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Ancestry/Genealogy

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CountAllVotes

(20,876 posts)
Mon Feb 18, 2019, 12:13 PM Feb 2019

DNAeXplained - Genetic Genealogy [View all]

Very interesting blog re: DNA testing and the results that ancestry.com is coming up with.

It goes into some depth about the number of persons coming up as Scandinavian and Finnish ancestry, most of which seems to be entwined with perhaps other very different types of blood.

I too was recently told by ancestry.com that my DNA results have been modified.

They now tell me that I too have Scandinavian roots as well as Finnish.

What is the truth? How helpful is it to have another DNA test done by another company?

Is it a waste of money or what?

>>The problem is that their admixture percentages are simply WRONG. Period. Not a “tiny error”, not “needs tweeking,” utterly, entirely wrong. Throw it out and start over wrong. There are no secret Scandinavians hiding in the bushes, or in everyone’s family tree, and the fact that they are embracing their error and trying to turn a dime by telling people that they DO have a huge amount of mythical Scandinavian blood and they just need to use Ancestry’s tools to search longer and harder is not only infuriating, it’s unethical and self-serving.

Several bloggers and others have pointed out that after taking many of these types of tests, Ancestry’s results are the only ones showing large amounts of Scandinavian heritage. So every other company and population geneticist is wrong and Ancestry has made a monumental discovery?

Ancestry has been put on notice by many individuals. The gal, Crista, in this video who has the unfortunate job of telling this whopper publicly and attempting to convince you of this newly found “truth” even said that people have been challenging those results and are “confused.” No doubt, they should be.

But instead of looking at the reference population data validity (that Ancestry refuses to share), or the math, for possible issues, Ancestry is lauding this inherent error as a discovery, as stated by their executives at recent conferences and elsewhere in the press, and using is it as a marketing ploy. Well, it is the season for politics and “spin” but this is reprehensible.

Christa Cowan, on this video, uses her own father’s results and genealogy as an example. He has 47% Scandinavian ethnic percentage according to Ancestry, yet his pedigree chart showed line after line of Scotland, England and Wales as his ancestral origins, with holes, of course, representing brick walls, like we all have. Crista was trying to convince us, and probably herself too, that in spite of all that British Isles ancestry, and no discernible Scandinavian pedigree heritage, that in fact this was ALL attributed to Scandinavian ancestors – because her father had NO British Isles heritage, according to Ancestry.

Much much re: this you can read here:

https://dna-explained.com/2012/10/24/ancestrys-mythical-admixture-percentages/





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