Ask Lemmy

36138 readers

2195 users here now

A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions

Rules: (interactive)

1) Be nice and; have fun

Doxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, and toxicity are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them

2) All posts must end with a '?'

This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?

3) No spam

Please do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.

4) NSFW is okay, within reason

Just remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either !asklemmyafterdark@lemmy.world or !asklemmynsfw@lemmynsfw.com. NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].

5) This is not a support community.

It is not a place for 'how do I?', type questions. If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email info@lemmy.world. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.

6) No US Politics.

Please don't post about current US Politics. If you need to do this, try !politicaldiscussion@lemmy.world or !askusa@discuss.online

Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.

Partnered Communities:

Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu

founded 2 years ago

MODERATORS

Bluetreefrog@lemmy.world

TheSaneWriter@lemm.ee

Asudox@lemmy.world

lemmy_bot@lemmy.world

beefbaby182@lemmy.world

ModeratorCan@lemmy.world

neidu3@sh.itjust.works

asudox@lemmy.asudox.dev

candyman337@lemmy.world

candyman337@sh.itjust.works

How many possible humans are there? (lemmy.world)

submitted 6 hours ago* (last edited 5 hours ago) by gedaliyah@lemmy.world to c/asklemmy@lemmy.world

17 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Looking only at genetic code, is it possible that there have ever been two genetically identical people who are not twins (or clones)? How many medically distinct human beings can their actually be?

I'm assuming that we're only talking about biologically modern human beings. So the genes that make us human cannot be eligible for variation.

If we don't include environmental factors and non-DNA genetic material, what is the actual number of genes that can vary from one person to another? Do we even understand the human genome well enough to make this kind of calculation?

I'm assuming from combinatorial math that it's more humans than can ever exist through the course of the entire universe. But what is the actual number? If those genes are varied at random, how many people will it take before they say a 50% chance that two of them are identical? For example, it only takes 23 people to have a 50% chance that at least two of them have the same birthday.

Edit: I found an interesting article about the complications with trying to calculate this number. The number seems to be on the order of 10^(tens or hundreds of thousands)

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] Apeman42@lemmy.world 10 points 6 hours ago (2 children)

I'm no scientician, but wouldn't mutation mean that the possible number of gene combinations is constantly growing? And maybe even making previously non-viable permutations viable, which seems like it would really fuck with the math?

[–] Skyrmir@lemmy.world 3 points 6 hours ago

There would still be a limit as long as the species was constrained to modern homo sapien. Mutating yourself out of the species would mean you're no longer in the set of things.

[–] gedaliyah@lemmy.world 1 points 6 hours ago

I'm also no scientitian. I believe any mutations would have to be within the existing genome or else it would no longer be a biologically modern human.

Let's add the additional stipulation that we are not adding any meaningless genes. I know that there are a lot of them, but I'm just curious about what the math would look like and if we even have the knowledge about the genome to know which gene variations are meaningful.

I'm thinking of the doppelganger thought that experiment. Am I really the only person like me that has ever lived or what level or live? Or is it statistically possible that another genetically identical version of me could exist within the timeline of the universe (as I mentioned, with a 50% probability or better)?