Slashdot Mirror
DNA Link Found Between Frozen Aboriginal Man and 17 Living People
The Globe and Mail is reporting that scientists claim to have found a DNA link between the frozen remains of an aboriginal man and 17 living people. "While the work on the human DNA project has opened new doors and work will continue on establishing a fuller family tree, Long Ago Person Found's descendants said they finally have the opportunity to give their ancestor a proper burial. Because his lineage had never been established, no memorial potlatch could be held. Of the 17 people linked through DNA, 15 self-identify with the Wolf Clan, meaning the young man was most likely Wolf as well."
and here I was thinking lupus was a species, not a clan...
MP3 Search Engine
He could be. And he probably would be if they checked my DNA. But who knows? TFA is really short on information.
There is no mention of the methodology of the study, particularly on how the samples were chosen, or if there was a control group.
Did they decide how close was close enough and then go looking for DNA? Or did they look first and then say "That seems close enough."? To me, the only intellectually honest way to do it would be the former. There has to be a possibility of the answer being "Nobody that we found was close enough".
I don't wish to criticize these researchers based on the absence of information, but it is remarkably convenient for them that they came up with the politically correct and properly ethnically sensitive result. It makes a cynic like me suspicious.
He might have only died 160 years ago. I'd be more impressed if he'd been dead for thousands of years.
Nicholas Kerensky? Was he buried with his Battlemech?
-
The Genomics application on Facebook lets you send genes to your friends (ok, not yours).
Aboriginal of what continent?
...
That's a remarkably narrow family tree!
Having traced my family tree back a couple of hundred years, I found that my great-great-great-great-grandmother had about three bazillion descendants (I am nowhere near coming up with an accurate count).
I banged them all
This dude supplied genetic material to SEVENTEEN living people....before the interwebs and pr0n!!!
/. can claim this same thing: impregnating 17 different people? (or impregnating the same person-or themselves 17 times without cleaning their keyboard and mouse?)
He HAD to have crawled out of his Mom's basement to get this lucky!
Who on
Damn, you Canucks are a lusty lot! If your winters weren't so cold, I'd move up there!
P.S. Can you all tell I've been drinking and posting tonight?!?!?
Down With Slashdot BETA!!! I've been around the corner and seen the oliphant; you can only abuse me from your perspecti
Of course he would have relatives living today. They all work in advertising at Geico. =)
Sorry. No Refunds.
... was one of the 17, perchance, Steve Ballmer?
let me guess, they all are in the 'Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer' Law firm
I read the article and as far as I can tell it doesn't explain how they found those 17 people. Who has a database scientists can check the Aboriginal's DNA against? The police? Did those people sign something that would allow the police to help third parties to search through their DNA?
I'd say this was somewhat scientifically interesting. They found a body between 150 and 350 years old, and found some of his relatives. I wouldn't claim this as a huge scientific success, and there isn't enough information in the article for the scientific element to be enlightening. I wouldn't be surprised if there was no scientific relevance except for doing DNA tests to determine relationships. That would put it on the scale of scientific interest of paternity suits.
The bigger part of the article is about cultural relevance, which is higher, but there still isn't enough to say how valuable that is. Most of the value seems to be for those who are related to him, and the tribe(s) they're from.
Now get me some DNA testing on Kennewick Man, and I'll be interested.
Sure I'm paranoid, but am I paranoid enough?
Due to the lack of a frozen will, the 17 people will now be heading off to court to fight over who inherits the frozen wooden bowl and spoon found with the man.
Some archaeologist was really into necrophilia.
Perhaps this is a win for genetics research, or perhaps it is indicative of the size of DNA databases, which is more worrisome. Mr. Freeze wasn't really all that old, though. It's like saying they found a genetic link between you and your great great grandfather: Ancestry.com can do that. If they could do the same thing with the frozen remains of a 20,000 year old Neanderthal--now that would be interesting. Not only would it be ground-breaking research, it would mess up all the anthropological theories.
How about a moderation of -1 pedantic.
He doesn't have 17 children but 17 possible decendents (with possibly even more) the article states that scientists believe he died somewhere between 1670 and 1850, assuming he had two kids, who in turn had two kids and we have a generation lifecycle of about 30 years (with the latest possible death date), it wouldn't be that out of place to expect 32 decendents assuming the earliest death date there is the possibility of 2643 decendents.
Of course I've pulled those numbers out of thin air and they could be much higher/lower but finding 17 decendents isn't that surprising.
> his dude supplied genetic material to SEVENTEEN living people..
Go back and re-read TFA. There have been no descendants identified.
He shares ancestors with 17 people, through his mother's side.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
So you find a native in north america, and dna tests show that he is from north america - what's the story here-
In typical Champagne-Ashihik fashion (cheap shot, let's say western-northern native, cause we all know the nacho's(na-cho nyak dun) are worse), they have to complain - we told you so why didn't you listen to our stories, see -now will you build your science on our stories? give me a break....
What do you call 20 natives walking down the it street? - a family
What do you call 40 natives walking down the street?
- the clan
Did the Wolf Clan sniff the remains to idenfity this member?
"I guess I'm gonna fade into Bolivian."
Even in that area there are way more than seventeen people within a hundred miles. As you point out, I would have expected everyone in the vicinity to be related to the frozen guy.
u know what i mean;-)
It's pretty sad when you have to read TFA to find out even what country we're talking about.
