Ivan Michurin, developer of over 300 varieties

[castanea]

Aug 16, 2012 20:39:09 GMT -5 cletus said:

That is really cool about the chestnuts. Burbank was a talented person for sure. I need to learn more about him and pickup one of his books. I did not mean to say that he was completely haphazard. I was doing my best from memory to summarize Michurin's explanation of their differences in approach, and I have not read Burbank first hand. I do remember he said that Burbank came to some similar conclusions about "environmental influences". You would have to see some of these phenomena working with perennials for so long. I remember reading a couple places that Burbank is not strictly considered a scientist in the sense that his methods were not completely systematic, and (correct me if I'm wroing) that Burbank didn't really try to keep clear data and prevent unintended pollenation. His achievements were no doubt incredible regardless. I do not think this criticism is valid for Michurin. This is not a deep criticism of Burbank, its just to say that whats striking about Michurin's methods is they can produce results on a small level, in a relatively rapid and defined way (especially with perennials). Even when Michurin had the support of the State (not until after many decades of being a poor plant breeder), his approach was still very direct and painstaking, not requiring a massive operation but requiring more attention to the plant throughout its development. For me this is important so that the methods can be employed in as broad, decentralized a way as possible (as breeding should be). I can post the actual quotes I was thinking of, I'm sure its much clearer than my writing (I clarified my last post a bit too). Perhaps Michurin's methods can help us get blight resistance and flavors into those incredible chestnuts ;] Its all about improvement.

"Even the best cultivated plant can be improved"
-IV Michurin

Burbank kept extensive notes of some of his experiments but not of others. That doesn't make him any less of a scientist. There are few scientists anywhere who have recorded and controlled all variables for eevrything they do because most of the time it is impossible. If Burbank had spent his time writing everything down he would have accomplished far less than he did, which is perhaps the difference between his 800 new varieties and Michurin's 300 varieties. Even so, we still have Burbank's 8 volumes of "How Plants Are Trained to Work for Man" and

"Luther Burbank: His Methods and Discoveries. A 12–volume monographic series documenting Burbank's methods and discoveries and their practical application, prepared from his original field notes covering more than 100,000 experiments made during forty years devoted to plant improvement. Created with the assistance of the Luther Burbank Society and its entire membership, under the editorial direction of John Whitson and Robert John and Henry Smith Williams."

What Michurin did in recording methodolgies is important. What Burbank did in developing new varieties is important. You don't need a record of what trees Burbank crossed (or that Albert Etter crossed, or that Fellix Gillet crossed) to benefit from and use their results. Ignorance, and scientific snobbery, are behind most of the critics who claim Burbank was not a scientist. Burbank accomplished more than hundreds of his contemporaries who sat behind desks and wrote things down. I'm sure that annoyed many of them, but instead it should have been a lesson for them. If you're planting open pollinated seeds, growing them out, planting their seedlings, making observations, learning, and planting some more seedlings, you are a scientist.

1 Luther Burbank type scientist is more valuable than 1000s of Monsanto scientists.

[cletus]

I'm not saying Burbank wasn't a scientist, nor downplaying his achievements by any means. Neither did Michurin. I was describing a legitimate difference in method beyond documentation. There is no versus here. To each their own, do what works for you. Its not about documenting everything in complete detail. Michurin did however paint in detail many of his varieties. The criticism is not that Burbank should have been 100% systematic. He did what he did and we're all thankful for it. I'm sure Michurin and Burbank spent the same amount of the day in the garden. Comparing the number of useful varieties introduced by the two, we would have to take several things into account. Most of his life Michurin was very poor and self-funded, which meant that he had to develop methods that were direct and functional with a small amount stock. What he pioneered was not in recording the methodologies, it was the methodologies, and they are precisely what allowed him to be so successful even on small scales/low resources. Michurin's criticism of Burbank is not the same as the armchair academic scientists. I see if that was confusing mentioning them together. Michurin wouldn't have wanted more data from Burbank. He wanted (and found) a way of influencing plants that was less random. This does not mean that it was 100% purely systematic and theoretically described (the full theoretical significance of what he discovered has not yet been elucidated). Take the pollen mixture experiments for example. If you mix pollen from 7 different conifers to pollenate another conifer of a different type you would perhaps get a crazy "hybrid" kind of plant with strange characteristics and plasticity. Michurin couldn't have told you what exactly was going on and much less recorded all the relevant data. But he could tell how how to train it, when and how to graft it, and all kinds of other stuff about how to develop it in a certain direction. Burbank was a hero, nothing but respect to him. I plan on researching him more as well, and would be happy to learn anything about him you can tell me.

