Help me with my research paper on 23andme!
December 29, 2008
Got a few minutes? Have a few thoughts on direct-to-consumer genetic testing? Haven’t done enough nice things in 2008 yet? Well then you should help me with my research paper! Answer as many of the questions below as applicable to you. I’d really appreciate it!
MacKerricher State Park!
December 27, 2008
Full title: MacKerricher State Park… now, with rain!
As I type this I’m sitting in the back of a car, covered in blankets (me… not the car), and clothed in warm fuzzy fleece pants and a giant fleece zip-up. Outside I’m surrounded by a whole lot of trees, a whole lot of mud, and a whole lot of rain.
So where are we? Fort Bragg, California! That’s right, Eric and I decided a while back that a mini-trip up the coast before Christmas was just what we needed. Eric just finished his fall quarter at UCLA (and got a 4.0!) and it was high-time I used some of my 100-odd vacation hours.
Saturday morning we headed out from San Francisco and took HWY 1 up the coast all the way up to Fort Bragg. Here’s a list of what we planned on doing:
- A long run (this is my doing. I’m training for a marathon which means every weekend I’m doing a progressively longer long run. This weekend I was scheduled to do a run somewhere between 110 – 120 minutes [or 1hr50min to 2hrs]. Eric was, you can imagine, was not too excited about this one.)
- Cycling (We brought our road bikes and hoped to spend a day biking either North up to the Lost Coast area and beyond or back South through Mendocino. We had to get cycling shoe wind cover bootie thingies because it’s too friggin cold right now to be riding without them. For those non-riders out there, the wind goes through the shoes and makes your feet go numb… which really gets in the way of the whole being-able-to-pedal thing.)
- Hiking (There are some beautiful redwood forests around here – even, I’ve discovered, a virgin redwood grove [“virgin” because the grove has never been logged which, I’m told, is a feat in itself in these parts since North coast redwoods were heavily logged to support the building of San Francisco…twice [once during the Gold Rush and again after the big fire (which I think was during the big earthquake… both of which I’m too comfortable right now to turn around and fact check)]])
it’s clear I like parentheses
- Exploring (The lost coast area is so called because during the building of all the highways and what not up and down California, the builders decided that that area was too rugged to lay down roads. So, instead of HWY 1 hugging the coastline, they decided to hook it up with the more inland 101. This means there’s a big chunk of the coast that isn’t easily accessible. So, it’s lost! In order to get out there you basically have to 4WD it over tight, unpaved, currently super muddy, roads. Which is all another way of saying this is an area Eric has decided he absolutely must see in his new luxury vehicle (aka a Subaru Outback).
- Eat (I’m all about nature stuff – trail running, exploring, hugging redwoods, you name it, I’m there – but what I really love about going to new places is the chance to try brand new restaurants! And what is better than running for two hours and then going somewhere for a delicious breakfast filled with the sweet tastes and aromas of maple syrup (real only!), hot chocolate (not that water instant pack crap), salty things (like sausage!), and the like?
Answer: Nothing. There is simply nothing better.
So it’s Monday night and I’ll let you know what we’ve done so far:
- On the drive up we stopped in Mendocino for a bit of walking and eating. The town is super cute but holy gods! I’ve never smelled so much pot in my life. Actually there’s a funny story here. We were walking down the main street (called, conveniently, “Main st.”) and passed by a beat up truck and a bunch of 1/2 punk 1/2 hippy people. Right as we walked by I smelt the pot. And, without thinking, I blurted out “Gosh, it smells like pot everywhere we go in this town!” At which point they turned to me and one guy, who, Eric tells me, was at that time holding said pot, and said, “Not everywhere!”
You know me, always making friends!
Anyways, other than smelling a lot of pot (used by young and old alike), we got truffles from the local chocolate shop (didn’t really do it for me but Eric seemed to enjoy eating both of ours!), checked out some truly gorgeous views of the sunset over the rocky beach, looked in lots of super neat artsy expensive shops, fantasized about owning things from said super neat artsy expensive stores (note: this part may have been done more by me than Eric), ate dinner at a really good pub with surprisingly delicious food, and got a book filled with information about outdoorsy things to do in the area.
