Introduction
We are very scientific folk. Since the Enlightenment, modern man has developed a sneer towards the fantastic and an impatience of superstition. Give us any phenomenon and we will interrogate it, test it, hypothesize about it, and freeze it in the carbonite of a materialistic universe. The parts that don’t fit in the paradigm are consigned to the outer isles of the Bell curve, while we make a cozy nest inside the comforting boundary of one standard deviation.
But then we find strange things that seem to defy explanation, which stretches the already bursting seam of credulity of our materialistic commitments. The study of genetics is one of those fields where it is getting harder to maintain a Darwinian structure. Stephen Meyer’s Signature in the Cell, Michael Behe’s The Edge of Evolution, and Doug Axe’s Unbelievable are several of many recent books that have peed in the Cheerios of those old crustaceans still hanging onto the Old Ways of materialism. The great discovery of genetics is not one of biology or chemistry, but of a third fundamental reality of existence: Information.
The human genome is nothing but highly concentrated and pristine information. And the more we read that living tome, the more nuanced and intricate the information gets, and the more it begins to resemble computer programming. Or rather, the more our computer programming is revealed to resemble DNA.
Genetics Primer
The genetic code (DNA) consists of billions of nucleotide base pairs – think of these like letters in the alphabet, except there are only 4 base pairs instead of the 26 in the English alphabet. These base pairs are organized into certain sequences called genes, which can be made of up several hundred to several million “letters” long. Genes are recipes for manufacturing specific proteins. It is estimated that the human genome consists of 20,000-25,000 genes. As you can imagine, this can look like one long run-on sentence. To keep everything nice and tight, DNA has a couple tricks to be efficient and save space. Histones are structures DNA wraps itself around to keep from getting tangled and save space. You do the same thing when you wrap up a garden hose or extension cord on a storage reel. These DNA-wrapped histones are then further bound up tightly into larger structures called chromosomes. You have 46 chromosomes in each and every one of your pretty little cells (except your balls and ovaries, which have 23 each, but that’s a whole other thing).
DNA is 99.9% the same for all humans, the physiological differences like skin color, and inner workings like metabolic rate, are represented in only 0.1% of its entirety. Our genotype is our entire genetic code, and the phenotype refers to the observable differences in our physiology and anatomy. At conception, we receive half of our DNA from our father and half from our mother, which provides a nice mix of both while still spicing things up with peculiar hairlines and half-thumbs of second-degree relatives buried deeper in the code, that like to skip a generation or two.
Certain conditions can also be passed onto offspring because of previous genetic mutations in the parents. Familial Adenomatous Polyposis, for example, can cause cancerous polyps to develop in the descending colon, not altogether uncommon in the elderly, but highly abnormal in the teens, which is when this genetic time bomb starts ticking. A host of other genetic conditions can plague a genome, but thankfully range from uncommon to extremely rare.
If compiled into books, the genome would fill 6,500 copies of Tolstoy’s War and Peace, which was painful enough to read once. It used to be thought that up to 85% of DNA (equivalent to 5,525 of the books) was “junk” – vestigial remnants of viral fragments, duplicated genes, and other accumulated hodgepodge. Kind of like when you peruse the bookshelves at Goodwill and see multiple copies of The da Vinci Code and The Secret, unread and taking up space. However, the more we understood that maybe there wasn’t all that much junk DNA after all. Hidden in the rubble of this junk code was the control panel for gene activation. The name given to this (probably very large) portion of the DNA is epigenetics.
Epi- means “above” and is called such because this set of activation codes presides over the mechanical portions of DNA that actually code for a protein. This information acts as instructions for the genome. Think of a car. Alone, the car is non-functional, even if it is perfectly assembled. At some point, the car needs to be activated in a specific series of steps, at the right times, in order for the car to function. Having all the pistons and cylinders and spark plugs in place won’t last too long without the timing mechanisms that give the spark and fire the rhythm needed to fire efficiently and properly. This is what epigenetics does in the human genome, it is the instruction manual for what genes to activate and when.
A clear example of epigenetic changes at work is a cell differentiating into a particular type of cell. The first cells made after conception are called pluripotent cells – literally “many abilities.” These cells will eventually become the cells specific to kidney, heart, gastro, neuro, etc. Since all of these cells have the same DNA, it is the epigenetic direction that activates particular genes guiding them towards their end goal of becoming, say, a gut cell that carries out gutty processes using only the specific genes in the genome that code for gut proteins. Same for all the other organs. These epigenetic changes happen by altering the physical structure of the DNA (uncoiling the DNA around certain histones and snapping on a methyl group, for example). As I say, this happens naturally all the time. It can also happen “abnormally” when a particular gene wasn’t meant to be expressed or repressed but does so in response to external stimuli. An easy example of this is carcinogens in a cigarette which can throw a monkey wrench into your lung cells and cause an epigenetic change.
Apart from mutational anomalies, epigenetic influences can nudge brain development in certain directions. Neuroplasticity is at its highest in infancy and early childhood. External circumstances and relationships can have positive or negative effects on how the brain folds itself, and these are also considered epigenetic changes. A neglected child is prone to exhibit certain predictable behaviors such as being anxious, dependent, or clingy, which may result in generalized anxiety disorder, codependency, or phobias. These have observable and measurable neurotransmitter abnormalities and altered brain function, as the brain prunes unused neural pathways and strengthens others frequently accessed. The base genetic code remains unaltered in these traumatic childhood events, but the epigenetic expression of certain genes can change drastically.
