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Guilford Press

Lysenko and GeneticsAuthor(s): J. B. S. HaldaneReviewed work(s):Source: Science & Society, Vol. 4, No. 4 (Fall, 1940), pp. 433-437Published by: Guilford PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40399357 .

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LYSENKO AND GENETICS

Lysenko's ontributionrinted n the summernumberof scienceand societywillcertainlygiveoccasion o theenemyoblaspheme."have ittledoubtthathe has gonetoo far n somedirections,ut it is*importantoseewhat here s ofvalue nhis criticismforthodoxenetics.

He begins yattackinghetheory, hich ppears obe taughtn theSovietUnion, hat ncea pure ine s established,elections useless. his

theoryssimply

alse,forthefollowing

eason.Apure

lineoriginallyconsistsfindividualsll ofwhich rehomozygousnd geneticallylike.

But in course ftime hisceases o be the case as a result fmutation,and also in the case of an allopolyploiduchas wheat, f crossingverbetween hromosomeshichdo notnormallyross ver. Hence a purelinegraduallyreaks p into other pproximatelyure ines.

Someofthesewillbe worse rom n economic ointofviewthantheoriginaline. But some t anyrateare betterdapted o local conditionsthantheir ncestors. enceLysenkos quiterightn stressinghe mpor-tanceof selectingelite strains f seed"from o-called urelines. Any

readerwho supposes hat am taking his ine becauseLysenko s aCommunist ight o worse hanreada paperwhich publishedn theJournal fGenetics or1936, ntitled The Amount fHeterozygosisoBe Expectedn anApproximatelyureLine."

His nextpoint, he breadth f the zoneof isolationneededfordif-ferentrops, asnothingo do withMendelism s such. have ofcourseno meansof judgingwho is right n thiscontroversy,ut I should be

preparedobetonLysenko'seing ubstantiallyorrect.Then wecome othequestion fthethree-to-oneatio,which ysenko

sayss a

statistical,ot a

biological egularity.confess hat am not

quiteclearwhathe meansn this ase,perhaps ecausehisspeech as beensummarized.here three-to-oneatio sexpectedccordingo the awsofformal enetics,t is very arely btainedwithcomplete ccuracy. he

433

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434 SCIENCE ANDSOCIETY

deviations rom t aredue to twocauses.First fall, we havedeviationsdue to chance.Thus ifwe expect 0 hairy nd tensmooth lantswe are

quitelikely o get33 and sevenor 27 and 13.And thisfact s ofgreatbiologicalmportance.fplants ranimalswere lways roducednexactlyMendelian atios herewouldbe a perpetualquilibriumnhybridopu-lations.These deviations,o far as they re random, re partly ue tosampling,artly o linkage f thegenestudiedwithothergenes n thesamechromosomeffectingiability r fertility.wingto these hance

deviations,ne typeor anotherwill ultimatelyisappear rom smallpopulation,nd it will becomehomogeneous.ewallWright fChicagohas studied hiseffectn greatdetail.Second,when argenumbersregrown, deviation rom he three-to-oneatio s usuallyfound, ecauseone type s fitterhantheother.One of the argestistsof suchdevia-tionsn anyplantwaspublished ydeWinton ndmyself.1f therewereno systematiceviationsfthiskind therewould be no natural electionbasedon survival f thefittest,ven f therewerereproductiveelectionbased on differencesf fertility.hus systematiceviations rom hethree-to-oneatio rea fact f extremeiologicalmportance.

His nextpoint, he mportancef selectionn theFlfor first ybridgeneration,s correctf thehybridsre not between ure ines.As wesaw,pure ines reidealswhich rerarelyuiterealized,nd agriculturalvarietiesmaybe very arfrom ure ines.

Nextwe havethequestion f food. think hatninetimes utoften

Lysenkos wrong, hat s to say thatyou cannot mprove breedofanimalsby improvingts food.But there re caseswherethis s pos-sible, nd theymaybe common nough o makeLysenko's rinciple fgreatpractical alue.The clearest f suchcaseswas discoveredt Bar

Harbor,Maine,byLittle'sgroupof workersn mousegeneticsnd hasbeenspeciallytudied yBittner.Formanyyears hey adkeptdifferent

pure inesofmice.Each linehad a characteristiciability o mammarycancer n females.n one line90 percentof all females ho did notdieofsomeother ause before heage oftwoyearswoulddevelop hisdis-ease, n anotherineonly5 percent. The membersfthe mmune inewereno more ikely odevelop t iftheywere agedformonths ith he

susceptibleine. The liabilityeemed o be hereditary.ut it turned utthat ftheyoung fthe usceptibleinewere eparatedromheirmothersat birth ndsuckled y mmune emalesheyweremuch ess ikely obe-

come ancerous. nd thispartialmmunityshanded n to their hildren.Nothing f thekindhas beendiscoveredor otherforms f cancer.

