In article <3367C78E.192D at ix.netcom.com>, Bob Phair
<rphair at ix.netcom.com> writes
>At the end of his really useful post in response to my reading of
>Kacser, Athel asks if I have any insight into why MCA has not cought on
>in the States.
>>In the US, the typical response to theoretical biology is summed up in a
>phrase from my interview with Fran Ganong, then president of the
>American Physiological Society, when I was a graduate student regaling
>him with the wonders of physiological modeling. He pushed back in his
>chair and said, "Physiology is an experimental science and mathematics
>has no place in it."
Then I think he should have been sacked on the spot. Interesting you
should mention this because a friend told me last week that there was an
interview on the radio (2) where according to my source, a molecular
biologist was being interviewed and he suggested there there were no
great concepts left to be developed in biology and all that was left to
do was catalogue!
>>There is a fork in the road for all of us who choose to pursue
>theoretical biology as our life's work. That fork comes when you decide
>who your audience is going to be. Are you going to speak to fellow
>theoreticians, or are you going to speak to biologists?
How about, satisfy your own curiosity or is that too old fashioned these
days! :).
>>>To make MCA a mainstream biological tool will require only one thing.
>You have to use it to solve an important biological problem that cannot
>be solved by experiment alone. And you have to publish the result where
>bench biologists will see it. (One man's opinion)
But it's the chicken and the egg dilema, how can one work on an
important experimental problem (as I wanted too) that can be addressed
by MCA if the grant awarding bodies won't give you the money in the
first place because they don't think MCA is relevant? Perhaps one should
put in a traditional proposal (and get it) but secretly work on an MCA
experimental problem?
>>My impression is that there is a massive convergence of schools of
>biological modeling that is underway right now, and I think the point of
>convergence is functional genomics. I think this is a really great time
I'm not a cloner, could you tell me more about function genomics? I
presume it's something to do with assigning function to genes?
>to be in biological modeling and I'm pleased to have encountered all of
>you on my own personal fork in the road.
>>Regards,
>Bob
>--
Herbert
--
Herbert M Sauro
email: HSauro at fssc.demon.co.uk
Telephone: 01974 282428
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"He who cannot draw on 3000 years is living from hand to mouth" Goethe
"Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's a heaven for?"
R Browning.
