#epigenetics in general is just so fucking fascinating tho

[dragimal]

so I just watched Annihilation again and I have some thoughts

to start off, let me highlight a couple ways that Annihilation gets biology wrong

- the way Lena describes all the flowers growing near the hut, “To look at them you wouldn’t say that they are the same species… but they’re growing from the same branch structure… so it *has* to be the same species. It’s the same plant! It’s like they’re stuck in a continuous mutation.” ‘same species’ is, uh, not the conclusion I would first come to in that situation! if anything, I’d go for extreme symbiosis (like lichen-level) first, maybe some radiation-induced grafting of plants together (as this is something that can actually be done to certain plants irl, depending on compatibility). plant physiology/ecology is *notoriously* easy to fuck with without even going so far as the gene level to do so

- when Lena is analyzing the gator-shark, she says, “you can’t cross-breed between different species,” which is blatantly false lmao. I’m willing to believe she simply meant something like “between broad clades” and was just simplifying the idea for her non-bio teammates, but in context with all the other weird bio assumptions she makes, idk...

- the scene w/ the human-shaped plants, where Josie explains that the HOX genes were mutated to reflect those of humans.... that’s not how HOX genes work? 

see, on a basic level, HOX genes function like gene->part, NOT gene->shape. like, look at this diagram of fly HOX genes

each gene corresponds to a part/section of the fly, not any particular shape. thus, if a plant were to turn “human” (or vis-versa in Josie’s case) via *specifically* HOX mutation, the mutations would occur as parts reflecting parts. say, something like the stalk specifically forming the torso, the leaves specifically forming the fingers, the apical meristem forming the head, etc. (idk exact plant or human genetics, so don’t quote me on those *specific* reflections, but u get the gist), which might then be arranged into an approximate human shape

(and this isn’t even to *mention* the fact that genes end up coding for different things over time, so the exact same codes are simply going to *mean* something different when applied to the genes of different organisms. tho I’m far more willing to assume alien radiation interference on that front)

now these are little bits that have bugged me since I first saw the movie, but something always held me back from trying to ‘fix’ the worldbuilding (as I am want to do). it’s only recently that I realized that I never actually wanted to fix the worldbuilding-- I’ve always loved the worldbuilding just fine! it was the character explanations that were so wrong

like, these events could have been explained with a lil more plausibility. the flowers at the hut could’ve undergone some hyper-drive symbiosis, or even had any ability for horizontal gene transfer ramped up to goddamned 1000. the human-shaped plants could’ve taken on the shape of a human via some warped radiation that kept the environmental ‘imprint’ of a human from the area, and reflected it onto the plants via epigenetic tinkering. then Josie turning into a plant looked far more like rapid absorption by a plant parasite rather than her actually turning *into* a plant. these are explanations I immediately latched onto as a biologist myself-- explanations I feel any other biologist would at least *consider* long before just... completely misinterpreting the way HOX genes function

now I only really realized all this after watching Folding Ideas’ video abt Annihilation and Metaphor. u may be wondering: how did an analysis video abt metaphor help me reach this conclusion abt the more concrete worldbuilding (however much of it we can even take at face-value)? well the thing abt aliens is that, as far as we know, they could function on metaphor! 

aliens are literally unknowable by our current understanding of biology and life. the movie itself even blatantly states that, “It’s not like us… it’s unlike us.” we’re so entrenched in what life looks like on Earth, we have no goddamned CLUE what life could look like elsewhere, under different circumstances. this search for the true, distilled basics of life is at the heart of the field of Universal Biology, and why some researchers are actively trying to change the way they approach and think abt Earth life as well

thus, everything that the Shimmer causes is completely plausible to me, whether on a biological level, metaphysical level, or both! and specifically, the idea of an alien species having some control over metaphysical properties, beyond what we can sense or comprehend, is what leads me to believe that an alien species could, theoretically, work by “metaphor logic”

like, “reflection and refraction”. what would it mean for us to encounter an alien species can read our psychology and reflect us so intimately? that can recognize our *essence*, and apply our shape to other organisms, and vis-versa? it’s absolutely fascinating to consider

so with that in mind, when I criticize the bunk biology explanations, I totally get that this movie is far more metaphor than anything-- that when the movie says the flowers are “the same plant”, or implies that Josie “became” the plant, it’s working directly towards themes around self-identity and trauma and change

BUT here’s the thing. by not understanding actual biology enough to apply the explanations in functional ways w/ the themes, the movie misses a GOLDEN opportunity for an even MORE fitting, blatant metaphor

remember me explaining that HOX genes don’t equate to shape? it’s environmental factors that influence the shape of plants (and, honestly, the shape of organisms in general) via stressors like temperature, amount of light, wind speeds, etc. while these stressors can’t change the actual sequence/makeup of DNA in a given organism’s lifespan, they *can* change the ways genes are expressed in that lifespan—essentially how tightly/loosely DNA strands are packed and how easily transcriptions factors can subsequently read and further express those genes

these changes in how DNA is packaged/expressed can then, shockingly enough, be passed on to later generations. epigenetics studies this particular kind of inheritance, and has led further to the study of “inherited trauma”*, and how the stressors that a parent experiences may pass on genetically to their offspring to prepare them for those same stressors, whether the offspring actually encounter those stressors or not

(*NOTE: this field of study is still rather novel-- research into inherited trauma in humans in particular is still in its infancy, and while it’s yielded interesting results, it’s good to be critical and cautious of these results in the context of other environmental factors)

like. inherited trauma. I can’t fucking believe Annihilation missed that opportunity. and with how much ppl focus on the Lena/Kane’s potential “shimmery kids” you’d think this would be an even more obvious extension of the metaphor

anyways, Annihilation good movie. but neither Lena nor Josie passed 5th grade biology