ANCESTRY-DOT-WHO

There are people who spend inordinate amounts of time tracing their ancestry.  I feel that anything past 100 years (five generations) is a waste of time as the DNA inherited from any one ancestor is so minute as to be inconsequential.  

There is no such thing as a direct line of ancestry.   Ancestry is most always followed through a particular male line, and each preceding generation (20 yrs.) is counted exponentially:

Generation #1:   2 parents – 2 grandfathers

Gen. #2:   4 grandfathers

Gen. #3:   8 grandfathers

Gen. #4:   16 grandfathers

Gen. #5:   32 grandfathers…

The DAR members attempt to show a direct blood line back to the American Revolution (about 240 years or 12 generations.)   At that point you have 4000 twelfth-generation-great-grandfathers.  And since only half of your DNA comes from your male line and half comes from your female line, any great… grandfather from that era represents only one-eight-thousandth (1/8000^th.) of your DNA.

Another interesting fact is that we share 89% of our DNA with our closest ape relative chimpanzees, and if you are of European ancestry you probably have between 2-to-4 percent of your DNA Neanderthal.  

Posted by your cousin

the Ol’Buzzard