Skeptic's Answer To Ketchum's Dna Testing

[Guest]

Thanks Bob for the reply.

With your comments and those of parnassus, I'm now recognizing my ignorance and confusion on the subject of DNA.

I was under the impression that the DNA we are discussing could read 100% human (modern human?) through the maternal side and something other than 100% modern human by testing the nuclear DNA.

Parn is saying that this is nonsense and that we could not have a population that is consistently hybrid (and known through the nuDNA). I think this is what he is saying. And this rules out one of my notions related in an above post.

To try to clarify this in my mind, let me ask: if an male African mated with a female Australian two hundred years ago, would the great, great grandchild of this pairing have mtDNA that reads only Australian (and we're presuming for the sake of argument this particular woman is mtEve)? And would the nuDNA reveal the mixing of African and Australian genetic material?

(Or is my question too simple a reduction, or beside the point, or just stupid:) ?)

Parn, are you saying that an admixture of genetic material or a hybridization, while it may produce a unique individual, would not express itself population wide over time? What if there were repeated hybridisation of the same two species over time? Would that be reflected in the mtDNA, as well as the nuDNA? Or just the nuclear?

And would either of you fellows have a clue as to what Stubstad was looking for a few years ago here?: http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/loom/2006/05/16/the-neanderthal-genome-project-begins/

[Guest Jodie]

Thanks Bob for the reply.

With your comments and those of parnassus, I'm now recognizing my ignorance and confusion on the subject of DNA.

I was under the impression that the DNA we are discussing could read 100% human (modern human?) through the maternal side and something other than 100% modern human by testing the nuclear DNA.

Parn is saying that this is nonsense and that we could not have a population that is consistently hybrid (and known through the nuDNA). I think this is what he is saying. And this rules out one of my notions related in an above post.

To try to clarify this in my mind, let me ask: if an male African mated with a female Australian two hundred years ago, would the great, great grandchild of this pairing have mtDNA that reads only Australian (and we're presuming for the sake of argument this particular woman is mtEve)? And would the nuDNA reveal the mixing of African and Australian genetic material?

(Or is my question too simple a reduction, or beside the point, or just stupid:) ?)

Parn, are you saying that an admixture of genetic material or a hybridization, while it may produce a unique individual, would not express itself population wide over time? What if there were repeated hybridisation of the same two species over time? Would that be reflected in the mtDNA, as well as the nuDNA? Or just the nuclear?

And would either of you fellows have a clue as to what Stubstad was looking for a few years ago here?: http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/loom/2006/05/16/the-neanderthal-genome-project-begins/

NO Jerrywayne, that is not what Parn is saying. He is saying that none of the DNA is anything other than mis-identified human samples sent in by bigfoot researchers.

I know you want Parn to answer your questions, but you are a really bright guy in your own right, your questions could be answered by doing some fundamental reading and drawing your own conclusions. I have full confidence in you.

Just because an African guy mated with an Australian woman 200 years ago does not guarantee that any of her mtDNA would survive. It depends on how many daughters came in the successive generations that would determine the inheritance of the Australian woman's mtDNA.

Since there is no precedence for completely modern human mtDNA mixed with nuclear DNA that is not human, no one can answer that question. I doubt it could happen, but there have been hybridizations with male Neanderthal/female Cro Magnon and that seems to be the only combination for that pairing. No one knows why, but more than likely the opposite combination didn't produce viable or fertile offspring. I'm sure it wasn't the first time that two different types of hominids mixed, research seems to indicate we are hybrids many times over. It really depends on how similar the sasquatch DNA is to ours whether there is any truth in that rumor.

Stubstad looked at three samples and drew some erroneous conclusions about them in my opinion. He thinks he found mtDNA that hasn't been seen since the Franco Cambrian era, since there were two samples like that, he decided that they weren't hoaxed or misidentified modern human mtDNA. From that, he made the giant leap that these samples indicated sasquatch DNA and that sasquatch must be human.

