[DeepDish]

I hope that you do not think that I have bought the "we are more closely related than you think" argument. With a 1.5% difference in human/chimp dna, which sounds small, there is a stunning number of base pairs involved. If I remember correctly, there are about 4 billion sequences in the human genome. 1.5% of that number is about 60 million, this is not a number of little consequence. It does tend to support the argument that when nature, or God, depending on your C/E beliefs, finds a combination or sequence useful, that combination is used widely.

The small percentage difference is impressive to the guys who were playing pocket pool in high school while the math teacher had his back to the class explaining the subject at the blackboard.

[Blueflag]

Not at all. Just adding my 1.98874532 cent's worth

;-)

[RightWhale]

Are there 30,000 genes that seem to be functional in the genome? Clearly there are more than 30,000 traits, so the genes work in combinations and the number of combinations would be astronomical. It's like an alphabet with 30,000 letters rather than 24 or 40, or a musical scale with 30,000 pitches in an octave rather than 12. Plus, most of the sequences don't do anything at all and might not be considered genes. That's all I know, and more.