Example of "high‑moral" nonsense: sticker cells and telegony

I was browsing the internet today. I ended up on a stranger’s blog with a rather odd entry. Nearby was a cloud of tags. I clicked the tag “biology” to see what else was being written. Eventually I arrived here (this is “Answers@Mail.ru”). There is a link to the following text (a little blue one). A mother not of her own child. The doctor lifted his eyes from the sheet with the conclusion. — According to the analyses, you are only the mother of your eldest son… — What? What are you saying? I carried all four of them! Shouldn’t I have known this? — Margaret Walsh (name changed for ethical reasons) was shocked. THIS “PIT” The story began when her younger daughter Karen burned her hand and, diagnosed with toxic shock, was admitted to the intensive care unit of the University of Pennsylvania. She required multiple blood transfusions. Margaret, her husband Charles, and their three older children offered themselves as donors. Doctors took blood from them for analysis—to determine whose blood type and antigens matched the girl’s best… And then a shocking result: the girl was not Margaret’s daughter at all. In the end, Charles, Margaret’s husband, became the donor, and two weeks later Karen was discharged from the hospital. Margaret’s life turned into a nightmare. Was the baby mixed up at birth? Why did she know nothing? What now? Charles tried to calm his wife: “Stop! The doctors messed up. The important thing is that the daughter is fine…” But Margaret stood firm: “Then let them admit their analyses were wrong!” Finally, with the results of genetic testing of her children (according to which not only Karen, but in fact only the first child was biologically hers) and a gynecologist’s certificate confirming that she had been pregnant and given birth four times, Margaret went to genetics professor Peter Reed. The scientist was interested and agreed to study the paradox. Professor of the University of Pennsylvania Peter REED says: We took Margaret’s oocyte and her husband’s sperm for analysis. Both the female cells and the sperm were completely normal. But when, with the couple’s permission, we performed in‑vitro fertilization, we saw something strange: together with Charles’s sperm, some foreign cell entered the oocyte. This foreign cell first expelled the nucleus from Margaret’s oocyte, took its place, and then the foreign oocyte was fertilized by Charles’s sperm. A two‑stage fertilization! (Teleogenesis…) Charles underwent urological examination. Inside the head of his penis, in the so‑called boat‑shaped cavity, several hundred such foreign cells were found! — The existence of the boat‑shaped cavity (an expansion inside the penile glans) was known to physicians before, — continues Professor Reed, — but nobody had ever found foreign cells there… Examination showed that these cells have extremely sticky membranes. They were even called “sticker cells” – from English sticker, “adhesive”, “sticky”, or simply “sticky cells”. Experimenting with Charles’s sperm, we saw how these stickies, during sexual contact, penetrate the oocyte and, instead of the mother’s genetic material, fertilize it with completely foreign genetic material. KOPR: — But whose? The analysis showed that Charles had no relation to these cells. A DECEITFUL CHEATER! Research continued. But after a few days, while scientists were puzzling over the source of the man’s foreign chromosomes, the sticker cells suddenly disappeared – another analysis showed they were absent from both sperm and the penis. For the next two weeks Charles provided sperm samples every two days. Finally the foreign cells reappeared, — This patient posed a problem for us, — continues Professor Reed. — We proposed many hypotheses: hereditary diseases, consumption of genetically modified foods, stress… The solution came, as often happens, unexpectedly. When one of us asked, “What is the frequency of your sexual activity?” Charles hesitated a bit, then admitted that he had a lover with whom he met several times a week. There were other women before her… Together with Charles we compiled a schedule of his sexual encounters with the lover over the past weeks, and those days coincided with the days when sticky cells with a foreign chromosome set were present in his sperm! The sticky cells found in Charles’s sperm contained the genes of his lover. Thus, this unknown woman is Karen’s genetic mother! KOPR: — But how did the lover acquire these strange cells? — We found them in the woman’s uterus! Specifically, inside the cervical canal. Previously it was thought that only a so‑called mucus plug resided in the cervix, but now it is known that sticker cells also inhabit it. When the research was completed, scientists could reconstruct exactly what happened to Charles. During sex with his lover, the penis made active contact with the partner’s cervix. At that moment, sticker cells entered it. After reaching the boat‑shaped cavity, these cells temporarily lost motility and adhered tightly to the inner surface of the male urethra. (By the way, that is why they are not washed away by the ejaculatory wave.) Doctor REED reports! Approximately an hour after intercourse the stickies regain motility. They