Mutation and Genius

Written by: You-Sheng Li

(2003, rewritten May 2010) (The author's website: http://taoism21cen.com )

Now it becomes crystal clear that the driving force behind human evolution is ge
ne mutation. What is gene mutation? You can find a precise definition in any gen
etics textbook. But such a definition is only professional jargon which doesn’t ma
ke any sense to ordinary people who have a much broader view. Gene mutation is r
eally the decay of our genetic material, DNA. It decays like a deserted city whi
ch eventually becomes ruined, not distinguishable from its natural surroundings.
Gene mutation is part of the universal process, a process from order to chaos.

Human body uses haemoglobin, one of the thousands of proteins, to transport oxyg
en. Most mutations of the haemoglobin gene are neutral if they do not affect the
binding and releasing capacities of oxygen. When they do, as you can imagine, t
he mutations usually reduce the binding and releasing capacities except a few wh
ich benefit human beings. Many of them may be lethal, such as those which kill t
he fetus within the first few weeks of pregnancy. Some peculiar examples are tho
se mutations that make it much harder for malaria parasites to grow inside the r
ed cells, therefore the patients become resistant to malaria infection.

Human evolution gave way to cultural evolution when our first ancestors appeared
one hundred thousand years ago in Africa. Those human beings relied on their so
cial cooperation to survive rather than on the advantage of their physical bodie
s.

Some scholars believe that the driving force for this cultural evolution of huma
n society is still mutation: cultural mutation, which is far removed from conven
tional thinking. Statistics also tell us that a genius’s close relatives have a hi
gh rate of schizophrenia. As a direct result, such non-conventional even abnorma
l behaviours can be hallmarks of genius for certain people. One group of literat
ure and artistic virtuosoes in the last century was called decadents. The term i
mplies that they were geniuses in art and literature but decaying elements in so
ciety. I recently watched a video, Total Eclipse. It was about the life and rela
tionship of two notable French decadent poets, Arthur Rimbaud and Paul Verlaine.
It was an experience of humiliation and indignity to watch such a movie. The oc
casional reciting of their beautiful poems was not enough to serve as a palliati
ve dose against the pain it caused. Their lives moved along a zigzag course stra
ddling the line between creative talent and the most destructive force. The dest
ructive force not only ruined themselves but also ruined anyone who happened to
be related to them, though the video tries to obscure this part. In an incident,
Verlaine left his infant daughter to his wife and fled with Rimbaud. They cause
d pain and trouble everywhere.

What about scientists? A Chinese scientist may serve as an example to illustrate

the mutated unconventional elements of scientific minds, which can also be dest
ructive when powered by politics.
In the late 1940s and early 1950s, a young intelligent Chinese man, named Chan,
studied nuclear physics in the United States. He was not a sociable person but h
ad a strong left-wing political tendency. He had some trouble with the FBI, whic
h made him delve deeper into left-wing thinking. He eventually managed to go bac
k to the People’s Republic of China through a third country. He late became one of
the few father figures who helped China to develop their own nuclear weapons. H
is fanatic, political stance was soon nationally known. He entered the most powe
rful Central Party Committee during the cultural revolution when millions of int
ellectuals fell in disgrace.

