http://www.foxnews.com/images/330455/1_61_mouse_fearless_2.jpg

 

Japanese scientists say they've used genetic engineering to create mice that show no fear of felines, a development that may shed new light on mammal behavior and the nature of fear itself.

 

Scientists at Tokyo University say they were able to successfully switch off a mouse's instinct to cower at the smell or presence of cats — showing that fear is genetically hardwired and not learned through experience, as commonly believed.

 

must be a pit bull gene

fear is learned through experience, they mostlikely disabled the mice's ability to show any signs of fear by preventing that part of hte brain from being used.

nothin to fear but fear itself. hahahahahhaha

wow thats insane i wonder if they can do that to humans to get ride of different types of fears.

Look on the cats face...

 

"yeah.. you try it big boy, ill eat you when i am hungry"

I hear this argument in it's various forms many times a month. Geneticists love to pretend that things are all hardwired, that our lifestyle has no effect on us. In humans this is especially dangerous because of the huge increase in lifestyle-related disease in the last 30 years. FYI, our genome hasn't changed appreciably in 30,000 years.

 

This anomaly that they produced in the lab would last about 5 minutes in the wild. It would be immediately returned to the normal state of affairs. Mice are a food source for cats, it they don't run or hide, they go extinct. The mice that run and hide survive. Genetics in the lab doesn't equate to genetics in real life.

 

A better question from all this would be, "Why do scientists always feel that they have to decide between Nature or Nurture? Why are they completely unable to understand that both have an effect on an organism and species' survival?"

I hear this argument in it's various forms many times a month. Geneticists love to pretend that things are all hardwired, that our lifestyle has no effect on us. In humans this is especially dangerous because of the huge increase in lifestyle-related disease in the last 30 years. FYI, our genome hasn't changed appreciably in 30,000 years.

 

This anomaly that they produced in the lab would last about 5 minutes in the wild. It would be immediately returned to the normal state of affairs. Mice are a food source for cats, it they don't run or hide, they go extinct. The mice that run and hide survive. Genetics in the lab doesn't equate to genetics in real life.

 

A better question from all this would be, "Why do scientists always feel that they have to decide between Nature or Nurture? Why are they completely unable to understand that both have an effect on an organism and species' survival?"

well put