are we enslaved to our genes?

Sometimes it feels like some people think that our genes make up everything about us, that we cannot escape them and it is pointless to try.  I keep coming across things to do with this as part of my research – although I’m looking at how people think, learn and remember, I stray into behaviour and personality and get rather sidetracked by talk of genetics on occasion.

(I’m no scientist, but I’m more likely to pick up a copy of the New Scientist than I am Woman’s Weekly. I find the former fascinating…the latter less so.)

From what I’ve read it falls in line with my own muddled thoughts on the matter: that there is no nature versus nurture or one thing that determines us, rather our lives are chock full of influences and leanings – be they external or internal. 

In the words of Robin Barrow and Ronald Woods:

We are not determined by our genes; they are rather potentialities or tendencies that place limits on who we can become, but do not dictate specifics.¹

Yes, genes have power, but they are not all powerful.

In a magazine article looking at the relationship of genes to criminal punishment, Kevin Beaver says that

With criminal behaviour, or virtually any behaviour, genes are not fatalistic nor are they deterministic – they simply increase the odds of someone committing a criminal act.²

Long before we explored our genes we knew that we all had different problems, our own tendencies, our own weaknesses.  Does knowing there may be a genetic element to these mean that we should give up on ourselves?  Does knowing a possible reason mean we should not try and overcome it?  E.g. if, in a classic example, I have a tendency toward violent behaviour am I in someway not ‘responsible’ for what I do?  Do I have no power over myself at all?  Or, do I identify the things of tendency and potential within me and choose to nurture the good and overcome the harmful?

My genes influence, guide, attract.  But I refuse to accept them as my master.  Some would say I have little choice, but that is where we disagree the most.  I would say we always have choice.  Some choices will be harder than others.  But none the less, we have the capacity to make them, because I still believe we are more than the sum of our parts.

I should add that I mean this in a general sense.  I know that there are serious genetic conditions which do rob people of the power of choice, among other things. This is just rambling on a topic from a non expert who does not claim to be otherwise. 


¹ Robin Barrow and Ronald Woods, An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education, p23
² Kevin Beaver, Should your genes determine your punishment in court? BBC Focus Magazine, Issue 212, February 2010, p23 (again!)


Image from University of Sussex website

the happiness gene

Since I posted last month on the happiness movement and the idea of happiness as a decision, another article caught my eye yesterday. Apparently, they're saying there is a 'happiness gene', which explains

...why we each have a unique baseline level of happiness and why some people tend to be naturally happier than others, and that's in no small part due to our individual genetic make-up. - Source here

From my perspective, it seems that there so many factors to so many parts of life (do you know how many theories there are about CFS/ME? It can be very befuddling!). If there is a tendency for some to be 'happier' than others, how we do we balance this with human choice or indeed religious belief? Is 'joy' unhampered by such precise ideas of happiness?

And the big old question - how much are we enslaved to our genetic make up? Can we act against our genes? Should we bother?

Biblically speaking what we are "in the flesh" is countered by who we are in the Spirit - not meant to be controlled by our "natural" cravings (I use quotation marks because such concepts are hard to translate). If the Christian life goes against our instincts (to some degree), does it go against our genetics, too? Can we be set free from our genes?

Just random, uninformed musings...!

Image from the Press Association (see source article)