On 31-Aug-17 9:22 AM, wjhonson wrote: > Let's say some eighth generation descendant or Franz, married some ninth generation descendant of Mary. > > How can I tell if a snippet came through the line from Mary or the line from Franz???? How!!!!! > > Because you test people who came through Mary but did *not* come through Franz, and you test people who came through Franz and did *not* come through Mary. And you establish this by ... a paper trail? As one of the pigeons who pursue medieval genealogy with NIL interest in DNA results of any kind, I find the cultural aspect of relationships between people more interesting than the biological. And FAR more interesting than their culturally and biologically diffuse and dilute connection to modern individuals. Peter Stewart

On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 8:39:14 PM UTC-7, Peter Stewart wrote: > On 31-Aug-17 12:55 PM, wjhonson wrote: > > I have no idea why people put up straw men arguments. > > > > Did any of what I said, say that I *do not* use a paper trail? No. > > I asked if you used a paper trail and in reply you posted "I don't". > > Peter Stewart Well I think you asked if I "establish" this by a paper trail. What I'm suggesting is that instead of the paper trail being the basis, and the DNA being the additional evidence, that you flip it around. Make the DNA the *basis* of the tree, and the paper trail be the "additional evidence"

---- taf <taf.medieval@gmail.com> wrote: > On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 5:25:16 PM UTC-7, Peter Stewart wrote: > > > If you don't use a paper trail to establish which people "came through > > Mary but did *not* come through Franz" in order to eliminate > > cross-relationships for DNA testing, how else do you do this? By ouija > > board perhaps? > > Without a paper trail (and that is after all why we are doing this) you would have to compare all 7 billion genomes on the planet to every other one, a 50 septillion-fold matrix with a million sites in each genome to compare. If you have a supercomputer that can do a million-site comparison in a millionth of a second, it would still take about 37 million years to complete the comparisons. Once you start matching sibling genomes and reconstructing hypothetical parental genomes, each of those would then have to be compared to all 7 billion. It is ludicrous to suggest such an analysis would take place, even were the data all to be collected. (and this doesn't even take the data-loss problem into account) > > taf > > -- why does this remind me of some of the absurdities in hhggttg?

A question on early Scottish history? Woolf in 2006 correctly identifies Fortriu with Moray, which I believe is clearly show in its usage in the Prophecy of Berchán. Now with Fortriu move from Southern Pictland there is a lack of kings in Southern Pictland. Accept for those which historians have associated with Dal Riadan lineages. (I also note that the late 9th century Fortriu kings are also identified as being from a Dal Riata line.) One of these Dal Riadan kings located in Southern Pictland is the 7th century Bridei son of Der-ilei, King of the Picts. He has been identified as being Nechtan son of Dargart son of Fingin son of Eachach son of Loingsech son of Comgall, hence from the Cenel Comgaill line of of Dal Riada. Vita Sancti Servani, says that St Serf founded a church at Culross within the time of Bridei son of Der-Ilei of Cenel Comghaill. The life identifies the location of Culross thus: “cuillenn ros hi sraith erinn hi comgellaibh etir sliabh n-ochel 7 mur n-guidan” from Leabhar Bhaile an Mhóta “Culros in Strathearn (Ireland’s Valley) in Comgall’s peoples (thought as being Cenel Comgaill) between the Ochill Hills and the Forth of Firth.” (From the Book of Ballymote and the Book of Lecan.) So at some point the land which the King of the Picts, Bridei son of Der-Ilei, who is of Cenel Comgaill lineage, grants to St Serf belonged to the people of "Cenel Comgaill". With references to Cenel Comgaill disappearing soon after Bridei reign. I wonder if the land was taken at around the time of his reign, based on the assumption that at only during his time were there descendants of Cenel Comgaill powerful enough to claim land? It seems Bridei son of Der-Ilei and his brother may represent a Dal Riata takeover of portions of the lands of the Southern Picts? Additional in the first half of the 8th century, assuming the identification of Alpin mac Eochaid mac Domangart is correct, the Cenel Gabhrain are making their first appearance in Gowrie (they seem to replace Cenel Comgaill in the records). Aplin is defeated by Oengus, king of Fortriu (i.e. Moray), around Moncrieff in Gowrie. Gowrie has been suggested by Dr Woolf to be from Cenel Gabhrain to which Alpin mac Eochaid mac Domangart belonged. This seems supported by the fact that kindred of Alpin’s great uncle Fergus Goll came to occupy Gowrie and another great uncle Connal Cerr’s kindred occupied Fife. The "royal line" of Cenel Gabhrain appear as the 8th century as rulers of Fortriu, after the dynasty of Oengus has died out. (Thereby happily fulling a prophecy made by St Patrick as per the Tripartite Life of St Patrick - dated to either the 8th century or 9th century. Which seems to follow a literary tradition of author using know facts of the day and making today's reality the result of blessing or curses accredited to St Patrick or even the gods Lugh or Gobhan.) Did the Dal Riada rule Southern Pictland from a earlier time than currently accepted?

