Montana man's DNA oldest found on the continent, testing company says

[marino760]

Personally I don't trust CRI. I had my DNA tested with them and they had some really odd stuff for me and a couple of things that were down right impossible to be true.
For example they had me at 8% Jewish. I have no ancestors that I know of that have any Jewish lineage. 23andme had me with 0% Jewish.
CRI showed a significant ancestry from northern Europe. 23andme had me with 0% northern Europe.
CRI showed a small amount of Peruvian Andes DNA which is impossible since my parents immigrated here from Italy with no ties to the Americas.

After comparing my CRI DNA with 23andme DNA, it was obvious CRI left much to be desired IMO and I'm being kind.

[Roselvr]

I wonder where they got their database.

What I got from the article was that the tribe got wives from other tribes; his DNA results were true for his line but may not be true for others in his tribe depending on where the wife came from.

[SimplySagacious]

Originally Posted by Lodestar

Such a rich heritage we have! These new discoveries are exciting.

I am in mind of a book I read in high school about Thor Heyerdahl, a Norse explorer who had the theory that people had migrated from Peru to populate Polynesia - a backwards migration from a American-centric point of view. Circular!

He aimed to prove its viability by building a raft made from material which would have been available at that time period in Peru and actually sailing it to Raroia.

It's a great read - like an adventure novel. If you are interested its name is "Kon-Tiki."

I am disturbed that the study of genetics has been so politicized that it has interfered with our true, scientific perceptions.

Yes, I know of Heyerdahl's expedition and it is interesting. Recent linguistic and ethnobotanical evidence contradicts him, however. Did you know about this expedition https://www.scientificamerican.com/a...cling-journey/
Amazing

How the Kon-Tiki voyage misled the world https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smith...fic-180952478/

Agree about politicized genetics, but it's not too surprising. Archaeology and anthropology have been politicized also my entire life, and before, in fact.

Originally Posted by cjseliga

It's interesting though, that Homo sapiens left Africa about 60-70,000 years ago, and it made sense that they would try and stay on or near land, but eventually they got their "sea legs" and decided to set sail.

Rethinking it https://cosmosmagazine.com/biology/r...f-homo-sapiens




ETA, forgot to mention that South Pacific Islanders, the Melanesians in particular, have significant Denisovan DNA which is interesting.

[Lodestar]

Thanks for the references, SimplySagacious.

We seniors need to keep updated! It gets harder all the time. LOL

[Alandros]

Originally Posted by bjh

That is another theory of how people got to the Americas. Both the Bering land bridge and boats across the Pacific are likely. Neither one cancels out the other.

Concise and well said.

Too often people see articles that word things to make them sensational. As if finding some new things disproves everything that came before. Usually it's the opposite, our picture of thing often expands and it's perfectly reasonable to not believe a hypothesis until there's enough evidence to reasonably put stock in it. Not being to that point is not dismissing it, it's keeping it in the line up until it deserves to move up.

In the last few years there have been a couple well respected DNA studies that dig into the traces of Polynesian looking DNA found in parts of America. Nothing conclusive but this may support boat travel making a relatively small impact in the greater population coming from the Bering, though enough to show up with blips of DNA. Of course the distant East Asian relation of the majority of Native American DNA and Polynesians have always made this hard to separate the two. What's just a trace of more ancient shared DNA and what's a small blip of newer DNA.

Not of this means we should dismiss all the data, studies, and analysis that we already have just because we may be expanding our view. Most of all the new stuff that comes just builds on the stuff we already know.

That concept is widely known by those that are familiar with this, of course it doesn't produce a sexy click bait headline of how the world of Native American history and DNA is upended by some finding. Of course this has the luxury of being closer to the reality.