5 ms·

> There are plenty of inheritable genetic physical diseases So I can respond to something solid, can you name some?

by tomhoward 6y ago

username90 6y ago
There are plenty, Huntington's disease is an example.
- tomhoward 6y ago
  Huntington's disease is one of a small number of conditions that is caused by a single-gene defect (along with haemophilia, and a few others). It's very rare. What is known about mental "illnesses" are that they sometimes manifest when certain combinations of genes are present, but not always, and when you look at the details of cases you can pretty much always find an outer-world factor that triggers the state (e..g, abuse, trauma, neglect etc). So we're talking about very different things.
lostdog 6y ago
Here's dozens of them: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genetic_disorders https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genetic_disorders If you want a few well-known examples: Cystic fibrosis, Muscular Dystrophy, Canavan Disease, and Hemophilia. There's lots of obvious bad stuff floating around in our genomes. It's not surprising that the roots of mental illness, heart disease, diabetes, and others are hereditary too.
- tomhoward 6y ago
  Of the conditions you mentioned, cystic fibrosis and haemophilia are due to specific, single-gene mutations, and both are quite rare. There's a huge difference between conditions that are caused by a single-gene defect vs conditions that sometimes arise when a combination of genes are present/expressed in combination with other (e.g. environmental) factors. > There's lots of obvious bad stuff floating around in our genomes Too handwavy. Please be specific :)
  - igravious 6y ago
    Not handwavy. They were specific. The article makes this exact point: “In the genes ------------ One pillar of this future approach is a better understanding of the genetics of mental illness. In the past decade, studies of psychopathological genetics have become large enough to draw robust conclusions. The studies reveal that no individual gene contributes much to the risk of a psychopathology; instead, hundreds of genes each have a small effect. A 2009 study found that thousands of gene variants were risk factors for schizophrenia. Many were also associated with bipolar disorder, suggesting that some genes contribute to both disorders. This is not to say that the same genes are involved in all brain disorders: far from it. A team led by geneticist Benjamin Neale at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston and psychiatrist Aiden Corvin at Trinity College Dublin found in 2018 that neurological disorders such as epilepsy and multiple sclerosis are genetically distinct from psychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia and depression (see ‘Mental map’).”
    - tomhoward 6y ago
      My point is that it's not "obvious bad stuff", and the continued presumption that it is is probably the reason why so little progress has been made in the field. Even that passage of the article you quote doesn't characterise the genes as "bad stuff"; just known genes that seem to correlate with the (contextually undesirable) conditions manifesting.
      - igravious 6y ago
        You asked someone for examples. They gave them to you. You decried those examples as handwavy and not specific (which they clearly were not). I countered that they had been specific and not handwavy, explained why, and pointed out that moreover this ground had already been covered in the article and that the article concurred with those examples. Your reply to me misses the point that I was making and argues against a point I wasn't making – which strikingly is the very thing that prompted me to counter your top-level post.
        tomhoward 6y ago
- LifeLiverTransp 6y ago
  sickle cell anemia?
martingoodson 6y ago
Asthma, type II diabetes, obesity, Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, MS, etc
- tomhoward 6y ago
  Just as is the case for mental "disorders", none of these conditions are attributable to a known gene or gene combination, or have a 1:1 match between carrying a certain gene combination and having the disease (meaning there must be an environmental trigger in addition to the genetic predisposition). For almost all of them (possibly all of them in some cases), there is evidence of links with auto-immunity and the presence of active pathogens (including viruses, bacteria, funguses, etc), suggesting that the illness is related to the body's efforts to fight off or cope with pathogens, or to some effect of the pathogen's activity. Those who invoke conditions like Huntington's Disease and haemophilia are on more solid ground, as these are directly attributable to single-gene mutations. But these conditions are also very very rare, unlike mental "disorders".
  - martingoodson 6y ago
    You asked for 'inheritable genetic physical diseases'. I gave you a list. Now it seems you actually want a list of 'mendelian' genetic disease, i.e. those which are caused by a single genetic variant. Mendelian diseases are not the only sort of genetic disorder. This is a misunderstanding of genetics. Source: I was a university researcher in psychiatric genetics
    - tomhoward 6y ago
      I'm making the distinction between illnesses that are directly caused by an identifiable genetic defect (e.g., Huntington's), and conditions that can arise when a certain combination of genes/genetic expressions are present but even then only arise some of the time. As a professional in the field you'll know the terminology better than me and that's great, but you must understand the distinction I'm trying to make. In the former case, we can clearly see a 1:1 causal link from genetic defect to the manifestation of the disease (whether it's a single gene or more is not central to the point). In the latter case, the genetic predisposition is there, but there must also be some other form of conditional trigger. One of your examples with which I'm quite familiar is asthma, which I've experienced at times in my life (though neither of my parents did). I started experiencing it at about age 9 (as an allergic reaction to dust, dust mite and possibly other chronic infections I had at that age). Then it stopped in my mid teens. Then it started again when I smoked tobacco in my 20s, then stopped as soon as I stopped smoking. Then it started again in my mid 30s when I was experiencing severe stress and anxiety, then it stopped when I undertook a combination of approaches to reduce the stress/anxiety in my life, and a dietary program and other remedies to reduce chronic infections. That was 6 years ago and I've not needed asthma medication ever since. The point is, there's nothing genetically deterministic about my asthma, given that it's come and gone through out my life and has been clearly influenced by environmental factors. Further, it's plausible that the asthma has been a beneficial symptom, to protect my body from allergens and pathogens, and signal that I needed to change my lifestyle. Certainly, it was a big part of what signalled to me that I need to stop smoking, and later to clean up my diet and make other improvements to my emotional and physical health. As I've proposed in several other comments, it's just as plausible that the conditions we regard as mental "illnesses" are likely not genetic flaws or other malfunctions at all, but rather beneficial adaptations that have been selected for by evolution (e.g., it's obvious how the presence of "ADHD" in a small percentage of the population would have been beneficial in prehistoric human tribes). Given this, our real challenge is to do a better job of interpreting and responding to these conditions, as several practitioners going back decades have already figured out how to do.

