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a cell is adapted to may possibly be maintained by cells after transplantation into a new environment. This is one way, to state it simply, that bone marrow transplants work in cancer patients. Rather than adapting to the environment of the recipient and becoming cancerous, the donor cells maintain their ability to function and replace the aberrant cellular environment.

The Alternatives

Proponents for cellular memory as a theory of consciousness ask how the stories of transplant recipients such as Sylvia can be explained if not by the idea that personality is carried by cells, along with chemicals. One argument is psychology. Similar to the placebo effect, a patient can exhibit a mind over matter reaction to treatments and procedures. Though some evidence exists for neurochemicals altering the brain chemistry in a manner that benefits patients, there are also unknown elements to the power of the mind. Patients like Sylvia want to believe that they can find their donor and do so through conventional channels. Talking to friends who may be able to locate the family, as Sylvia did, can sometimes be enough in the small world we live in. There are many psychological factors involved in personality adjustments and alterations in likes and dislikes that can explain what she, and a handful of others, have experienced.

If cellular memory actually carried bits of the donor with the cells, the phenomenon would be more widely experienced. Either that or many of those who do experience it are overlooking its occurrence. It can be tested by systematic elimination of psychological factors, before and after personality tests on donors and recipients, and research into whether animals injected with human cells exhibit human characteristics. But that last test has already been shown to be negative, which does not suggest any substantiation of this idea in the future.

Learn more about this author, Alicia M Prater PhD.
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