As the technosciences, including genomics, develop into a global phenomenon, the question inevitably emerges whether and to what extent bioethics can and should become a globalised phenomenon as well. Could we somehow articulate a set of core principles or values that ought to be respected worldwide and that could serve as a universal guide or blueprint for bioethical regulations for embedding biotechnologies in various countries? This article considers one universal declaration, the UNESCO Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights ( 2005a (...) ). General criticisms made in a recent special issue of Developing World Bioethics are that the concepts used in the Declaration are too general and vague to generate real commitment; that the so-called universal values are not universal; and, that UNESCO should not be engaged in producing such declarations which are the domain of professional bioethicists. This article considers these and other criticisms in detail and presents an example of an event in which the Declaration was used: the request by the Republic of Sakha, in Siberia, for a UNESCO delegation to advise on the initiation of a bioethics programme. The Declaration was intended to provide an adequate “framework of principles and procedures to guide states in the formulation of their legislation, policies and other instruments in the field of bioethics” (article 2a). The Declaration was produced, and principles agreed upon, in an interactive and deliberative manner with world-wide expert participation. We argue that the key issue is not whether the general principles can be exported worldwide (in principle they can), but rather how processes of implementation and institutionalisation should take shape in different social and cultural contexts. In particular, broader publics are not routinely involved in bioethical debate and policy-making processes worldwide. (shrink)

Molecular genetic data have greatly improved our ability to test hypotheses about human evolution. During the past decade, a large amount of nuclear and mitochondrial data have been collected from diverse human populations. Taken together, these data indicate that modern humans are a relatively young species. African populations show the largest amount of genetic diversity, and they are the most genetically divergent population. Modern human populations expanded in size first on the African continent. These findings support a recent African origin (...) of modern humans, but this conclusion should be tempered by the possible effects of factors such as gene flow, population size differences, and natural selection. BioEssays 20:126–136, 1998. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (shrink)

This article integrates (1) research in the historical dynamics of state societies relating group solidarity and group expansion to cultural frontiers, (2) comparative research in anthropology relating matrilocality to a particular variety of internal politics and a particular form of warfare, and (3) interdisciplinary reconstructions of large-scale “demic expansions” and associated kinship systems in prehistory. The argument is that “metaethnic frontiers,” where very different cultures clash, are centers for the formation of larger, more enduring, and more militarily effective groups. In (...) small-scale non-state societies, the major path toward the formation of such groups is the establishment of cross-cutting ties among men. This often involves the adoption of matrilocal norms. The current distribution of matrilocality and matrilineality around the world may be partly a residue of major demic expansions in prehistory involving matrilocal tribes. This hypothesis is evaluated with a range of evidence, including information regarding the spread of two language families, Bantu and Austronesian. (shrink)

The Human Genome Project (HGP) represents a massive merging of science and technology in the name of all humanity. While the disease aspects of HGP-generated data have received the greatest publicity and are the strongest rationale for the project, it should be remembered that the HGP has, as its goal the sequencing of all 100,000 human genes and the accurate depiction of the ancestral and functional relationships among these genes. The HGP will thus be constructing the molecular taxonomic norm for (...) humanity. Currently the HGP genomic baseline is almost exclusively skewed toward North Atlantic European lineages through the extensive use of the Centre d’Études du Polymorphisme Humaine (CEPH) data set. More recently, the HGP has shifted to the use of volunteer donors since adequate informed consent had not been secured from the CEPH families. No evidence exists that either the CEPH families or the current volunteers are the most appropriate demographic or evolutionary lineages for the functional genomic studies that will guide production of new DNA based drugs, targeted therapeutics and gene-based diagnostics. The lack of scientific representativeness of the HGP is a serious impediment to its broad applicability. Yet this can be remedied, and five alternative sampling strategies are presented. In response to the current exclusionary design of the HGP, there is noteworthy caution and skepticism in the African American community concerning genetic studies. The Manifesto on Genomic Studies Among African Americans reflects both a desire to be systematically included in federally funded genomic studies and a desire to maintain some control over the interpretation and application of research results. Representative sampling in the HGP is seen as an international human rights issue with domestic ethical implications. (shrink)

Confusions about the place of race in medicine result in part from a failure to recognize the plurality of race concepts. Recognition that the ordinary concept of race is not identical to the racialist concept of race makes it possible to ask whether there might be a legitimate place for the deployment of concepts of race in medical contexts. Two technical race concepts are considered. The concept of social race is the concept of a social group that is taken to (...) be a racialist race. It is apt for use in examining and addressing the medical effects of discrimination. The populationist concept of race represents race as a kind of biological population. It makes it possible to frame the question whether biological race is a factor in disease susceptibility and drug responsiveness. It is apt for use in determining whether biological race is a medically significant category. (shrink)