^D. de Winton ndJ.B. S. Haldane,Journal fGenetics, xiv,p. 1.

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COMMUNICATIONS 435

And I believe t to be a rarerphenomenonhanLysenkoupposes. utit is futile o deny tsexistence nd to regard ysenko'sssertionf itspossibilitys inanywayunscientific.

Nowfollowshequestion fgrafting. ysenko ersonallyouches orfour aseswhere omatoes avebeenaltered ygrafting. omatoes elongtotheSolanaceae,whichhave ongbeen known obe particularlyuscep-tible to virusdiseases. These diseases an be transmitted,mongothermethods,ygrafting. ater esearch asshownhat esides isease-produc-

ingviruses,t is possible o transmitiruseswhichhaveno obvious ffecton theplant,but immunizet to one or moreof the diseaseproducers.Someofthese irusesre known obe heavy roteins hich eproduceorarereproduced) ithinheplant ells. Lysenkolaims ohave vidence ftransmissiblegentswhich lter he hapeof thefruit. t seems uitepos-siblethat herange ftransmissiblegentstretchesromhosewhich ro-duceobviously athologicalffectsuchas yellowpatches n the eaves,tootherswhich roducemorphologicalffectsike those fgenes. DanielandDangeardn Francehavereportedimilar esultsn Compositaeuchas theJerusalemrtichoke.

On the otherhand, don'tagreewithLysenkon believinghatMi-churin avea white-fruitedherryed fruit y graftingt. There is avastamount f practical xperiencen graftingherries,pples,plums,roses,nd othermembersftheRosaceae, ndnorecordedaseofa perma-nent olor hange.Michurin'slaims ohave ucceeded ith ybridizationswhich therwiseailed,s a result fgrafting,reonquitea differentoot-ing. Theymayormaynotbe confirmedyworkersn other ountries.Butso littlesknown boutthe onditionsor uccessfulybridizationhatthey o notseemto be a priori mprobable.And in view of thegreat

valueofLysenko'sechniquefvernalization,hich as been mply rovednotonlyn theSovietUnionbut all over hecivilizedworld, shouldper-sonally e surprisedfhis statementsn resultsbtained yhimwerenotlargelyorrect.

But scientificioneers re not infallible.Pasteurdid moreforthetheorynd practice ffermentationhananyotherman. Yet he madesomebigmistakes.Havingdiscoveredhat heusualagents ffermenta-tion, uchas yeastsnd bacteria,werealive,he denied thepossibilityffermentationynonlivingubstances.Yet today housandsf different

enzymesre known, bout twenty ave evenbeen crystallizedy Sum-

ner,Northrop,ndothers,mostlyn theU.S.A. In the amewayLysenko,who srightn pointingutthat hemajorityf charactershowingMen-delianinheritancere of littleeconomicmportance,s quite wrongn

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436 SCIENCE ANDSOCIETY

supposinghatnoneofthemre.I take simple xample rom ritishgriculturalractice.Two dom-

inant ex-linkedenes, or arred eathersnd for ilver s opposed ogoldfeathers,howup in newly atched hicks. Thus bya suitable ross, orexample f a LightSussexhenand a RhodeIsland Red rooster, e cangetchickens hose exes anbe separatedt onceandgiven ifferentood.So longas tenyears go a singleBritish irm asraising 00,000 hicksyear romuch rosses.This wasdonewith everelyracticalmotives,ndnotto confute

ysenko. f his authorityreventsimilar racticen the

SovietUnionhe willbe doing disserviceo socialism.In the ameway, amsurethathegoesmuch oo far nhisattack n

the hromosomeheory.His statementhat anyhereditaryropertiesanbe transmittedrom ne breedto another venwithout heimmediatetransmissionf chromosomes"s, in myopinion, bsolutely alse, ndI think hat nyonewithpractical xperiencefgraftingoses r appleswouldagreewithme. But it is equallyfalseto saythatno hereditarypropertiesan be so transmitted. he correcttatements as above,but

substitutingsome" or any."

