Princeton University
Department of History
Prof. Angela N.H. Creager
HIS 396: History of Biology
Reading Response QuestionsWeek 12, Precepts April 28-30, 1998
Email: creager@phoenix.princeton.edu or manfredl@princeton.edu
Reminder: Send an e-mail response to your preceptor addressing these or other aspects of the readings.
Note for Week 12: The first four articles in this week's readings are by scientists about the social significance of molecular genetic work. Consider them the 'primary' sources-views from the insiders. The last three, while contemporarily written, are critical of various aspects of recombinant DNA research and the human genome project, even though the last two are also written by prominent biologists. The article by Susan Wright is the only lengthy piece in this week's readings, and will require time to digest. Lewontin's "Dream of the Human Genome" was a review of several books on the Human Genome Project, including the book The Code of Codes, from which the articles by Gilbert and Hood were drawn. We will add a chapter from Dean Hamer's recent book exploring some of the more controversial aspects of behavioral genetics.
Week 12
Berg et al, "Potential Biohazards of Recombinant DNA Molecules"
What prompted the serious concern about recombinant DNA molecules among these scientists? What kinds of experts did they propose should be deferred out of concern for laboratory and public safety?
Koshland, "Sequences and Consequences of the Human Genome Project"
Why does the Human Genome Project seem like 'big science'? Is that label apt, according to Koshland? What are the benefits of the HGP? What does he mean by the 'prevention' of multigenic diseases, such as mental health problems? What scenarios does he consider 'outlandish'? Who does he argue will be most helped by the new genetic technologies? Do you agree?
Gilbert, "A Vision of the Grail"
p. 83 What scientific question does the Human Genome Project enable asking? Which questions are left unattended to? How does he contrast the molecular biologists' and population geneticists' views of the organism and of genetics? (Bear in mind that Richard Lewontin is a population geneticist.) What are the phases involved in developing the 'human genome as a research tool'?
p. 91 What kind of 'functional' information about genes can be obtained by having the sequence?
p. 93 What characterizes molecular biology as a 'successful science'? What are the 'advances' that Gilbert describes at the bottom of the right-hand page? What takes the place of the labor?
p. 94 Through what instrument will the sequences be made meaningful? How will the sequence determination of human genome change medicine? What are the potentially negative social effects?Hood, "Biology and Medicine in the Twenty-First Century"
p. 138 What is the timetable for the HGP? (This article is from 1992.) What are the three genomic maps he refers to? What benefits does Hood see from having a complete sequence of the human genome?
p. 145 What needs to be done to make large-scale DNA sequencing feasible (in terms of time and money)?
p. 147 What kind of computational problems does the accumulation of genome sequence data pose? What kind of new scientists does Hood feel is needed?
p. 150-53 What kind of regulatory/developmental information does Hood expect will be decipherable from the sequence? How will having the human genome sequence reverse the way in which genes and their functions are studied?
p. 157 What scenario does Hood envision for the newborn baby?
p. 159 What industry will be directly impacted by the medical applications of the HGP? What sorts of problems can you imagine in this process?
p. 160 What kind of applications does Hood imagine for DNA diagnostics? What industrial opportunites will be generated?Wright, "Recombinant DNA Technology and Its Social Transformation, 1971-1982"
p. 303 What broad social transformation accompanied the development of recombinant DNA techniques?
p. 306 What made practical applications of molecular biology seem likely?
p. 315 Why was the gene-splicing experiment by Boyer, Cohen, et al., viewed as unprecedented and novel?
p. 316 What concerns began to surface about the new methods and novel molecules? On the right-hand side Wright details the history of the first article you read (by Paul Berg et al. for a National Academy of Sciences committee).
p. 318 When did the media begin to publicize the recombinant 'revolution'?
p. 320 What kinds of genes did biologists begin doing recombinant experiments with c. 1977? What (four) goals guided research during this period? What five developments does Wright cite which were important to working towards those four research goals?
p. 323 What two interests did the goal of expression embody? Why was this an important aim for the commercial uses of recombinant DNA?
p. 325 What was the initial commercial response to these developments? Were there exceptions? Who had funded almost all of the early recombinant DNA research?
p. 327 What scientific findings complicated the hopes of using recombinant DNA techniques to produce therapeutics and other commercially important molecules from 'higher' organisms?
p. 332 What three forms of commercial interest in genetic engineering had emerged by the late 1970s?
p. 335 How did the media hype around genetic engineering change the way in which research breakthroughs were announced?
p. 337 What kind of political and economic changes in the late 1970s (especially in the U.S.) facilitated a 'gold rush' mentality about commercial genetic engineering? How did this alter the relationships between university life scientists and the private sector? To what growing industries was genetic engineering compared?
p. 343-45 Why did competition in genetic engineering intensify in the early 1980s?
p. 351 What happened to the hype around genetic engineering in the mid-1980s? What products had actually come to market and at what price?
p. 353 How did universities pick up on commercial interests in biotechnology?
p. 356-58 How did the commercialization of recombinant DNA affect biologists? the research ethos of molecular biology? the content of molecular biological research?
p. 360 What two conditions does Wright argue were critical for the commercialization of DNA technology?Hubbard and Wald, "The Eugenics of Normalcy"
p. 185 What problems and dangers do Wald and Hubbard see in claims about genes determining diseases and disorders? What do they see as the political valences of these new 'findings'?
p. 187 What sorts of social discrimination might result from the new human genetics?
p. 188-89 What do the authors object to in the 'geneticization' of homosexuality? How might the development of myriad tests for genes facilitate the invention of a new normalcy for every trait and metabolic function? Who stands to benefit from these new medical norms?Lewontin, "The Dream of the Human Genome"
p. 63 What does Lewontin contend is wrong with the claim that from its complete DNA sequence an organism could be ' computed'?
p.66 How does an appreciation of contextualism (as introduced in last week's lecture on molecular immunology) challenge a simple-minded interpretation of genetic determinism?
p. 67 Where have the most dramatic improvements in health due to medicine and science come from (in the alst two hundred years)?
p. 74 How do biologists' conflicts of interest play into the social and ethical problems being generated by the HGP?
p. 76 Why is the assumption that greater genetic knowledge will empower individuals too simplistic? How does genetic information complicate the relationship between employer and employee? between state and citizen?