I like your last line a lot!

[castanea]

I understand. I just feel compelled to explain Burbank to those folks who aren't quite clear on who he was or what he accomplished. Luther Burbank was, in the truest sense of the word, a genius. In the history of mankind, there is one Luther Burbank, the most accomplished plant breeder who has yet set foot on this planet. I know that many of Burbank's accomplishments were not as random as some people claim because I own his 12 volume set and have read most of it. I also suspect that many of Burbank's other "accidental" accomplishments were not quite as random as most people believe. Randomness does not lead to the kind of success that Burbank consistently had. You can find many interesting plant breeding secrtes by reading Burbank's works. Some are quite explicitly set forth while others require some digging and thinking.

I just wish Michurin's works were as readily available in English as Burbank's.

[atash]

Good idea, Raymondo. In the case of the cross I made, I bet it will be easy to distinguish hybrids from non-hybrids, because the parents are so different. Same genus but very different-looking species. But it would simplify things to have 100% hybrid seedlings.

[cletus]

Castanea, you can find Michurin's "Selected Works" for around 20$ used online. Most of the other publications you see by him are included within that compendium. There is a gold mine of info in there from his over six decades of experience in plant selection. I definitely don't think Michurin and Burbank are somehow diametrically opposed in their approaches, unprincipled vs principled or anything like that. Imagine the possibilities in the combination of some of Michurin's various innovations: preliminary vegetative approximation, use of mediator, pollenation during the first year of flowering, pollen mixtures/mentor pollen, and mentor grafting. These methods take so much time and attention in playing with the developmental conditions of plants, but they are highly innovative and open up a lot of possibility. They allow the possibility of not only relatively quickly creating entirely new species, but also to influence characteristics by degree (mentor grafting only works on plants in a 'plastic' state). For example, a young hybrid pear was grafted onto the crown of a lemon tree in Michurin's greenhouse. The young hybrid pear gradually changed its structure more approximating the lemon tree. The leaves became glossy and did not go deciduous for 4 seasons. The same experiment consistently fails if the plant for mentoring (the pear here) is not a young hybrid. According to Michurin's experiences, the wider the hybrid is and the younger it is, the more receptive it is to influence and the less its power in transmitting its own hereditary qualities. These methods are unique in the history of plant selection as far as I know, and the fact is that pretty much anyone's methods (esp. w/ perennials) are in a sense more random than this. To be clear, it allows both greater and specificity and wider possibilities of influence in less time (again, especially important when working with perennials on a limited budget). The compare/contrast to transgenic technology would be interesting, but requires some books still unwritten, and others still unread. Thanks for educating on Burbanks methods. I would love to discover more of his experiences/principles and plants. At any rate, both of their lives serve as wonderful examples of both the creative power of nature and the capacity of humans to dream and improve the world. I'm sure they would have been good friends.

[cletus]

Burbank and Michurin did however have a mutual friend, the widely respected Russian geneticist, Nikolai Vavilov. I just found out that Vavilov actually wrote a very interesting obituary of Burbank upon his death in 1926.
"Plant Breeding Giants: Burbank, the Artist; Vavilov, the Scientist"
www.genetics.org/content/158/4/1391.full

It's interesting to note that both Michurin and Burbank have been criticized by many armchair scientists for their 'Lamarkian' views, although this is finally beginning to change as our genomic knowledge gets subtler. They were also both criticized for their varieties not performing well in every ecology and climate. An inherent limitation in this work, that was the reason Michurin usually downplayed new amazing qualities of his varieties. Every locale should ultimately develop its own uniquely adapted varieties.

Luther Burbank (1849–1926)

Nikolai Ivanovitch Vavilov

Luther Burbank died on April 11, 1926, in Santa Rosa, California. During the last half of the nineteenth century and the first quarter of the twentieth, no other name has so clearly focused public attention on the role of selection and geographical origin in the creation of new plant forms.