In thesameway Lysenkowaswrongfhe referredo the theoriesfcurrentenetics,uch s the three-to-oneatio nd the ike, s "fantasies."Theyarenotfantasies,utapproximations. opernicus'sheoryhat he

planetswentroundthesun in circleswas an approximation.Kepler'stheoryhat heymovednellipseswasa betterpproximation. he New-

ton-Laplaceheory asyet betterpproximation,ut t wasstillundia-lectical,s it did not allowfor nyrealhistoryfthe solar ystemn thesense f rreversiblehange. Then Kant andGeorgeDarwin howed hatthesolarsystemadundergonend wouldundergo lowand irreversible

changes hroughidalfriction,ithnotonlythe moonbut most f theplanetsmovingn slowlywidening rbits. Variousdevelopmentsf thetheoryfrelativityuggestther lowchanges.

AlthoughheCopernicannd Newtonianystemserenadequate,heyweregreat dvances n the ystemsfPtolemy, idinnu,ndother arlierastronomers. ndI think osterityillrankMendelwithCopernicusr

Kepler, hough ardlywithNewton.It mustnotbe supposed hatLysenkotands lonein hiscriticismf

formal eneticsnd his belief hatbreeds an be altered yfeeding. omeof his views re shared, orexample, yJ. L. Hammond f Cambridge,

England. I think hathe hasgonetoofar, uthemaywellhavedoneaservice o Sovietgenetics ymakinghis moretraditionally inded ol-

leagues xamine otonly hetheoreticaloundationsf theirwork, ut tsrelation o agriculturalractice.

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COMMUNICATIONS 437

In thesamenumber f science and societyPolyakov riticizesmymathematical ork. Probablyhis criticism efersmainly o that sum-marizedn The Causes fEvolutionn 1930. He says hat t includesnoconsiderationf real biological nterrelations." his is largely rue,be-cause mathematicalreatmentf even he implestvolutionaryroblemsis difficult. ne mustbeginwithproblemss abstracts themotion ftwoperfectlylastic illiard alls on a frictionlessable. I had tobegin,justas mathematicalhysicistsad tobegin, y eaving ut factorsfgreat

practicalmportance.Wright, isher,nd others avegreatlymprovedmywork ymakingtmore oncrete.But have also donesomyself.Forexample,ifteenears go calculatedhe quilibrium hichhould

resultwhen he amegenewasconstantlyeingproduced ymutationnd

destroyedynatural election.The idea ofan equilibrium asundialec-tical, ikeCopernicus'sdea ofplanetary otionn perfectnd invariablecircles.But tgaveresultsf theright rder fmagnitude.ThenFisher

pointed utthatn this aseselectionfmodifyingeneswouldcause low

evolutionaryhangesn the pparentquilibrium.Later dealtwith real

biologicalnterrelations"nd showed hat n civilized umanpopulations

therelaxationf inbreedingn recent enturies ad probably ausedasharp ecreasen thefrequencyfrecessivebnormalitiesuch s amaurot-ic idiocy,lbinism,nd sometypes fblindness. n fact hemotor us,

bybreakingp inbred illage ommunities,asa powerfulugenic gent.Here, f amcorrect,amgettingown o"realbiologicalnterrelations."If I were Newton r a Maxwell, might avegotto thispoint n one

step. I mightvenhavedoneso had I beena Marxist ifteenears go,inwhich ase shouldhavebeenveryuspiciousfequilibriums,nowingthat he onflictetweenwo endenciesuch smutationnd selection ay

lead toapparentquilibrium,ut s very ptto causerealchanges,itherslow volutionaryhangesrqualitativeeaps. I mightlsohavebeenonthelookoutforbiological ffectsf technical hangesn transportndcommunications.

I havealsohadtobringmy heoriesp todate n the ight fthenew

facts iscoveredntheSovietUnionbyDubinin ndhiscolleaguesn their

studies fwildpopulationsfDrosophila. I had predictedomeofthem,but by no meansall. The factthat I had predictedomeof them

shows hatmymathematicsada certain alidity.Anymathematicalheorynevitablyeavesouta gooddeal of relevant

facts.Butit is more xactthan theory xpressednwords. AndI be-lieve hatmy wntheories,nadequates they oubtlessre,were nessen-

tialstep owardxact hinkingngenetics.J. B. S. HALDANE