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Human Language Gene Changes How Mice Squeak
archatheist writes "Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany have engineered a mouse whose FOXP2 gene has been swapped out for a different (human) version. This is interesting because the gene is implicated in human language, and this has changed how mice squeak. 'In a region of the brain called the basal ganglia, known in people to be involved in language, the humanized mice grew nerve cells that had a more complex structure. Baby mice utter ultrasonic whistles when removed from their mothers. The humanized baby mice, when isolated, made whistles that had a slightly lower pitch, among other differences, Dr. Enard says. Dr. Enard argues that putting significant human genes into mice is the only feasible way of exploring the essential differences between people and chimps, our closest living relatives.' The academic paper was published in Cell."
... with ultrasonic zombie mice.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
Today's biology is finite component analysis done at a massive scale.. Figuring out how a machine as big as a person works is going to take millenniums.
How we know is more important than what we know.
This is how The Secret of Nimh began, isn't it?
I'm assuming most people here won't have a problem with this research. But truly, where is the line? What about injecting human brain cells into mice? How about into chimps? Do we have any moral obligations not to cross this line? I am in awe and at the same time terrified about the future.
This article raises some of these questions. It's quite interesting that it was written in 2004. It even mentions the FOXP2 gene.
http://www.reason.com/news/show/34941.html
Although this kind of research is interesting, the final results of this would have wide ranging implications that I would rather avoid. Mainly, that is if animals were allowed to converse in a common language with humans, it would show us if they possess a consciousness, can reason, and what emotions that they can feel. This would either prove the sanctity of animal life or deny it, ultimately; I would rather keep the ongoing debate and not have a decision.
If our elected representatives no longer represent us, do we still live in a Democracy?
Pinky, are you pondering what I'm pondering ?
Hasn't that been done already ?
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4860483760049380308
One could pick apart the errors of the parent statement, but the fact remains that if a simulation is too slow or wrong to make meaningful predictions, there's something wrong with the simulation.
"The ability to delude yourself may be an important survival tool" - Jane Wagner -
Suppose that this mouse is actually now sentient. Do we commit a crime when we imprison it in a laboratory or mangle its body (for the sake of some test)?
When we create chimera, we are playing god.
One of the more interesting aspects of basal ganglia is that it, along with the thalamus, make up the limbic system. Located below the cerebral cortex, this is the area of the brain where base emotions are generated, such as aggression and impulse.
While researching speech in relation to the brain, it was discovered that while regular, everyday speech originated from the pars opercularis and pars triangularis of the inferior frontal gyrus, cursing originated from the basal ganglia.
We know intuitively that cursing 'feels' different than regular speech when you do it, at an emotional level. They have proven that it actually is different, at the biological level.
What's supercool about this experiment, is they increased the mouse's capacity to curse .
What I wouldn't pay for a mouse that could curse. Or good god a monkey. Give me a cursing monkey and I'll tithe you every paycheck 'til I die.
"Study your math, kids. Key to the universe." -The Archangel Gabriel
We should beware of popular reports of scientific discoveries: almost all the popular reports of FOXP2 claimed that it was the gene for language or even more ludicrously the gene for grammar - the truth is more complicated and far more interesting than that.
No-one should imagine that the development of language relied exclusively on a single mutation in FOXP2. They are many other changes that enable speech. Not least of these are profound anatomical changes that make the human supralarygeal pathway entirely different from any other mammal. The larynx has descended so that it provides a resonant column for speech (but, as an unfortunate side-effect, predisposes humans to choking on food). Also, the nasal cavity can be closed thus preventing vowels from being nasalised and thus increasing their comprehensibility. These changes cannot have happened over such a short period as 100,000 years. Furthermore the genetic basis for language will be found to involve many more genes that influence both cognitive and motor skills
Human mind needs human cognition and human cognition relies on human speech. Ultimately, we will find great insight from further unravelling the evolutionary roots of human speech.
"Okay, who moved my fuckin' cheese! Hey Mr. Labcoat, why don't YOU run this goddam maze; you look like you could lose some weight."
Table-ized A.I.
TF(academic)A is a very well done piece of work. I'm glad to see this, as opposed to the junior high school comprehension level press releases usually presented as science. As such, my criticisms are offered respectfully.
The FOXP2 gene cannot be said to be directly involved in language. The referenced works state that altering it disrupts some aspects of language production. There are many more ways that disruptions can occur through third variables or more general systems. In this case, altering the gene causes alteration in the dopamine system, which feeds the spiny neurons. Dopaminergic activity on spiny neurons causes inhibitory signals in the gamma range (~40 HZ) to be sent to the neurons in Hebbian cellular assemblies (a primary processing unit), synchronizing them and causing them to perform their function. This may well happen in the basal ganglia, but also happens over much of the cortex. This is a general system, responsible for a great deal of brain function. To claim it is part of language is not wrong, but is improper in that it is inaccurate due to over-specificity. As evidence, the well studied dopaminergic disorder Parkinson's does cause language disruption as noted in TFA, but clearly does so only as a specific example of a global phenomenon.
Similarly, specific changes due to specific allele substitutions can only be said to be true if and only if substituting other alleles into the same locations do not cause similar changes. There is no evidence that the example referenced is as specific as is implied by the statement as presented.
The statement that studying mice as 'the only feasible way' to study the relationship between humans and chimps appears so skewed that I wonder if it is a misstatement or misinterpretation. In any case, direct comparison studies have been done with excellent results. My old boss at NIH did volumetric comparisons on chimps brains using MRI, looking for left/right asymmetry in the language areas. In all of a dozen or so cases, he found it, to a degree similar to that in humans. In all but one cases, the left was greater than the right, also as found in humans. The one exception is not a difference, but rather a supporting similarity. The language centers are usually on the left because they are usually contralateral to the dominant hand, usually the right. In a dozen or so humans, chances are one or so will be left handed, with language centers on the right, just as was seen in the chimps. Studying mice is certainly fruitful and the results may well generalize to primate comparison studies. But to say it's the only feasible way to compare primate data is very wrong.
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
But guess what?! DRIVER INCOMPATIBILITIES! It must have been a memory leak or something, because when I turned the thing on "low" and aimed it at Alabama (that'll teach you to deny my MBA application!), rather than disintegrating the state, it covered it in peanut butter.
And not nice smooth peanut butter, either. Some extreme chunky variety that really didn't harm Alabama at all.
So fuck you, Microsoft, and your shitty drivers.
You better watch out, there may be dogs about . .