Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Human Genetic History

Founding discussion

Archived at Wikipedia:WikiProject Human Genetic History/Proposal. Please do not edit that page but feel free to continue discussion here of any of the points that came up. Jheald (talk) 16:15, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Project banner

I've created a first cut at a project banner template:

• Template:WikiProject_Human_Genetic_History

Thoughts and discussion about tweaks/changes probably best carried on here, until we're all reasonably happy. Jheald (talk) 20:17, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Articles tagged

I've tagged most of the articles in Category:Genetic genealogy and sub-cats with the project template (excluding Category:Genealogy software and Category:Human MHC haplogroups.

See Category:WikiProject Human Genetic History pages. Note that clicking on Related changes there can be used to get a list of all recent edits to any of the associated talk pages. -- Jheald (talk) 23:30, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Hi all. Great work in starting things off! I just wanted to ask for feedback about the scope of tagging. For example, in articles that have a section discussing DNA ancestry (one of which I edit frequently is Palestinian people), do people think it is appropriate to add a tag for the project? In other words, should any article that mentions genetic history be added to the project, or only those devoted to the subject itself. Thanks. Tiamut^talk 19:33, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Side issue re that Palestinian people article. If I remember rightly, most of the studies currently cited only looked at 6 markers. But that's not enough to reliably separate the different subgroups identified eg by the Haplogroup J project. Some very different lineages can appear very similar, at only 6 markers; while some much more closely related lineages can appear much more distant.

Are the conclusions from studies like Nebel's still safe, when we consider more detailed haplogroups defined with more STR markers? Or should they be carry a heavy health warning? Jheald (talk) 20:31, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Yes, go ahead and tag them; that's what importance assessments are for. ;-) – Swid ^{(talk · edits)} 20:05, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Even if we end up claiming the entire territory of Wikipedia:WikiProject Ethnic Groups? I can see both sides here. It would be nice to be able to generate two separate listings really -- articles where we would see this as the primary, most associated project; and articles where we do have an association, but a lesser one. "Importance" (FWIW, I prefer "Priority") doesn't quite do that: some "low priority" articles, will definitely primarily associate here. Other articles, eg some for which Molecular Biology is probably the primary association (eg "Allele") nevertheless are still far from low priority for us.

I just fear that tagging all sorts of articles for us, will make it harder to spot eg high-traffic articles for which we would see ourselves as being in the first line of responsibility. Jheald (talk) 20:31, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Ah. I see your proposal in more detail below, in the "WP 1.0 Assessments" thread. Still not 100% convinced though. Jheald (talk) 20:40, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

In your case, it sounds like the bot-assisted sorting of tagged articles would be very helpful; just ignore anything that winds up in the "Low-Priority" or "Unassessed" categories. :-P On a serious note, while the overall potential overlap with WP:ETHNIC is quite large, for the short- to intermediate-term future, most ethnic groups won't have any published genetic data available. Also, tagging ethnic group articles where there is data available helps remind people in other projects that we're another available resource. – Swid ^{(talk · edits)} 20:58, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

I'm just bothered it might really clutter up the recent changes and recent changes to talk pages lists. Jheald (talk) 23:00, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia 1.0 assessments

Now that we're live, I want to get things started. Shall we start doing some article assessments and set up organization by the Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Using the bot? Once we do that, we can start using the Igor tool that I've been developing to manage things pretty easily. – ClockworkSoul 16:08, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Sounds a good idea. The talk page template would need to be updated - I only created a very basic one; code would need to be copied from more advanced ones, to add a field to display the assessments.