On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 8:45:08 PM UTC-7, taf wrote: > > You keep dividing, without multiplying. You have to do both. > > Loss is loss, it is progressive, and it doesn't matter how many > descendants there are that don't have the lost material. By the way, it isn't good enough for the DNA to be preserved in some line, it has to be identifiable to be any good to the analysis. There is an amount actually, literally, lost but a further amount that is lost to the analysis because its presence can not be linked to the common descent. You act like if the DNA is anywhere, among any of the descendants, then it is useful in a reconstruction/confirmation, but it has to be shared by multiple descendants and it has to be known that it is shared because of the specific common descent being evaluated. If either of these conditions fail, then the sequence in question is not literally lost but is lost to the analysis nonetheless. In the other post, I already showed how dramatic this loss can be if you ever have a generation with a small number of siblings. I can remember someone telling me that with a powerful enough superdupercomputer it should be possible to recover the voice of George Washington, because we can track individual molecules in the air to determine their trajectories and velocities, then extrapolate them back into the sound waves that dissipated to leave them in their current state, and thereby reconstruct progressive sets of sound waves, back in time, until you get to George Washington. Like with what you propose, the theory is sound (if simplistic), but in the real world any attempt would fail abysmally. taf

On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 7:55:23 PM UTC-7, wjhonson wrote: > Y-DNA cannot properly support a paper trail because there is almost no > way to confirm where someone goes in that tree. Autosomal DNA *can* > properly support a paper trail. You keep saying that, and it keeps being wrong. > And Todd I do know that *on average* each generation inherits one half, > however if every generation has multiple descendants, than you have a > good chance that *the vast majority* of the DNA is *preserved* across > the entire population. And all it takes is one generation of having a single child, and you lose half the information. Not every family has a dozen children, each with a dozen children, . . . . The effect of this is cumulative information loss, no matter which way you trace it. > You keep dividing, without multiplying. You have to do both. Loss is loss, it is progressive, and it doesn't matter how many descendants there are that don't have the lost material. taf

On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 4:25:21 PM UTC-7, wjhonson wrote: > So you are claiming, against all actual data, that testing an *aunt* can > never be any sort of subsitute whatsoever for testing a *mother*. > > That in other words, the DNA you share with an Aunt says nothing at all > about your Mother? > > If that is what you are claiming, I'm at a loss for words. Let's take a close look at this example. If there is a living person X, whose parents are both dead, and each parent has one living sibling available for testing, what can we learn by testing the the individual, their aunt on one side and their uncle on the other side. First the father's side. The aunt would have shared 50% of the DNA of her brother, and the child would only have 50% of the DNA of the father, so they would share 25% of the DNA of their aunt. That means that 25% of the DNA of their father would have been determined and the other 75% unknown. So lets say you then test a second cousin, the next closest relation to the father. They will share, on average, 3% of their DNA, but a quarter of that will be the same part shared wth the aunt, so we now have a little over 27% reconstructed. Even if there are 10 second cousins, that still doesn't even get you to 50%, and it gets pretty asymptotic if you go any more distant. So, in one generation we have lost 50% of the information. Not all generations will be so limited, with one or two siblings, but even losing only 20% per generation, you will be down to minuscule levels of identifiable DNA before you hit colonial times, and there will be nothing that can be traced from medieval times. taf

I have no idea why people put up straw men arguments. Did any of what I said, say that I *do not* use a paper trail? No. I said that using a paper trail and Y-DNA to support each other is a fool's task without the additional use of Autosomal DNA I think I've said this now several times. Y-DNA cannot properly support a paper trail because there is almost no way to confirm where someone goes in that tree. Autosomal DNA *can* properly support a paper trail. And Todd I do know that *on average* each generation inherits one half, however if every generation has multiple descendants, than you have a good chance that *the vast majority* of the DNA is *preserved* across the entire population. You keep dividing, without multiplying. You have to do both.

