"Thirteen million degrees of Kevin Bacon"

[Berlin-Bob]

I found this article in a german newspaper today.

"Größter Stammbaum verbindet 13 Millionen Menschen"
i.e Biggest family tree connects 13 million people"
https://www.tagesspiegel.de/wissen/ahnenforschung-groesster-stammbaum-verbindet-13-millionen-menschen/21024170.html

The german article was a report on an article in "Science"

Thirteen million degrees of Kevin Bacon: World’s largest family tree shines light on life span, who marries whom.

Researchers have published what may be the largest family tree ever: a genealogy database stretching back 5 centuries that links 13 million people related by blood or marriage. The tree has already led to such insights as the link between genes and longevity and why our ancestors married whom they did. And researchers say that’s just a start.  [...]

http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2018/03/thirteen-million-degrees-kevin-bacon-world-s-largest-family-tree-shines-light-life-span

regards,
Bob

[Viktoria]

Wow! However has all that been authenticated?
I have a family member who--supposedly--- has traced our lot back to King Arthur.
I don`t doubt that the German tree is authentic but as for my lot
Nice to see you back Bob ,it seems a while. Viktoria.

[Wendy2305]

MM it says they got their original data from public trees on Geni.com website wonder if they checked that data

[maddys52]

MM it says they got their original data from public trees on Geni.com website wonder if they checked that data

Yes, it says in the article the info came originally from Geni.com data. Whilst I'm sure some of the data would be well researched and accurate, I know some is completely wrong. My brother (who is not really interested in genealogy but watched a TED talk about Geni and thought it sounded like a good idea) uploaded a lot of research I had done, however I later discovered an error in one family line and have corrected on my family tree but of course, the error is still there on Geni.

[Flattybasher9]

"Last week, scientists using data from Ancestry.com and Geni.com each unveiled papers analyzing the genealogies for patterns like migrations, lifespan, and when people stopped marrying family members."

Having had a history of "Trees" from others which are reportedly linked to mine, I think that I will stay sceptical in my judgement of the accuracy of this tree.

Malky

[CarolA3]

Surely, as professional scientists, they must understand that any bogus 'facts' lurking in these trees could render most of their conclusions invalid

Maybe they should have asked RCers to do some random quality checks

Carol

[BushInn1746]

Wow! However has all that been authenticated?
 ...

Authentic? Laughter     

A very good question - Viktoria

It must be one of those tree joining exercises.

We hear that some trees online contain error/s.

Compound errors - spring to mind ...
My colleagues and I arrived at work one morning with the balance of our xx millions spend budget intact, by the mid afternoon our pc programmers were telling us we were bankrupt and our Departmental system was down, while our Programmers and Systems Analysists worked through the evening and all night to trace how the massive deficit came about. A simple input error was duplicating.

PC systems - Detritus in - Detritus out!

Mark

[pharmaT]

If they pay me and give me expenses I'll work from home and check every step in the tree .

[Geoff-E]

If they pay me and give me expenses I'll work from home and check every step in the tree .

Payment when the job is finished?