DNA-R1B1C7-L Archives

Archiver > DNA-R1B1C7 > 2007-06 > 1182193468


From: "R. C. Mac Donald" <>
Subject: Re: [DNA-R1B1C7] Introduction
Date: Mon, 18 Jun 2007 15:04:28 -0400
References: <BAY109-DAV670A561FB84F73E2B9ADFD5130@phx.gbl><000f01c7b1cf$45ba4390$6400a8c0@Ken1><BAY109-DAV1DC0A1024B8ABFA8834D2D5130@phx.gbl><002f01c7b1d3$0f3277d0$6400a8c0@Ken1>


Ken,

Unless you're alleging outright fraud by FTDNA, I think you agree that at the very least "tested" indicates that some kind of test was performed, don't you? I also noticed the sudden appearance of all those "tested" haplotypes on YSearch, and I imagine that, like mine, they are there because the individuals updated their information to include the confirmation. Remember that the correlation of the SNP mutations with specific haplotypes isn't entirely worked out even now, and until a certain number of such correlations were discovered there would have been no point to providing confirmation of SNP testing with the STR results.

I agree that in many cases SNP testing is pointless, not because the tests don't tell us anything but because we don't know what to do with what they do tell us. Given the astronomical odds against the same mutation happening twice, we can be virtually certain that all men testing positive for the same mutation are lineal descendants of one man, but without some clue as to who this ancestor was and where and when he lived this isn't very useful information. In our case, however, there seems to be plenty of evidence (the Trinity study, for example) that the common ancestor was some guy in Ulster, possibly Niall the Great or some other descendant of Conn, maybe Conn himself. The better we can define who is and who isn't a descendant of this person (and testing for M222 does precisely this) the closer we can come to determining who he was -- and who we are.

RCM



----- Original Message -----
From: Ken Nordtvedt<mailto:>
To: <mailto:>
Sent: Monday, June 18, 2007 2:04 PM
Subject: Re: [DNA-R1B1C7] Introduction


Notice that almost all, or at least a large majority of the entries into
Ysearch are called "tested" now. That all appeared one instant of time a
couple months ago.

The "tested" is an unexplainable (and diabolical) act by FTDNA and means
nothing. It's your dime, so if you want to have more SNPs tested by all
means. I just think a good amount of SNP testing is very little value added
and measuring extended haplotypes would be more informative.

The way Ysearch is structured, we don't even know who is responsible for the
H1a "estimate". A large number of even the most common haplogroups are
mis-labeled as to haplogroup in Ysearch.

Ken


----- Original Message -----
From: "R. C. Mac Donald" <<mailto:>>
To: <<mailto:>>
Sent: Monday, June 18, 2007 11:55 AM
Subject: Re: [DNA-R1B1C7] Introduction


> Ken,
>
> The contact person listed for 9EUBC is a Joel Sinor, so I'm assuming it's
> his sample and that he's the one who reported that he was "H1a(tested)."
> I realize it's possible that he is mistaking an estimate made by FTDNA for
> a test result, and the best way to determine this would be just to ask
> him. But even if it turns out that what he's reporting is just an
> estimate, I think this still makes my point about the importance of SNP
> testing; if we can match so closely and have our estimated haplogroups so
> far apart, how much confidence can we have in those estimates?
>
> RCM
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Ken Nordtvedt<mailto:<mailto:>>
> To: <mailto:<mailto:%3Cmailto:>>
> Sent: Monday, June 18, 2007 1:36 PM
> Subject: Re: [DNA-R1B1C7] Introduction
>
>
> Who said 9EUBC was SNP tested as H1a?
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "R. C. Mac Donald" <<mailto:<mailto:%3Cmailto:>>>
> To: <<mailto:<mailto:%3Cmailto:>>>
> Sent: Monday, June 18, 2007 11:28 AM
> Subject: [DNA-R1B1C7] Introduction
>
>
> > Hello, and a big thanks to all those who have made this forum possible.
> >
> > I'm M222+ with DYS390 =24, so I've found some of the discussions going
> on
> > here particularly interesting, especially concerning the possibility of
> a
> > subclade within R1b1c7 based on the value of 390 (and of other markers
> > too, I presume). It appears to my amateur's eyes, though, that some of
> > the confusion about precisely what marks one as a descendant of the "Ui
> > Neill" kindred -- allele values, SNP test results or both -- and much
> of
> > the unsound speculation that follows from it could be reduced by
> adopting
> > a couple of simple steps.
> >
> > First, it would be great if someone could construct a table of all
> R1b1c7s
> > excluding the data for those markers known to be fast-mutating. This
> > should make it easier to see clusters of surnames that match roughly
> the
> > old Irish genealogies, as we should expect to see if we aren't
> completely
> > wrong about this whole business.
> >
> > Second, we should urge all the participants to have the SNP test to
> > determine whether they are M222+; a simple estimate based on the STR
> > numbers just won't do. In my own case, one of my closest matches on
> > YSearch (I'm YPVPQ) is 41 out of 47 (with no marker off by more than
> one,
> > for a genetic distance of 6) with a man named Sinor (9EUBC) who is H1a;
> > this is closer than my match to most confirmed R1b1c7s. If we hadn't
> both
> > been SNP tested, anyone looking at our numbers might place us in the
> same
> > subclade.
> >
> > R.C. Mac Donald
> >
> >
> > -------------------------------
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> >
>
>
>
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