Talk:Pedigree collapse

message: What do people think about adding a simple example to the article? such as:
Mary, John, Bob and Carol each have two parents, four grandparents, eight great-grandparents, which would bring the total of great-grandparents bewteen the four to 32, except for the fact that Mary, John, Bob and Carol are all brothers and sisters, there for 32 collapses to only eight great-grandparents total due to common ancestry.▪◦▪≡ЅiREX≡Talk 23:57, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The example suggested (using four siblings) has no pedigree collapse. A person has (normally) eight great-grandparents, and any siblings (be they Mary, John, Bob, Carol or whoever) have the exact same parentage and therefore the exact same great-grandparents - eight, no more and no less, and therefore no pedigree collapse. It would require M/J/B/C's parents to be first cousins (sharing one pair of grandparents in common) for a pedigree collapse to exist. --Pete Hobbs (talk) 12:43, 5 July 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Simple example of a collapse 

message: I User:la loi du récit suggest someone translate most of the German article that translates to this article. I believe a great deal is lost in the translation between these two articles, and I don't see how they easily correspond. If someone can suggest how I might find this translation in work in a different article, then link me to that article please. laloidurécit 31 October 2008 16:46 Eastern
:There is some intriguing material in the german article - in particular suggesting Augustus II the Strong had only 12% of the maximum number of ancestors going back 12 generations (499 vs 4096). But I don't see a source of their cool table. ★NealMcB★ (talk) 02:36, 14 September 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  German Article that links to this Pedigree Collapse 

message: Like most people, the family tree of Elizabeth II to five generations has 62 different people in the 62 different positions. The family tree of Charles II had only 32 different persons in the 62 positions. Going back two more generations, he had only 82 different people in 254 positions.
Going back five generations, you have 32 positions.  Six generations is 64 (not 62) positions, while eight generations is 256 positions (not 254).  I've corrected those numbers, but are the "32 different persons" and "82 different persons" part correct or also mistakes? XinaNicole (talk) 08:54, 1 February 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: You did the math wrong. It is not 2 to the 6th=64 like you think.  It is 2+4+8+16+32.  Look at this ancestry box to the sixth generation to see.  There is only 62 slots plus the person.--KAVEBEAR (talk) 06:19, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

text: Firstly, this talk-section should have been titled "Elizabeth II and Charles II" for clarity, as it discusses two rulers (not just Charles II), and I have therefore amended the title accordingly. Secondly, the original description for Elizabeth II (pre-Feb.2010, as quoted above) was correct before alteration to a currently wrong and confusing "The family tree of Elizabeth II to six generations has 64 different people in the 64 different positions." The chart on a Wikipedia page titled Ancestry_of_Elizabeth_II shows quite clearly that she has 62 different ancestors in the FIVE immediately preceding generations of her family - exactly as per the original description. As for Charles II, the same 2010 revision to "The family tree of Charles II had only 32 different persons in these 64 positions; going back two more generations, he had only 82 different people in the 256 positions" is equally incorrect, as the total number of possible positions can only be 254. Evidence of the 82 different people would be nice, if someone could find/add a link. Meanwhile I shall restore the originally quoted sentences immediately. --Pete Hobbs (talk) 13:58, 5 July 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Elizabeth II and Charles II 

message: I revised this section, maintaining the references and the general and specific example of royalty Alfonso XII. I removed the more arcane mathematical observations and replaced them with straightforward examples.
In a school paper or a conference paper, the idea is to impress knowledgable, educated readers. In an encyclopedia, and especially in Wikipedia, the idea is make text easily understood by the likely readers. In this case, that might be almost anybody investigating genealogy. So use of phrases such as "directed acyclic graph" and "binary tree" and "High Middle Ages" is counter-indicated, since probably only 5% of readers would know what those all are. 98.210.208.107 (talk) 01:19, 1 March 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Nicely done. Clear and, so far as I can tell, quite accurate. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 01:31, 1 March 2011 (UTC)
replies: text:  I disagree (mostly). Conference papers are not written to impress, they are written to spread information. School papers are (in a proper school) an excercise in doing so. Dividing written material into two categories, one to impress its readers, the other to be easily understood and then assigning wikipedia articles to this second category is specious. Furthermore, in an online encyclopedia such as wikipedia, the reader can simply click to open an article on any topic that is unfamiliar, such as those mentioned above. So concepts that may be difficult to the casual reader still have a place in the article. If a version without any such concepts is still deemed useful, then it can be placed on simple.wikipedia.org. It is however a good point that such concepts should preferably be used in a manner that still allows a reader to understand the article also when those concepts are unfamiliar. Reinstating directed acyclic graph accordingly - after all, readers unfamiliar with graph theory might find this real world application of it interesting. Lklundin (talk) 18:45, 1 August 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Revision of "How it works" section

message: Thanks LKlundin for maintaining the "binary graph", "directed acyclic graph" and "High Middle Ages terms".  
This article would benefit greatly from a measure of how much pedigree collapse typically takes place after n generations.  Presumably, for most people there is 0 collapse thru generations 3 or 4 but by generation 10 on average, how much collapse has taken place?  By generation 20?   Skates61 (talk) 00:29, 30 December 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: "If a child and parent were to procreate, their offspring would have four grandparents, although one of these would also be a parent and therefore introduce no additional genes – thus procreation between parents and children would result in less pedigree collapse than procreation between full siblings."
How can the fact that no new genes are introduced result in less pedigree collapse. That's what it says. CapnZapp (talk) 16:01, 1 March 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Measure of Pedigree Collapse