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<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"by David Riech, 2018, Vintage Books, A Division of Penguin Random House, New York<\/p>\n
This is a totally fascinating book about a subject I knew very little.\u00c2\u00a0 This is not to say that I didn’t know anything about DNA; it’s rather that I didn’t know anything about the research being done on ancient DNA whole genome and what the implications are.\u00c2\u00a0 I was amazed at the sheer volume of tests that are being conducted on DNA of individual remains that are thousands of years old.\u00c2\u00a0 The book outlines how these ancient DNA data are extracted and how they are compared to the DNA data that is being collected from current populations around the world.<\/p>\n
In addition to learning about the origins and migrations of “modern” humans, I learned about what these finding might tell us about our behavior.\u00c2\u00a0 For example, the author has a whole chapter devoted to “The Genomics of Inequality” which sheds some light on the prevalence of misogamy in our current society. He also provides some background on the prohibition of Native American Indian tribes to undergo DNA testing as evidenced in Elizabeth Warren’s can of worms she experienced when she had her DNA tested to prove Native American ancestry.\u00c2\u00a0 Reich also has something to say about the political pushback he has experienced when he has shared the results of his research when that information suggests there may be genetic differences between the races.<\/p>\n
Much of this book is not easy to follow, however. In fact, I totally missed most of the math and logic of how the DNA is analyzed. I even attempted to read and reread some of these passages several times but to no avail.\u00c2\u00a0 I even hesitate recommending this book to some other individuals as I fear they may no longer wish to include me in their close friends.\u00c2\u00a0 Nevertheless, I am glad I persevered through the entire book, even though I may have understood less than half of its contents.\u00c2\u00a0 As the author pointed out, this is just the beginning of the eventual knowledge that testing of ancient DNA can uncover.\u00c2\u00a0 It will be interesting to see what else comes of it in the future.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
by David Riech, 2018, Vintage Books, A Division of Penguin Random House, New York This is a totally fascinating book about a subject I knew very little.\u00c2\u00a0 This is not to say that I didn’t know anything about DNA; it’s …<\/span> Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[16,32],"class_list":["post-2458","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","tag-non-fiction","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2458","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2458"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2458\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2459,"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2458\/revisions\/2459"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2458"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2458"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilsonld.com\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2458"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}