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Thread: Did the Nigerian Prince Move to Canada?

  1. #16
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    This reminds me of a story told by one of my business partners in Jamaica. There was a lady who had conned the entire Jamaican government that she was a princess- I can't remember where from- and she apparently convinced a lot of people. She was at a high-level government function when my friend was talking to her, and she used in a sentence the word "highway," but she pronounced it, "I-way." Well, folks, there is no better way to know if someone is from Jamaica than if they say "I-way." She knew right then and there that this lady was a fake. The lady did ultimately get exposed as a fraud. I do not remember what the goal of her scam was- somehow she used her influence to get money or loans or grants of money- I don't recall.

  2. #17
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    Quote Originally Posted by Myk Rian View Post
    All bow down and welcome...uh...Sire Jimmy!


    My DNA shows I'm related to Jesse James.
    My Wife agrees.
    LOL....

    I was pretty amused when I got back 10-13 generations (a few back to the late 1300s) and saw some of the "names". But the reality of things genetically is that I share about as much DNA with them as I do with almost anyone here at SMC.

    But "holy big families, Batman"!!! I think some of those folks spend more time making babies than they did doing anything else.
    --

    The most expensive tool is the one you buy "cheaply" and often...

  3. #18
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    But "holy big families, Batman"!!! I think some of those folks spend more time making babies than they did doing anything else.
    Before electric lights and television that's what people did.

    jtk
    "A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."
    - Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

  4. #19
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jim Becker View Post
    LOL....

    I was pretty amused when I got back 10-13 generations (a few back to the late 1300s) and saw some of the "names". But the reality of things genetically is that I share about as much DNA with them as I do with almost anyone here at SMC.

    But "holy big families, Batman"!!! I think some of those folks spend more time making babies than they did doing anything else.
    Well, you share a lot of DNA with us. Even if we're monkeys, we've got 90% plus the same DNA.

    DNA you have in common with some today is quite a different question than whether or not the DNA you have is directly transmitted to you from some particular ancestor through a line of descent. Thirteen generations back you have 8000+ grandparents (although same will at that remove probably be your grandparent^13 multiple times, so the unique number is smaller. You only have 46 chromosomes, so you can't trace any chromosomes back to most of those ancestors. Any DNA you inherited from one of those excluded, you got through crossing-over. That's impossible to predict, other than to say, it won't keep most of your ancestor's in your DNA family tree.

    I've met a few people who claim to be able to trace their ancestry back as far as the time of Charlemagne. That's 50 generations back. At that remove, you have 1000 trillion grandparents. You only have circa 3 billion base pairs in your DNA, so you have DNA from fewer than one in a million of those lines of descent. Although, at that remove, some ancestors appear as your grandparent in thousands and in some cases millions of lines. Can't be otherwise - there have been at most about 100 billion humans in the history of the species.

  5. #20
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    That's 50 generations back. At that remove, you have 1000 trillion grandparents.
    [edited]
    - there have been at most about 100 billion humans in the history of the species.
    One or the other of these two statements can be true, not both, unless something has passed by me.

    jtk
    "A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."
    - Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

  6. #21
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    Must be the new math.

  7. #22
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jim Koepke View Post
    One or the other of these two statements can be true, not both, unless something has passed by me.

    jtk
    Well it's a matter of how you count. If you think of yourself as at the bottom of an inverted pyramid representing your family tree, there are two lines from you to your parents, and two lines from each of them to their parents, your grandparents. So, there are four lines you can follow from you to a grandparent. So too, there are 8 lines you can follow from yourself to a great grandparent. Each generation back the number of lines doubles. By 32 generations back - roughly 8 centuries, give or take, you can follow 2 billion lines to 32nd remove ancestors.

    But there weren't nearly enough people alive at that time for each of those lines to end at a unique individual. There will be many instances of the same person being your 32nd degree grandparent through multiple lines of descent. At 1200 years (50 generations), the number is 1000 Trillion lines of descent, but only a few thousands to hundreds of thousands of unique individuals sitting in them.

    So, it is true, although paradoxical, that if you're descended from Charlemagne, and could prove that by tracing at least one line (you obviously can't trace all 1000 trillion), it's highly probably that you're descended from him by thousands of different paths, and yet quite possible that you inherited absolutely none of your DNA directly from him.

  8. #23
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    That's 50 generations back. At that remove, you have 1000 trillion grandparents.
    This is the part that threw me off. Having that many grandparents was hard to envision.

    jtk
    "A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."
    - Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

  9. #24
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    It only takes some basic detective work to figure out this is a complete scam. The website doesn't exist and a search for the firm's name doesn't turn up any information except that other people have been searching for the same company name.

    I'm sure the sender thinks the recipients will take a postal letter more seriously than an email. It costs a little money to send these out, but if you send out a few thousand and hook someone you'll make a profit.

  10. #25
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jim Koepke View Post
    This is the part that threw me off. Having that many grandparents was hard to envision.

    jtk
    Exponential growth is mindblowing. But if you are n generations back, you have 2n lines of descent in that generation. Grandparents: 22 = 4; Greatgrandparents: 23= 8; Greatgreats: 24= 16; Charlemagne era (assuming 4 generations per century): 250 = 1.125 X 1015.

    Just for giggles, there is another computation (that unfortunately requires a good deal more math and simulation) that shows that if any of Charlemagne's DNA survives by direct descent, then the most likely case is that most of the European population has it. This is a statistical, not absolute conclusion, but once you get into higher generation numbers, population genetics dictates that an ancient "stud" is either ubiquitous or dead.

  11. #26
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    I thought that scam had faded away 20 years ago. Perhaps in these computerized times they think the old way has more credibility.
    The Canadian government tender request to build death camps for Covid in the wilderness was far more amusing. It had to have a ‘guillotine’ to cope with the hordes. The give away was it was all in imperial units and we are metric!
    ​You can do a lot with very little! You can do a little more with a lot!

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