a field of research, we have got to start to do substantially better in designing, executing, interpreting, reviewing and funding these studies. Being afraid that bad research might damage the reputation of the entire field of epigenetics doesn't seem like something I'd worry about too much if I didn't believe in epigenetics as a valid object of scientific study.
- nextos 11y ago
  While the study might not be well designed and interpreted, may I ask why you don't believe in epigenetics?
  - tomhoward 11y ago
    may I ask why you don't believe in epigenetics? That's not a question based in science. It's not about beliefs, it's about evidence. Speaking for myself, I've taken a strong interest in epigenetics due to my own health experiences and general curiosity. I find some of the hypotheses around epigenetics to be compelling, including that of generational inheritance of trauma, which is at issue here. But hard data is lacking, and I hope to see more rigorous studies that produce more solid evidence that can enable us to better understand the issue. Someone who hasn't heavily researched epigenetics or any other topic is perfectly entitled to take the null hypothesis position and demand better evidence before adopting a different position.
    - k__ 11y ago
      Epigenetics sound more like another way of mutation to me.
x0054 11y ago
The original article is using a sample group which is just much too small to make any reasonable statistical correlation, and in it's conclusion is making claims about causation without even being able to prove correlation.
Mikushi 11y ago
The only clear case is that of bad science.
sharkbot 11y ago
I would suggest a change to your first sentence: "some stressors methylate genes, and those same genes may be methylated in descendants." It is not a "mutation", at least not in the sense of a stable and heritable gene change. DNA methylation can be reversed, hence it is considered an epigenetic change, rather than a genetic change. The controversy over epigenetics seems to be about how long an epigenetic change can remain in a series of offspring, and how much of an impact an epigenetic change can have on the genetic material, the only long-term mechanism of heredity that we know of. Caveat: IANABiologist
daemonk 11y ago
There are good reasons to not think trans-generational epigenetic inheritance is possible though. The main piece of evidence is the reprogramming that occurs after fertilization where epigenetic marks are erased and re-established. You could maybe argue that that epigenetic machinery was transferred trans-generationally during cell division to help in re-establishing specific epigenetic marks, but that's not really an "informational" inheritance.

stefantalpalaru 11y ago

Politics is much more efficient than hard science at getting you research grants, so the researchers adapt their proposals and ultimately their results to the market.

gkya 11y ago

After seeing this sort of research, I sometimes think that we are drowning in an excess amount of scientific information regarding more humane things. I think that such approach will not let us understand ourselves better.

astazangasta 11y ago
We need to broaden our epistemological horizons. The other day I was reading the wikipedia article on physical attractiveness; it is mostly a litany of controlled studies isolating various physical variables. This is rapidly becoming the only way we know how to think.
- gkya 11y ago
  > [... The scientific method] is rapidly becoming the only way we know how to think. And for better or worse, it's not a way to think, it's a way to know and prove.
  - 0xdeadbeefbabe 11y ago
    Can fashion, politics, philosophy, or religion help scientists decide what to prove or what to know? Or is that also within the purview of science?
    - gkya 11y ago
      Science is a method for getting to know the universe. Fashion and politics are unrelated. Philosophy, religion and science are the most common ways to acquire knowledge. In religion, the source is the myth. In philosophy, the source is the thought. When philosophy needed a method to get to know for better the nature, it begat science. Science produces raw data. Philosophy, or any other method of thinking for that matter, are to interpret what science collects. But paraphrasingly-quoting Socrates via Plato, in Alchibiades II 144a and 146-147, without the knowledge of the good from the bad, information otherwise is useless, and maybe pericolous. And, it's not established that Mathematics be a science, so, shall we dismiss it[1]? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematics#Definitions_of_mathematics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematics#Definitions_of_mat...

squozzer 11y ago

I am still fascinated by the possibility of genetic memory, but also heartened by the existence of skeptics. Looking forward to the debate, assuming it's a healthy one.

katelynsills 11y ago

"I really don’t like criticising colleagues, a tendency I’m guessing we all share in science." This. This is everything that's wrong about modern science.

