Recent entries

oscar snail oscar pursues z oscar meets jim oscar and camus desert campfire metadada card index ChatGPT talks to itself while working Trying to gather my photos of Iris Laugh the next time you hear a MAGAt asking for transparency Jimmy Carter's death is not all that important, is it? Staying on the alert for for prople to blame for our problems My father's Doughboy statue Taking more screenshots to help understand this QA macro Design a personal dump truck I think Gawd speaks through AI Election Day Canvassers - Reminders and Updates Vocabulary lesson Iris and I had an interesting discussion with Google Bard this morning. Iris and I had an interesting discussion with Google Bard this morning. Discussion on the Pomona College class of 1964 listserv I’m illiterate Elon Musk I love photographing the artists at Wildacres Eating a Mouse It Really is a Fascist Flag (at least to some Americans) I love the New York Times Metropolitan Diary Watching The Ten Commandments in Gafsa, Tunisia, in the sixtes I wanna be like these guys when I’m their age! The insignificance of photography Enough
November 20, 2021 identity

Genetic Geneology

The November 22, 2021 Issue of The New Yorker has an article entitled How Your Family Tree Could Catch a Killer by Raffi Khatchadourian.

In the midst of the discussion of the ethics of genetic testing, I found this:

Even in the best of circumstances, the nature of DNA made the question of consent particularly thorny. As one commenter on a genealogy blog pointed out, “When YOU give consent, you are also giving consent for fifty percent of your mother’s and fifty percent of your father’s DNA, too.”

Doesn’t this help break down our especially American belief that we are each autonomous, separate individuals? Part of our genetic “identity” also belongs to other people.

I’m not even sure what questions this raises, but I’m sure there are many.

Previous post
PANCHO LÓPEZ In the summer between my junior and senior years in high school (I think), the father of my best friend, Mark (“Gruesome”) Grandy, found us jobs
Next post
Our Living Contradiction The November 14, 2021 issue of the New York Times Magazine contains an article by Jake Silverstein entitled A Nation of Argument. (If you follow the