Also check out the wiki article on chimera's. People, plants, and animals with multiple sets of different chromosomes in different parts of the body
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One thing I read recently was an article in Nature about the argument to declassify plant species *as* species at all - because hybridization is so naturally rampant among plants. I think it's interesting how we define things in such narrowly defined containers, and then the giant fact that we all evolved from the same set of RNA and later DNA begins to rear its ugly head.
I believe that our ideas of speciation and genetic diversity are probably in for a relatively wild ride over the next 100 years - it'll be fun to watch and even more fun to participate in.
The speciation issue is intriguing. And the more we know about any living thing, the harder it becomes to draw those lines. SHould it be based only on DNA (and if so what differences matter the most)? Should it be based on reproduction?
And yet its an issue we need to deal with so that when scientists talk about an organism, they have a basic understanding of what kind of organism is being described. At least until computing power catches up with biological complexity.
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One thing I read recently was an article in Nature about the argument to declassify plant species *as* species at all - because hybridization is so naturally rampant among plants. I think it's interesting how we define things in such narrowly defined containers, and then the giant fact that we all evolved from the same set of RNA and later DNA begins to rear its ugly head.
I believe that our ideas of speciation and genetic diversity are probably in for a relatively wild ride over the next 100 years - it'll be fun to watch and even more fun to participate in.
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And yet its an issue we need to deal with so that when scientists talk about an organism, they have a basic understanding of what kind of organism is being described. At least until computing power catches up with biological complexity.
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