Quotes of the Day

Shedding Our DNA Chains
Kudos on your cover story on epigenetics [Jan. 18]. As the director of mind-body medicine for a cancer center that offers seminars on how patients can benefit from this emerging science, I can attest that most have never heard of epigenetics. Yet everything in our environment — the way we think and feel, our exposure to stress — affects the way our DNA is expressed. Once we understand this premise, we can incorporate strategies to effect epigenetic changes — including neurogenesis, the growth of new nerve tissue in the brain.
Brenda Stockdale
Atlanta

It is important to clarify for your readers that not all those who receive a diagnosis of myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) will die within two years of getting it, regardless of whether they take "conventional blood medications" or azacitidine. Of the estimated 60,000 people living with MDS in the U.S., 75% have a lower-risk diagnosis, providing a much less ominous prognosis. Research indicates that lower-risk MDS patients under age 70 survive, on average, four to nine years after diagnosis, meaning that some MDS patients live much longer.
Richard M. Stone, Mikkael A. Sekeres, Aplastic Anemia & MDS International Foundation
Rockville, Md., U.S.

The work of Dr. Lars Olov Bygren in epigenetics referenced in your article would seem to nullify one of the icons of Darwinian evolution, Darwin's finches. Darwin noted that the bill length of finches changed depending on environmental conditions. Darwin explained this by natural selection. Other scientists have noticed that the bill lengths of those finches return to normal when conditions return to normal. Sounds like epigenetics and not Darwinian evolution. Darwin skeptics tend to agree that organisms can adapt (or evolve) within certain boundaries, but such organisms do not evolve into new species. Bygren's study of epigenetics would seem to explain this phenomenon better and more simply than Darwinian evolution.
Timothy Cox
Palm Beach Gardens, Fla., U.S.

Yemen: The New New Frontier
Instead of sending tens of millions of dollars to Yemen for military purposes, the U.S. should be spending funds to eliminate illiteracy and poverty [Jan. 18]. Building schools with qualified teachers and medical clinics in every village would truly help the people of Yemen.
Robert Read Sr.
Hickory, N.C., U.S.

Now Yemen is the U.S.'s "most fragile ally." But our country does a good job on its own of keeping terrorists busy there and all around the world. We invade countries to spread our form of government, then we fail to comprehend their ancient tribal systems, their religious systems and their views about marriage and family structure. The rise of terrorist activity over the past decade should at last lead us to look more carefully at ourselves, not the people chewing khat in Yemen.
Tom Edgar
Boise, Idaho, U.S.

The Atrocity of Human Trafficking
Thank you for "The New Slave Trade" [Jan. 18]. The tragedy of human trafficking and enslavement still needs much more coverage, and it's encouraging to see it in a prominent publication like TIME. I was sorry to see, however, that human trafficking in the U.S. was not mentioned. There have been cases of trafficking and slavery reported in all 50 states and D.C., and Kevin Bales, founder of Free the Slaves, estimates the number of modern-day slaves in the U.S. to be between 40,000 and 50,000. Leaving out this information allows readers to assume that it is a problem only in a faraway place.
Elizabeth Tromans
Hamilton, Ohio, U.S.

Don't Call Me the Idiot
I am one of the antireform liberals Joe Klein disparages in "Village Idiots" [Jan. 11]. While the value of the health care reform bill is debatable — 30 million people may get coverage that may or may not be worthwhile — I can't understand why anyone would not be outraged that the government is forcing them to buy private insurance from an industry that routinely pays CEOs seven figures while denying sick, dying people coverage. How is that not outrageous?
Ezra Abrams
Newton, Mass., U.S.

Klein needs to get out more. The failure to preserve the public option is an affront not to the left but to the base. Progressives are not demanding that everything be thrown out. Keep the regulations and break up insurance monopolies. Move the financial aspects of the bill to reconciliation, and institute Medicare for all with a 51-vote majority. That is a rational response.
Virginia Velez
Bainbridge Island, Wash., U.S.