REAL GENES, REAL INTELLIGENCE 111that the properties of matter that created life might have, eventually,
created genes.
And how did genes eventually become established? Prob ably not at all
as the original recipes, designers, and controllers of life. Instead they
arose as templates for molecular components used repeatedly in the life
of the cell and the organism: a kind of fa cil i ty for just- in- time production
of parts needed on a recurring basis. Over time, of course, the role of
these parts themselves evolved to become key players in the metabolism
of the cell— but as part of a team, not as the boss.
Th is has been nicely described by physiologist Denis Noble: “Th e
modern synthesis has got causality in biology wrong. Genes, aft er all, if
they’re defi ned as DNA sequences, are purely passive. DNA on its own
does absolutely nothing until activated by the rest of the system through
transcription factors, markers of one kind or another, and interactions
with the proteins. So on its own, DNA is not a cause in an active sense.
I think it is better described as a passive data base which is used by the
organism to enable it to make the proteins that it requires.”^5
It is not surprising, then, that we fi nd that variation in form and func-
tion has, for most traits, only a tenuous relationship with variation in
genes. Th e rest of this chapter and much of those that follow explain why.
THE REAL ROOTS OF INTELLIGENCETh e role of genes is restricted in the sense just mentioned for a very impor-
tant reason. Th ey are not the creators of “all that we are,” because as
dumb templates, they can only code for the production of the same thing
all the time: the same protein; the same “cog” for the same machine,
doing the same thing ad infi nitum in a predictable environment.
Th at traditional view might be fi ne in stable environments, with recur-
ring, predictable, demands. But during the lifetime of most organisms,
most aspects of environments are rapidly changing, making changing
demands on the organism. Energy sources may start to fl uctuate, a new
predator appears, temperature variations become more extreme, and so
on, with diminishing predictability. Such conditions cannot be met
by the same recurring response from the same system (i.e., the genes). SoThis content downloaded from 139.184.14.159 on Tue, 17 Oct 2017 13:52:50 UTC