I'm never quite sure with the "importance" field - is that supposed to be "importance" (priority) for Wikipedia Version 1.0; or importance/priority to this WikiProject ? Jheald (talk) 15:25, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

From what I've gathered, "importance" started as an assessment for the former, but is now most commonly seen as an assessment for the latter. Since the guidelines mention having a consensus on an importance scale before going out and tagging things, here's a quick-and-dirty attempt at an assessment scale for this project:

• Top - Human genetic history is the main topic of the article and provides wide-ranging information (examples: recent single origin hypothesis, main mtDNA and Y-DNA pages)
• High - Human genetic history is the main topic of the article (examples: individual haplogroup pages)
• Mid - Human genetic history is not the main topic of the article, but is important to its understanding (examples: general articles on SNPs, STRs, RecLOH)
• Low - Human genetic history is not the main topic of the article, and does not play a major role in its understanding (examples: ethnic group pages)

– Swid ^{(talk · edits)} 20:21, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Are all haplogroups really high importance? Even the really rare ones? Are they really of higher priority than some others of the more trafficked articles? I'm not convinced -- at least not 100%. Jheald (talk) 20:37, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Ideally, yes. If nothing else, I'm very uneasy having this project state from the outset that "all haplogroups are important, but some are more important than others". I know that a wide gap exists among haplogroups in terms of the amount of published information available, but just because a group is rare or hasn't attracted much research interest, that shouldn't mean that it isn't important to us. I see nothing wrong with having articles tagged as high-priority and as stub- or start-class. – Swid ^{(talk · edits)} 21:13, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Hmmm. I still can't see Lewis surname DNA project or 100% English or even Jefferson DNA data coming in ahead of Genetic drift or Haplotype. And what about articles like Origins of the Kurds, Ukrainian LGM refuge or Sub-Saharan DNA admixture in Europe? Is STR lower priority than List of DYS markers? But maybe the only way to go is to try it and see... Jheald (talk) 21:40, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

It appears I've failed to take my initial description to its logical conclusion. Genetic history being the sole topic of an article has to go hand in hand with usefulness/interest to a general audience; I'm sorry I didn't make that assumption explicit. In addition, by "individual haplogroup pages" in the original priority description, I meant articles named "Haplogroup <letter> ([Y-][mt]DNA)". – Swid ^{(talk · edits)} 21:51, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

I like it. It's a good start and we can add different layers of understanding to the ranking system as the need arises. Tiamut^talk 00:45, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Article hits for February 2008

I've put up a list at Wikipedia:WikiProject Human Genetic History/articles of articles currently tagged for the project, ranked by hits for Feb 2008 from Henrik's site, [1].

It gives us some idea of what readers are interested in - or, perhaps more accurately, what they're most easily led to at the moment; so articles we should make sure are of a reasonable calibre.

The Related changes link from there can be used to bring up a list of all recent edits to the project's articles. As noted above, a similar list of all recent edits for the corresponding talk pages can also be pulled up, here. Jheald (talk) 15:34, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Automated PMID to WP templated citation converter

Here. A useful resource for automatically generating WP templated citations, and for improving the production quality of existing cites. Jheald (talk) 23:17, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Genetics of the Ancient World

Might be worth keeping an eye on this apparently new article. The creator has run into some accusations of article POV and POV-forking in the past. Jheald (talk) 12:22, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Updating Y-DNA articles

There's going to be a lot of work to do in once the article below (press release) becomes publicly available:

Karafet, T.M., Mendez, F.L., Meilerman, M.B., Underhill, P.A., Zegura, S.L., and Hammer, M.F. New binary polymorphisms reshape and increase resolution of the human Y-chromosomal haplogroup tree. Genome Research. doi:10.1101/gr.7172008.

– Swid ^{(talk · edits)} 23:24, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Need help with protected template

A have noticed that Template:Infobox Ethnic group has no genetics information tab. Probably it would be a good idea to add such tab, so the participants of our project(and others if interesting) can provide the information about frequency of haplos(and other notable genetic info) for each ethnic group. Sasha l (talk) 23:50, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Some suggestions/comments

I've just noticed this project now from the imbalanced article cline (population genetics). The first thing I notice is that the title should be Human genetic history (we don't capitalize unless needed here). Secondly, the project is not nested in WikiProject Biology where it should be, which makes navigation difficult. Surely it's obvious that this isn't just a science project but specifically a biology project. But more importantly I think a project on genetics in general is much needed. Projects like medical genetics and this one could then be subprojects or task forces.