[Guest Jodie]

I think what Parn is saying, and has said from the get go, is that the DNA samples are mis-identified human DNA sent in by the researchers or out and out hoaxes. I know you want Parn to answer your questions, but you are a really bright guy in your own right, your questions could be answered by doing some fundamental reading and drawing your own conclusions. I have full confidence in you.

Just because an African guy mated with an Australian woman 200 years ago does not guarantee that any of her mtDNA would survive. It depends on how many daughters came in the successive generations that would determine the inheritance of the Australian woman's mtDNA.

Since there is no precedence for completely modern human mtDNA mixed with nuclear DNA that is not human, no one can answer that question. I doubt it could happen, but there have been hybridizations with male Neanderthal/female Cro Magnon and that seems to be the only combination for that pairing. No one knows why, but more than likely the opposite combination didn't produce viable or fertile offspring. Yet in 30,000 years with no admixture we retained 1-4% of that DNA. Mitochondrial DNA represents an even smaller percentage of the human genome than the 1-4% of the genetic material we got from Neanderthal. Based on what we know right now, it really depends on how similar the sasquatch DNA is to ours whether there is any truth in that rumor. I could be proven wrong with an official DNA report.

Stubstad looked at three samples and drew some erroneous conclusions about them, in my opinion. He thinks he found mtDNA that hasn't been seen since the Franco Cambrian era, even though the samples weren't exact matches to that specific one in GenBank, it was pretty close when he ran it through in an unvalidated way to get a match. Since there were two samples like that, he decided that they weren't hoaxed or misidentified modern human mtDNA. From that, he made the giant leap that these samples indicated sasquatch DNA and that sasquatch must be human.

[BobZenor]

...

To try to clarify this in my mind, let me ask: if an male African mated with a female Australian two hundred years ago, would the great, great grandchild of this pairing have mtDNA that reads only Australian (and we're presuming for the sake of argument this particular woman is mtEve)? And would the nuDNA reveal the mixing of African and Australian genetic material?

(Or is my question too simple a reduction, or beside the point, or just stupid:) ?)

The mtDNA doesn't change or recombine in practical terms. It might in rare occurrences but it can be assumed to be stable. A better example would be an Australian woman brought to a large African village of 1000 that has a stable population. Her daughter would have the same mtDNA. Her daughters daughters would have the same mtDNA. The daughters of those would all have the same Australian mtDNA but their nuclear would only be about 1/2 for the "hybrid", 1/4 for the grand daughter, 1/8th for the great grand daughter. Random odds could make them have more or less of the Australians Great grand mothers nuDNA but that should be about right. Great grand daughter down the maternal line should have about 1/8 grandma Australians nuDNA and 100 percent Australian mtDNA assuming no inbreeding after that many generations. The nuclear would soon be essentially all African in that population if selection or survival were random. Some traits from the "Australian" are bound to be beneficial and increase over time.

20 generations into the future you would have virtually none of the nuDNA from the Australian except that which was favorable and caused more children to reproduce or those with favorable selection value. If that Australian mtDNA gave a 10 percent greater survival percentage for example, you would expect the frequency of that haplogroup to increase. In 3 generations say 10 females have that mitochondria. It doesn't really matter what the frequency in men is. In that example, I calculated about 25 generations or about a 1000 years to virtually eliminate the African mtDNA. The amount of nuclear would depend on how beneficial it was but it would be about 0.1 percent assuming no selection value since that was a non growing stable population of 1000 and she was one of them.

And would either of you fellows have a clue as to what Stubstad was looking for a few years ago here?: http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/loom/2006/05/16/the-neanderthal-genome-project-begins/

I think his logic was flawed. He saw mitochondria from a European that he thought was tens of thousands of years since it diverged from a modern human relative. He assumed that meant that bigfoot ancestor must be a hybrid from that cross with a European and a Neanderthals since Neanderthals were in Europe at that time. The main flaw in that is assuming that populations of modern humans don't move around. That haplogroup could have easily also been in Asia 30,000 years ago. They could have even made it to America over 13,000 years ago as the Solutreans. The other assumption would be that Neanderthals were the logical hominid to make a hybrid that was the ancestors of Bigfoot. That seems highly unlikely to me. There were other hominids around 30,000 years ago so if I was going to assume an ancestor, it would be something much more distantly related. Even denosova looks too closely related but at least they have a more distantly related mitochondria. They also lived in the right place, were apparently large or had big teeth and no reliable record of how technological it was. It contributed to some modern humans and had more genes in common with neanderthals but that doesn't really mean much in this context where we are assuming hybrids with modern humans and logically neaderthals as well. I would assume a cross to be something unrecognized in the fossil record with some from other hominids thrown in.