We track and analyze the re-situation of scientific knowledge in the field of human population genomics ancestry studies. We understand re-situation as a process of accommodating the direct or indirect transfer of objects of knowledge from one site/situation to other sites/situations. Our take on the concept borrows from Mary S. Morgan’s work on facts traveling while expanding it to include other objects of knowledge such as models, data, software, findings, and visualizations. We structure a specific case study by tracking the (...) re-situation of these objects between three research projects studying human population diversity reported in three articles in Science, Genome Research and PLoS Genetics between 2002 and 2005. We characterize these three engagements as a unit of analysis, a “skirmish,” in order to compare: the divergence of interests in how life-scientists answer similar research questions and to track the challenging transformation of workflows in research laboratories as these scientific objects are re-situated individually or in bundles. Our analysis of the case study shows that an accurate understanding of re-situation requires tracking the whole bundle of objects in a project because they interact in particular key ways. The absence or dismissal of these interactions opens the door to unforeseen trade-offs, misunderstandings and misrepresentations about research design and workflow and what these say about the questions asked and the findings produced. (shrink)

A consensus view appears to prevail among academics from diverse disciplines that biological races do not exist, at least in humans, and that race -concepts and race -objects are socially constructed. The consensus view has been challenged recently by Robin O. Andreasen's cladistic account of biological race. This paper argues that from a scientific viewpoint there are methodological, empirical, and conceptual problems with Andreasen's position, and that from a philosophical perspective Andreasen's adherence to rigid dichotomies between science and society, facts (...) and values, nature and culture, and the biological and the social needs to be relinquished. DNA forensics is just one field of research that reveals how race remains both idea and object for human population biologists, an indication that it is premature to accept the existence of a no- race consensus across the disciplines. DNA forensics research also demonstrates ways in which race is reified by scientists by the representation of what is cultural or social as natural or biological, and of what is dynamic, relative, and continuous as static, absolute, and discrete. The philosophical analysis of foundational concepts of human population biology such as population, race, and ethnic group is best served by foregoing traditional objectivist approaches for a critical stance that recognises the inextricability of the biological and the social. Introduction Consensus view: biological races do not exist Andreasen's defence of the biological reality of races as clades Biological permutations of race Conclusion. (shrink)

This paper questions the prevailing historical understanding that scientific racism “retreated” in the 1950s when anthropology adopted the concepts and methods of population genetics and race was recognized to be a social construct and replaced by the concept of population. More accurately, a “populational” concept of race was substituted for a “typological one”—this is demonstrated by looking at the work of Theodosius Dobzhansky circa 1950. The potential for contemporary research in human population genetics to contribute to racism needs to be (...) considered with respect to the ability of the typological-population distinction to arbitrate boundaries between racist society and nonracist, even anti-racist, science. I point out some ethical limits of “population thinking” in doing so. (shrink)

At least below the level of species, biological populations are not mind‐independent objects that scientists discover. Rather, biological populations are pragmatically constructed as objects of investigation according to the aims, interests, and values that inform particular research contexts. The relations among organisms that are constitutive of population‐level phenomena (e.g., mating propensity, genealogy, and competition) occur as matters of degree and so give rise to statistically defined open‐ended biological systems. These systems are rendered discrete units to satisfy practical needs and theoretical (...) preferences associated with specific contexts of investigation. While it may be possible to defend a realist position regarding biological relations among organisms, biological populations are “made” when contextual features determine which kinds and degrees of relations to privilege over others, and so how to bound genes in space and time. Consequently, the objectivity of population‐based approaches to species genome diversity cannot rest in the mind‐independence of populations themselves. (shrink)

In popular articles that play down the genetical differences among human populations, it is often stated that about 85% of the total genetical variation is due to individual differences within populations and only 15% to differences between populations or ethnic groups. It has therefore been proposed that the division of Homo sapiens into these groups is not justified by the genetic data. This conclusion, due to R.C. Lewontin in 1972, is unwarranted because the argument ignores the fact that most of (...) the information that distinguishes populations is hidden in the correlation structure of the data and not simply in the variation of the individual factors. The underlying logic, which was discussed in the early years of the last century, is here discussed using a simple genetical example. (shrink)