On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 5:25:16 PM UTC-7, Peter Stewart wrote: > If you don't use a paper trail to establish which people "came through > Mary but did *not* come through Franz" in order to eliminate > cross-relationships for DNA testing, how else do you do this? By ouija > board perhaps? Without a paper trail (and that is after all why we are doing this) you would have to compare all 7 billion genomes on the planet to every other one, a 50 septillion-fold matrix with a million sites in each genome to compare. If you have a supercomputer that can do a million-site comparison in a millionth of a second, it would still take about 37 million years to complete the comparisons. Once you start matching sibling genomes and reconstructing hypothetical parental genomes, each of those would then have to be compared to all 7 billion. It is ludicrous to suggest such an analysis would take place, even were the data all to be collected. (and this doesn't even take the data-loss problem into account) taf

---- tkomninos@gmail.com wrote: > Hello Leo, can you send me your genealogy records? Tom K. > he died sevaral months ago. try his site: genealogics.com

On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 4:25:21 PM UTC-7, wjhonson wrote: > > Only if you have both parents' data already in hand, and even then population homozygosity means that for most of the DNA you may not be able to tell anyhow, not that it matters. > > > > I see little point in continuing this. Your grand plan for DNA-based medieval genealogy is both impractical and impossible. > > So you are claiming, against all actual data, that testing an *aunt* > can never be any sort of subsitute whatsoever for testing a *mother*. > > That in other words, the DNA you share with an Aunt says nothing at > all about your Mother? > > If that is what you are claiming, I'm at a loss for words. You just insist on completely ignoring the effects of the information loss in each generation. To give a trivial example, if your aunt has blue eyes, and your mother had brown, you can deduce absolutely nothing about what was going on with your mother at that locus. True, you would say this is only one locus and there are a million more, but the same applies to 1/2 of the total of your mother's DNA, and the next generation in each line the same happens, so first cousins share only 1/8, and second cousins only 1/32. The loss of information is dramatic and progressive and debilitating to the analysis you propose, and all of the genomes in the world won't overcome this. taf

On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 4:46:31 PM UTC-7, Peter Stewart wrote: > On 31-Aug-17 9:22 AM, wjhonson wrote: > > Let's say some eighth generation descendant or Franz, married some ninth generation descendant of Mary. > > > > How can I tell if a snippet came through the line from Mary or the line from Franz???? How!!!!! > > > > Because you test people who came through Mary but did *not* come through Franz, and you test people who came through Franz and did *not* come through Mary. > > And you establish this by ... a paper trail? > > As one of the pigeons who pursue medieval genealogy with NIL interest in > DNA results of any kind, I find the cultural aspect of relationships > between people more interesting than the biological. And FAR more > interesting than their culturally and biologically diffuse and dilute > connection to modern individuals. > > Peter Stewart I don't. Personally I think people who use Y-DNA to give "strong evidence" for their "strong paper trail" are misguided, or possibly worse. I am more of an advocate for using Autosomal DNA to turn traditional genealogy upside-down. Start with a foundation, then build.

On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 4:25:21 PM UTC-7, wjhonson wrote: > On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 3:37:10 PM UTC-7, taf wrote: > > On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 2:28:15 PM UTC-7, wjhonson wrote: > > > > > But you can identify which parent was the source of a snippet of DNA > > > Not sure what you're saying there. > > > > > > The entire point of Autosomal is that you can identify from where a > > > snippet comes. > > > > Only if you have both parents' data already in hand, and even then population homozygosity means that for most of the DNA you may not be able to tell anyhow, not that it matters. > > > > I see little point in continuing this. Your grand plan for DNA-based medieval genealogy is both impractical and impossible. > > > > taf > > So you are claiming, against all actual data, that testing an *aunt* can never be any sort of subsitute whatsoever for testing a *mother*. > > That in other words, the DNA you share with an Aunt says nothing at all about your Mother? > > If that is what you are claiming, I'm at a loss for words. The *entire basis* of Lazarus is to try to reconstruct the DNA of an ancestor, and now you're claiming that that approach is utterly without merit?

On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 3:37:10 PM UTC-7, taf wrote: > On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 2:28:15 PM UTC-7, wjhonson wrote: > > > But you can identify which parent was the source of a snippet of DNA > > Not sure what you're saying there. > > > > The entire point of Autosomal is that you can identify from where a > > snippet comes. > > Only if you have both parents' data already in hand, and even then population homozygosity means that for most of the DNA you may not be able to tell anyhow, not that it matters. > > I see little point in continuing this. Your grand plan for DNA-based medieval genealogy is both impractical and impossible. > > taf So you are claiming, against all actual data, that testing an *aunt* can never be any sort of subsitute whatsoever for testing a *mother*. That in other words, the DNA you share with an Aunt says nothing at all about your Mother? If that is what you are claiming, I'm at a loss for words.