<edit to add>

I need the add the disclaimer that it was assuming that he was even correct about it being DNA from a sasquatch which I don't assume to be correct. It also was close to 50 generations not 25 to essentially eliminate the African mtDNA in that hypothetical example.

Edited November 17, 2011 by BobZenor

[yowiie]

Parnassus, you make a great point and I agree 100%. If the DNA study comes back as human DNA, I'll be the first in line to cry foul.

What I've seen was NOT human, they're human-like in the sence they have two arms, two legs etc....but so does a Gorilla. So in the same sence Gorillas are human-like too. Bigfoot DNA absolutely must be different from human just as Gorilla DNA is certainly different from ours.

I'll never accept that these creatures are modern humans because I've seen them and they're simply not. I don't know for sure what they are, but I know they're not us. IMO

Chris B.

Chris B

I will agree 100% with you, these animals are far from human. If the DNA comes back human there is somthing underhanded taken place, which at the end of the day will make the BF community a laughing stock.

[Guest]

One problem people have is imagining how hybridization between something as apparently different as Sasquatch and modern humans could be possible.

The main way you get largely sterile "mules" is that the chromosome number between parents is different, even if the genes are pretty similar. Somewhere back in the modern human lineage, the apes' number 2 and 4 chromosomes fused, so we have one fewer pair. So, even if if our DNA were exactly the same as chimps, the progeny between us would largely be sterile.

When this chromosome fusion happened, I don't know. But if it happened before humans and Sasquatch split, there is no reason why a mating wouldn't produce fully reproductive offspring, as odd as that may seem.

Oh, and this occasional mating between the two species may explain the diversity in features reported - some more "human" and others more "robust." Others have suggested this before.

I'm not signing off on that officially, but biologically it's a sensible hypothesis. It will also give you dead leads like modern human mtDNA hanging out in a perfectly obvious Sasquatch that doesn't look or act a bit like us except it walks on two legs.

Edited November 17, 2011 by tsiatkoVS

[Guest gershake]

THanks for that interesting piece of knowledge, Tsiatko.

[Guest Jodie]

I think that's a tad simplistic, the reason you don't have progeny from chimps and humans is because the protein coding genes and the mRNA that controls gene expression are not and do not work the same in chimps and humans. The number of chromosomes are important, but what is in the chromosomes is even more important. If you have nuclear DNA that is not human, or close to it, then there is no reason to think anything would result from hybridization, at least not a naturally occurring successful species. For all we know, the reason there is no fossil record and such a disparity in the physical descriptions could be because the sasquatch isn't what it used to be if the populations were and are isolated and suffer from atavistic changes as a result. Even so, those regressions aren't compatible with life most of the time.

http://www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/atavism-embryology-development-and-evolution-843

http://www.biology.duke.edu/kksmithlab/papers/bioessays.pdf

Edit to say- This is assuming the rumors we are hearing are even true. Most likely they aren't.

Edited November 17, 2011 by Jodie

[Guest RedRatSnake]

Anyone got some info on this one ~ it's taken from ~ http://bigfootevidence.blogspot.com/2011/07/erickson-lindsay-project-bigfoot.html

Ketchum burned her best friend for the money and glory. After Ketchum got herself a Hollywood lawyer and wrote up new NDA’s giving herself almost 100% of the proceeds from the study and everyone else close to zero, a number of people left the study because they refused to sign the new NDA.

An excellent female geneticist was on the team, and she was close to Ketchum. She refused to sign the new NDA, and Ketchum coldly dumped her from the team. This woman was distraught and absolutely devastated that her close friend would betray her like that for cash and fame.

