发育、基因与信息——从进化型基因看基因决定论

Development,Gene and Information:Genetic Determinism in the Point View of Evolutionary Gene

现代生物学告诉我们发育由基因和环境共同决定,然而直觉层面基因决定论或预成论的阴影却挥之不去。这一矛盾揭示了基因在发育视角和进化视角下的张力。从信息进路分析可得,在发育上,基因携带了关于表型的相关信息,与环境因素相比没有根本的特殊之处;但在进化上,基因携带了由自然选择编码的目的论语义信息,奠定了进化论意义上的现代版预成论,即被选择的基因预先设定了所对应的表型,而其中的基因需被理解为"进化型基因"。

According to the modern biology,development results are determined by both genes and the environment.However,the intuition of genetic determinism or preformationism is still lingering.This apparent contradiction reveals the tension of the gene in developmental and evolutionary senses.By analyzing the concept of information-gene,this paper shows that in the developmental sense,a gene carries correlational information about development,which does not have a fundamentally special role compared to environmental factors;while in the evolutionary sense,a gene carries teleosemantic information encoded by natural selection,underlying a modern version of"evolutionary preformationism",in which the gene should to be understood as"evolutionary gene".