DNA tests

[Chip]

Coming from a Mormon family, my old aunties thrashed out our family tree in Norway, Ireland, and England back to 1500 or so.

I'm interested in the last two centuries, but before that it seems pretty distant. Anglican archbishops, mint masters, petty nobility. Also farmers, tradesmen, sailors, and working folk, from whom I have tiny scraps of genetic material but not much beyond.

I do like finding tangible relics, like gravestones and old photos.

[Niner]

I don't trust popular commercial DNA testing companies as far as I can throw a Denisovan who doesn't want to be thrown. My understanding is that the companies test areas of DNA most likely to peg a customer's ancestry in terms of far distant geographical origin. They sort of hit the highlights.

So a customer could be 80% northern European (with 95% confidence), 8% South Asian (with 85% confidence), 6% sub-Saharan African (with 90% confidence), and 6% Eastern European (with 75% confidence). The customer would not likely be told of the confidence estimates, nor that bits and pieces that might radically change the report were not even tested, since the odds of that kind of contradiction occurring are low. Further, I'm suspicious that the testing companies will check hard, at least in American samples, for any chance of there being American Indian ancestry, since many American customers would be pleased to find such an ancestor 400 years ago (with 0.1% confidence).

I have had my own DNA collected for analysis. While in an altered state of consciousness after surgery, I agreed to the test. The reason given for taking the sample was to determine whether one pain medication might be more effective than another. The sample was never used for that purpose. I do not know what became of the information.

[TSherbs]

I have had my own DNA collected for analysis. While in an altered state of consciousness after surgery, I agreed to the test. The reason given for taking the sample was to determine whether one pain medication might be more effective than another....

First time that I've heard of this kind of thing.

[RobJohnson]

23 and me and Ancestry are being investigated by the Federal Trade Commission on how they share DNA information with third parties.