Atheists condone and condemn rape

[Mystical]

Chas chas chas, chas cha chchas, chas cha chas cha chas!
Come back and tell me how I tossed my salad wrong!

By inflating the importance of inheritance via an epigenetic route.

Remember, only changes to germ cells can be inherited, not genetic or epigenetic changes to somatic cells.

Sorry Chas, I disagree.

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What looks legit? Memory and epigenetics aren't related.

The statements show a conflation of shallowly-understood concepts.

Memories document experience. I was equating experience to epigenetics, though. Not memory although they come hand and hand as our genes actually remember, too.

Not only are our genes affected by our experiences, but they are affected by the experiences of our parents and their parents and theirs before them.
Environmental signals such as diet and stress can trigger changes in gene expression, and flexibility of the epigenome is important in forming new memories.

http://www.neuropsychotherapist.com/epig...xperience/

Epigenetics is the contemporary study of how the environment influences gene expression both within and, through heritable changes in DNA, beyond the lifetime of an organism. The idea that organisms can inherit environmentally acquired characteristics is, however, the old idea of Lamarckian inheritance. In 1809, Jean-Baptiste Lamarck suggested that an organism would acquire traits through adapting to its environment, and that these traits would then be inherited by its offspring (Handel & Ramagopalan, 2010). Lamarck’s theory was overlooked in favor of Darwin’s natural selection theory of evolution, as the two explanations appeared at the time to be mutually exclusive, but the advent of epigenetics has made it possible for these theories to be reconciled. “Epigenetics” literally means “above the genes,” and is the means by which the environment “marks” the genes, dramatically or subtly, changing their level of expression either transiently or for our lifetime, or, through inheritability, throughout our children’s and grandchildren’s lifetimes.

For example, following the favorable social experience of being reared in a communal nest, mice challenged with one hour in a mildly stressful novel environment generate hippocampal BDNF faster than mice raised in a standard nest, as a result of an epigenetic mark on the BDNF gene (Branchi, Karpova, D’Andrea, Castren, & Alleva, 2011). However, rat pups subjected to a rat equivalent of childhood maltreatment are epigenetically marked by this experience, reducing the level of BDNF in their pre-frontal cortex throughout their adult life. The offspring of these rats also carry the same epigenetic mark on their BDNF gene even when they have been cross-fostered to non-maltreating mothers (Roth, Lubin, Funk, & Sweatt, 2009). Thus, epigenetics, the mechanisms by which our genes record or adapt to the environment, can shape gene expression over a few minutes, an hour, or a lifetime, and can even shape the gene expression pattern of the next generation. It is even possible for genes to “remember” an event and make a contingency plan for its recurrence, as in the case of the corticotropin-releasing hormone gene of rat pups.

http://learn.genetics.utah.edu/content/e...pi_learns/

The Changing Epigenome Informs Gene Expression As a fertilized egg develops into a baby, dozens of signals received over days, weeks, and months cause incremental changes in gene expression patterns. Epigenetic tags record the cell's experiences on the DNA, helping to stabilize gene expression. Each signal shuts down some genes and activates others as it nudges a cell toward its final fate. Different experiences cause the epigenetic profiles of each cell type to grow increasingly different over time. In the end, hundreds of cell types form, each with a distinct identity and a specialized function.

Even in differentiated cells, signals fine-tune cell functions through changes in gene expression. A flexible epigenome allows us to adjust to changes in the world around us, and to learn from our experiences.

After birth and as life continues, a wider variety of environmental factors start to play a role in shaping the epigenome. Social interactions, physical activity, diet and other inputs generate signals that travel from cell to cell throughout the body. As in early development, signals from within the body continue to be important for many processes, including physical growth and learning. Hormonal signals trigger big changes at puberty.

Experiences Are Passed to Daughter Cells As cells grow and divide, cellular machinery faithfully copies epigenetic tags along with the DNA. This is especially important during embryonic development, as past experiences inform future choices. A cell must first "know" that it is an eye cell before it can decide whether to become part of the lens or the cornea. The epigenome allows cells to remember their past experiences long after the signals fade away.

http://learn.genetics.utah.edu/content/e...heritance/
Epigenetic inheritance is an unconventional finding. It goes against the idea that inheritance happens only through the DNA code that passes from parent to offspring. It means that a parent's experiences, in the form of epigenetic tags, can be passed down to future generations.

As unconventional as it may be, there is little doubt that epigenetic inheritance is real. In fact, it explains some strange patterns of inheritance geneticists have been puzzling over for decades.
Epigenetic inheritance is an unconventional finding. It goes against the idea that inheritance happens only through the DNA code that passes from parent to offspring. It means that a parent's experiences, in the form of epigenetic tags, can be passed down to future generations.

As unconventional as it may be, there is little doubt that epigenetic inheritance is real. In fact, it explains some strange patterns of inheritance geneticists have been puzzling over for decades.

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