On Tue, Jan 29, 2013 at 2:10 PM, Leo A. Martin <leo@possi.org> wrote: > DNA sequencer goggles are not (currently?) good enough to detect variants > and > subspecies, so many people whose DNA goggles are stuck on their heads > [hope/ suspect / > assume / believe / think / behave as though / wonder whether] variants and > subspecies do > not actually exist. > Not true, Leo. We have the technology to sequence full genome to study all the variants of all genes in any given organism, and thus emerged the latest and hottest field of population genomics (a modern version of the old population genetics). Whereas in the past we have looked a few genes to determine population, we now look at ALL of the genes to determine populations. We are doing this in my lab. A post-doc in lead of a population genomics project for a species of mushroom found 500,000 locations in the genome that determines population. This power is immense compare to the several hundred loci used by population geneticists of old. And of course we know that variants and populations exist. Just take a look at two seedlings and you can see right away. Taxonomists don't go out of their way to describe them all because that's not within their field and even outside of their interest. We just pick one level and study what we know and allow someone else with an expertise and interest to study deeper levels. Nhu