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In a paper published in this week’s issue of “Science,” Harvard University geneticist Dr. Robert Rothschild identified within the reams of uninterpretable data that constitute the human genome a basis for searching for reason and order in a universe where there is barely any at all.
“It is this gene that drives man to crave an empirical explanation for the apparent randomness of his own existence,” wrote Rothschild in the paper’s discussion section. “It is also this gene that allows man to cling desperately to any half-decent explanation for that randomness that he can come up with, if only through dubious experimental practices and falsified data.”
The gene’s discovery came as a great relief to Rothschild, who had spent countless dollars pursuing the gene and countless nights cultivating the belief that if he found it, all the things that puzzled him would become explicable or else disappear completely.
“We knew it had to be out there,” Rothschild said at a recent press conference. “Otherwise, what would be the purpose of science? To reveal the mysteries of life up to a point, then shut us out when microscopes and mitochondria can no longer account for life’s impossible complexity? No, no, no. There had to be a gene.”
The newly discovered gene lies on the fifth chromosome, alongside other genes Rothschild believes will become relevant in the near future. Among them, a gene that allows natural miracles to provoke wonder, a gene that transforms wonder into frustration and the bullheaded conviction that no natural miracle is complicated enough to lie outside the realm of scientific explanation and BRXQ48—the probable genetic basis for man’s tendency to give esoteric, jargony names to things.
Already, the global scientific community is abuzz with reactions to Rothschild’s revolutionary finding. “My lab recently abandoned a project to find the protein misfolding behind our tendency to look to proteins to explain why flowers bloom bright, eagles write poems in the sky and a babe’s touch melts the hardest heart,” said University of Washington’s Professor Cecilia Vorkink. “Rothschild’s work has inspired us to start the project up again.”
Rothschild is not without his share of detractors, however. A number of prominent scientists and academics have stepped forward to publically debunk his result. “Those kind of traits just aren’t reflected on a genetic level. It’s that simple,” said Dr. Nihal Claybourne, director of the American College of Psychoanalysts. “Everyone knows why people search for reason and order in the world. It’s because we’re afraid our dads are going to cut our dicks off.”
Continued Claybourne, “For Pete’s sake. I thought we had established that already. Next question!”