(Canada)
Y'know, I'm all for DNA sequencing and more medical research in that area in general, but couldn't the scientists' time (which if I'm not mistaken is ridiculously hard to come by if you need any kind of DNA sequencing done) have been better spent than trying to identify the living relatives of a long, long, long dead guy.
Like seriously... we could spend time either using DNA sequencing to help solve cold-case murders, or we could sequence this ancient dead guy and a whole pile of people, and see if any of 'em are similar.
Captcha: verified
Planet Zebeth - Metroid with a twist
to erase their culture, so cut 'em a fuckin' break, k?
otoh, the idea that "We needed to know who he is so we can treat him properly," illustrates the downside of tribalism: if u r not a member of the tribe, u r not human...
Because the summary didn't bother to explain what Wolf Clan....
This would be the Wolf Clan of the Champagne and Aishihik First Nations in Yukon, Canada. Their traditional territory is about an hour and a half from Whitehorse, around Haines Junction. I live in Whitehorse but I'm not of this first nation. I believe they had strong trade ties with coastal first nations, I want to say Tlingit but I'm probably wrong.
It's an interesting discovery and an interesting moment for that first nation.
This is clearly the Ancient Technology Activation gene
Kudos for the math and statistics, but this was meant to be humorous....my bad!
Down With Slashdot BETA!!! I've been around the corner and seen the oliphant; you can only abuse me from your perspecti
I did not read it the first time.(Hey- it's a /. tradition!!)
Bad joke on my part...sorry to disturb you.
See here:http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=537124&cid=23232364
*voice over: Foghorn Leghorn: I made a funny son, now that 4-legged dog-looking critter over there is a CHICKEN and you are a Chicken Hawk-get it?*
Has everyone here lost their sense of humour but me, or am I just not PC?
Down With Slashdot BETA!!! I've been around the corner and seen the oliphant; you can only abuse me from your perspecti
17. Steve Ballmer
16. Donald Trump
15. Susan Powter
14. Dennis Kucinich
13. Ron Popeil
12. Helen Thomas
11. Steven Segal
10. Courtney Love
9. Rob Schneider
8. Neil Bush
7. John Ashcroft
6. Dan Quayle
5. Gene Simmons
4. Kevin Federline
3. Crispin Glover
2. Ann Coulter
1. Cowboy Neal
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
Public relations, public relations, public relations. If this increases DNA sequencing visibility in the general public's eyes, there might be more funding acquired.
It's never lupus.
and here I was thinking lupus was a species, not a clan...
College-Pages.com - Online Colleges, Degrees, and Programs
Well, pretty soon with Google Genetics, you'll (or at least someone) will be able to see that his descents search for the term 'back hair removal' 15% more than the general population, that the average income of people with those genes is ~18,500USD, and that they have a 85% higher chance of left nostril cancer. Convenient links to scrollable/zoomable views of their houses also available.
I have to take issue with your statement that They have never been defeated in battle, and never have been made war upon. That's crap. You're as bad as the lefties who say how great the Inuit are because they never fought wars. Their population density is too low to fit the definition of war. If in historical times an entire political unit of Inuit decided "let's go to war" how many healthy adult males could they muster? Even during the caribou season! Five? Ten? And who would feed their families in the meantime?
Inuit did not "war", and were not "made war upon", but only because when three guys shoot or stick a spear in a fourth, we call it "murder".
One of the interesting things is that we might start looking at how much the sequences have changed over the generations. It would give us an idea of mutation and generatic drift. In addition, if done right, we might be able to pull some virus from his body, which would show that drift as well. THough to be honest, on the later, I think that we might want to be careful. No sense bringing back live small pox.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
The irony is that one of them is Kevin Bacon!
...this frozen dude and every other living human on the face of the planet today...
All of our DNA contains the exact same four chemicals: Adenine, Thymine, Guanine and Cytosine.
Zounds!!!! There you have it. We're all genetically linked!
Are these people really serious?
Ironically, all 17 people have GEICO for their auto insurance.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
"This reaffirms the integrity of our oral history," Chief Strand said. "Our oral history needs to have a place in your scientific world."
What?! Most other "oral histories" have been written down by now. Hey, you! Chief Strand! Get yourself a laptop and start write! If you also install LaTeX you won't have to worry about not being scientific, as "LaTeX is the de facto standard for the communication and publication of scientific documents." as read on http://www.latex-project.org/.
I can't read 'First Nation' without wanting to stick a long finger down my throat.
Can't we come up with a better phrase to describe them. Why do we need to describe them at all, anyway. Isn't the label part of what makes segregation and discrimination work.
What happens when their ('First Person' tribes) claim as the first settlers is found to be incorrect; and evidence is uncovered showing that - actually - a Previous People (let's call them that already) were established in central and south America for 10,000 years before the 'First People' arrived in North America from Asia (Yes, you read it here first, they migrated from Australia)
... maybe it was a teamkill?
A...nd I want his bones back! I can see someone trying this as his bones are valueable.
quis custodiet ipsos custodes
Well, I for one, am glad this happened in Canada. Now the family can give him a proper send-off without having to file a lawsuit and wait another generation for conclusion.
The cost of that cleanup, of course, will be borne by taxpayers, not industry.
Wait till Biggus Dickus hears of this.
I can see someone trying this as his bones are valueable. I would really app...reciate it if you w...ould stop ma...king fun of the w...ay I talk.
Sin...cerely
Er...ic the Mid...get