remain active for about a day. If the man has another sexual act within that time, these cells attach to the sperm head and carry foreign genes to other female partners. We have already examined 1,500 Americans and found that virtually every woman’s cervix contains such cells. It turned out they are precursors of oocytes, which is why they have exactly the same chromosome set. (In other words, during evolution the oocyte formed from them. — Author’s note.) In fact, scientists already knew that a huge number of similar cells mature in the ovaries. Previously it was thought that the remaining cells were reabsorbed; now it is clear that they travel down the fallopian tubes to the cervix. If sexual contact occurs, they enter the penis, and the man transports foreign genes from one woman to another… TRUE MALE CORR.: — Nature is very rational. Perhaps this mechanism is not accidental and carries some meaning? — Indeed, nature strives to leave only the strongest and healthiest individuals in the offspring. Biologists know that during the breeding season the male first chooses the best (strong, large, beautiful) female in his habitat. Now we know that by copulating with her, he essentially collects cells with her genes and then distributes them to other females. Even weak females can then give birth to offspring with the chromosome set of the strongest! Opinion of the European Society of Geneticists, candidate of medical sciences, geneticist Serhiy SEROV: Just two years ago, when American scientists decoded the human genome, they were surprised to find that all people (including different nationalities) are genetically very close to each other… Today, thanks to Professor Reed’s group, scientists explained this paradox: people born to different mothers can be relatives. File “S‑I.” According to SIECUS (American Council on Sexual Information and Education, — author), about 4 % of families in the USA, without realizing it, raise genetically unrelated children. Instead of an afterword Doctors explained to Charles: it was the infidelities that caused his wife Margaret to carry the children of his lovers. Deeply shaken, Charles confessed to his wife that same day. “My world turned upside down,” Margaret told Professor Reed. “At first I felt a wild revulsion! But then I decided: since I carried and gave birth to them, they are my children! And I forgave Charles – after all, we have a huge life behind us…” Prepared by Volodymyr Medvedev I was just stunned. At first I thought: maybe there’s something behind this? Sure, a lot was exaggerated, but the article reminded me of the elimination of a non‑clonal genome in green frogs. No, I didn’t believe what was written, partly because passages like the following have long been an irritant (I wrote about it, for example, here): Indeed, nature strives to leave only the strongest and healthiest individuals in the offspring. Biologists know that during the breeding season the male first chooses the best (strong, large, beautiful) female in his habitat. Now we know that by copulating with her, he essentially collects cells with her genes and then distributes them to other females. Even weak females can then give birth to offspring with the chromosome set of the strongest! Then I realized the ends did not match. How many sperm does a man eject at once? How many cells could stick somewhere and later detach? Moreover, there is serious competition among sperm for movement. If a cell attaches to a sperm, it ends badly. And, by the way, it is not only the sperm that penetrates the oocyte – the oocyte also takes the sperm in. Why would it preserve the possibility of letting some foreign thing in together with the sperm? I searched and found a rather reasonable analysis of this nonsense, posted on LiveJournal by a blogger tanchik, whose view I can only share. I quote her text with some excerpts. First I tried to Google English keywords: sticker cells, sperm, oocytes, etc. I also searched for Professor Peter Reed, supposedly working at my university. Even on the internal university site I found nothing. Maybe I searched poorly. If you find the source of this article, please send me a link. Now, let’s start the breakdown, examining everything, not only the medical part. (1) The University of Pennsylvania hospital does not treat children at all. Children are treated at the separate, huge, famous CHOP hospital right next door. Because of CHOP’s reputation, a “mix‑up” is practically impossible. (2) Unlike Russia, local hospitals do not practice blood transfusion from relatives. Blood components come from donors; plasma is frozen from a bank, and platelet‑rich plasma and red cells come from donors who have previously donated, to reduce infection risk. Thus, points 1 and 2 already show the author’s Russian bias, which also explains why I found nothing in English sources. (3) Now a bit of theory. A sperm is very small, clearly smaller than any other “standard” cell, which increases its mobility. It contains only tightly packed genetic material, a tail with mitochondria for energy, and a special organelle – the acrosome – a bag of enzymes needed to penetrate the oocyte’s zona pellucida. The sperm is so “tuned” to its function that during development it loses many typical