In this paper I briefly introduce work on ancient-DNA and give some examples of the impact this work has had on responses to questions in archaeology. Next, I spell out David Reich’s reasons for his optimism about the contribution aDNA research makes to archaeology. I then use Robert Chapman and Alison Wylie’s framework to offer an alternative to Reich’s view of relations between aDNA research and archaeology. Finally, I develop Steven Mithen’s point about the different questions archaeologists and geneticists ask, (...) arguing that different disciplinary perspectives color researchers’ perceptions of “the most important questions” or the “central topics” in a field. I conclude that evidence from aDNA research cannot solve archaeological disputes without closer, mutually respectful collaboration between aDNA researchers and archaeologists. Ancient DNA data, like radiocarbon data, is not a silver bullet for problems in archaeology. (shrink)

The development of evolutionary approaches to psychology from Classical Ethology through Sociobiology to Evolutionary Psychology is outlined and the main tenets of today's Evolutionary Psychology briefly examined: the heuristic value of evolutionary thinking for psychology, the massive modularity thesis and the monomorphic mind thesis.

The use of socially learned information (culture) is central to human adaptations. We investigate the hypothesis that the process of cultural evolution has played an active, leading role in the evolution of genes. Culture normally evolves more rapidly than genes, creating novel environments that expose genes to new selective pressures. Many human genes that have been shown to be under recent or current selection are changing as a result of new environments created by cultural innovations. Some changed in response to (...) the development of agricultural subsistence systems in the Early and Middle Holocene. Alleles coding for adaptations to diets rich in plant starch (e.g., amylase copy number) and to epidemic diseases evolved as human populations expanded (e.g., sickle cell and G6PD defi- ciency alleles that provide protection against malaria). Large-scale scans using patterns of linkage disequilibrium to detect recent selection suggest that many more genes evolved in response to agriculture. Genetic change in response to the novel social environment of contemporary modern societies is also likely to be occurring. The functional effects of most of the alleles under selection during the last 10,000 years are currently unknown. Also unknown is the role of paleoenvironmental change in regulating the tempo of hominin evolution. Although the full extent of culture-driven gene-culture coevolution is thus far unknown for the deeper history of the human lineage, theory and some evidence suggest that such effects were profound. Genomic methods promise to have a major impact on our understanding of gene-culture coevolution over the span of hominin evolutionary history. (shrink)

The monograph is an English, expanded and revised version of the book Cheshko, V. T., Ivanitskaya, L.V., & Glazko, V.I. (2018). Anthropocene. Philosophy of Biotechnology. Moscow, Course. The manuscript was completed by me on November 15, 2019. It is a study devoted to the development of the concept of a stable evolutionary human strategy as a unique phenomenon of global evolution. The name “An Evolutionary Metaphysics (Cheshko, 2012; Glazko et al., 2016). With equal rights, this study could be entitled “Biotechnology (...) as a result and factor of the evolutionary processˮ. The choice in favor of used “The Evolutionary Metaphysics of Human Enhancement Technologiesˮ was made in accordance with the basic principle of modern post-academician and human-sized science, a classic example of which is biotechnology. The “Metaphysics of Evolution” and “Evolutionary Metaphysics” concepts are used in several ways in modern philosophical discourse. In any case, the values contain a logical or associative reference to the teleological nature of the evolutionary process (Hull, 1967, 1989; Apel, 1995; Faye, 2016; Dupre, 2017; Rose, 2018, etc). In our study, the “evolutionary metaphysics” serves to denote the thesis of the rationalization and technologization of global evolution and anthropogenesis, in particular. At the same time, the postulate of an open future remains relevant in relation to the results of the evolutionary process. The theory of evolution of complex, including the humans system and algorithm for its constructing are а synthesis of evolutionary epistemology, philosophical anthropology and concrete scientific empirical basis in modern science. ln other words, natural philosophy is regaining the status bar element theoretical science in the era of technology-driven evolution. The co-evolutionary concept of 3-modal stable evolutionary strategy of Homo sapiens is developed. The concept based оn the principle of evolutionary complementarity of anthropogenesis: value of evolutionary risk and evolutionary path of human evolution are defined bу descriptive (evolutionary efficiency) and creative-teleological (evolutionary correctness) parameters simultaneously, that cannot bе instrumental reduced to others ones. Resulting volume of both parameters define the vectors of blological, social, cultural and techno-rationalistic human evolution Ьу two gear mechanism genetic and cultural co-evolution and techno-humanitarian balance. The resultant each of them сап estimated Ьу the ratio of socio-psychological predispositions of humanization / dehumanization in mentality. Explanatory model and methodology of evaluation of creatively teleological evolutionary risk component of NBIC technological complex is proposed. Integral part of the model is evolutionary semantics (time-varying semantic code, the compliance of the blological, socio-cultural and techno-rationalist adaptive modules of human stable evolutionary strategy). It is seem necessary to make three clarifications. First, logical construct, “evolutionary metaphysics” contains an internal contradiction, because it unites two alternative explanatory models. “Metaphysics”, as a subject, implies deducibility of the process from the initial general abstract principle, and, consequently, the outcome of the development of the object is uniquely determined by the initial conditions. Predicate, “evolutionary”, means stochastic mechanism of realizing the same principle by memorizing and replicating random choices in all variants of the post-Darwin paradigm. In philosophy, random choice corresponds to the category of “free will” of a reasonable agent. In evolutionary theory, the same phenomenon is reflected in the concept of “covariant replication”. Authors will attempt to synthesize both of these models in a single transdisciplinary theoretical framework. Secondly, the interpretation of the term “evolutionary (adaptive) strategyˮ is different from the classical definition. The difference is that the adaptive strategy in this context is equivalent to the survival, i.e. it includes the adaptation to the environment and the transformation (construction) of the medium in accordance with the objectives of survival. To emphasize this difference authors used verbal construction “adaptiveˮ (rather than “evolutionaryˮ) strategy as more adequate. In all other cases, the two terms may be regarded as synonymous. Thirdly, the initial two essays of this series were published in one book in 2012. Their main goal was the development of the logically consistent methodological concept of stable adaptive (evolutionary) strategy of hominines and the argumentation of its heuristic possibilities as a transdisciplinary scientific paradigm of modern anthropology. The task was to demonstrate the possibilities of the SESH concept in describing and explaining the evolutionary prospects for the interaction of social organization and technology (techno-humanitarian balance) and the associated biological and cultural mechanisms of the genesis of religion (gene-cultural co-evolution). In other words, it was related to the sphere of cultural and philosophical anthropology, i.e. to the axiological component of any theoretical constructions describing the behavior of self-organizing systems with human participation. In contrast, the present work is an attempt to introduce this concept into the sphere of biological anthropology and, consequently, its main goal is to demonstrate the possibility of verification of its main provisions by means of procedures developed by natural science, i.e. refers to the descriptive component of the same theoretical constructions. The result of this in the future should be methods for assessing, calculating and predicting the risk of loss of biological and cultural identity of a person, associated with a permanent and continuously deepening process of development of science and technology. (shrink)