On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 3:32:02 PM UTC-7, joe...@gmail.com wrote: > On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 3:12:09 PM UTC-5, wjhonson wrote: > > On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 1:02:17 PM UTC-7, taf wrote: > > > On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 12:10:28 PM UTC-7, wjhonson wrote: > > > > > > > My theory is that *every* snippet gets passed down to *someone*. > > > > > > OK, so let's take a medieval person who had only one child. That child receives exactly 1/2 of the parent's DNA and does not receive the other half. That means in 1 generation, 50% of the DNA gets passed to NO ONE. In every generation, even in a family with a dozen children, statistically some of those snippets will be lost completely. So much for that theory. > > > > > > Further, after 10 generations, the blocks that get passed are the same blocks passed for 30 generations, just in a progressively lower proportion of descendants - this means that two people claiming descent from Edward I may well share the same block of DNA, but it may be entirely coincidental if one of them descends from Edmund Crouchback, or Joan Fitz Roy, or Toda Aznarez of Pamplona, with the presence of this shared DNA being entirely coincidental and not due to the common descent you are trying to test. Even if you get a match, you haven't confirmed squat. > > > > > > I know you have it in your mind that it would be possible to reconstruct the genomes of medieval people simply by doing autosomal testing on the entire human population and using their pedigrees to extrapolate back, but such an approach would not survive the collision with hard reality. To argue that autosomal DNA testing can be used in this way because you think it should be possible is fantasy. > > > > > > taf > > > > > > However a lower proportion, multiplied by a broader base, means the same proportion or perhaps even more. > > > > And you are still stuck on two living people trying to compare their DNA to determine if they descend from Toda Aznarez. While I'm not. > > > > I'm speaking of a project which would recreate the DNA of every medieval person, by testing every living person. Not just two. > > Ah, there is it. *This is not possible*. It is totally illogical and non-nonsensical. > > Proof: > - There existed a person that every living person is descended from. For convenience sake, we shall call him "Ugg" > > - Posit that Ugg had 2 children, Franz and Mary. > - At some point, descendants of Franz and descendants of Mary intermarried and had children, call them "the descendants". > - Go Autosomal Test one of these "descendants" or any of their descendants. > > -> There is nothing. Absolutely nothing, that will tell you the DNA signature of Franz or Mary... or Ugg. For each segment of your DNA that came from UGG, it could have come through Franz. It could have come through Mary. You have no way to know. You also have no way to know if it came from Ugg or his wife. You can't even identify a *single* segment as being Franz's or Mary's. > > It isn't hard from here to construct a proof by induction that this is true for anyone alive today. > > --Joe C This is not the case however. Let's say some eighth generation descendant or Franz, married some ninth generation descendant of Mary. How can I tell if a snippet came through the line from Mary or the line from Franz???? How!!!!! Because you test people who came through Mary but did *not* come through Franz, and you test people who came through Franz and did *not* come through Mary.

On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 2:28:15 PM UTC-7, wjhonson wrote: > But you can identify which parent was the source of a snippet of DNA > Not sure what you're saying there. > > The entire point of Autosomal is that you can identify from where a > snippet comes. Only if you have both parents' data already in hand, and even then population homozygosity means that for most of the DNA you may not be able to tell anyhow, not that it matters. I see little point in continuing this. Your grand plan for DNA-based medieval genealogy is both impractical and impossible. taf

On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 3:12:09 PM UTC-5, wjhonson wrote: > On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 1:02:17 PM UTC-7, taf wrote: > > On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 12:10:28 PM UTC-7, wjhonson wrote: > > > > > My theory is that *every* snippet gets passed down to *someone*. > > > > OK, so let's take a medieval person who had only one child. That child receives exactly 1/2 of the parent's DNA and does not receive the other half. That means in 1 generation, 50% of the DNA gets passed to NO ONE. In every generation, even in a family with a dozen children, statistically some of those snippets will be lost completely. So much for that theory. > > > > Further, after 10 generations, the blocks that get passed are the same blocks passed for 30 generations, just in a progressively lower proportion of descendants - this means that two people claiming descent from Edward I may well share the same block of DNA, but it may be entirely coincidental if one of them descends from Edmund Crouchback, or Joan Fitz Roy, or Toda Aznarez of Pamplona, with the presence of this shared DNA being entirely coincidental and not due to the common descent you are trying to test. Even if you get a match, you haven't confirmed squat. > > > > I know you have it in your mind that it would be possible to reconstruct the genomes of medieval people simply by doing autosomal testing on the entire human population and using their pedigrees to extrapolate back, but such an approach would not survive the collision with hard reality. To argue that autosomal DNA testing can be used in this way because you think it should be possible is fantasy. > > > > taf > > > However a lower proportion, multiplied by a broader base, means the same proportion or perhaps even more. > > And you are still stuck on two living people trying to compare their DNA to determine if they descend from Toda Aznarez. While I'm not. > > I'm speaking of a project which would recreate the DNA of every medieval person, by testing every living person. Not just two. Ah, there is it. *This is not possible*. It is totally illogical and non-nonsensical. Proof: - There existed a person that every living person is descended from. For convenience sake, we shall call him "Ugg" - Posit that Ugg had 2 children, Franz and Mary. - At some point, descendants of Franz and descendants of Mary intermarried and had children, call them "the descendants". - Go Autosomal Test one of these "descendants" or any of their descendants. -> There is nothing. Absolutely nothing, that will tell you the DNA signature of Franz or Mary... or Ugg. For each segment of your DNA that came from UGG, it could have come through Franz. It could have come through Mary. You have no way to know. You also have no way to know if it came from Ugg or his wife. You can't even identify a *single* segment as being Franz's or Mary's. It isn't hard from here to construct a proof by induction that this is true for anyone alive today. --Joe C