> There are plenty of inheritable genetic physical diseases So I can respond to something solid, can you name some?

username90 6y ago

There are plenty, Huntington's disease is an example.

tomhoward 6y ago
Huntington's disease is one of a small number of conditions that is caused by a single-gene defect (along with haemophilia, and a few others). It's very rare. What is known about mental "illnesses" are that they sometimes manifest when certain combinations of genes are present, but not always, and when you look at the details of cases you can pretty much always find an outer-world factor that triggers the state (e..g, abuse, trauma, neglect etc). So we're talking about very different things.

lostdog 6y ago

Here's dozens of them: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genetic_disorders https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genetic_disorders If you want a few well-known examples: Cystic fibrosis, Muscular Dystrophy, Canavan Disease, and Hemophilia. There's lots of obvious bad stuff floating around in our genomes. It's not surprising that the roots of mental illness, heart disease, diabetes, and others are hereditary too.

tomhoward 6y ago
Of the conditions you mentioned, cystic fibrosis and haemophilia are due to specific, single-gene mutations, and both are quite rare. There's a huge difference between conditions that are caused by a single-gene defect vs conditions that sometimes arise when a combination of genes are present/expressed in combination with other (e.g. environmental) factors. > There's lots of obvious bad stuff floating around in our genomes Too handwavy. Please be specific :)
- igravious 6y ago
  Not handwavy. They were specific. The article makes this exact point: “In the genes ------------ One pillar of this future approach is a better understanding of the genetics of mental illness. In the past decade, studies of psychopathological genetics have become large enough to draw robust conclusions. The studies reveal that no individual gene contributes much to the risk of a psychopathology; instead, hundreds of genes each have a small effect. A 2009 study found that thousands of gene variants were risk factors for schizophrenia. Many were also associated with bipolar disorder, suggesting that some genes contribute to both disorders. This is not to say that the same genes are involved in all brain disorders: far from it. A team led by geneticist Benjamin Neale at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston and psychiatrist Aiden Corvin at Trinity College Dublin found in 2018 that neurological disorders such as epilepsy and multiple sclerosis are genetically distinct from psychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia and depression (see ‘Mental map’).”
  - tomhoward 6y ago
    My point is that it's not "obvious bad stuff", and the continued presumption that it is is probably the reason why so little progress has been made in the field. Even that passage of the article you quote doesn't characterise the genes as "bad stuff"; just known genes that seem to correlate with the (contextually undesirable) conditions manifesting.
    - igravious 6y ago
      You asked someone for examples. They gave them to you. You decried those examples as handwavy and not specific (which they clearly were not). I countered that they had been specific and not handwavy, explained why, and pointed out that moreover this ground had already been covered in the article and that the article concurred with those examples. Your reply to me misses the point that I was making and argues against a point I wasn't making – which strikingly is the very thing that prompted me to counter your top-level post.
      - tomhoward 6y ago
LifeLiverTransp 6y ago
sickle cell anemia?