Summary: The evolution of complex societies began when agricultural subsistence systems raised human population densities to levels that would support large scale cooperation, and division of labor. All agricultural origins sequences postdate 11,500 years ago probably because late Pleistocene climates we extremely variable, dry, and the atmosphere was low in carbon dioxide. Under such conditions, agriculture was likely impossible. However, the tribal scale societies of the Pleistocene did acquire, by geneculture coevolution, tribal social instincts that simultaneously enable and constrain the (...) evolution of complex societies. Once agriculture became possible, a competitive ratchet drove further improvements in subsistence and in scale of social organization . Those societies that grew and became better organized were advantaged in individual wealth and economic and military power, and tended to conquer, absorb, or be imitated by smaller and less well organized societies. Internal competitors for power espousing useful social innovations could deliver improved returns when their quest was successful. Notwithstanding the ratchet, social complexity increased only slowly in the first half of the Holocene and even afterwards few periods except the past two centuries saw changes that were dramatic on the scale of individual lifetimes. We attempt a taxonomy of the processes that regulate rates of institutional evolution, cause reversals of complexity against the ratchet, and impose historical contingency on institutional evolution. (shrink)

Free enterprise economic systems evolved in the modern period as culturally transmitted values related to honesty, hard work, and education achievement emerged. One evolutionary puzzle is why most economies for the past 5,000 years have had a limited role for free enterprise given the spectacular success of modern free economies. Another is why if humans became biologically modern 50,000 years ago did it take until 11,000 years ago for agriculture, the economic foundation of states, to begin. Why didn’t free enterprise (...) evolve long ago and far away? (shrink)