It stands to reason that even though we have found this exceptional new meta-order in the human genome, it still is a closed system, functioning in clockwork form. Of course, we have obvious examples of how external forces can cause genetic mutation (ie: smoking), but these mutations are limited to the particular organism who smoked a pack a day of unfiltered Marboros. A woman’s lung cancer would not cause a spontaneous lung tumor in her child. Your decisions, your mutations, your problem.
But there are some very interesting circumstances where physical external circumstances can cause an epigenetic expression in an individual, activating genes in them, which are then passed on in activated form to the next generation.
Of Mice and Rats
Scientists took two mice, one had a particular “fat” gene inhibited in one and expressed in the other. As you would assume, the mouse with the fat gene expression got porky and the other was trim as a mountain shrew. They then activated the fat gene in the skinny mouse and, predictably, it got pudgy. When this mouse had pups, they inherited the activated fat gene and they all were fat. Since the original fat gene of the mommy mouse’s inherited genotype was deactivated, and only activated when it was an adult, it was thought that the next generation would only be able to inherit the original fat gene in its deactivated form. Epigenetic changes that the mouse incurred as an adult were passed on to its offspring, not according to the base genotype, but in the activated or inactivated status they are in when the mouse is impregnated.
Two rats, one anxious and the other bold (I don’t know how they assigned these character traits to rats, but just go with it, it’s science). When these rats gave birth, the bold one would lick its young, all of which then grew up to be bold little rats who licked their own young when they were born. Licking babies is a sign of boldness in rats, but not in adult men; the moms get very angry. The anxious rat did not lick its babies, and this pattern of anxiety and neglect was passed on to its children, who grew up to be anxious, non-licking adults themselves. In the next litter, scientists swapped the anxious rat babies with bold rat babies. The bold rat mom licked the anxious babies, who then grew up to be bold, and subsequently licked their offspring. Vise versa for the bold rat babies, they were left unlicked and became anxious and yadi yadi yada, you get the idea.
This generational rat behavior is more than the rat remembering what it was like to grow up in a stable family filled with warm licks and wanting the same for its kids. They don’t work that way. Genetically, the rats had not changed. There were no mutations that had occurred on the level of nucleotide base pairs. But what had changed was the epigenetic expression of certain genes. I have linked the study below so you can read the technicalities if you are so inclined.
Stretching the Implications
It seems reasonable to conclude that if this mid-life epigenetic change can radically alter the gene expression of a mouse, it can happen in humans and that this change can also be passed on to our offspring. Could this apply to extremely good or traumatic experiences? Could emotional abuse activate a gene for addiction that otherwise would be silent? Might sexual abuse inhibit a “skinny gene”? Based on the current research, it seems that this may be the case.
And if we know these epigenetic changes remain activated or deactivated generationally, might the child inherit an activated gene for addiction which would otherwise be deactivated but for the traumatic experience of the mother? Or to take the lighter side, could reconciliation of relationship and catharsis cause an epigenetic change that would decrease serotonin uptake, alleviating depression or chronic pain?
Epigenetic changes have physical manifestations. Depression is largely believed to be a malfunction of serotonin production or altered function in some way. That means these epigenetic changes cause neurochemicals to be produced in fewer quantities or some other antagonistic process that messes with them in some way. Or to put it more technically, the epigenetic change has a phenotypic manifestation – something that can be seen, measured, detected, observed.
The Tongue Bridge
One possible means of effecting these changes is through our words. The Bible describes some incredible power to the tongue.
Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and those who love it will eat its fruits.
Proverbs 18:21
Life and death. Could the stakes be higher?
Obviously, words can cause spiritual harm, broken relationships and emotional turmoil which could then present in physical problems. We have consigned the source of these physical manifestations from trauma to the realm of the mental: that metaphysical place where the beliefs and emotions dance around the fire with Jungian archetypes and Freudian complexes. Bad words cause mental anguish which then has some clear effect we can see or assess, and that’s as far as we can get.
But what if these words also have a tangible, physical effect on a person, altering their gene expression, presenting phenotypically, changing their lives visibly, with the potential of passing these changes onto the lives of their children? Might we call them Blessings and Curses?
What if blessings and curses are real in a way that is scary. What if our tongue really does carry the power of life and death, not in some intangible mental or spiritual way alone, but by reprogramming the epigenetics, altering actual protein expression on the genetic level, and causing real time change that can be measured? I’m not talking about using the killing curse on Professor Snape or sending positive words out to the Universe for a sign, but a much deeper, more profound, genealogical blessing or curse which can come from our mouths. Would we talk to our kids differently? Would we encourage others with more frequency? A kind word could cure; a harsh word, dismantling.
A Christian needs to see these boundaries between the physical, spiritual and mental as semi permeable membranes and not fixed categories. The further we get into many of these studies, the more information seems to be taking on a epi-functional role providing the direction for all things in the universe, great and small. If all information in the human experience comes from a mind, then it is not great leap to see the Mind behind genetic information. At that point, the connection between the physical and spiritual becomes less fringe, the power of the tongue more plausible, downright self-evident.
References
Gershon, Naomi B., and Pamela C. High. “Epigenetics and Child Abuse: Modern-Day Darwinism – the Miraculous Ability of the Human Genome to Adapt, and Then Adapt Again.” American Journal of Medical Genetics Part C: Seminars in Medical Genetics, vol. 169, no. 4, 2015, pp. 353–360., https://doi.org/10.1002/ajmg.c.31467.
Thought Butter 