Bruce Harold Lipton (born October 21, 1944) is an American

developmental biologist Developmental biology is the study of the process by which animals and plants grow and develop. Developmental biology also encompasses the biology of regeneration, asexual reproduction, metamorphosis, and the growth and differentiation of stem c ...

noted for his views on

epigenetics In biology, epigenetics is the study of stable phenotypic changes (known as ''marks'') that do not involve alterations in the DNA sequence. The Greek prefix '' epi-'' ( "over, outside of, around") in ''epigenetics'' implies features that are "o ...

. In his book ''The Biology of Belief'', he claims that beliefs control human biology rather than DNA and inheritance. Lipton's contentious claims have not received attention from mainstream science.

Biography

Lipton received a B.A. in biology from

C.W. Post Campus of Long Island University LIU Post (formally, the C.W. Post Campus of Long Island University, and often referred to as C.W. Post) is a private university in Brookville, New York. It is the largest campus of the private Long Island University system. The campus is nam ...

in 1966 and a PhD in developmental biology from the

University of Virginia The University of Virginia (UVA) is a Public university#United States, public research university in Charlottesville, Virginia. Founded in 1819 by Thomas Jefferson, the university is ranked among the top academic institutions in the United S ...

in 1971. From 1973 to 1982, he taught

anatomy Anatomy () is the branch of biology concerned with the study of the structure of organisms and their parts. Anatomy is a branch of natural science that deals with the structural organization of living things. It is an old science, having its ...

at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine, before joining St. George's University School of Medicine as a professor of anatomy for three years. Lipton has said that sometime in the 1980s, he rejected

atheism Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no d ...

and came to believe that the way cells function demonstrates the

existence of God The existence of God (or more generally, the existence of deities) is a subject of debate in theology, philosophy of religion and popular culture. A wide variety of arguments for and against the existence of God or deities can be categorized ...

. From 1987 to 1992, Lipton was involved in research at

Pennsylvania State University The Pennsylvania State University (Penn State or PSU) is a Public university, public Commonwealth System of Higher Education, state-related Land-grant university, land-grant research university with campuses and facilities throughout Pennsylvan ...

and Stanford University Medical Center. Since 1993, he has been teaching in non-tenured positions at primarily alternative and chiropractic colleges and schools. Lipton has said, "When I first started back in the '70s and my research was coming out, it was the golden age of genes. My research irritated a lot of people. I always thought of them as lemmings running off the cliff of DNA, and I'm standing there on the side with the results from my stem-cell studies thinking, 'Oh my God, you're all going the wrong way.' At some point I realised that they marginalised my work because it didn't conform to their conventional beliefs and I thought, well, they're not even being scientists. And I just left the system. I realised the message is more important for the average person than it is to argue in the halls of science". Lipton has received the 2009 Goi Peace Award.

Reception

In 2010, in her opinion column in the journal ''

Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment ''Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment'' is a peer-reviewed scientific journal issued ten times per year, and consists of peer-reviewed, synthetic review articles on all aspects of ecology, the environment, and related disciplines, as well a ...

'',

Katherine Ellison Katherine Ellison (born August 19, 1957) is an American author. With two colleagues, she won the 1985 Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting for their work reporting on corruption in the Philippines. Career Ellison has authored and co-authore ...

wrote that Lipton "remains on the sidelines of conventional discussions of epigenetics", and quoted him saying he was basically ignored by mainstream science. In ''

Science-Based Medicine ''Science-Based Medicine'' is a website and blog with articles covering issues in science and medicine, especially medical scams and practices. Founded in 2008, it is owned and operated by the New England Skeptical Society and run by Steven N ...

'', professor

David Gorski David Henry Gorski is an American surgical oncologist, professor of surgery at Wayne State University School of Medicine, and a surgical oncologist at the Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute, specializing in breast cancer surgery. He is an out ...

described Lipton as a "well-known crank" and likened his idea to the law of attraction, also known as "'' The Secret''": "wanting something badly enough makes it so".

Books

* ''The Biology of Belief – Unleashing the Power of Consciousness, Matter & Miracles'' (2005) * ''Spontaneous Evolution: Our Positive Future and a Way to Get There from Here'' (2010) * ''The Honeymoon Effect: The Science of Creating Heaven on Earth'' (2013) * ''The Biology of Belief - 10th Anniversary Edition'' (2015)

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Lipton, Bruce 1944 births Living people 21st-century American biologists 21st-century American non-fiction writers Developmental biologists Former atheists and agnostics Pennsylvania State University faculty People from Mount Kisco, New York Pseudoscientific biologists Scientists from New York (state) Quantum mysticism advocates University of Virginia alumni University of Wisconsin–Madison faculty

Biography

Reception

Books

See also

References

External links