The article acknowledges this, though perhaps obliquely: > “As a matter of truth in advertising, the ‘finished’ sequence isn’t finished,” said Eric Lander, who

The article acknowledges this, though perhaps obliquely: > “As a matter of truth in advertising, the ‘finished’ sequence isn’t finished,” said Eric Lander, who led the lab at the Whitehead Institute that deciphered more of the genome for the government-funded Human Genome Project than any other. “I always say ‘finished’ is a term of art.” The phrasing of your parent is arguably dismissive and does little to further substantive discussion. Can one meaningfully discuss "the human genome"? As you point out, each human (with the exception of identical twins) has a unique genome. I think it's reasonable and useful to be able to say "the human genome" as opposed to "the chimpanzee genome" or "the drosophila genome". If one would rather insist on using the indefinite article, i.e., "a human genome", one can present it without resorting to a rhetorical question replete with scare quotes.