Must Introductory Genetics Start with Mendel? (original) (raw)
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Mendel, Darwin, and Lysenko: the battle toward understanding genetics
Open Access Government
Mendel, Darwin, and Lysenko: the battle toward understanding genetics August 1948 saw the Soviet government ban all teaching and research in genetics. Within a year, “the doctrine of agronomist Trofim Lysenko – dubbed ‘Soviet Creative Darwinism’ – replaced genetics in curricula and research plans of biological, medical, veterinary, and agricultural institutions.” (Krementsov 2010). Here, Ute Deichmann on the occasion of Gregor Mendel’s 200th birthday in 2022, commemorates his great achievements as a pioneer of genetics as well as the strongest attack on the gene concept in the history of science, launched in the Soviet Union under Stalin.
MENDEL IN GENETICS TEACHING: SOME CONTRIBUTIONS FROM HISTORY OF SCIENCE AND ARTICLES FOR TEACHERS
School science descriptions about Mendel and his story are problematic because several statements that are controversial among historians of science are repeated over and over again as if they were established facts. Another problem is the neglect of other scientists working on inheritance in the second half of the 19th century, including Darwin, Spencer, Galton, Nägeli, Brooks, Weismann and de Vries, who paved the way for the reinterpretation of Mendel’s work in 1900. These problems are often found in textbooks and are likely to be present in school science throughout the world. Here, we discuss the contributions that history of science and papers published in journals that target teachers may bring to improve how school science deals with Mendel and his contributions. Evidently the idea is not that school teachers could solve problems still under discussion in the historical literature. The point is, rather, that it is important to avoid treating Mendel’s contributions as uncontroversial, mentioning, for instance, that there are ongoing debates on whether he proposed the laws named after him, appealing to invisible factors underlying phenotypic traits that are seen as the heritable potentials for those traits, and would in due time be known as genes. History of science can contribute to put the mythic Mendel into question in the science classroom, bringing school science closer to the controversies around the interpretation of his work.
This paper addresses the teaching of advanced high school courses or undergraduate courses for non-biology majors about genetics or history of genetics. It will probably be difficult to take the approach described here in a high school science course, although the general approach could help improve such courses. It would be ideal for a college course in history of genetics or a course designed to teach non-science majors how science works or the rudiments of the genetics in a way that will help them as citizens. The approach aims to teach the processes of discovery, correction, and validation by utilizing illustrative episodes from the history of genetics. The episodes are treated in way that should foster understanding of basic questions about genes, the sorts of techniques used to answer questions about the constitution and structure of genes, how they function, and what they determine, and some of the major biological disagreements that arose in dealing with these questions. The material covered here could be connected to social and political issues raised by genetics, but these connections are not surveyed here. As it is, to cover this much territory, the article is limited to four major episodes from Mendel's paper to the beginning of World War II.
A brief history of genetics: Chronology, concepts, and themes
2021
The history of genetics, since its origin, has transcended the scientific dimension, interweaving social, cultural, and political contexts. This brief contribution aims both to offer a chronological overview of scientific achievements in the field of genetics, starting from the pivotal work of Mendel and Darwin, and to outline concepts and themes that have emerged over time. It will show how the history of genetics allows us to reflect on some peculiar dynamics of the history of scientific thought, such as the evolution of scientists’ image, its relationship with society, the birth of new forms of cooperation (from the small lab to Big Science), and a constant, intense dialogue among the different social actors. All these elements still strongly characterize genetics today and investigating their historical roots will help us understand their nature and raison d'etre .
Traits, genes, particles and information: re-visiting students' understandings of genetics
International Journal of Science Education - INT J SCI EDUC, 2004
Findings from a study of 10 German students aged 15–19, using problem‐centred interviews, suggest that many students hold an ‘everyday’ conception of genes as small, trait‐bearing, particles. Analysis of this notion identified a number of ways in which such a view might restrict the ability of students to develop an understanding of the scientific explanation. For example, if genes are equated with trait there is no clear distinction between genotype and phenotype, and hence little need to consider a mechanism by which a gene could be expressed in the phenotype. This everyday perspective provided a plausible explanation of the difficulties and misconceptions found, after formal teaching of genetics, in a survey of 482 English students aged 14–16 based on written questions and interviews. Drawing on this analysis, an approach to teaching genetics and inheritance that takes account of students' everyday views is suggested.
Darwin and Mendel: evolution and genetics
Many studies have shown that students' understanding of evolution is low and some sort of historical approach would be necessary in order to allow students to understand the theory of evolution. It is common to present Mendelian genetics to high school students prior to Biological Evolution, having in mind historical and epistemological assumptions regarding connections between the works of Gregor Mendel and Charles Darwin. It is often said that Darwin 'lacked' a theory of heredity and, therefore, he had not been able to produce the synthetic theory of evolution himself. Thus, schools could provide a prior basis for heredity, so that students could begin to study evolution with a proper background in genetics. We intend to review some research on the history of biology, attempting to show that, even if Darwin had had notice of Mendel's works – which we think he did – he would not have changed his views on heredity. We examine this belief and its possible origins, offer some considerations about Darwin's views on heredity, including his knowledge of the 3:1 ratio, the consequences for the work on Nature of Science (NOS), and finally give five reasons to consider alternative possibilities for curriculum development.