After that we drove the rest of the way up to MacKerricher State Park, which is where we’re car camping.
Alright that’s enough for this post! I’ll explain the rest of our trip in my next entry.
All the pictures can be found here
Why Atlas Sports Genetics is scary and stupid
December 2, 2008
Full Title: Direct-to-Consumer Genetic Testing (aka: why Atlas Sports Genetics is scary and stupid)
Three things have led me to this post.
First, I read “Born to Run? Little Ones Get Test for Sports Gene” in the NYtimes over the weekend and it definitely raised (and then spun in fancy pretty ways) red flags in my mind.
Second, for a class I’m taking through Harvard I have to do a large end of semester project on something that has changed substantially due to the “technological explosion. I’ve decided to do mine around the question, “How does direct-to-consumer genetic testing change individuals’ conception of self — both as individuals and as members of a larger society?” And I think consistently writing up my musings on the topic will help me more cogently and tightly express myself in that project.
Third, I’m committed to submitting a paper to this upcoming philosophy conference I’ve heard about. The conference is themed around, among other things, autonomy and moral obligation. So in other words, I’ve decided it’s high time I got my shit together and wrote something up based on the year-long project I’ve mentioned before. As a reminder, that project has to do with, again among other things, how my being a person who can live a flourishing (eudaimon) life depends in large part on my ability to have certain kinds of meaningful relationships with people in my community (which then I think gives rise to certainty responsibilities and obligations we have to each other). And I think genetic testing like the sort described in the article and generally provided by companies like 23andme has the power to alter my identity as both an individual – both understood in the discreet solo-going sense and in the member-of-a-larger-community sense.
Which is a long winded way of saying I think taking this sort of genetic testing seriously is critical if we want to make sure we give ourselves the chance to live good lives. And writing up little blog posts are small moves in the direction of writing up something presentable.
Alright with all that said, I want to go back to company featured in the NYtimes article – Atlas Sports Genetics.
- First, if you go to their homepage the first thing you see is an image of three blond kids in soccer uniforms. And under that it says “Genetic Testing for Speed/Power and Endurance Events”. So here’s my first piece of free advice – probably not a good idea to have only blond beautiful kids on your genetic testing for superior athletic performance website. You’re trying to get away from that whole evil eugenics thing, right? Alright take my advice – diversify that shit.
- Second, take a look at this graph that shows the relationship between genotype frequency and different elite athletes. Notice anything interesting? How about the fact that this test really doesn’t tell you much of anything about whether you’re genotype is shared by elite endurance athletes. And why is that? Because it seems there really isn’t a certain genotype (at least based on the ACTN3 gene) that is more frequent in elite endurance athletes than the controls. So I seriously have no idea what they’re talking about when they say having two copies of the R577X allele predispose you to endurance sports.
- Third, as was pointed out in the article, there exist examples of Olympians who have genes that, based on their test, would suggest they would be unsuccessful in their sport. Will this test create a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy. When a parent gets this test done on their children they won’t encourage their participation in certain sports – and so over time less and less children with the “wrong” genes do that sport. And so, over time, the top level performers in that sport only have the “right” genes… namely because nobody with with the “wrong” genes is doing it.
- Fourth, do we think parents should be getting these sorts of genetic tests done on their children? There’s no medical purpose and the child can’t autonomously agree to it.
- Fifth, how will this impact the relationship between parents and children. When a football-fanatical father finds out his son doesn’t have the “right” genes to play – how will that change their relationship?
There are lots of interesting questions here and with comments like,
“China and Russia, Mr. Epley [President of Atlas] said, identify talent in the very young and whittle the pool of athletes until only the best remain for the national teams. ‘This is how we could stay competitive with the rest of the world,” Mr. Epley said of genetic and physical testing. ‘It could, at the very least, provide you with realistic goals for you and your children.’”
I think we’re letting people frame them in pretty scary ways.