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From: "Michael Muckian" <>
Subject: Re: [DNA-R1B1C7] Dubious Paternity descriptions
Date: Tue, 7 Oct 2008 12:00:04 +0100
References: <f09a1f950810021858y4fa925d5p76383bdc8451b2b@mail.gmail.com>
In-Reply-To: <f09a1f950810021858y4fa925d5p76383bdc8451b2b@mail.gmail.com>


Following up on Tony O'Shaughnessy's thought-provoking post, it strikes me
that the term NPE is a nonsense anyway, as no birth happens without a
paternity event of one form or another.

And "Extra Marital" implies that "Marriage" of one man and one woman is the
normal source of offspring, though for a variety of reasons many
relationships produce children without the parents ever being "married" in
any formal sense. There are cases where married couples with a male
infertility problem make discreet arrangements to have a child with the help
of another male family member or friend, and the child of an unmarried
daughter has often been declared to be her younger sibling, father unknown.
Add to this the informal adoption of totally unrelated children and the
polygamy that was normal for those who could afford it in the early days in
what became Ireland, and how can we know who is/was conceived
extra-maritally?

With such complications, made more interesting still nowadays by factors
such as "serial monogamy" and sperm or egg donation, I believe we need a
judgment-free term to describe cases where the father is not the person who
would be conventionally assumed to have that role. In fact, I wonder whether
with our Genetic Genealogist hats on we need a term to describe it at all.

There are two potentially conflicting considerations, inheritance and
heredity. Inheritance - the passing on of physical or financial assets - is
normally determined by the family, while heredity - which is what we are
interested in - comes with the genes. Our Ydna roots are what they are, and
our mtdna roots are what they are, "family trees" notwithstanding. If there
have been some unconventional twists and turns in the paths they followed to
get to us, so be it - it just makes the hunt more intriguing!

Looking in old Irish and Scottish genealogies is certainly very interesting
and produces some clues, but their content cannot be authenticated at this
distance in time, and many of them are demonstrably heavy on spin and
wishful thinking. Real results can only come from combing out the strands of
our dna, and in the long run this may well help us unravel the history
mysteries as well! So let's not waste our time over P and non-P, but spend
it instead on getting people signed up for dna testing!

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