protein is, in fact, detected by part of the gene itself.

So, nucleotide
sequences determine what kind of proteins organisms will make, and they
are also part of the signaling machinery that controls the manufacturing of
those proteins in response to external conditions. The signaling system is a
mechanism by which environment interacts with genes in creating
organisms.
Genes have yet a further function, which is to serve as a pattern for the
manufacture of further copies of themselves. When cells divide and sperm
and egg cells are produced, every new cell has a complete set of genes that
are more or less identical to the genes in the old cells. These newly
manufactured years and occupy tens or even hundreds of billions of dollars.
Of course, there is always the promise that more efficient technology will
become available to reduce the magnitude of the job. But why would one
like to know the complete sequence of A's, T's, C's, and G's that make up all
the human genes?
The claim is that if we had a reference sequence from a so-called normal
individual and we compared bits and pieces of the sequence from a person
with some disorder, then we could locate the genetic defect that causes the
disease. We could then translate the genetic code of the altered person into
an altered protein to see what is wrong with the protein, and this might tell
us how to treat the disease. So, if diseases are caused by altered defective
genes and if we know what a normal gene looks like in its finest molecular
detail, we then would know what to do about fixing the abnormal
physiology. We would know what proteins have gone awry in cancer and
could somehow or another invent ways to fix them. We might find particular
altered proteins or missing proteins in schizophrenics or in manicdepressives or in alcoholics or in drug-dependent people, and with an
appropriate medication relieve them of these terrible disabilities. Moreover,
by comparing all the human genes in their molecular detail with the genes of,
say, a chimpanzee or a gorilla, we would know why we are different from
chimpanzees. That is, we would know what it is to be human.
What is wrong with this vision? The first error it makes is in talking about
the human gene sequence as if all human beings were alike. In fact, there is
an immense amount of variation from normal individual to normal
individual in the amino acid sequence of their proteins because a given