Quote from: TDoS on Nov 26, 2025, 04:06 PMRE explained a topic in an interesting and understandable way. Was worth looking up and seeing how deep that rabbit hole could go, and when you get into all the combinations, the answer is...DEEP.
Glad it was helpful. The topic is very deep indeed, and you have to be quite careful extrapolating too far based on what we know about genetics versus what we don't know. Even scientists in the field will convey the idea that because we worked out the genetic code carried on DNA, we have all thhe tools we need to work out how a given organism works, just a matter of time in identifying what code sequence is responsible for each phenotype. Fact is , there is far more we don't know than what we do.
What we do know is that DNA codes for different proteins, and these proteins serve either as catalysts for a metabolic pathway or as building blocks for the structure of the organism. Which makes it possible to identify genes responsible for a variety of diseases and sometimes fix them.
Going much beyond this however is still shrouded in mystery. There is little understanding of how genes code for the gross morphology of an organism, its body plan. It always bothered me when I discussed it with Eric, and our bio teacher never gave me a satisfactory answer either. I've also never been happy with the explanations for cell differentiation in different organs, nor with explanation of the organization of the brain by region. Had I continued my study for a doctorate, this is where I would have focused my research. The area of study is wide open to this day because it's so mysterious. Nobel Prize material if you could work it out.
Anyhow, without an understanding of the gross structure to begin with, it's a mistake to go too far using genetics to explain how intelligence works and what traits can be ascribed to specific genes or sets of genes. You can however do pretty good statistical studies of populations to see how the numbers shake out, then work backwards to figure how many genes are involved and what's dominant or recessive. Not much of that being done either, since most of the money is being spent on DNA research that has direct application in pharmaceutical drug synthesis. That's where the money is.
RE