Researchers breed fruit flies that, after 40 generations of conditioning, have acquired the ability to react to numbers.
My comment:
The pairing of the light stimulus and shaking seems unlikely to elicit any transgenerational epigenetic effects on neuro-architecture. Operant conditioning (i.e., training) is unlike classical conditioning in this regard. For example, epigenetic effects on intracellular signaling and stochastic gene expression allow Pavlovian conditioning / classical conditioning to directly effect behaviors that help to establish organisms in their ecological niche. That’s how nutrient chemicals are responsible for the ecological niche construction that precedes social niche construction and survival of species, which is controlled by the metabolism of nutrient chemicals to the pheromones that control reproduction in species from microbes to man.
The ecological and social niche contribute to the neurogenic niche in invertebrates that allows nutrient chemicals and pheromones to contribute to adaptive evolution by promoting brain changes (e.g., in neuro-architecture) that are passed on to offspring via transgenerational epigenetic inheritance. Vertebrate evolution proceeds along these same lines: ecological, social, neurogenic, but we begin to see some additional epigenetic effects of nutrient chemicals and pheromones because both alter the more highly evolved hypothalamic neurogenic niche that is responsible for vertebrate species survival and the development of our socio-cognitive niche.
Where do others think is the best place to look for changes in neuro-architecture caused by training? Is there a model for that?
James Vaughn Kohl was the first to accurately conceptualize human pheromones, and began presenting his findings to the scientific community in 1992. He continues to present to, and publish for, diverse scientific and lay audiences, while constantly monitoring the scientific presses for new information that is relevant to the development of his initial and ongoing conceptualization of human pheromones.
Recently, Kohl integrated scientific evidence that pinpoints the evolved neurophysiological mechanism that links olfactory/pheromonal input to genes in hormone-secreting cells of tissue in a specific area of the brain that is primarily involved in the sensory integration of olfactory and visual input, and in the development of human sexual preferences. His award-winning 2007 article/book chapter on multisensory integration: The Mind’s Eyes: Human pheromones, neuroscience, and male sexual preferences followed an award winning 2001 publication: Human pheromones: integrating neuroendocrinology and ethology, which was coauthored by disinguished researchers from Vienna. Rarely do researchers win awards in multiple disciplines, but Kohl’s 2001 award was for neuroscience, and his 2007 “Reiss Theory” award was for social science.
Kohl has worked as a medical laboratory scientist since 1974, and he has devoted more than twenty-five years to researching the relationship between the sense of smell and the development of human sexual preferences. Unlike many researchers who work with non-human subjects, medical laboratory scientists use the latest technology from many scientific disciplines to perform a variety of specialized diagnostic medical testing on people.
James V. Kohl is certified with:
* American Society for Clinical Pathology
* American Medical Technologists
James V. Kohl is a member of:
* Society for Neuroscience
* Society for Behavioral Neuroendocrinology
* Association for Chemoreception Sciences
* Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality
* International Society for Human Ethology
* American Society for Clinical Laboratory Science
* Mensa, the international high IQ society
