The old paradigm offers a simplistic view that the characteristics or traits of organisms are each tied to specific genes, which are unaffected by one another or by the environment. And that, except for very rare random mutations, the genes are passed on unchanged to the next generation. Instead, scientific findings within the past 20 years reveal an immense amount of cross-talk between genes. Genes are nothing if not sensitive, dynamic and responsive, to other genes, to the cell or organism in which they find themselves and to the external environment. The layer upon layer of feedback between genes and environment, not only determine whether genes are active or not, but what function and structure they have.
Genes can mutate, multiply, rearrange and jump around in response to the environment.
They may even jump out of the genome of one organism to infect another one. It is more accurate to see the genes as having a very complicated ecology, and that for genes and genomes to remain constant, you need a balanced ecology. So the new genetics is radically ecological and holistic. I referred to genetic engineering biotechnology as a hoax back in 1994. This hoax is perpetrated by an unholy alliance between corporate capitalism and the discredited scientific paradigm.