The DSM-III, DSM-IV, DSM-IV-TR and ICD-10 have judiciously minimized discussion of etiologies to distance clinical psychiatry from Freudian psychoanalysis. With this goal mostly achieved, discussion of etiological factors should be reintroduced into the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition. A research agenda for the DSM-V advocated the "development of a pathophysiologically based classification system". The author critically reviews the neuroevolutionary literature on stress-induced and fear circuitry disorders and related amygdala-driven, species-atypical fear behaviors of clinical severity in adult (...) humans. Over 30 empirically testable/falsifiable predictions are presented. It is noted that in DSM-IV-TR and ICD-10, the classification of stress and fear circuitry disorders is neither mode-of-acquisition-based nor brain-evolution-based. For example, snake phobia and dog phobia are clustered together. Similarly, research on blood-injection-injury-type-specific phobia clusters two fears different in their innateness: 1) an arguably ontogenetic memory-trace-overconsolidation-based fear and 2) a hardwired fear of the sight of one's blood or a sharp object penetrating one's skin. Genetic architecture-charting of fear-circuitry-related traits has been challenging. Various, non-phenotype-based architectures can serve as targets for research. In this article, the author will propose one such alternative genetic architecture. This article was inspired by the following: A) Nesse's "Smoke-Detector Principle", B) the increasing suspicion that the "smooth" rather than "lumpy" distribution of complex psychiatric phenotypes may in some cases be accounted for by oligogenic transmission, and C) insights from the initial sequence of the chimpanzee genome and comparison with the human genome by the Chimpanzee Sequencing and Analysis Consortium published in late 2005. Neuroevolutionary insights relevant to fear circuitry symptoms that primarily emerge overconsolidationally are presented. Also introduced is a human-evolution-based principle for clustering innate fear traits. The "Neuroevolutionary Time-depth Principle" of innate fears proposed in this article may be useful in the development of a neuroevolution-based taxonomic re-clustering of stress-triggered and fear-circuitry disorders in DSM-V. Four broad clusters of evolved fear circuits are proposed based on their time-depths: 1) Mesozoic circuits hardwired by wild-type alleles driven to fixation by Mesozoic selective sweeps; 2) Cenozoic circuits relevant to many specific phobias; 3) mid Paleolithic and upper Paleolithic circuits ; 4) Neolithic circuits. More importantly, the author presents evolutionary perspectives on warzone-related PTSD, Combat-Stress Reaction, Combat-related Stress, Operational-Stress, and other deployment-stress-induced symptoms. The Neuroevolutionary Time-depth Principle presented in this article may help explain the dissimilar stress-resilience levels following different types of acute threat to survival of oneself or one's progency. PTSD rates following exposure to lethal inter-group violence are usually 5-10 times higher than rates following large-scale natural disasters such as forest fires, floods, hurricanes, volcanic eruptions, and earthquakes. The author predicts that both intentionally-caused large-scale bioevent-disasters, as well as natural bioevents such as SARS and avian flu pandemics will be an exception and are likely to be followed by PTSD rates approaching those that follow warzone exposure. During bioevents, Amygdala-driven and locus-coeruleus-driven epidemic pseudosomatic symptoms may be an order of magnitude more common than infection-caused cytokine-driven symptoms. Implications for the red cross and FEMA are discussed. It is also argued that hospital phobia as well as dog phobia, bird phobia and bat phobia require re-taxonomization in DSM-V in a new "overconsolidational disorders" category anchored around PTSD. The overconsolidational spectrum category may be conceptualized as straddling the fear circuitry spectrum disorders and the affective spectrum disorders categories, and may be a category for which Pitman's secondary prevention propranolol regimen may be specifically indicated as a "morning after pill" intervention. Predictions are presented regarding obsessive-compulsive disorder and "culture-bound" acute anxiety symptoms. Also discussed are insights relevant to pseudoneurological symptoms and to the forthcoming Dissociative-Conversive disorders category in DSM-V, including what the author terms fright-triggered acute pseudo-localized symptoms. Speculations based on studies of the human abnormal-spindle-like, microcephaly-associated gene, the microcephaly primary autosomal recessive gene, and the forkhead box p2 gene are made and incorporated into what is termed "The pre-FOXP2 Hypothesis of Blood-Injection-Injury Phobia." Finally, the author argues for a non-reductionistic fusion of "distal neurobiology" with clinical "proximal neurobiology," utilizing neurological heuristics. It is noted that the value of re-clustering fear traits based on behavioral ethology, human-phylogenomics-derived endophenotypes and on ontogenomics can be confirmed or disconfirmed using epidemiological or twin studies and psychiatric genomics. (shrink)

Two families of mathematical methods lie at the heart of investigating the hierarchical structure of genetic variation in Homo sapiens: /diversity partitioning/, which assesses genetic variation within and among pre-determined groups, and /clustering analysis/, which simultaneously produces clusters and assigns individuals to these “unsupervised” cluster classifications. While mathematically consistent, these two methodologies are understood by many to ground diametrically opposed claims about the reality of human races. Moreover, modeling results are sensitive to assumptions such as preexisting theoretical commitments to certain (...) linguistic, anthropological, and geographic human groups. Thus, models can be perniciously reified. That is, they can be conflated and confused with the world. This fact belies standard realist and antirealist interpretations of “race,” and supports a pluralist conventionalist interpretation. (shrink)