Elizabeth Warren refuses to take DNA test

[phunk]

They can tell you if your DNA has chromosomes traceable to certain areas or neanderthals. They cannot, however, prove a negative. They cannot prove that there have never been certain chromosomes in your ancestry in the past.

Genes, not chromosomes. Whole chromosomes never get passed down.

 

[rdwight]

Wherein she makes the distinction that she's not a member of any tribe. That hardly sounds like she's claiming any special privilege.

Ya I haven't seen any proof that her claims had given her any specific handouts in the sense some seem to believe. Believe I read that her initial college paperwork merely self identified herself as white. Not like she was trying to get acceptance at that point due to native american status etc.

That doesn't seem to be true.

There is nothing in there that dismisses what he claimed. She did specifically identify herself as a minority/Native American, explained by herself to be in the interest of networking with others that share her background while a professor. Seems an odd explanation, but meh.

She did bring it up first when/where? In law school before ever being in the public eye, hardly ever to be mentioned again until political opponents dug it up to use against her?

There seems to be the issue some have pointed out. Her more recent appearances refer to it being a large part of her upbringing and identity, but it wasn't really discussed by herself at all besides identifying as a minority professor and upon it becoming an attack during her political career. Seems like she is overcompensating to defend at this point.

 

[ahhell]

Wherein she makes the distinction that she's not a member of any tribe. That hardly sounds like she's claiming any special privilege.


That doesn't seem to be true.



She did bring it up first when/where? In law school before ever being in the public eye, hardly ever to be mentioned again until political opponents dug it up to use against her?

You should actually read that Snopes piece. Under false, it points out that whether she got any advantage from it is actually unclear. It doesn't not address my claim that she seems to have advertised herself as a minority professor.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Warren

In April 2012, The Boston Globe sparked a campaign controversy by reporting that from 1986 to 1995 Warren had listed herself as a racial minority in the Association of American Law Schools (AALS) directories, called the Directory of Law Teachers (1970–1988) and the AALS Directory of Law Teachers (1989–present).[66] Harvard Law School had identified Warren as a "woman of color" in response to criticisms about a lack of faculty diversity.[67][68]

Now, is there any evidence that conservatives really care about this other than for the Lolz? It seems to mostly come up as a joke, much like Trump's small fingers or family's original last name. Are we to assume that progressives think Drumpf's small fingers are unfitting a president?

 

[blutoski]

I like how these DNA ancestry tests can tell what percentage neanderthal you are, or which specific part of europe your ancestors came from before crossing the atlantic, but somehow cant tell if you're 1/32nd native american.

It's probably off topic, but actually they can't tell you what part of Europe our ancestors came from. If you submit samples to different companies, you get different results, and if you submit three samples to the same company year after year, you can get different results every year. The science isn't ready yet.

I'm starting to consider them a category of healthfraud, IMO. Depends on the claim: if it's just for entertainment value, then no fraud. If it's medical diagnosis, then fraud. And the grey area is ancestry analysis: I would say it's fraud if the company claims it's scientifically valid analysis. At this point, we don't have enough information to give reliable geographic/ethnic ancestry breakdowns.

I think sciency people like skeptics have a blindspot for these because they're so techy.

gizmodo article: [How DNA Testing Botched My Family's Heritage, and Probably Yours]

 

[rdwight]

I have a similar story in my family, a great-great grandfather married a Blackfeet Indian woman. My brother's test at Ancestry.com didn't show it. Does that make the story untrue? No, because the tests are not that sensitive.

I also have a similar story told by my great grandmother, although I don't recall how far back it went (her grandfather/great/great-great etc.). Mother's dna test came back with none. So same boat.

It is funny to me that this is such a common story in a lot of families. Not sure why to be honest, but for most of us it is not taken too seriously I'd imagine. Nothing that would make the average person identify as Native American in any official capacity, just a cool story to tell randomly to friends who coincidentally have a one just like it themselves..

 

[Belz...]

It, to the best of my knowledge, gets weird.

According to Politifact's breakdown of it outside of a weird and out of left field incident with a cookbook back in 1984 (no seriously) this whole thing started because Warren sent a formal notice to a couple of law schools (Harvard and University of Penn) claiming either Cherokee or Delaware blood in what appears to be a bid to get a teaching job.

And this was pretty much it (outside of a one off reference in a 1996 University newsletter from Harvard touting the schools diversity) until 2012 when it got brought up... somehow in some context during her Senate race and sort of just snowballed from there.

Obviously that's far worse than anything Trump has done, and it's indicative of the left's hypocrisy!

 

[Upchurch]

Genes, not chromosomes. Whole chromosomes never get passed down.

