Saturday, July 13, 2019

Count of generations

If I take my maternal grandparents as generation 0, then already my family has generation 3 and generation 4 family members who are the same age (actually some generation 4 who are older by a few years than generation 3).

Is this just an anomaly of the modern age with extended maternal and child survival compared to the norm over 100K years of human existence? 

When geneticists try to estimate generation counts over aeons, I wonder what models they use.
Posted by Arun at 8:43 AM
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Guest II's avatar

Guest II · 298 weeks ago

There have actually been some studies of this, in Iceland, for example, where they have genealogies that go back hundreds of years. I recall reading a paper about it in my archaeological genomics class. Most retrospective studies where no such data exists use crude estimates, typically 20 or 25 years per generation.

There is also the classic movie, You've Got Mail.

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