In the autumn of 1921 I had the opportunity to become acquainted with the activities and personality of Luther Burbank. My recollections carry me involuntarily to the shores of the Pacific Ocean in California, to the little town of Santa Rosa, tangled in sweetbrier and twining roses. Here, in the midst of the town, behind a low picket fence, in a space of about two and a half acres the curious eye could peer into the Holy of Holies of the creation of plant forms.

A humble, inviting, little ivy-covered house was Burbank's home. The garden office, which faced the street, called attention to itself by means of an inscription that read: "Mr. Burbank is no less occupied than are the officials of Washington, and therefore he most humbly requests that the public not disturb him with visitations." A ferocious female secretary would sternly confront anyone who disregarded this announcement, observing that Mr. Burbank was extremely busy and cautioning the intruder against a long visit.

To my astonishment, despite a warning from a Washington official, I received a most favorable reply to my letter from Dakota, requesting permission to visit the celebrated plant breeder, and, already rather well acquainted through published data with the activities of the California creator of new plant forms, I obtained an audience of several hours.

As in a fairy tale, the visitor found himself in a magical garden. There were huge cactuses without thorns but with delicious fruits covered with fine needles, completely original asters, chrysanthemums, bright late-blooming poppies (Eschscholtzia), gladioli, an enormous number of cultivated varieties of fruit trees, and mighty walnut trees, including an interspecific hybrid with sharply displayed heterosis in height. There were unique varieties of maize of various types: sweet, dent, reminiscent somehow of hybrids of maize and sorghum; bush phlox with unusual flowers; in short, an entire living museum in which everything was full of meaning. There were marvelous roses, strange dahlias, unique cannas. The autumnal season had not diminished their colors.

A unique, very recently produced, low-growing sunflower attracts one's unwitting attention by a huge corolla on a short stem and a pendant head deliberately selected to grow in this orientation for protection from birds.

Many beautiful gardens can be seen in any advanced country. The uniqueness of Burbank's garden is that everything in it that meets the eye is the result of creativity. Everything in the garden has been subjected to the influence of the plant breeder.

I recall the moment when, standing with my camera before Burbank amidst his flowers, I comprehended this living fairy tale—the story of the force of individuality in this beautiful old man with the face of an actor, of an artist among his creations.

Let us now shift from fairy tale to reality.

It is difficult to enumerate all that was accomplished by the great plant breeder, to calculate the material and intellectual balance sheet of this remarkable life. The essence of his intellectual legacy, in my opinion, comes down to broad selection of worldwide varietal material, to large-scale research into seedlings from fruit trees, and to the application of distant interspecies hybridization and creating methods to promote reproduction.

The first principle lies in Burbank's personality, bequeathed and embodied in word and deed. It consists of his gathering of plant riches on a broad scale from around the world, his mobilization of the Earth's plant capital. South American flora, Tibetan and Himalayan mountain species, plants from China, Japan, and the entire Old World—all passed before the eyes of the great observer. The idea of the wide use of the world's plant resources found reflection in the creation in Washington, D. C., of the Bureau of Plant Industry within the U. S. Department of Agriculture, which endowed the Bureau with a systematic, powerful organization. In the last several years the activities of this institution have radically changed the varietal composition of the cultured vegetation of the United States and Canada.

The second principle is the usefulness of the collection of seeds from plants that had been reproduced asexually. Burbank showed that in practice in the field of pomology, when practiced on a wide scale, rather frequently the selection of seeds produces very valuable new forms with new combinations of characteristics—the result of the recombination of genes among hybrids. These characteristics are then perpetuated in our fruit trees that are reproduced asexually.

The third principle is broad, bold, persistent interspecies hybridization. In the area of horticulture and pomology, the ability to use asexual reproduction after crossing opens a broad prospect in the application of distant hybridization. Aborted seeds and disharmonies in the development of reproductive organs, all difficulties to be overcome in field crops reproduced by seeds, can be ignored in asexual reproduction. Intuitively the mind of the ingenious plant breeder grasped, with American quickness, the practicality of this new path of asexual plant reproduction, and in an extremely short time he realized its broad possibilities. The very infertility of the hybrids thus propagated was cleverly used to create seedless fruits, which in and of themselves are interesting in practical pomology. In a period dominated by discussion and theoretical elucidation of the limits of the possibility of distant hybridization, Burbank, with American persistence, blazed new trails.

