The Importance Of The Human Genome Project Essay -- Science Genetics B

The Importance Of The Human Genome ProjectThis is the outstanding achievement not only if of our lifetime, but of human history. I say this, because the Human Genome Project has the potential to impact the life of every person on this planet. It is a giant imagination that will change mankind, much like the printing press did.The famous words of Dr. James Watson resonated as a victory bell, signaling the successful boundary of what many deemed the boldest undertaking in the history of biology The Human Genome Project (2003). On the fiftieth anniversary of the day that forever changed science the day Watson and his gent Francis Crick unraveled the secret of life, the structure of deoxyribonucleic acid the world was presented with another shocking discovery the complete sequence of the human genome. Almost immediately, uproar swept passim the science community and the world-at-large, as many believed that the solution to our problems had finally arrived the true secret of life the panacea that would dissipate the ominous clouds of disease and suffering. Yet, as oft happens when a promising new idea is presented on tenuous grounds, the revelers had only heard a fraction of the entire story their grand hopes were born earlier of imagination. But when all the celebratory confetti had cleared, there stood defiantly amidst all the hoopla voices of reason. Molecular anthropologist Jonathan Marks voice was one of these. In an excerpt from his literary run short What It Means to be 98% Chimpanzee Apes, People, and Their Genes, Marks undermines the importance of the Human Genome Project and our genes, advocating instead a more(prenominal) rational and moderate view of them. By exposing three of the Project s flaws, he hopes to convince... ...ealize that our genes are but one aspect of our history, that there are many other histories that are even more important it is a delusion to think that genomics in isolation will ever tell us what it means to be human (2001, paragraph 11). Indeed, everything is not solely in our genes.Works CitedBeckwith, J. (2002). Geneticists in society, society in genetics. In J. Alper (Ed.), The double-edged helix (pp. 39-57). Baltimore The Johns Hopkins University Press.Lewontin, R.C. (1991). Causes and their effects. Biology as ideology the doctrine of DNA (pp. 41-57). new-sprung(prenominal) York HarperPerennial.Marks, J. (2002). The meaning of human variation. What it means to be 98% chimpanzee apes, people, and their genes (pp. 88-95). Berkeley University of California Press.Paabo, S. (2001). The human genome and our view of ourselves. Science Magazine 291, 1219-1220.