In the 1950s, China barely managed to feed their enormous population on limited
lands. It fell far short of matching the new leaders’ political appetites, especia
lly when those leaders had just jumped from nowhere to the heavenly top of this
huge country. Young Chan sensed the frustration of the new country’s leaders. He o
ffered a magic dose, a farfetched fantasy: He argued that if all the energy of s
unlight could be transformed into chemical energy, and stored in grain such as w
heat and rice, then the food produced from a limited piece of land would be limi
tless. He expanded his fanciful theory, saying that city people could be fed by
growing crops on top of their buildings and there would no longer be any need to
transport food from the countryside. Among the 600 million Chinese people at th
at time, Chan could convince none with his fairy tale fantasy except one, Chairm
an Mao, the most powerful man in the world and the living god of China. To be ex
act, Mao was only half-convinced for a few months. But that was enough to put Ch
ina into Chaos for a few years, and killed some twenty or thirty million people.
Were those thirty million people willing to die without a fight? Of course not.
But they failed, and failed miserably. One of the critical events was the negle
ct of the autumn harvest in 1958, the year of the great leap forward. If you do
not harvest in autumn, there will be no food for winter and next spring. That wa
s a truth well known to all Chinese peasants. Thus in 1958, half a billion peasa
nts wanted to harvest crops to ensure their winter food but Mao and Chan still t
hought the crops they grew on top of city buildings would be enough to feed the
whole China, and peasants should do something more important than harvesting, su
ch as catching up with the Americans by melting cooking pans to make steel and s
o on. The gap was too big. Millions of communist officials went to the countrysi
de to stop peasants from harvesting their crops. How could they stop those hungr
y peasants from taking the food they had grown themselves? Of course, violence w
as essential. Many peasants were beaten to death. But in the end, those millions
of communist officials only managed to succeed in some areas of China. If they
had succeeded all over China, there would be no Chinese left today.

Twenty years later in 1978, two years after Mao died, a provincial Chinese newsp
aper carried an unusual news story saying that an 11 year old boy could read boo
ks with his ears. Chinese newspapers did not normally carry such news and regard
ed it as superstitious. That provincial newspaper received severe criticism from
its superior office, and published a correction and apology a few days later, s
aying the boy was a liar and played tricks to get cigarettes. But Mr. Chan, now
a much more powerful and influential figure both in politics and in science, int
erfered in this matter, saying it was possible to read books with one’s ears. The
boy’s story went to the national newspaper, People’s Daily the next day. An addition
al 50 boys from the same region were encouraged by the news and claimed the same
ability. Due to Chan’s strong, perverse, unyielding support, within in a few year
s, numerous supernatural persons emerged from all over China, who, mostly poorly
educated, claimed that they could not only read books with their ears but also
could cook meals in their bare hands, fly into the sky without any wings, go thr
ough solid walls, and so on. There were many research institutes and numerous pu
blications that promoted such miracle making. Nobody dared to say anything. The
former general secretary of the Party Mr. Hu, whose death triggered the Tiananme
n Square Events in 1989, was reported to have once said, “China is too poor to spe
nd money searching how to read books with one’s ears but let Mr. Chan do what he w
ants.” At a time, many Chinese dropped to the ground and broke their legs when the
y tried to fly. The local hospitals issued a formal warning on a city newspaper,
saying “We hospital staff do believe patriotic Chinese can do all sorts of miracu
lous things while foreigners cannot. We fully support those Chinese people who w
ant to fly by jumping from a high building. But remember, do fly please after yo
u jump, and don’t fall to the ground and break your legs. Our hospital space is li
mited.”

Some American scientists heard the story and went to China to challenge those pe
ople who claimed to be able to do all sorts of miracles. Their challenge was wel
l broadcast and published. But not a single person turned out. Those American sc
ientists had to leave China disappointed. This did not embarrass Mr. Chan, nor s
top those people who continued to perform all sorts of miracles.

One young man claimed that he could do four kinds of miracles including going th
rough solid walls. He also claimed that he was the only person in the world who
could talk to God and persuade him to postpone his plan to explode our planet. B
ut this young man took a political approach, which made him different from Mr. C
han who was most loyal to the party. One day, twenty thousand of his followers m
arched in front of the Chinese Communist Party’s Headquarters. The Party leaders w
ere outraged and arrested many of them. The Party started an all-out national ca
mpaign against those superstitions.

What has been the reaction of the one billion Chinese people? They now use those
“miracles” as a laughing-stock to cheer themselves up in their busy life. You can h
ear people talking on the streets: “Can you cook me a meal using your bare hands?
I am hungry.” “Were you trying to fly when you fell off your bicycle?” and so on. Is t
here something missing in those sarcastic jokes? One thing is certain. Jesus had
to hear the sarcastic questions when he was crucified, “Can your father save you?”
Two thousand years later, some Chinese prisoners have to face similar questions:
“Can you go through the prison walls to escape?”