Burbank's activities are described in the 12 volumes of an excellent publication entitled Luther Burbank, His Methods and Discoveries (1914-1915). The image of a great artist emerges virtually alive from this luxurious publication. A total of 1500 beautifully produced color plates illustrate all the stages of the life and activities of the California toiler. Here are the condensed details of his autobiographical data. Luther Burbank was the 13th child. He was born in a farm family in a little village near Lancaster, Massachusetts.

Through both personal acquaintance and study of his 12-volume work, one is struck first and foremost by the huge number and variety of his objects of selection. Indisputably his greatest practical achievements were made in the field of pomology. Plum hybrids, crosses of plums and apricots, new varieties of apples, plums, pears, and grapes, diverse blackberries and raspberries with gigantic fruits all attracted Burbank's attention in the bloom of his creative activity. His practical achievements in the selection of plums and blackberries were especially great and provided the market with new varieties of exceptional value.

Burbank's first experiments were with the potato. The variety produced from seedlings that he brought out in the 1870s, famous under the name "Burbank," until recently occupied significant acreage in the potato cultivation in the United States. The Burbank potato, like other varieties, is distinctive for its cosmopolitanism. The Burbank was cultivated until recent times, when it was supplanted by new varieties. Burbank's potato had already increased the material well-being of the United States. Along the Pacific Coast, in a single year (1906) more than 8-million bushels of the Burbank potato were harvested.

Of the 12-volume compilation, the fifth volume, devoted to Burbank's work with plums, is a masterpiece of the breeder's art. Marvelous color illustrations, achievable only in American publications, speak without words about Burbank's remarkable studies. Broad hybridization made it possible for the artist-breeder to mold forms at will. Burbank had collected a huge, worldwide assortment of the genus Prunus. Crosses of a series of wild varieties among themselves and with cultured types displayed, as a result of hybridization, gigantic fruits. The largest plum in the world was created. There were plums that dried out on the tree, producing tree-borne prunes. Old Chinese and Japanese varieties were crossed with diverse European forms, and to them were added the qualities of small-fruited Persian plums. To the tender qualities of the Old-World races was added the hardiness of the American plum. Burbank found a small French plum with sour, astringent fruits, but lacking a stone. By crossing this plant with a cultured plum and repeated crossings with various plums, hybrids that combined the absence of a stone with the desirable qualities of cultured plums were developed. The entire volume with 105 colored plates deserves the most attentive study by pomologists.

Unfortunately, descriptions in this volume, as in the entire work, have a belletristic character and lack scientific documentation. Only the illustrations and occasional passages and references to initial varieties allow one to grasp the essence of the creative work.

The endless variety of new forms of chrysanthemums, Amaryllis, lilies, Watsonia, Crinum, Cakeolaria, and every conceivable new type and kind of monoecious and dioecious horticultural object were subjected to the influence of the methods of selection and hybridization. There seems to be an original approach to each object. Among ordinary roses a blue color must exist, and Burbank almost found it. A blackberry without thorns was created and a daisy of a previously unseen shape and size, and so on without end. "How does your work in selection begin?" a visitor asks Burbank. "First, you establish an ideal. Then you seek the ideal," answered Burbank.

In his last decade, Burbank devoted much attention to the selection of maize, sorghum, beans, peas, flax, wheat, and sunflowers. His interests changed noticeably from garden items to field crops, and, to our astonishment, 5 years ago we were able to observe a great number of field plants in Burbank's garden. Cactuses without thorns, a large number of vegetable-garden plants, starting with artichokes and ending with beets, and finally tree and forest species—none escaped Burbank's sphere of attention.

More intuitive than others, Burbank apprehended the practical significance of heterosis in silviculture for creating wood pulp in a short time. With no theoretical investigation, Burbank correctly discerned the prospects for making use of the intensification and acceleration that are often the results of hybridization.

Contrary to our expectations of encountering a profoundly old man resting from his work and reaping the harvest of past labors, we found a vital researcher in his 70s still engaged in endlessly seeking new discoveries and bemoaning the thanklessness of the task of plant selection, the profits from which accrue to commercial firms, while the portion that remains to those who created the new products is at best empty glory. Despite information that we happened to hear in Washington, reinforced by a widespread rumor about Burbank's primarily commercial inclinations, we were witnesses to great work and untiring labor under the humblest of circumstances in his eighth decade.