martingoodson 6y ago

Asthma, type II diabetes, obesity, Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, MS, etc

tomhoward 6y ago
Just as is the case for mental "disorders", none of these conditions are attributable to a known gene or gene combination, or have a 1:1 match between carrying a certain gene combination and having the disease (meaning there must be an environmental trigger in addition to the genetic predisposition). For almost all of them (possibly all of them in some cases), there is evidence of links with auto-immunity and the presence of active pathogens (including viruses, bacteria, funguses, etc), suggesting that the illness is related to the body's efforts to fight off or cope with pathogens, or to some effect of the pathogen's activity. Those who invoke conditions like Huntington's Disease and haemophilia are on more solid ground, as these are directly attributable to single-gene mutations. But these conditions are also very very rare, unlike mental "disorders".
- martingoodson 6y ago
  You asked for 'inheritable genetic physical diseases'. I gave you a list. Now it seems you actually want a list of 'mendelian' genetic disease, i.e. those which are caused by a single genetic variant. Mendelian diseases are not the only sort of genetic disorder. This is a misunderstanding of genetics. Source: I was a university researcher in psychiatric genetics
  - tomhoward 6y ago
    I'm making the distinction between illnesses that are directly caused by an identifiable genetic defect (e.g., Huntington's), and conditions that can arise when a certain combination of genes/genetic expressions are present but even then only arise some of the time. As a professional in the field you'll know the terminology better than me and that's great, but you must understand the distinction I'm trying to make. In the former case, we can clearly see a 1:1 causal link from genetic defect to the manifestation of the disease (whether it's a single gene or more is not central to the point). In the latter case, the genetic predisposition is there, but there must also be some other form of conditional trigger. One of your examples with which I'm quite familiar is asthma, which I've experienced at times in my life (though neither of my parents did). I started experiencing it at about age 9 (as an allergic reaction to dust, dust mite and possibly other chronic infections I had at that age). Then it stopped in my mid teens. Then it started again when I smoked tobacco in my 20s, then stopped as soon as I stopped smoking. Then it started again in my mid 30s when I was experiencing severe stress and anxiety, then it stopped when I undertook a combination of approaches to reduce the stress/anxiety in my life, and a dietary program and other remedies to reduce chronic infections. That was 6 years ago and I've not needed asthma medication ever since. The point is, there's nothing genetically deterministic about my asthma, given that it's come and gone through out my life and has been clearly influenced by environmental factors. Further, it's plausible that the asthma has been a beneficial symptom, to protect my body from allergens and pathogens, and signal that I needed to change my lifestyle. Certainly, it was a big part of what signalled to me that I need to stop smoking, and later to clean up my diet and make other improvements to my emotional and physical health. As I've proposed in several other comments, it's just as plausible that the conditions we regard as mental "illnesses" are likely not genetic flaws or other malfunctions at all, but rather beneficial adaptations that have been selected for by evolution (e.g., it's obvious how the presence of "ADHD" in a small percentage of the population would have been beneficial in prehistoric human tribes). Given this, our real challenge is to do a better job of interpreting and responding to these conditions, as several practitioners going back decades have already figured out how to do.