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[-] Num10ck@lemmy.world 75 points 11 months ago

i wonder what percentage of people understand that all living things on earth share a common ancestor.

[-] qyron@sopuli.xyz 29 points 11 months ago

Not enough.

I was fortunate enough to sit through an impromptu family tree debate after I had been made aware that to some degree we are all related.

I lack the words to adequately describe the reactions of shock and horror when people who had been married for decades suddenly realized they shared real and somewhat close blood relation, some times only two or three generations apart.

[-] JJROKCZ@lemmy.world 28 points 11 months ago

People in small towns especially, go back only a couple generations and they all start merging. Then they act shocked our town of <5000 people is all related

[-] Aggravationstation@lemmy.world 6 points 11 months ago

80,000 people in my town and the risk is still pretty serious

[-] BleatingZombie@lemmy.world 16 points 11 months ago

This might be a really dumb question, but is it possible that any two human beings don't share a common ancestor? Like, do we all link back to a single bacteria or were there multiple "made" at once?

[-] ForgotAboutDre@lemmy.world 44 points 11 months ago

There is a genetic Adam and Eve. However, I don't think they existed at the same time. These were humans, not just apes/mammals/animals/bacteria. We are all distantly related.

We are also more related to mushrooms than trees are to mushrooms.

[-] nul@programming.dev 21 points 11 months ago

Yeah, it's hard to pin down when these common ancestors lived precisely, especially given that as portions of our genome go extinct, the common ancestor will change.

But Y-chromosomal Adam is estimated to have lived around 200,000 years ago, while estimates for when Mitochondrial Eve lived are a bit more recent, around 150,000 years ago.

[-] affiliate@lemmy.world 4 points 11 months ago

how far back is that in terms of great grandpas and great grandmas?

[-] nul@programming.dev 12 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

According to an unverified internet search, the average age of childbirth for women throughout history is 23.2 years, and for men it is 30.7.

So, statistically, your great^6463 grandmother is the same as mine. Same goes for our great^6512 grandfather.

[-] affiliate@lemmy.world 5 points 11 months ago

wow! that’s quite a few. i wonder what our great^6512^ grandparents were like

[-] DasAlbatross@lemmy.world 8 points 11 months ago

They were freaks. They didn't have as many generations of separation so they were definitely fucking their cousin at best.

[-] JJROKCZ@lemmy.world 17 points 11 months ago

A quarter of us trace back to one mongol, fairly certain there’s going to be a point we all tie together to the same ape eating magic mushrooms in what would become Africa. Long ass time ago though

[-] Communist@lemmy.ml 14 points 11 months ago

No, all humans share a common ancestor, as does all multicellular life. Google clades for more info.

[-] GojuRyu@lemmy.world 3 points 11 months ago

With how funky micro organisms are with sharing DNA I'm not sure it matters. I've heard it likened to the genetic tree turning into a bush instead whare it's a big mes of sharing of DNA across species.

[-] ThatWeirdGuy1001@lemmy.world 8 points 11 months ago

That doesn't mean fucking someone that close to you doesn't come with risks.

But as long as it's not multigenerational it's a very small increase to the already small percentage of defects.

[-] Dave@lemmy.nz 21 points 11 months ago

If it required charts to explain and took years to work out then I'm guessing it probably wasn't first cousin's, and may not have even been second cousins. By the time you are at that level the risk is probably barely different than picking someone from the same country as you at random.

[-] Kusimulkku@lemm.ee 4 points 11 months ago

Could be a case of a long lost uncle

[-] TrickDacy@lemmy.world 1 points 11 months ago
[-] Alexstarfire@lemmy.world 2 points 11 months ago
this post was submitted on 22 Nov 2023
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