On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 2:10:28 PM UTC-5, wjhonson wrote: > On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 12:01:51 PM UTC-7, joe...@gmail.com wrote: > > > No Joe. I'm not going to argue statistics with a pidgeon. Full Stop. > > > > I have no idea what you mean by "pidgeon", but I have no doubt I have taken a great quantity more statistics classes than you. > > > > I'm not asking to argue statistics. I'm asking you to offer a single example that proves or illustrates your point. Currently you are just stating it is possible, and offered not one example how. > > Joe > > I seriously doubt that you are a better mathematician than am I. > > As to your example of two men, brothers, who have a paper trail back to a man in 1450, and identical Y results. It is meaningless. > > At *any* time in the past six hundred years one cuckold could have supplied two children. Or it could simply be that the paper trail is worthless, and yet the genealogy is not affected, they just belong to some *other* family. > > There is really *no* way to tell these cases apart from each other. None. Zero. The Y does not tell you at all, in any way whatsoever, whether the descendants are sixth cousins, second cousins, or fourteenth cousins. > > You really get almost no genealogical *evidence* from it at all :) > > And to your point of whether Autosomal DNA can tell you anything about medieval genealogy, you're wrong. I have already stated the reason earlier. > > Instead of asking the odds for whether a particular snippet of DNA gets passed down intact to *one* person, you need to look at whether that snippet will get passed down to *any* descendant. And then extrapolate that over the entire DNA > > My theory is that *every* snippet gets passed down to *someone*. > > You just need to test every one I have no basis to judge "goodness" of a mathematician, or any basis to know how good of one you are. I don't know why you have an opinion on the matter either. We are going to have to agree to disagree on both your points above which, for the reasons stated, I disagree with entirely. --Joe C

On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 3:05:01 PM UTC-7, Andrew Lancaster wrote: > On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 8:49:47 PM UTC+2, wjhonson wrote: > > > However if the point of your genealogy is to trace *your own* family, and after forty years of that you finally break down and take a test and discover that you were apparently adopted, then where are you exactly? > > There would be the point indeed, but it is NOT the point at all for most genealogists. > > Let me explain your position better than you have above: You are effectively saying (I will not cut and paste all the different quotes) that it is not genealogy or it is bad genealogy, and absolutely to be avoided, that we should spend any time on anyone who might not actually be a direct ancestor. You have expressed horror of this in many ways, over and over. > Utterly Incorrect. Not once have I said that spending time on any one who is not a direct ancestor is a bad thing. Not a single time. > On this basis real genealogy has never existed and still does not exist. We will need to wait for better technology. > Not what I said. > But I will just keep doing what I call genealogy. I am not too worried about researching people who possibly are not direct ancestors. In fact I like that. > > If you ever get to understand more about the autosomal DNA you will realize that once you get back a few generations, the ancestors you are studying (even if definitely your direct ancestors) are not more like you genetically than lots of random people with a similar geographic/ethnic ancestral mix. And again this is missing the point of anything I said.

On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 2:57:03 PM UTC-7, Andrew Lancaster wrote: > On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 10:12:09 PM UTC+2, wjhonson wrote: > > > However a lower proportion, multiplied by a broader base, means the same proportion or perhaps even more. > > > > No, the autosomal testing available now is not full sequencing. It is looking at specific known and common mutation points, and then identifying big clumps of DNA that seem to be moving together from generation to generation. No big clumps because too many generations, no ID possible. Nothing I said implies that it is full sequencing. Nothing in my idea requires full sequencing.