Like every great personality to whom errors are not unknown, Burbank concentrated the attention of both friend and foe. His intuitive creativity as an artist-breeder not infrequently ran counter to the precise genetic perspective of the contemporary establishment. Not being a theoretician in plant breeding, Burbank reached not a few mistaken conclusions in the explanation of his work. The theoretical side and the explication of the results of his work do not always find Burbank at the level of contemporary science. When Dr. George Harrison Shull (1874-1954), a representative of the Carnegie Institute, was assigned the task of providing a scientific description of the results of Burbank's research, he was obliged to give up the job with disappointment because of the lack of strict and objective documentary data.

It is difficult to learn from Burbank. One needs a good theoretical grounding to be able to separate the substantial from the insubstantial, to find the explanations of the exceptional successes Burbank achieved. A good textbook on plant selection would be more useful for a beginner than Burbank's 12-volume artistic work. In studying Burbank's creations, it is always necessary to bear in mind that the artist's intuition overwhelms his research. Because of the great amount of practical work in constant pursuit of ever newer and newer objects, Burbank was unable to follow the rapid developments in the field of genetics. One can imagine that the large number of critics was engendered by the mistakes of the great plant breeder, especially in his own country. As the proverb says, "No man is a prophet in his own country." Nevertheless, objectively, it is impossible to deny the results of the immense creative work that this plant breeder left to posterity.

Plant selection can be understood as a scientific discipline that studies the principles and methods for the elaboration and creation of new varieties. Selection can be an art as well as a craft. To his grave has gone a great artist-breeder who intuitively and correctly chose the path to solving problems of plant selection and who undoubtedly accomplished a huge amount of practical work, especially in the areas of pomology and horticulture.

Thanks for inspiring me to learn more about Burbank, he (along with Michurin) was clearly a genius. Vavilov, another well known genius, had the opportunity to evaluate each of their work first hand. He is nothing but laudatory of Burbank's creations and intellect. He also notes: "Selection is an art as well as a craft...It is difficult to learn from Burbank...The artists' intuition overwhelms his research." I like the way he words this because he isn't saying that the creative-artist tendency is inherently negative, indeed it is part of what made Burbank so successful, especially given the large scale subsidized conditions. I think this very gentle criticism is a point of difference to Michurin. I find both their similarities and differences fascinating. Michurin was an amazing artist as well, but they each had their own unique genius (which thankfully worked out for them both and is a boon to us all).

[castanea]

I think the art of plant breeding is largely ignored today. In a society in which almost any creative endeavor is called "art", no matter how stupid or ugly, there are very few artists who engage in plant breeding.

I am a big fan of Vavilov. I really enjoyed this book:

www.amazon.com/Where-Our-Food-Comes-Retracing/dp/1610910036/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1345254855&sr=1-2&keywords=nikolai+vavilov

Felix Gillet:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Felix_Gillet

[cletus]

Great recommendation, thanks. The book on native american agriculture by the same author looks cool too.

Hadn't heard of Felix, he sounds interesting, do you happen to have any of his cultivars?

[castanea]

Aug 19, 2012 11:53:04 GMT -5 cletus said:

Great recommendation, thanks. The book on native american agriculture by the same author looks cool too.

Hadn't heard of Felix, he sounds interesting, do you happen to have any of his cultivars?

Gillet produced the most widely propagated chestnut cultivar grown in the western US and possibly the entire US. In fact the majority of chestnut orchards planted in the west in the last 20 years consist primarily of Gillet's cultivar "Colossal".

In Nevada City, where Gillet had his nursery, there are hundreds of chestnut and walnut trees planted around the city that either came from Gillet's nursery or are descended from Gillet's trees.

[cletus]

Very interesting, Revi, thanks. I still have many gaps in piecing together my historical understanding of this subject. Its definitely interesting from many perspectives. From what I get so far I think it is fair to say that Lysenko did politicize Michurin, and yet it is clear he was genuinely influenced by him. Again I don't know a whole lot, but I have read Michurin's "Selected Works". Michurin's words are clear, thoughtful, no-nonsense, and sharply intelligent. There are clear instances of state propaganda, but they are obvious and unsurprising. Its also very clear that the only thing Michurin really cares about is the practicality of plant breeding methods via experience, not with academic or political concerns. It is unfortunate that Michurin was posthumously politicized, but I think you're right, Revi, that there are many subtleties to this story.

