Themes in courses to understand

The Dutch have a millenium and a half experience in managing the flow of water to drain flooded land at the mouth of one of Europe's great river systems. In addition, canals, became active arteries of commerce in the Middle Ages -- much the same purpose they served in Tang and Song dynasty China where locks to control different water levels were perfected. Many historians agree that the control of water power since the ancient world was responsible for a revolution in technology during the 1000 to 1500 period in Asia and Europe.

Turning to biological sciences the theme of revolution is eviden in Darwin's story of natural selection is survival of the fittest. But on reflection he evokes, instead in me, a way of depicting nature that dwells on good luck, or:

Survival of the fortunate, which is a more sensible, defensible, and less uncertain interpretation of Darwin's descent by means of natural selection. That is because, unlike Darwin, given what we do know today of genetics, selection ecology and paleontology, some of the most "fit" or reproductively prodigious species have through no cause of their own perished. Fitness which suggests appropriate, favored, or secure in belonging, for Darwin meant the success a creature has in reproducing its own kind.

For example:

Frankenstein as the embodiment of good intentions gone horribly wrong is an important theme in modern society. This may be because of how in the story by Mary Shelley the use of knowledge about anatomy and electricity end result in producing an unanticipated outcome of creating a perfect person. Instead of beauty, grace and promise, the creature of Dr. Frankenstein's craft and learning ends up the more familiar monster, imperfect and a disgrace to its maker.

Some critics argue that since we live with countless unintended consequences of inventions such as dynamite, medical therapies, and missiles tipped with nuclear bombs, that the theme of benign intentions gone awry--embodied in the myth of Frankenstein as the new Prometheus (actually the revision of the Pygmalion and Galatea story)--is an important component of 21st century life.

Science discovers novelty and inventors then give us spectacular new products:

Quantum mechanics and relativity breakthroughs in understanding electromagnetism and atomic science gave us electronics, nuclear energy, satellite navigation and microwave ovens.

"Frankengenes" have become one hysterical reaction to the biological revolution called "genetic engineering," that has also swept up stem cell research into the fears the public expresses over radical new techniques in medicine, therapy and agricultural genetics.

The base sequences of DNA that code for proteins because of how the sequences are arranged on the double helix wrapped tightly within the chromosomes are called genes.

Writer, Mark Ridley, has called genes, "stories" because they convey information about life.

Perhaps genes are more properly seen as recipes, or scripts that must be brought to life, orchestrated, or "made" by some master. In the case of genes the master molecule is RNA.

These base pair sequences are the actual chemical components of what biologists call, the "particulate materiality" of the chemicals of life, or "genotype." Evelyn Fox Keller, in The Century of the Gene, refers to this physical and chemical manifestation of order as having less concreteness than the name gene implies. That is because chromosomes have a great many genes and not all chemical combinations on chromosomes are genes.

Clearly genes, or so Keller argues, are more than codes for making proteins. They are complex expressions (phenotype) of the underlying material processes and instructional guidelines mediated by proteins and RNA in the nuclei and cytoplasm of cells. Thus the closer we get to observing genes the less clearly they appear. For genes are not just pieces of a living puzzle, or parts of a blueprint.

"The Unseen Genome: Beyond DNA" genetic vs. epigenetic considerations are discussed here.
The Triple Helix
The Double Helix
Kaku, Visions

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