cellular structures and even cannot feed on its own, relying on nurse cells. Because of its size, a sperm cannot physically carry any other cell, even if such a cell existed. There would not be enough force. Even if we assume the other cell is also microscopic, the sperm would be outcompeted by other, faster sperm. Let’s set that aside; perhaps sticker cells somehow boost the sperm – imagination required. ;) Then the question: how would a sticker cell get into the oocyte and expel its nucleus? Obviously it would need an acrosome, just like a sperm, otherwise it cannot. Let’s assume, for the sake of argument, that there exist tiny “micro‑oocytes” in women’s cervixes that no one has ever seen, or that scientists missed a new cell type living in the cervical canal (from which smears are constantly taken). Suppose these mysterious cells have developed three new systems: being extremely small and hiding in a smear, being able to hitch a ride on a sperm, and being able to dissolve the oocyte’s membrane. Fine. But we have another problem, Watson. Human oocytes have a special mechanism that prevents multiple sperm from fertilizing the same egg. After the zona pellucida is breached, it quickly hardens and becomes impermeable, so other sperm can no longer penetrate. Professor Reed tells us that a sticker cell first enters the oocyte, expels its native nucleus, and then the sperm uses the sticker cell as a vehicle. This two‑stage fertilization is emphasized in the article. Let’s assume the previously accepted fertilization mechanism was wrong. Even with five assumptions, we face another issue: fertilization requires a single set of chromosomes, not a double set. A single set is produced by a special type of cell division, and in women this occurs only during fetal development; no new oocytes are formed after birth. Therefore, to accommodate the story we would have to assume either an unknown alternative way of producing haploid cells in women, or that all decades‑old knowledge of ovarian biology is wrong, or that sticker cells can, after entering an oocyte, split and discard half of their genetic material – a mechanism not described for any somatic mammalian cell. Is this too much fantasy and sensational scientific discovery for one article? Yet we persist. Thus, the boat‑shaped cavity. In it, sticker cells that have stealthily migrated from the cervix sit attached, waiting for a sperm moving at a few meters per second (haha) to latch onto. For attachment and waiting, these cells chose the worst possible place. The cavity receives ducts of special glands, whose density is highest there. The glands’ task is simple: they produce a lot of mucus to trap and flush microbes out of the urethra. Citing a textbook: Mechanical protection is provided by the Geren valve separating the boat‑shaped cavity (urethral entrance) from the anterior urethra, the Littre urethral glands secreting urethral mucus, and the bulbourethral (Cowper’s) glands secreting a specific fluid during ejaculation. The Geren valve offers a partial barrier, while the Littre and Cowper glands aid mechanical removal of microorganisms from the urethra. So, according to Professor Reed, sticker cells sit for a whole day or more, attached in this “drafty” spot where nature provides a mucous wash, like water in a toilet. Wonderful, reliable location. I think that’s enough dissection of this dogma. Also, sometimes we should not forget biology and anatomy textbooks. Know and love your body, that’s the idea. So, everything is clear. I didn’t need to go to American sites – a competent person already did. The sensible analysis of these tales exists only in one place online (my link will be the second), and the non‑critical repetitions are scattered everywhere, fueling wild speculation, including about teleogenesis. In the Answers@Mail.ru link there is a reference to a text by the proto‑theologian Nikolai Golovkin. The text is incomplete, but his reflections also fill the internet. I copy it from the forum library of a Orthodox portal. Teleogenesis – the science of virginity This discovery was hidden for a long time. Today it has countless opponents. People who marry, for the most part, want children. But not everyone knows how virgin purity affects the health of offspring, what exactly depends on it – what your children will be like… Our ancestors knew this: they could see that a wandering girl does not produce good progeny. In modern times, geneticists have explained the link between virginity and offspring quality by discovering the phenomenon of teleogenesis in the last century. It holds that the decisive influence on a woman’s offspring is the first man in her life. He, not the eventual father of the child, deposits the genetic foundation of each woman’s progeny, regardless of when and from whom she later bears her children.He, having broken virginity, becomes, in a sense, the genetic father of all future children of the woman. Should modern girls, who decide to begin an intimate life before marriage, know this? Undoubtedly. About 150 years ago, horse breeders, developing new horse breeds, decided to cross a horse with a zebra to increase endurance. The experiments failed: not a single conception occurred—neither horses with male