I've moved the category for this project into WP BIOL, though it would have been nice to hear of this there earlier. I'll mention it now. Richard001 (talk) 10:30, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

There is a proposal at the WikiProject Council for an all-encompassing Genetics WikiProject. It has been suggested that this project and WP:MEDGEN can be incorporated either as descendant WikiProjects or task forces. Feel free to leave comments there. Cheers. – Liveste (talk • edits) 01:24, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

New Article Collaboration?

Hello, all. I started a new article Genetics of the Ancient World which was intended to be an intro discussion on archaeogenetics followed by an annotated bibliography of relevant articles, but another editor said this format is unacceptable on Wikipedia...so it has now been changed. Is there anyone else out there who might think it worthwhile to start an annotated bibliography of genetics articles? A list of relevant genetics articles with a short summary is highly useful for those of us who are or plan to be involved in research in genetics. Thanks for your thoughts. regards Hkp-avniel (talk) 11:44, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

I think your article is problematic. To begin with, archaeogenetics is a stub. Why not begin with expanding that instead of creating a new article under the artificial title of "Ancient World"? The ToC and scope of your article seems ... heterogenous, and raises concerns of WP:SYN. The article necessarily turns out to be in summary style, and it is difficult to see how a collection of summaries on various regions will be useful. Also, many of your {{main}} articles tellingly are in turn problematic (classical rambling {{essay-like}} "ethnic" writeups like Origin of the Nilotic peoples). dab (𒁳) 17:06, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Proposal to move Haplogroup E1b1b (Y-DNA) to Haplogroup E-M215 (Y-DNA)

The new tree-form names in Haplogroup E are particularly unfamiliar, unwieldy, hard to remember accurately, and likely to become subject to ongoing change.

I therefore propose that we switch the article title for what was Haplogroup E3b to the YCC's SNP-form nomenclature, ie E-M215; and use the SNP-form name as the primary name for discussing sub-haplogroups of it, ie E-M35 rather than E1b1b1, and E-M78 rather than E1b1b1a. (Although always with an explanatory mention of each subgroup's current tree-form name, and where appropriate past tree-form names, when first introduced).

I'm aware this marks a new departure from our current article-naming convention, but I think (at least in Haplogroup E; and possibly also for other groups where the top-level haplogroup is deeply branched, and our article is about a subgroup quite far down that structure) that this is the right way to go.

Discussion at Talk:Haplogroup_E1b1b_(Y-DNA)#Requested move. Jheald (talk) 11:54, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Molecular anthropology Page

I have added a history section to the page, since I have written a history article on another forum. It was on the list of articles in the project but the level of interest was low. The article has a poor lead, which I did not change, and it needs new sections added for specific subprojects such as mtDNA and Y-chromosome.PB666 ^yap

Controversy about terminology on E1b1b article: opinions please

Could I ask anyone interested in phylogeny who might be able to give some neutral opinions to have a look at the current problems on the E1b1b article? The problem started last week when I starting editing, mainly because of the new article by Henn et. al.(2008) Y-chromosomal evidence of a pastoralist migration through Tanzania to southern Africa. See comment on Dienekes blog and public release. A third person, or even better "third persons" would probably help a lot by just commenting on some of the debating points, for example:

I referred to the newly discovered sub-clade of E1b1b in the cited article as "E-M293" using the standard nomenclature for naming by mutation. The reverting editor says this is incorrect because the cited article itself called it E3b1f-M293, which he has inserted. He claims that I am therefore inserting un-verifiable and un-sourced material into the article, or at best I am making an original synthesis by putting something in which requires looking at more than one source. This even though I've pointed out to him that...

(a) the wikipedia article as it stands already uses the more up-to-date E1b1b1 to "translate" E3b1 (which BTW the cited article does also call E-M35 in one place) and that mixing E3b1... into a list of clades starting E1b1b1... is actually just wrong

(b) the f name at the end, the proposed sub-clade name, was recently already taken up by another SNP, P72, in Karafet.

The reverting editor also claims that the E-M293 style of nomenclature itself is rare and auxiliary, and should either be removed from the article (his preference) or only mentioned in an auxiliary way, as for example old names like E3b are mentioned.

