Biomedical Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
decreasing any genetic differences between groups and, second, increas-
ing the differences between individuals of the same population.
The medieval champion of individuality John Duns Scotus antici-
pated something of Cavalli-Sforza's insight into the significance of
individuality:
In the universe as a whole, order is mainly considered according to types or species
where their inequalities or differences pertain to order. According to Augustine,
however, in the
City of God
[bk. 19, chapter 13] “order is an arrangement of like
and unlike things whereby each of them is disposed in its proper place.” That is
why this Agent who primarily intended the order of the universe (as the principle
good, intrinsic to Himself) not only intended this inequality that is one require-
ment for order (among species) but also desired a parity of individuals (within the
same species), which is another accompaniment of order. And individuals are
intended in an unqualified sense by this First One insofar as he intended some-
thing other than himself not as an end, but as something oriented to that end.
Hence to communicate his goodness, as something befitting his beauty, he pro-
duces several in each species. And in those beings which are the highest and most
important, it is the individual that is primarily intended by God.
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Summation
This general orientation lays out some critical insights into our con-
siderations of human nature from the perspective of modern genetics.
We are a dynamic, evolving species with a common genetic as well as
geographic origin. We have a genome that is adaptive and responsive to
a variety of environments. Cavalli-Sforza neatly summarizes this:
“Anthropometric characteristics, including skin color, demonstrate the
selective effects of the different climates to which modern humans have
been exposed in the course of their migrations over the Earth's surface.
They vary especially with latitude. By contrast, genes are considerably
more useful as markers of human evolutionary history, especially migra-
tions. They vary more with longitude.”
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The differences between populations are skin deep and essentially
irrelevant socially or politically. Nevertheless, within the population of
humans as a whole, each individual presents with a unique genotype.
Even so-called identical twins have some genetic differences. Thus,
within an essentially genetically homologous group, the individual stands
out. As humans we therefore exist as individuals within a dynamic envi-
ronment, our physical evolution speeded up dramatically by culture.
What is a clear and significant factor in understanding human nature is