zebra partners nor zebras with mare partners. The experiments were halted and attempts were made to forget them, assuming the matter was settled. However, a few years later, striped foals began to be born to mares that had participated in the experiments. From purebred stallions! The astonished scientific world named this phenomenon telegony. Experiments by C. Darwin, Professor Flint, Felix Ladantek, and other scientists on other animals confirmed this phenomenon. Thus, a paradoxical situation has arisen by our time: this phenomenon, which has a direct relation to the birth of viable offspring and should be considered by anyone who wants a healthy family, is known predominantly only to livestock breeders. And they know it well: otherwise Russia would not have the best animal breeds—neither purebred racehorses, nor dairy cows, nor excellent sables... Incidentally, domestic furs have captured a third of the world fur market. Then, 150 years ago, contemporaries immediately asked physiologists: “Does the effect of telegony extend to humans?” Scientists no longer needed to be prompted. Intensive physiological, anthropological, sociological studies began, and even experiments, if such a possibility seemed feasible. After many years of numerous, diverse experiments, impartial science declared firmly: “Yes, the effect of telegony extends to humans, and in a much more pronounced form than in the animal world!” Here the veil of secrecy fell! The discovery of telegony was immediately hidden from people, as it opened mysterious veils over the fates of many individuals—both ordinary and great. Moreover, it firmly blocked the way for all kinds of sexual revolutions, which did not fit the plans of the enemy of the human race. For secrecy, a convenient phrase was found and entered into the encyclopedia: allegedly the phenomenon of telegony was not confirmed... Thus, telegony (from “tele” – far and “gony” – birth) is a science that asserts that all previous sexual partners of a female affect the offspring of that female. It is known that even several years after extramarital relations with traveling performers at international festivals, sports Olympics, our Russian girls began to give birth to children “neither from the mother nor the father, but from a black and feeble young man” by their genetically healthy white husbands. The cause of these “young men” was a genetic mutation of the chromosomal chain; a long‑ago extramarital liaison became the source of family tragedies. Naturally, today the theory of telegony has countless opponents who cite “research results and experiments,” proving that telegony is nonsense, that taking it into account is disrespecting oneself and one’s desires. Most of these theorists are interested parties, because the pornography industry would suffer substantial losses if the phenomenon of telegony were studied by schoolchildren. Therefore it is more profitable for them if our children begin to study in school a “Family Planning” program that promotes the growth of future generations and, consequently, the replenishment of their wallets. And another question: is everything lost for those women who have lost virginity but wish to have a family? In the Orthodox Church—through the rite of baptism and the sacrament of confession—one can attain a second birth and, by the weapon of the Spirit, overcome physical weakness. But the confession must be genuine, so that it bears worthy fruits—that is, an inner transformation, purification and renewal of the soul. From a spiritual point of view, telegony is explained very simply: the soul influences the body. “Genes” are the emotions, impressions of the mother’s soul toward the child conceived within her: if the mother thinks of something, it will inevitably be reflected in the children, and they will be born resembling the one she loved the first time—because that feeling is very strong, practically unforgettable. Saint Ambrose of Milan called it “the gift of the first marriage” from God. It arises even in the absence of physical intimacy—hence why girls were previously hidden in towers. Now girls see everything… So preserving virginity is not easy, and restoring it is an even greater effort. Yet the reward is great: children born of chaste parents are a true joy of life. And do you know what the problem is? There are incomparably more “buyers” for this ill‑written chatter than for normal texts that correspond to natural‑scientific reality. Of course, the very blogger whose analysis I just quoted is having fun, but she accurately reflects the prevailing high‑moral‑Orthodox‑illiterate perception of such texts: This story is moral and instructive. It calls us to avoid fornication, to fast, to pray, and to listen to Radio Radonezh. The authors should also have added that cells are extraordinarily small, or have active enzymes, so they can pass through condom pores or dissolve it, etc., so that even with condoms they don’t go left, cursed studs! By the way, the link with telegony is easy to see. Sticky cells are a scare for men, and telegony is a scare for women. The rise in morality among fools who believe such tales does not convince me much, but the damage they cause to the capacity for thought is undeniable. Oh‑my‑goodness....