Single carats are the question, double are the quote from Wells
>This is an extract from a website of Jonathan Wells
>http://www.tparents.org/library/unification/talks/wells/DARWIN.htm
>>According to the standard view, the development of an embryo is programmed by its genes-its DNA. Change the genes, and you can change the embryo, even to the point of making a new species... Experiments similar to this have actually been performed, though not with dinosaur DNA. In every case, if any development occurred at all it followed the pattern of the egg, not the injected foreign DNA.
>>So DNA does not program the development of the embryo....
>
>I know Well carries two PhD's, but this seems just plain wrong. His statement that the DNA in an egg does not control the initial developement of the embryo seems almost silly. Is he refering to an egg with two sets of DNA (one natural one injected) ?
>Any ideas ?
There is just enough truth in the claim to make it a gross distortion of the facts rather than outright fiction. Proteins already in the cell and parental biochemical influences do control some processes, but as a whole the DNA of the cell dictates what will happen. Cloning is probably the most widely-known example showing that Wells is wrong. Transgenic organisms (e.g., "Genetically Modified" foods) are another example of the DNA rather than the heritage of the cell controlling what happens. The production of chimaeric embryos (in taxa with indeterminate cleavage), which result in superficially normal individuals, is a good example of the balance between direct influence from the cell's DNA and the influences of surrounding cells, proteins in the cells, etc. Experimenters have taken mice with different fur colors or even different species such as sheep and goats and put very early embryos together. This grows up into a single animal, as a result of the inter-cell sign!
aling. However, the parts that develop from each parental line also reflect their own DNA. A mouse made from three original embryos of different lineages has patches of fur corresponding to the parental colors of each lineage. The sheep-goat hybrid has different fur in different places as well.
Dr. David Campbell
"Old Seashells"
46860 Hilton Dr #1113
Lexington Park MD 20653 USA
bivalve@mail.davidson.alumlink.com
"That is Uncle Joe, taken in the masonic regalia of a Grand Exalted Periwinkle of the Mystic Order of Whelks"-P.G. Wodehouse, Romance at Droigate Spa
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