brighteyes 11y ago
I think there is plenty else that is wrong. For example: * Corporate influence via funding studies (and not publishing the failures), as well as hiring away top researchers (e.g. Hinton by Google) * The tenure system is vanishing, with more and more staff turning into non-tenured "associates", and fewer and fewer young hopefuls finding a successful career in science. * Promotions are based on dubious publication metrics.

throwaway1967 11y ago

The Holocaust, despite retroactively considered to have lasted from 1933 until 1945, should really be considered to have started only in 1941 when the meaning of "Final Solution" is argued to have changed from liquidation (i.e. expulsion to the marshy parts of Russia, as Hitler put it) to innocenticide, as 1941 is argued to be the first year that gas chambers went operational. Concentration camps that allegedly had these gas chambers were, in the beginning, all camps; after international investigation on the American-liberated camps, all the testimonies making the case that there were gas chambers in those camps were pushed aside, and it was revealed that they were all fantasies. Indeed, today it is accepted that there were no gas chambers in any American-liberated concentration camp, despite detailed descriptions of their operations, including trapdoor floors that would fling open to dispose of the bodies, not to mention other fantastical methods of human disposal (electrified floors, pedal-powered killing machines, etc) that despite all credible testimony, turned out to be false. In the end, only those camps that were liberated and immediately destroyed and rebuilt by the Soviets, are today said to have had gas chambers. The evidence, however, once taken out of its political context, is scarce. Historians and researchers that have attempted to find out the details of the procedures of those methods of killing involving gas chambers have perforce arrived at much lower numbers of estimated deaths due to constraints that only become apparent once one is forced to think of all the logistics involved in such an underfunded operation that could be readily exposed by the Red Cross who was in every camp and given free reign to come and go, and whose communications with the outside world were not intercepted nor subject to vetting prior to transmission. Auschwitz is the best example of ongoing research on the face of political resistance. Its death toll has plummeted from 4 million to as low as the official reports by the Red Cross which despite seeming incredibly low, nonetheless are time and again confirmed against independent measurements and estimates (like the communication between camps and their leadership which was intercepted by the British and released to the public much after the war and the subsequent show trials. Another example of ongoing research into Auschwitz is that the room that is now shown to be a gas chamber in the Auschwitz Museum, was actually uncovered to be a Soviet reconstruction, as admitted by then head of the museum, in an investigative piece of journalism by Jewish researcher David Cole. Nowadays, despite immense political censorship and general public ignorance due to several reasons, including media influence, Jewish emancipation, public inertia and confirmation bias, and so on, research continues. At the forefront of this research it is possible to find evidence that during Jewish liquidation (i.e. expulsion) some might have been chaperoned by Soviets once far enough East, and then sent to Siberia where they were slaughtered. There still remains details to be accounted for. Throughout these years since the Holocaust, several archives opened up, in a piecemeal fashion, all the way into the 1990s and a bit beyond. Every time one archive openings were announced, most historians would anticipate that better, more direct evidence for the existence and operation of gas chambers would finally surface and vindicate their pre-conceived conclusions. And every single time after the opening and visitations by the most illustrious of historians, they would come out empty-handed, disappointed that the newly available evidence could not be used to resuscitate the notion that gas chambers were used to commit innocenticide. Hence the need to rely on numerous movie releases and museums across the world to spread the message, as it is not a scientific message that can be passed from one person to another with "just the fact, ma'am" and none of the narrative that presupposes the facts. If you care to get your feet wet and plunge into this research yourself, look no further than Raul Hilberg on video admitting that he never vetted the estimated number of deaths from gas chambers, instead relying on the numbers that he heard during his own education and elevating those numbers to official status with the seal of approval that his name imparts. Indeed, not much of the whole mainstream Holocaust narrative can stand alone if stripped of its defenders, the personalities that give color to this story. In this sense, it is like Psychoanalysis in that a group of people with preconceived ideas of a narrative will shun outsiders and dissenters and shame them while upholding an illusory moral ground supported by the ideas and agenda of a radical group of influential thinkers who will stop at nothing to "better the world" through any means necessary.