Anyway, if others think I am wrong, then fine, but the current editing situation is unhealthy because it is largely one person editing and another reverting. Perspective is needed one way or another. --Andrew Lancaster (talk) 13:04, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Y haplogroup nomenclature discussion

This is partially combining the discussions here and here and generalizing it for all Y-DNA haplogroups.

Since the adoption of the Y Chromosome Consortium nomenclature in 2002, there have been two accepted methods to refer to a particular Y-DNA haplogroup. Here's the relevant text from the article:

We propose here two complementary nomenclatures. The first is hierarchical and uses selected aspects of set theory to enable clades at all levels to be named unambiguously. The capital letters (A-R) used to identify the major clades constitute the front symbols of all subsequent subclades...Subclades nested within each major haplogroup defined by a capital letter are named using an alternating alphanumeric system...Nested clades within each of these haplogroups are named in a similar way, except that lower-case letters are used instead of numerals. Again, paragroups are labeled with an * symbol, and the remaining haplogroups are labeled with an "a," "b," "c," etc. This naming system continues to alternate between numerals and lower-case letters until the most terminal branches are labeled (tip haplogroups). Therefore, the name of each haplogroup contains the information needed to find its location on the tree. Alternatively, haplogroups can be named by the "mutations" that define lineages rather than by the "lineages" themselves. Thus, we propose a second nomenclature that retains the major haplogroup information (i.e., 19 capital letters) followed by the name of the terminal mutation that defines a given haplogroup. We distinguish haplogroup names identified "by mutation" from those identified "by lineage" by including a dash between the capital letter and the mutation name. For example, haplogroup H1a would be called H-M36...Note that the mutation-based nomenclature has the important property of being more robust to changes in topology.

Currently, Wikipedia Y-DNA articles use the first method for article titles and the a mix of both in the text. Hopefully we can generate a consensus as to which method we will use from here on out. In closing, I would like to remind everyone that the hierarchical haplogroup nomenclature, like the field itself, has been changing very rapidly; to illustrate this, take a look at Y haplogroup trees from 2002, 2005, 2006, 2007, early 2008, and mid 2008. – Swid ^{(talk · edits)} 14:20, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

This subject certainly needs discussion and review every few months. FWIW the E1b1b article is perhaps a good place to see a debate in action about it. There is not only the current awkward discussion, but also an earlier one after Karafet etc was absorbed by the community: same people involved. [2]

Furthermore, during this current stand off, I put quite a case together, only to have it archived a few hours later! [3]

--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 14:27, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

[Nenaderthal]]

Is this Wikiproject good endpoint to anchor a talk about Neanderthal article recent fate ? In not please advise me, what to do. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Vdr826 (talk • contribs) 07:33, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

template "Y DNA"

The above mentioned template needs updating: IJ and K are now sub-clades of a new clade IJK. I do not have the necessary skills to change this template, sorry!:)--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 08:31, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Who are the "Giljak," "Shiba," and "Golde"?

I found the "Giljak" group in here: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/24/LA2-NSRW-1-0149.jpg Who are they? Giljak is empty. Where should this redirect to? As for "Shiba" and "Golde" - does Shiba refer to a Japanese clan or is this another ethnic group? What about the Golde? WhisperToMe (talk) 09:10, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Are the "famous members" sections trivia?

Project members should perhaps consider a discussion about the famous members section [4].--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 15:06, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

This subject has been discussed at length at Talk:Haplogroup E1b1b (Y-DNA). Wider input is needed, and a standard needs to be agreed upon so that the format is consistent for all haplogroup articles. Could we please continue the discussion here. The project guidelines currently recommend that such a section should be included but the format is not specified. One editor has however expressed concerns that such sections are non-encylopaedic and should not be included at all. In the Haplogroup G (Y-DNA) article the haplotype of the famous member has been included. This format has also been followed on List of haplogroups of historical and famous figures. Referencing seems to be a particular problem on the haplogroup E1b1b article and on the list as in many cases no published references exist to support the claims, and external links are provided to Y-search results and surname projects. What do project members think? Dahliarose (talk) 17:11, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

Here is a list of my concerns.

