Self-study
P1
The French biologist Jean-Baptiste de Lamarck (1744–1829) outlined a theory of evolutionary change in 1809, 50 years before Darwin's . ██ ███ ██████ ██ ████████ █████████ █████ ████ ███ ████ █████████ ██████ ██ ████████ ██ █████ ███████████ ███ ████ ████ ██ ██ █████ █████████ ███ ███ ███████████████ ████ ████ █████████ ███
Lamarck's Theory of Evolution ·
Environmental adaptations could be inherited
Critique ·
Consensus view among scientists is that Lamarck is wrong
Steele ·
Claims to have evidence for Lamarckism
Steele claims to have found evidence for Lamarckian hereditary mechanism in the immune system. Not sure what this means but presumably the rest of the passage will flesh this out.
P2
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Phenomenon ·
Complexity of the immune system
How does our immune system work? If knowledge of how to defend against attacks are coded in the genes, how does it defend against a new disease, something it's never encountered before?
Partial Explanation ·
Some immune system cells mutate a lot
The immune system doesn't know. But "typo" mutations (when an error occurs when transcribing DNA into RNA) happen a lot which allows immune system to test different defenses.
P3
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Steele's Hypothesis ·
Supporting Lamarckism
Steele hypothesizes that the "typo" mutations that end up working gets coded back into the immune cell's DNA. Steele further hypothesizes that a virus then carries the altered immune cell DNA into the DNA of the reproductive cells. That's the mechanism by which an environmentally induced adaptation (in the immune cell) gets inherited.
P4
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Evidence ·
for Steele's Hypothesis?
Steele ·
Yes, circumstantial evidence
Steele claims that there's circumstantial evidence. Something about a pattern of mutations. Not sure what this means.
Other Biologists ·
No, there are simpler explanations for the "pattern of mutations"
Passage Style
Critique or debate
Phenomenon-hypothesis (RC)
22.
The passage most strongly suggests ████ ███ ██████ ███ █████ ███ ██ ███ █████████ █████████ ██████ ███ ██████ ████████ ██ ██████ ███ ███ ███████████
a
confidence in its █████
b
indignation at its ██████████ ████ █████████
There’s no evidence the author is critical because it’s different from Darwinism. The author doesn’t comment in a negative way on the fact that Steele’s hypothesis doesn’t align with Darwinism.
c
distrust of its ███████
There’s no evidence that author is distrustful because of the hypothesis’s novelty. There’s no indication the author thinks a new hypothesis is inherently suspicious. What the author cares about is the speculative nature of the hypothesis and its lack of convincing supporting evidence.
d
doubt concerning its ████████████
This best captures the author’s attitude as conveyed by
e
dismay at its ████ ██ █████
“Dismay” is too negative. The author doesn’t express distress or concern about a lack of rigor. Although the author does call the hypothesis “speculative,” she doesn’t suggest that she’s unhappy or disappointed because of its speculative nature.