Incest and Folk-Dancing: Two things to be avoided - Professor Steve Jones

How closely are we related to each other, and how recently do we all share an ancestor? The answer to those questions is: closer and more recently than you might think. Professor Jones discusses patterns of relatedness in ancient and modern populations and how they can be measured from the records, from surnames, and - more and more - from the DNA. The pedigree hidden in every genome reveals some quite unexpected patterns of kinship and suggests that some may be very relevant to the chances of disease. However, the evidence that close kinship is breaking down is, in this modern and mobile world, very persuasive and it may be that the most important event in human evolution, and even in human health, was the invention of the bicycle. The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/incest-and-folk-dancing-two-things-to-be-avoided Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently nearly 1,500 lectures free to access or download from the website. Website: http://www.gresham.ac.uk Twitter: http://twitter.com/GreshamCollege Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Gresham-College/14011689941