This thread began with a summary article by Dr. Yongsheng Liu. He's done a lot investigation into Michurin. I have read a few of his articles that I could find. Liu contributed a really interesting article on graft hybridization in Advances in Genetics Vol. 56. You can see some of it here: books.google.com/books?id=IP5a4VHMF0AC&pg=PA106&lpg=PA106&dq=yongsheng+liu+michurin&source=bl&ots=I3uRQgdtFz&sig=HveML7bv6dQJKW30bwgq20fdYq4&hl=en#v=onepage&q=yongsheng%20liu%20michurin&f=false.

Here are several more articles by Dr. Liu that I've been able to find:

"A new perspective of Darwin's Pangenesis":
download.bioon.com.cn/view/upload/201108/10113502_6033.pdf

"Like father like son: a fresh view of the inheritance of acquired characteristics"
www.somosbacteriasyvirus.com/son.pdf

"Lysenko’s Contributions to Biology and His Tragedies": imichurin.narod.ru/liu2004.htm

"Science and Politics"
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2750069/

I found an abstract of another he wrote called "Graft Hybridization and the Specificity of Heredity in Fruit Trees"

Emphatically discusses the relationship between graft hybridization and the specificity of heredity in fruit trees on the basis of introducing the recent achievements in plant graft hybridization.We propose that genetic materials in rootstock being translocated and integrated into the genome of the germ cells and embryonic cells in scion are the main reasons why the majority of the hybrid seedlings have wild properties and the heredity of fruit trees violate Mendel's laws of heredity.The potential of graft hybridization in fruit breeding are also discussed.

[revi]

Cletus,
The question is whether LYsenko politicizes Michurin or both of them were "politically witch hunted" by western "official scientific community". Phrases like "Lysenko politicizes Michurin" seems totally IDIOTIC to me. IF THEY DON'T HAVE ANYTHING IN COMMON, HOW CAN ONE "POLITICIZE" OTHER? And another question, how many here HAVE GONE THROUGH ANY ORIGINAL LITERATURE OF LYSENKO? I can easily guess that NONE. All that has been said about Lysenko here are from secondary sources that are totally apathetic to him. At least, I myself don't want to come to any conclusion about anyone by "remarks" from people WHO ARE TOTALLY APATHETIC TO HIM/HER.
In fact, the "western official scientific community" was stuck to "no change in gene by external factor" like FUNDAMENTALISTS. Haldane, a "Marxist" biologist, who totally denied the possibility of creation of new species BY ANY MEANS by combining two separate species. While toady, it's a proven fact that two or more closely related species can met and bring new breed. In the northern part of Alaska and Canada, a new species of bear, which is actually result of combination of Grizzly and Polar bear, two different species can be found now which are quite fertile and can reproduce. Neanderthal genes have been found in modern human beings and that's a prove that Neanderthal's had interbreed with us humans in distant past and results were capable to reproduce.
Actually, the way both Michurin and Lysenko has been treated by and is "known" at present is the result of cold war ideological mentality. Problem is scientists are human beings and they often been influenced by the social condition, in which they were born and brought up. And even if somehow, they have been able to throw away this influences, they have to depend on the state for funding and other financial factors and rarely they can be able to go against the political line of the rulers of their countries, that's true for both USSR and "democratic" western countries. Haldane himself in one of his book "Science and Marxism" said that many of his scientist friends had got good results in their experiments by application of dialectic materialism, but he couldn't state their names because "that can harm them". Haldane made this remarks about "democratic UK", NOT about STALINIST USSR of that time.
What Lysenko and Michurin had done can be the starting of epigenetics IMO. But, at that time, any experimental result, which showed any sign of genetic changes influenced by external environmental factors had been treated with "doubt" and quickly the researcher had been marked as "Lamarkist" and soon deprived of his/her status and thrown out of scientific community. Such stubborn fundamentalist like mentality of "official scientific community" of west actually blocked the development of epigentics. WHAT I WANT TO MEAN THAT NOT ONLY LYSENKO, BUT HIS WESTERN CRITICS ALSO POLITICIZED BIOLOGY JUST IN THE OPPOSITE DIRECTION AND PROBABLY HAD DONE MORE HARM TO THE DEVELOPMENT GENETICS THAN LYSENKO.
Actually, Lysenko and Michurin had first pointed out changes can be incorporated into living beings (both plant and animal) by altering the environment in which it lives. THAT'S THE STARTING POINT OF EPIGENETICS. If you accept Michurin, you cannot ignore Lysenko BECAUSE MICHURIN'S WORKS ARE PROOF OF LYSENKO'S THEORIES. Actually, Lysenko based his theories on the experimental results of Michurin.
I myself have already gone through and downloaded the writings by Dr. Liu and exchanged some e-mails with him. I have also given him some links to experimental results that I have found in net and in reply, he thanked me. What I clearly want to say is that we now have to "rediscover" both Lysenko and Michurin by shading all "pre-conceived" notions that we have been "forcefeeded" during schools, colleges and elsewhere.
Those who want to know more about this matter, can go to this thread at marxistleninist.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=science&action=display&thread=356&page=1 and can go through all the links posted there.

