Book Reviews

_Nature_ v. 430, 22 July 2004, p. 404, "Peas and helices" is a review by Garland E. Allen of the book _Mendel's Legacy: The Origin of Classical Genetics_ by Elof A. Carlson. It looks like it may have some very interesting and relevant things to say.

The author "covers the first half of the twentieth century from the rediscovery of Mendel's work in 1900 to th epublication of Watson and Crick's paper on the structure of DNA in 1953." This indicates that for some 50 odd years, evolutionists knew that Darwin's formulation of their theory was based on a seriously flawed understanding of inheritance, but they kept up a facade on pure faith until they could cobble something together when they found out what they were dealing with.

The author doesn't believe that "classical genetics" has been "replaced" by our understanding of DNA molecules, "Rather, the two have been integrated such that, although the molecular details of genetics are quite different...genes remain the fundamental elements of herdity, evolution and development."

"Carlson devotes chapter to the history of evolution, cytology..." etc., and "asks a crucial historical question: if the roots of classical genetics lay in scientific traditions that were all developed in Europe, why did the United States become the place where mendelian genetics developed most rapidly and, in some ways, most successfully?" His answer (or the reviewers?), in part, "lies in the strong agrarian base...and the application of science to practical results." I have a feeling a major part was in the relatively greater resistance to evolutionary concepts in the US, or less concern with preserving Darwin-era ideas of "blending" and Darwin's borderline Lamarckian ideas of change through continued use over generations.

This book "contains good thumbnail descriptoins of the critical observations and experiments that went into the formation of the classical theory" and so may have some good material on the fruit fly mutation experiments. "There is also a chapter on the fusion of mendelian genetics and darwinian evolution (the evolutionary synthesis)" which may have some helpful information.

The reviewer includes as one of the "outstanding features of this book..." "...the attempt to show how classical genetics was involved with political issues in the twentieth century, suing three examples: eugenics(1883-1945), the Lysenko controversy int the Soviet Union (1930-1960), and the controversy over the genetic effects of radiation (1946-1970)." All of these have potential for information creationists can use.



Until Next Time,

David Bump
Philippians 3: 13 Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but [this] one thing [I do], forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, 14 I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. http://home.att.net/~david.bump