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From: "David Ewing" <>
Subject: Re: [DNA-R1B1C7] On Behalf of Something like ethnic specifics
Date: Sat, 1 Dec 2007 10:25:38 -0700


It is hard for me to understand why this conversation continues. Strictly
speaking, membership in R1b1c7 conveys zero information about ethnicity and
zero information about any observable phenotype--except perhaps some fluke
in spermatogenesis that I am not aware of. A similar, though perhaps
marginally less quantitatively ludicrous mistake is made at "family"
reunions, like the biennial gathering of Clan Ewing, where a bunch of 7th
cousins twice removed are going around looking for family resemblances.
Seventh cousins twice removed share an almost negligible amount of common
genetic material, probably not more than they would share with a random
member of the community.

There is an answer that could be made to my point, but I have not seen it on
this list yet. This is that for the most part members of communities tend to
interbreed, so even though the Y-chromosome itself carries little
information that is expressed in phenotypes and even though it represents an
almost negligible amount of the genetic material any one person has, in many
cases it can serve as a marker (heads up--this is not the use of the term
"marker" we are accustomed to) for "ethnic" or some other more clearly
defined group membership. That is, one can argue that since an individual's
Y-chromosome has deep roots in Ireland, many others of their deep roots are
probably to be found in Ireland.

This is certainly sometimes true, but often (especially among modern-day
Americans) it is not. I used to think of myself as Scots-Irish because my
name is Scots-Irish. But I have finally worked out a majority of my family
lines back to the immigrant ancestor, and discovered that only about
6.25%of them are Scots-Irish. Both of my mother's mother's parents
immigrated
from Sweden--presuming they were "pure" Swedish (whatever that could
possibly mean), I am on their account 25% Swedish. My father's mother's
maternal grandfather was a German immigrant; if he was "pure" German, I am
6.25% German on his account, plus probably some more in some of my female
lines I haven't been able to trace to the immigrant (eg, Hazen?). I found
several lines tracing back to Irish Catholics totaling about 12.5%, and to
my astonishment, shame and horror, I found that nearly half of my lines go
back to England (though thankfully, my mother's father's paternal line goes
to East Anglia, and therefore probably back to Denmark twelve or thirteen
hundred years ago). Add that to the fact that the name Ewing certainly
originated in Scotland, notwithstanding that the Ewing Y-chromosome appears
to be "NW Irish" and you can understand why I think it is ridiculous to
begin speculating on the basis of my membership in R1b1c7 that my gift of
gab (such as it is) has a basis in Irish genetics.

David Ewing

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