[cletus]

I knew we would get into the politics of this subject at some point. You really can't get around it completely. We are talking about multiple levels of prejudice here, political and scientific. Revi may I ask where you are from/reside? You know I pretty much agree with everything you stated, but we both also know that politicization (of science and most everything else) was a process going on on both sides of the Cold War. In this story it is overlapped also with the interplay of the organism/environment or nature/nurture discourse.

Revi I feel your frustration of being taught things occur in only one way, then to find a continuous stream of evidence come to light that seems to suggest the opposite. I graduated high school ten years ago in the US and I was definitely taught consistently that most of these kinds of phenomena would be impossible. I would like this thread to focus on the phenomenology, practicality, science and experimentation of Michurinian methods as much as possible. This subject has so much to offer gardeners--us--the ones who are evolving the seed. As a gardening forum, I don't want to get too bogged down in the political or historical aspects of this story. Yes many people have been held back from believing these kinds of phenomena through philosophical or cultural bias, and many no doubt still are. Now in the globalized age, the genomic age, we can start to explore these issues in a more open and subtle scientific way, less susceptible to political forces. What I'm trying to do is use Michurin's experiences/principles to to help evolve new forms. I've always had a love for perennial fruiters, and there are so many poorly adapted to the Eastern US biome. I also think this knowledge will become increasingly important with climate change, where our ability to use hybridization and these other different types and means of hybridization, will become crucially important with perennials especially.

[revi]

Cletus,
I am from India and still residing there. I also have been taught the same things as you yourself have taught in schools and higher education. But, problem is, however you may try, you cannot avoid politics while discussing Michurin. I hope you have noticed that I haven't mentioned any kind of ideological points, whatever I mentioned, comes automatically as they are so much attached to the subject.
IMO, what LYsenko had done or tried to do, is just to extend the principles of Michurin to crops. Whatsoever, lets stop discussing the political aspect of this subject here and better concentrate on the principles of Michurin only. I am curious to know, whether any gardener, you or anybody else, has got some success by applying Michurin's methodology or not. If yes, I am very much curious to know the details.
IMO, like Michurin, Burbank too was victim of such mentality though I am sure that no "cold war" ideological mentality was behind it. That's why attack against Michurin was more severe than Burbank, but in reality, both of them fell victim to the "Weissman school of thought" that was prevailing (and probably still is) over the general conscience of most biologists around the world.

[castanea]

I think that is one reason Burbank avoided discussing details too much. I am sure that Burbank realized that that some of his methods and results were neither politically nor scientifically correct. Rather than get bogged down in arguments, he just kept using methods he knew would work even though the scientific establishment would not approve.

[cletus]

Yes, there is a distinction between the politicization of science and scientific prejudice itself. Here in this story they seem to be intertwined on both sides of the cold war. Certain views/research were prohibited (tacitly and not so tacitly) both in the US and in Russia. Causal explanations having to do either more with the organism or more with the environment seem to have been respectively favored due at least as much to politicization as scientific disagreement. If you read through Michurin's "Selected Works" you immediately get the impression of a brilliant man with subtle views, and besides for the obligatory homage, there isn't much in the way of political drivel. Nor is there a super ridged categorical distinction of "fruitless bourgeois-captalist-mendelist genetics" vs "creative-communist-michurist-darwinist genetics." If you read "IV Michurin: the great remaker of nature,"by Bakharev, you find very little interesting information compared to Michurin's own works, and huge amounts of political drivel with lots of reference to these rigidly constructed politico-scientific categories.