[Guest]

Aside: the question of species and chromosomes is nicely explained in this essay by PZ Meyers in answering a student's question as to how species change their chromosome number in the first place...so for some who are interested it would be worthwhile read

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/04/basics_how_can_chromosome_numb.php

[Guest]

Ketchum burned her best friend for the money and glory. After Ketchum got herself a Hollywood lawyer and wrote up new NDA’s giving herself almost 100% of the proceeds from the study and everyone else close to zero, a number of people left the study because they refused to sign the new NDA.

That is your (highly inflammatory) opinion.

An excellent female geneticist was on the team, and she was close to Ketchum. She refused to sign the new NDA, and Ketchum coldly dumped her from the team.

To preserve the integrity of the study, secrecy must be maintained. this has been explained to you multiple times. The woman would not sign the NDA and was dismissed. Dr Ketchum did what she had to do to make sure the study could go forward.

This woman was distraught and absolutely devastated that her close friend would betray her like that for cash and fame.

Again, YOUR interpretation.

Edited November 20, 2011 by grayjay
GG1

[southernyahoo]

And you changed your avatar again..................

Edited November 20, 2011 by grayjay
removed quoted portion of removed post

[Guest RedRatSnake]

I like the red and black snake eye the most, then i have my Saturday night avatars i like to make i don't think i will be changing as much as i used to.

Edited November 20, 2011 by RedRatSnake
to remove inflamatory content

[Guest Jodie]

If bigfoot has differences in his nuclear DNA that do not affect every single one of his cells that is called mosaicism. If mixed with several other hominid lines along the way, as we have been, you could have a hominid that co-evolved along a different line than we did depending on the admixture, and when it happened through the inheritance of different mosaic patterns from hybridization. Unlike the article Dog4u posted said, it does usually have some kind of direct negative affect on the offspring, or along the inherited line, but the author was right in that it is strictly luck as to what combination or combinations express and survives to eventually form new species.

I don't have a problem with that possibility, it's why evolution took millions of years. If hybridization occurred with humans, it would still have to be fairly close to human, and not the genetic distance I'm hearing rumored about. That is going to make it tough to believe that what is sequenced is anything other than a regular modern human. It will get dismissed as contamination or mis-identification of some kind more than likely.

So to go back to legends where women from around the world were impregnated by the wild men, if the off spring survived, those individuals would be absorbed into our line in those specific populations. I doubt the gene flow went the opposite way very often where our line was absorbed into their line. You may or may not see evidence of that in the 750,000 human genomes mapped in GenBank, if I remember correctly, that are there for comparison. In order to pick out bigfoot DNA as something new and different a primer would have to be developed to detect that.

Where I do have a problem is from those leakers that insinuate the mosaicism is from different animals, and not from the hominid line. That is a chimera, and it is not a naturally occurring event. There was something that was originally posted on Paulides blog, but has been subsequently removed, that said the nuclear DNA was all over the place and not something seen before. Other rumors that I have heard insinuate that the nuclear DNA is a hodge podge of many different animal types.

Today's version of human/animal chimeras are created in the lab by mixing human and animal DNA during the first stages of meiosis in cell division. No one is growing full grown humanimals. The only way that could be done is through in vitro methods, and doing things to the embryo that affected the signals that turn gene expression on and off to get different desired traits that did not conflict with more modern traits. The difficulty with that is that one gene may affect many things, one mRNA might code for several different genes along the strand. We barely know what does what yet, we aren't there yet.

[Guest RedRatSnake]

That is your (highly inflammatory) opinion.

Dude it is just an article i came across and thought i would post it here so we can all talk about it, after all we all want the truth and nothing should be ignored ?

To preserve the integrity of the study, secrecy must be maintained. this has been explained to you multiple times. The woman would not sign the NDA and was dismissed. Dr Ketchum did what she had to do to make sure the study could go forward.

Ok they want secrecy, then why start talking about it on the internet in the first place ?

Again, YOUR interpretation.

I didn't write the article and i personally have no stake in it at all, i just find it pretty interesting with all the twists and turns this has taken.

Thank you and have a wonderful day