IUBio

Is "Junk" DNA Used to Provide Genetic Memory

Rifle River jstream at girch1.med.uth.tmc.edu
Wed Apr 27 10:41:03 EST 1994


In article <MASTRD-250494002908 at 129.59.17.145>,
MASTRD at ctrvax.Vanderbilt.edu (Russell Mast) wrote:
> Just had to add one more thing.  When your dog spins in circles to mat down
> prarie grass, I really don't think s/he is "remembering" anything, nor
> would s/he think about grass, matting, or praries.  
> 
> Much more likely, it's just some strange obsession with the animal, some
> kind of drive, a discomfort that comes from not having spun around.  And
> that's pretty easy to enforce with non-junk DNA.  A lot of animals come
> with what are called 'motor programs', stereotyped sequences of actions
> that can be done as effortlessly as a single activity.  (Why do you suppose
> your arms swing when you walk, and why does their synchornoization with
> your legs change with your speed?)  Anyway, just hook up the motor program
> for sitting down with a specially-designed one about spinning around.  Make
> the pup feel funny for not doing one before the other with some
> limbic-extrapyramidal hookups, and, viola', you have a beast that is really
> uncomfortable about lying down without spinning in circles.  

Kudos to Russell for this explanation.

It seems that people are often ready to jump to conclusions without
evidence while ignoring evidence which offers a plausible explanation.

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