Comments on: Closing the black box

By: Isegoria

Isegoria — Wed, 09 Mar 2011 15:25:15 +0000

I think the Human Genome Project had — and still has — plenty of potential; it’s just going to take a lot of time and effort to extract useful knowledge from the raw data — and I don’t necessarily think it’s the current medical experts who are going to lead the way. The task is one for information-coding experts, informed by “old school” medical experts.

Also, is there any way around dishonesty in funding, when those with the funds — and those they’re beholden to — can’t understand what they’re funding?

By: Bruce G Charlton

Bruce G Charlton — Wed, 09 Mar 2011 12:02:17 +0000

Indeed. So dishonesty was built into the project.

Many of us knew from its inception that the Human Genome Project was either ignorant (because the scientists knew virtually nothing about medicine) or dishonest (because the scientists did know about medicine, but wanted the money anyway) and would not yield what was promised.

The Human Genome Project was ‘sold’ on the basis of generating rapid and significant progress in the treatment of human disease, and that was a false and often fraudulent claim.

By: Isegoria

Isegoria — Tue, 08 Mar 2011 16:54:44 +0000

I was shocked to learn that the Human Genome Project was declared finished when it had not in fact sequenced the entire human genome. And I was baffled by the prevalent expectation that knowing the code without understanding the machine running it would yield massive, immediate breakthroughs in medicine.

By: Bruce G Charlton

Bruce G Charlton — Tue, 08 Mar 2011 16:14:26 +0000

“Now you mostly take that for granted and cut straight to the medical chase.”

Which, considering that the Human Genome Project (the most expensive scientific project in history, by far) has had approximately zero positive impact on medicine, actually means cutting straight to the BS, spin, hype and outright lies.