Philosophy Now Forum

Has anyone ever had one of these? I had mine done a while ago, more or less on a whim. I sent off for a kit where you have to stick two swabs into your mouth, one inside the left cheek and one in the right, and send them back sealed inside two little plastic vials. Eventually, after quite a long time, they sent me the results, including a breakdown of my ancestry. That wasn't actually my main reason for doing it, though. I wanted to know if I had any genetic anomaly, but there was none, just as I'd always been told. Anyway, for what it's worth, I'm...

82.9% English
11.4% Scandinavian
3.2% Irish, Scottish or Welsh
1.7% North and West European
0.8% Middle Eastern

The big surprise was the second one of those, which, if you do the maths, means that one of my great-grandparents was Scandinavian. I never met my maternal grandparents, both of whom passed away before I was born, but, after discussing it with my Mom, it turns out that this result should not have been a surprise at all (it's a long story). I'm not particularly surprised that I have a bit of Celtic ancestry, though, given my hair colour. As for Middle Eastern, well, who knows what that might mean. With that tiny percentage, whoever it was, who presumably came to England and married a local, lived two or three centuries ago.

Hope you weren't part of the 23 and me data breach in 2023.

LuckyR wrote: ↑Tue Apr 08, 2025 5:31 pm Hope you weren't part of the 23 and me data breach in 2023.

She was.

LuckyR wrote: ↑Tue Apr 08, 2025 5:31 pm Hope you weren't part of the 23 and me data breach in 2023.

No, it was last year, and a different company.

Greetings, Celtic sister. From what territory do you hail? I ride from the Cisalpine region as regiment chieftain under Brennus.

Please accept this freshly made haggis and goat cheese as a gesture of goodwill.

promethean75 wrote: ↑Tue Apr 08, 2025 6:24 pm Greetings, Celtic sister. From what territory do you hail? I ride from the Cisalpine region as regiment chieftain under Brennus.

Please accept this freshly made haggis and goat cheese as a gesture of goodwill.

Hail and well met, brother. I rode with the Iceni under Boudicca, and then, when she took her own life, I took part in the final siege of Mona, swimming across the straight with the Druids, until they were cut down in their groves. I have a large flagon of mead to bring to the feast, so that we may reminisce, in maudlin fashion, of battles lost and won, long ago.

I did the Ancestry one a few years ago. They keep updating the results so mine are quite different now from the first result. Still all around the same region though. Mostly Irish which I knew anyway. Thankfully not much Scottish
It's not quite as simple as the maths indicating a great grandparent. Genes can remain relatively unchanged for many generations, so your Scandinavian genes could go back to the time of the Viking invasion. They could also come from multiple sources.

Apparently most people have 1-4 percent Neanderthal DNA so that puts the small DNA result percentages into perspective.

accelafine wrote: ↑Tue Apr 08, 2025 7:52 pm I did the Ancestry one a few years ago. They keep updating the results so mine are quite different now from the first result. Still all around the same region though. Mostly Irish which I knew anyway. Thankfully not much Scottish
It's not quite as simple as the maths indicating a great grandparent. Genes can remain relatively unchanged for many generations, so your Scandinavian genes could go back to the time of the Viking invasion. They could also come from multiple sources.

I wondered about that, with regard to the Viking settlements in Eastern and Northern England, but after talking to my Mom about it, she told me that there had been some uncertainty over her own father's paternity. It's not the first time I'd heard this, but had pretty much forgotten about it. I agree that the maths certainly isn't exact, but the figures do seem to approximately line up with fractions, in this case, 1/8.

I'd always wondered if there was some Irish in me. My surname, apparently, could be either English or Irish, though my Dad knows of no Irish connection, and I'm told that I have a vaguely Celtic sort of appearance, red/auburn hair, for example. Probably means little, though. The English, Irish, Scottish and Welsh have been living alongside each other, fighting and breeding, for millennia.

accelafine wrote: ↑Tue Apr 08, 2025 7:57 pm Apparently most people have 1-4 percent Neanderthal DNA so that puts the small DNA result percentages into perspective.

Yes, a good point. The tiny percentages probably mean very little. Indeed, now that you mention it, I seem to remember reading somewhere that Neanderthals had red hair...

Maia wrote: ↑Tue Apr 08, 2025 8:22 pm

accelafine wrote: ↑Tue Apr 08, 2025 7:57 pm Apparently most people have 1-4 percent Neanderthal DNA so that puts the small DNA result percentages into perspective.

Yes, a good point. The tiny percentages probably mean very little. Indeed, now that you mention it, I seem to remember reading somewhere that Neanderthals had red hair...

You are VERY English, which means your genes in that region must go back thousands of years. I would think that all English people who go way back would have some Viking ancestry.

accelafine wrote: ↑Tue Apr 08, 2025 8:27 pm

Maia wrote: ↑Tue Apr 08, 2025 8:22 pm

accelafine wrote: ↑Tue Apr 08, 2025 7:57 pm Apparently most people have 1-4 percent Neanderthal DNA so that puts the small DNA result percentages into perspective.

Yes, a good point. The tiny percentages probably mean very little. Indeed, now that you mention it, I seem to remember reading somewhere that Neanderthals had red hair...

You are VERY English, which means your genes in that region must go back thousands of years. I would think that all English people who go way back would have some Viking ancestry.

Yes, undoubtedly. And they would be pretty similar, anyway. Hardly distinguishable.

The DNA test is the only test in my adult life that I failed.
It said I was related to my family.

Phil8659 wrote: ↑Wed Apr 09, 2025 2:49 am The DNA test is the only test in my adult life that I failed.
It said I was related to my family.

I'd ask for a refund, if I were you.

Maia wrote: ↑Wed Apr 09, 2025 7:58 am

Phil8659 wrote: ↑Wed Apr 09, 2025 2:49 am The DNA test is the only test in my adult life that I failed.
It said I was related to my family.

I'd ask for a refund, if I were you.

Well, that is why I get panic attacks and am down a lot. The government takes most all your money from the time you are born, until you die. Everyone is a slave to not one, but multiple corporate overlords. I am doing my best to start an insurrection. However, by now, too many have acquired the slave mentality. Too bad.

Jefferson, I believe, maintained that deficit spending is unconstitutional, and it was for a short time. People are so stupid as to not realize that deficit spending ends up to be taxation without representation. They cannot even put two and two together. It does not bother them that generations of children are now responsible for the forbearers debt. They sell their own children into slavery and simply do not understand it. They will now take everything, make you homeless, and then bitch that the homeless are a problem, which can be solved by government camps. Ring a bell?

The majority of homeless people are homeless due to government corruption.
What person, with any sense, believes that poverty and homelessness is the result of those very same people paying taxes?
Nobody owns property today because of recursive taxation. Recursive taxation is not a tax, it is a rental.