My apologies. A biologist, I am not.

There is nothing in there that dismisses what he claimed. She did specifically identify herself as a minority/Native American, explained by herself to be in the interest of networking with others that share her background while a professor. Seems an odd explanation, but meh.

Dammit. You're right. I was reading the part after it that said the school had said it.

There seems to be the issue some have pointed out. Her more recent appearances refer to it being a large part of her upbringing and identity, but it wasn't really discussed by herself at all besides identifying as a minority professor and upon it becoming an attack during her political career. Seems like she is overcompensating to defend at this point.

I don't see it as overcompensation. I see it more as not backing down to the bullying.

 

[Stacyhs]

As much as demagogues depend on character assassination to rile up the reactionaries, and as much as they'd like to bring down Warren, you might think they could come up with something less *********** pathetic than "she believes her family's oral history." But it does remind me that Trump never took that DNA test to prove that he isn't half orangutan.

My own family's oral history also mentions Cherokee blood several generations back, and I always thought that was cool, but Ancestry.com's DNA test didn't report any. There are too many gaps in the surviving documents to be sure, so I guess it's a good thing I didn't run for public office.

I'm in a similar boat. My family had no oral history of Native American blood, but in researching my genealogy, I found well documented evidence of a Creek 4X great-grandmother who is listed as "Indian" in the 1860 US census and who died on the Muskogee, OK Indian reservation in 1890. However, my Ancestry DNA test showed no Native American results. Apparently, I received no DNA from that ancestor but she is still my ancestor. My full sister is awaiting her DNA results and it will be interesting to see what her results show compared to mine.

 

[JoeMorgue]

Obviously that's far worse than anything Trump has done, and it's indicative of the left's hypocrisy!

Oh yeah smart guy! Well what about when someone from your political side didn't salt his pasta before boiling it on October 18th, 1987 at 7:42 PM.

Thought I had forgot about that? Well think again!

(Adds another point to my side's scorecard)

 

[Beelzebuddy]

It seems to mostly come up as a joke,

The OP doesn't seem to be joking to me.

 

[Belz...]

My apologies. A biologist, I am not.

But apparently, you're Yoda.

 

[Garrison]

I like Elizabeth Warren, and consider her to be a decent presidential candidate honestly.

But I think she should attempt to clear this up, even though it's a no-win, really.

Yeah I mean as soon as Obama released his birth certificate the Birthers all apologized and moved on....

 

[Upchurch]

Now, is there any evidence that conservatives really care about this other than for the Lolz? It seems to mostly come up as a joke, much like Trump's small fingers or family's original last name. Are we to assume that progressives think Drumpf's small fingers are unfitting a president?

Quite the knee slapper.

 

[ahhell]

The OP doesn't seem to be joking to me.

Maybe, I guess I just have a hard time taking posts on an internet forum seriously. Even the Op Ed piece linked in the op didn't seem to be suggesting it was that serious, more of a hey, isn't this weird?

Again, I compare it to the small fingered drumpf stuff, it gets brought up all the time, it started in an op ed by...Rolling stone? some periodical or other. Its not serious and effectively nobody takes it as such.

She can't actually make it go away because it's too funny but she can respond better. A simple, this is the story my grandma told us, are you calling my grannie a liar?* Rather than her response which seems to be, "This was a big part of my childhood and who I am" Which rings hollow when coming from a blond haired blue eyed law professor.

Probalby not that last bit but a simple, this is the story my family believes, lots of folks in america have a story just like it with just as little evidence. Again, "I'm 1/32 Cherokee" is a bit of cliche'd joke.

 

[Beelzebuddy]

Maybe, I guess I just have a hard time taking posts on an internet forum seriously. Even the Op Ed piece linked in the op didn't seem to be suggesting it was that serious, more of a hey, isn't this weird?

Again, I compare it to the small fingered drumpf stuff, it gets brought up all the time, it started in an op ed by...Rolling stone? some periodical or other. Its not serious and effectively nobody takes it as such.

She can't actually make it go away because it's too funny but she can respond better. A simple, this is the story my grandma told us, are you calling my grannie a liar?* Rather than her response which seems to be, "This was a big part of my childhood and who I am" Which rings hollow when coming from a blond haired blue eyed law professor.

Probalby not that last bit but simple, this the story my family believes, lots of folks in america have a story just like it with just as little evidence. Again, "I'm 1/32 Cherokee" is a bit of cliche'd joke.

So "funny" in the "I'm not racist, but..." sense of the word.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

I like how these DNA ancestry tests can tell what percentage neanderthal you are, or which specific part of europe your ancestors came from before crossing the atlantic, but somehow cant tell if you're 1/32nd native american.

