humanity back to a very small group (or a single female) about a
million years ago in eastern Africa based on mitochondrial DNA
analysis. That study is one of the stronger pieces of evidence for
the Out of Africa hypothesis of human origin.
larry
>It all comes down to the old "12 degrees of separation" thing, but to a
>different extent
>
>Just think about it this way...
>
>IF the Bible is correct, then;
>We're descended from 2 people originally (Adam and Eve), plus they must
>have in-bred their own children with Eve (they only had sons, right?)
>Next, we're then descended from 12 people (Noah & wife, his 5 children
>and their spouses)
>
>So, we are already so in-bred that it just doesn't matter who you meet,
>you're related to them <g>
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: John Stanley [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>> Sent: Monday, January 05, 2004 3:08 PM
>> To: CF-Community
>> Subject: Generational Math
>>
>>
>> Okay doing family history research which by the way can be
>> seen at http://www.netconceptions.com
>> <http://www.netconceptions.com> , and stating to see
>> something odd. I know that the number of ancestors a person
>> has for a particular generation doubles from the previous
>> generation's number. So at the 4th generation back from me I
>> have 8, and the 5th I have 16 and so on. Which leads to this.
>> You can tell the number of ancestors you have for a
>> generation by taking 2 to the (generation number minus one) power.
>>
>> This is all fine and dandy, but after a certain point it
>> becomes more and more improbable that say after 49
>> generations which is about 1500 years I would have
>> 562,949,953,421,312 ancestors in that generation.
>>
>> So what gives. Is the math suspect? Is there an inbreeding
>> curve? Even if you account for like 50% cross-ancestral
>> breeding, that still leaves a huge number of people anyone is
>> descended from going back that far. This must take into
>> account the number of people on earth for the whole
>> generational period in question.
>>
>> Anyone?
>>
>> John
>>
>>
>
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