I did it (as did my uncle) and I’m really glad I did. It turns out the family mythology explanation for my grandfather’s very dark skin (for a white person) – that his mother was part Native American – was bullshit, and he was actually 1/8th African American, as demonstrated by my ~3% sub-Saharan African ancestry and my uncle’s ~6% sub-Saharan African ancestry.
It’s cool to learn surprises like that, IMO.
I’d spend $20 on it. 
A very recent related thread.
As to ancestry percentages: note the link in Edward The Head’s post there.
Don’t believe most of the ancestry crap they provide.
In the documentary “Welcome To Leith”, which aired on PBS recently, the head of a white supremacist organization that wanted to take over this remote North Dakota town had his DNA analyzed and the results announced on a TV talk show which was hosted by two black women (don’t recall which show it was; it wasn’t “Oprah”.)
He was
86% Northern European and 14% sub-Saharan Africa. :eek:
There are 23 chromosome pairs, meaning there are 46 chromosomes.
The only cells with 23 chromosomes are the reproducing cells (ova and sperm).
So - are we talking about chromosome PAIRS or are we looking for ‘my stuff’ + ‘stuff from possible mate’?
If you want to mix-and-match test results, maybe you can “optimize” your baby’s genetic structure
To be clear - they are not banned from doing the tests, they are not banned from giving you the raw data. That, in principle, is no different from selling a blood glucose test that you can do yourself.
But if you want medical advice based on the data, the person giving that advice (if they are in the U.S.) must be qualified to do so.
If you don’t like the fact that people giving out medical advice are regulated, you are free to do whatever you want with your data. You could go to reddit/genetics and crowdsource your diagnosis. Or perhaps pass the data to an unlicensed and unregulated “genetic counselor” in Mexico for interpretation.
Why not?
Are you referring to the various percentages for countries-of-origin (e.g. my 12.5% Ashkenazi background)? Or possibly the mother and father haplo groups and where they migrated from and when?
Which parts should we disbelieve, and why?
This was totally me, except it was always that my great-grandfather was full-blooded Cherokee. Yeah, not a drop. I’m pure Euromutt, as expected.
I paid $70 for it and found it totally worth it. Yeah, there’s not much actionable in there, but it’s fun.
Which they do (or did, at least… I haven’t looked at the site since the FDA stuff). There are third-party sites that will process the data files from 23andme.
Anyone who lives West of the Mississippi has a Native American in the wood pile.
From hanging out in a lot of DNA genealogy forums, my impression is that Ancestry DNA is a better investment than 23andme. They have the largest DNA database, so you are far more likely to find connections to cousins if your interest is specifically genealogically-focused, but you can also download your raw DNA from Ancestry and upload it to Promethease, who charge $5 to do a medical analysis of your results. The presentation of the data is less user friendly than 23andme. Your total costs for AncestryDNA + Promethease will be less than a 23andme test.
I had one done about seven years ago, which only revealed my haploid group, which is G. But it did get me in contact with a closely-related family that had done a great deal of genealogical research, and I was able to verify who my ancestor was who had immigrated to Virginia in about 1730, about the time Washington was born not far down the pike. My ancestor’s will happens to be on the internet, detailing his lands and slave holdings, so I’m glad I know about that. I also found that my ancestors had already been living in Hannibal, when Mark Twain’s family first moved there.
I can see where it basically would have been a waste of money, were it not for the fact that I could be connected by it to a genealogist who had a great deal to share with me.
My dad actually did it a few months ago. It was pretty interesting. My dad had always been told growing up that he was a quarter native american because of his grandfather or something but the test showed he was like…5% or something small. So that was surprising. The little factoids about whether he was likely to hate broccoli or the chances of getting some disease were interesting.
My brother said all of us siblings should do it to find out what we have for racial percentage, and I mentioned we have to only have my mom do one and we’ll get all the information we’ll need. To which he said bullshit. Apparently in his mind, if dad’s like 50% one thing (like Irish) and mom is 0%, then each of use could be any percentage between those to numbers. ie I could be genetically 25% Irish and he could be 45%. I told him that made no fucking sense but he’s standing by his theory. :dubious:
My husband and I did it, mostly for curiosity, but also to see if there were any lurking horrors in the shallow ends of our respective gene pools. We both ended up very genetically healthy, no markers at all for any of the nasties they test for, and very unrelated to one another. So, shrug, good news?
According to the test, I am 100% Euro, and something like 99% Northwestern European, which is interesting to me, as I’m 9th generation Australian on one side, and 3rd gen on the other. I had heard rumours about a Jewish great-great-something, but no drop of Ashkenazi.
Oh, and it’s not a cheek swab, OP, it’s just saliva. Lots of saliva.
For us, totally worth it. We did 23+me when the test 1st became available.
A relative of my husband’s had the misfortune to have a child with (CF) Cystic Fibrosis.
As we found my husband is a carrier of the CF gene, we offered to pay for similar genetic screening for others in his family.
We have a young son. We will offer to finance testing for him, when he’s old enough to give informed consent.
It told me that I had tennis elbow…
He’s on the right track, though. Your parents give you half of their genes, but that doesn’t mean that you and your brother each received the same half. Maybe your maternal grandfather had a couple of markers that 23andMe uses to pinpoint Italian DNA, and your brother got them, but you received your corresponding markers from your African maternal grandmother.
I am male, and up until just now, I had just assumed that it was either an error or some minor consanguinity. The Y-Chromosome being much lighter on the information scale does make a pretty reasonable amount of sense.
I discovered that I am a carrier for Hereditary Hemochromatosis (literally, “Iron coloration”), a genetic disorder common in Ireland that shuts off the body’s regulators for absorption of dietary iron.
Did it tell you to stop jacking off?
Do you guys know each other?