Perhaps you don't understand the uneven balance in their data base and how much of your genome is actually used in the report.

Once someone identifies more alleles associated with different Native American lineages you will see more precision. Ancestry has that ad claiming, "I found out I was 26% Native American" because it's popular for people to want to have NA blood. Notice the ad doesn't say, Cherokee or Hopi or Blackfeet (by the way, I've seen photographs of that relative on my father's side that is supposed to be Blackfeet and she does look like a NA).

My last name is German, my ancestors were immigrants from Germany that became farmers in Kansas. My brother's analysis didn't show any German ancestry. That clearly was not a very precise analysis.

How many Mayan or Incan genetic identifiers are in their data base?

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

... Apparently, I received no DNA from that ancestor but she is still my ancestor. My full sister is awaiting her DNA results and it will be interesting to see what her results show compared to mine.

It's not necessarily that you have no DNA from that ancestor in your genome, it is just, if not more likely, the testing company doesn't have any genetic identifiers in their data base.

These companies are not (or were not they may be doing some now) researching genetic markers. They are using the data done by other researchers. For example, researchers that identified neanderthal genetic markers made that information available. The genetic analysis companies then put that data in their data base. Recording your full genome is cheaper now, they may be identifying your full genome, I don't know. Then their computer program mines that genome for identifying alleles or markers that are in the data base.

They can find Neanderthal DNA because that data is in their data base. The Nat Geo researchers mapped the human migrations out of Africa so there are lots of markers in the publicly available data base. The way a marker is used is when a particular mutation occurs, then anytime you see that mutation, you know that person is a descendant from the ancestor that mutation was first seen in. By following those markers, migration routes can be mapped.

Until there are a lot of alleles or genetic markers which identify Native American ancestry, the companies look at your DNA will have blind spots. They might see that DNA but not connect it to any particular ancestry.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

The OP doesn't seem to be joking to me.

No, certain members on this forum and in the population at large are led down the demonization path by the propaganda.

Clinton and Nancy Pelosi are demonized on a regular basis. You need not know what the complaint is, or that the complaint has not been substantiated or it may even have been disproved. All you need know is Pelosi and Clinton are evil demons.

Schumer and Warren are demonized. Could be a trivial thing like this one. Recently the GOP has begun demonizing Congressman Schiff because he's provided reliable evidence discrediting Nunes. Nunes' BS is easily documented. Schiff has done nothing that can't be supported by factual evidence. Won't matter, Schiff is a demon.

The OP is attacking a demon.

 

[Stacyhs]

It's not necessarily that you have no DNA from that ancestor in your genome, it is just, if not more likely, the testing company doesn't have any genetic identifiers in their data base.

These companies are not (or were not they may be doing some now) researching genetic markers. They are using the data done by other researchers. For example, researchers that identified neanderthal genetic markers made that information available. The genetic analysis companies then put that data in their data base. Recording your full genome is cheaper now, they may be identifying your full genome, I don't know. Then their computer program mines that genome for identifying alleles or markers that are in the data base.

They can find Neanderthal DNA because that data is in their data base. The Nat Geo researchers mapped the human migrations out of Africa so there are lots of markers in the publicly available data base. The way a marker is used is when a particular mutation occurs, then anytime you see that mutation, you know that person is a descendant from the ancestor that mutation was first seen in. By following those markers, migration routes can be mapped.

Until there are a lot of alleles or genetic markers which identify Native American ancestry, the companies look at your DNA will have blind spots. They might see that DNA but not connect it to any particular ancestry.

I would find it very unlikely that Ancestry.com, which has largely US based data, would not have quite a bit of Native American genetic identifiers.

 

[Stacyhs]

Perhaps you don't understand the uneven balance in their data base and how much of your genome is actually used in the report.

Once someone identifies more alleles associated with different Native American lineages you will see more precision. Ancestry has that ad claiming, "I found out I was 26% Native American" because it's popular for people to want to have NA blood. Notice the ad doesn't say, Cherokee or Hopi or Blackfeet (by the way, I've seen photographs of that relative on my father's side that is supposed to be Blackfeet and she does look like a NA).

My last name is German, my ancestors were immigrants from Germany that became farmers in Kansas. My brother's analysis didn't show any German ancestry. That clearly was not a very precise analysis.

How many Mayan or Incan genetic identifiers are in their data base?

In my case, my immigrant German great-grandparents spoke German and were originally German citizens. However, my DNA showed Scandinavian rather than German ancestry because they were from Schleswig-Holstein, an area of Germany that had been Danish until 1864 and they were actually of Danish descent. If your ancestors were from Schleswig-Holstein, this could explain your brother's results.