Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site utastro.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!bonnie!akgua!sdcsvax!sdcrdcf!hplabs!hao!seismo!ut-sally!utastro!ethan From: ethan@utastro.UUCP (Ethan Vishniac) Newsgroups: net.origins Subject: Re: How about the future? Message-ID: <588@utastro.UUCP> Date: Fri, 28-Sep-84 10:31:25 EDT Article-I.D.: utastro.588 Posted: Fri Sep 28 10:31:25 1984 Date-Received: Sun, 30-Sep-84 03:39:43 EDT References: <1323@ucla-cs.ARPA>, <158@mouton.UUCP> Organization: UTexas Astronomy Dept., Austin, Texas Lines: 18 [][][][] This kind of discussion quickly gets bogged down into arguments of what *you* would do if you were God. (I'd get rid of New Jersey, but that's neither here nor there.) The interesting thing about the biochemical similarities between species is that they are a pretty good measure of how *long* it has been since a common ancestor existed for two species (according to the fossil record). They are *not* a good measure of how physically similar two species are. (Except insofar as the second is correlated with the former, by no means an invariable rule) Incidentally, the same phenomenon can be seen in human blood proteins. This can be used to show that (among other things) that Boers have a significant amount of Bantu ancestry. Ethan Vishniac