Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id XAA05851 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Sun, 23 Jan 2000 23:41:09 GMT To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Date: Sun, 23 Jan 2000 15:40:30 -0800 From: "Scott Chase" <hemidactylus@my-Deja.com> Message-ID: <HGDDOJMGJKJFGBAA@my-deja.com> X-Sent-Mail: off X-Mailer: MailCity Service Subject: more on morphogenetic fields X-Sender-Ip: 209.240.200.77 Organization: My Deja Email (http://www.my-deja.com:80) Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Language: en Content-Length: 3102 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
I've been on the memory tangent lately (Daniel Schacter, Karl Lashley, JZ Young, and Richard Semon) so I've not devoted much time to learning about the fields (I kinda feel like a shallow jack of all trades- spread really thin). Here's a good, concise description of the morphogenetic fields in a recent developmental biology text though to add a little more clarity to this topic. From Werner A Muller's _Developmental Biology_ (1997. Springer. New York, p. 183):
(bq) "A morphogenetic field is an area whose cells can cooperatively bring about a distinct structure or set of structures. Another way to define a morphogenetic field is as an area in which signal substances- "inducer," "morphogen," or "factor"- become effective and contribute to the subdivision of the field into subregions. An example of a morphogenetic field is the circular area in the trunk wall from which the forelimb originates. The area is subdivided into concentric rings, an outer ring destined to become the shoulder girdle, and an inner area destined to become the free limb. A secondary morphogenetic field in the limb is the hand field, which subdivides itself into the palm and the fingers." (eq)
On the next page Muller lays out some pattern formation models including one based on positional information (ala Lewis Wolpert whose name I may have botched earlier) and some reaction-diffusion models (a section including names like Turing and Prigogine).
Brian Goodwin may be of interest (though not what one would call a gene-centrist). See:
Goodwin B. 1995. How the Leopard Changed its Spots: the Evolution of Complexity. Scribners. New York
Goodwin B. 1982. Development and evolution. Journal of Theoretical Biology (97): 43-55
A passage I had in mind in an earlier post comes from John Gerhart and Marc Kirschner's _Cells, Embryos, and Evolution_ (1997. Blackwell Science, Malden, Massachusetts, p. 240):
(bq) "In the embryo, a group of contiguous cells expressing a shared set of selector genes is called an *equivalence group* (or polyclone, or competence group, or morphogenetic field, depending on the embryologist), referring to the sameness of the cells' capacity for subsequent development, a capacity that differs between neighboring groups." (eq)
This is IMO an excellent (but VERY difficult) book for anyone serious about evolutionary biology. It's got me tearing some clumps of hair out late at night.
I have been inspired though. I just acquired Rupert Sheldrake's _The Presence of the Past_ as the second installment after _A New Science of Life_ to chase down the roots of this meme of morphic resonance (not much unlike chasing my tail probably). One of Sheldrake's latest interests from what I gather is psychic pets.
The reason I try to drive this home so to speak is that I've noticed morphogenetic fields being attributed to Sheldrake which is almost as disturbing as hearing engrams (ala Semon and Lashley) being attributed to (OK I won't go there ;-))...
Scott
--== Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/ ==--
Share what you know. Learn what you don't.
===============================================================
This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Sun Jan 23 2000 - 23:41:10 GMT