The ultimate in self awareness is the Human Genome Project (HGP). Most people are lucky if they know which side of their bodies the liver is on. The goal of the HGP is to determine exactly how organs are built, function, interact, and respond to environmental stimuli. Every living thing on earth is made up of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA). DNA consists (simply) of just four ingredients: adenosine (A), thymine (T), guanine (G), and cytosine (C). A, T, G, C, that's it. And those four letters are repeated in different patterns throughout an organism's DNA. The complete pattern for an organism is called the organism's genome. Generally, the smaller an organism the smaller its genome, though that's a wild generalism.
Biologists have fully sequenced, or found the pattern to, the smallpox virus, which is responsible through history for untold tens of millions of deaths. The virus, which only passes from human to human, was eradicated from the general population in 1979, though it's still kept frozen in high-security labs (we hope) in Russia and the U.S.
In comparison to the smallpox virus genome, the human genome is gigantic. If you printed out on paper the full human genome, or the fully sequenced pattern of ATCGGCGAA etc., it would fill a 30-volume encyclopedia, and has parts that are read forwards and other parts that are read backwards; thus, the complexity.
Why do I think this is important? Because:
1) We could wipe out disease and pain.
2) We could swiftly eliminate hunger by growing better foods.
3) We could enhance our understanding of other species.
4) We could enhance the quality of eldercare.
5) We could make better humans.
Yes, I know this last point is extremely controversial, but it's an important point. I'm not talking about euthanizing the sick, the poor, or the undesirable (well, at least not the sick and poor...), that's eugenics. I'm talking about improving the quality of life all around and completely. That involves the definite application of ethics, and I'm completely for that. My point is that we can do good with biotechnology, so we have an obligation to try.
Here is a list-in-progress of books and articles to consult:
Genome, by Matt Ridley Paperback - 352 pages 1st perenn edition (October 3, 2000)
Harpercollins; ISBN: 0060932902 ; Dimensions (in inches): 0.84 x 7.97 x 5.33
Scientific American is always a good source of what's going on in biomolecular research.
