Re: Will the human genome project be a postive contribution to community?

Well, the short answer is yes, but I'm guessing you want more than that. It may help if you compare the human genome project (HGP) to a project for developing a telephone directory. For a phone book, there are centralized places to submit information and people to go out and get the information. Is the information contained in a phone book useful? Of course. And so will the information from the HGP.

The human genome project will give us the basic information we need to find specific genes. You may ask "wasn't the information available before the HGP? After all, genes were found before the HGP." True, some of the information was available before the HGP but different people had it. You may know the phone # of 5 people but how would someone without a phone book get that information esp. if they don't know you? Were scientists able to find genes before the HGP, of course, but it took a lot longer -- very much like trying to find one specific person's contact information if they're not listed in a phone book and if they have no contact with people who are listed in a phone book.

Information of any kind is always useful and there is a lot of information available from the HGP. The ways and means to use this information are still being developed. If you want to see how the HGP came about and the techniques involved, you can check out Concept 39 of DNA from the Beginning (www.dnaftb.org).