• It may be of some notability that a famous person belongs to a specific Y chromosome haplogroup, that is a matter for that person's biographical article. I don't think it is notable for the haplogroup article that someone belongs to the haplogroup. The biography of any famous person belonging to the haplogroup is not, in my opinion, a notable or interesting thing about the haplogroup. After all, all haplogroups will contain famous people, and many famous people don't know their haplogroup, and those people would be famous whatever their Y haplogroup.
• The argument has been made that this is about genealogy and especially Y chromosome and family-name projects. I don't see the connection. Genealogy is not the study of famous people, it is the study of families. If the article wants to discuss how a specific haplogroup is used in genealogical research, then I think that would be relevant. The drawback is that I don't think knowing one's membership of a haplogroup is particularly useful when it comes to genealogical research, most haplogroups are far too old, and have far too much geographical spread to be useful in determining family relatedness. For example in this case the haplogroup E1b1b is believed to have arisen approximately 26,000ybp, but family names only started to become popular in Europe in about the fourteenth century. That means that for most of the time the haplogroup has been in existence it has had no relationship to any surname. It also means that the same surname can be shared over different haplogroups, and that the same haplogroup can be spread over many surnames. So knowing one's haplogroup does not necessarily mean one shares a recent family history with someone else who has the same surname and belongs to the same haplogroup. To infer recent familial relatedness we don't use haplogroups, we use Y-STR haplotypes and calculate the genetic distance between the haplotype of the individuals in question.[5]
• There is a very big concern with verifiability. Most of the claims about famous people belonging to a specific haplogroup appear to be posted onto family-name projects without any verifiable way of assertaining their validity. Often it seems to be speculation. There is absolutely no way we can assume these sources are reliable. Personally I think we should treat them as blogs, and we don't cite blogs. The people who write in these projects are not experts, and they have not published their research in peer reviewed journals or through academic or reliable publishing houses. These are the normal requirements in science for a source to be considered reliable. There's a good reason for this, peer reviewed journals, publishing houses and other reliable sources usually do very thorough fact checking before they publish, and they still sometimes get things wrong. When did Wikipedia start to accept the online opinions of the general public as reliable. I think our verifiability policy is important, and I don't think we can pick and choose when to ignore it. Claims that historical figures were members of this haplogroup need to be made in reliable sources. Indeed just because a group of people believe themselves to be the descendants of an individual, and they all belong to the same haplogroup, it does not follow that the individual in question also belonged to that haplogroup. Who's to say that they are correct? Possibly it is a family myth that the family name is derived from a famous person. There's no way of knowint. Possibly that man wasn't the biological father of his wife's children, that is always a possibility. These are concerns that are real. If someone publishes a reliable source that makes these claims, then we can of course cite it. But if we are relying on online speculation then I think we need to be far more careful.

In conclusion my problems are basically twofold: What's the relevance of biographies of famous people to the article? and, can we consider family-name projects reliable sources. Alun (talk) 07:03, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

I agree that there are valid verifiabilty concerns. I did make the famous people section on E1b1b which is the one unders discussion, but I had actually been hoping that it would prompt people involved in some of the genealogical research to help me get better sourcing, even if it involved publishing something somewhere, or at least making the basis of claims more clear on a website. I made it after all other parts of the article looked good and I noticed that this was a standard suggested section for any Y haplogroup article, as per this Wikiproject, and at about the same time people were telling me about many interesting examples. I do not agree with Alun's second point, which is apparently intended to describe my position, but I also do not think it is all that relevant. The dilemma is that there is work being done out there which is in a form that is hard to cite well.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 09:07, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Concerning that second point I'll comment because others might be interested:

• The argument has been made that this is about genealogy and especially Y chromosome and family-name projects. It is is not clear what "this" is in the above comment. The point is/was that Y haplogroup articles are involved in "genetic genealogy" and "genetic genealogy" is increasingly important in population genetics, including in terms of output of published articles. I mentioned that disqualifying a person's work because they try to link it to genealogy using the argument that Wikipedia is not about genealogy is unfair. I think this is a dead issue. For several years there has been no published article about I haplotypes which is as up-to-date as Ken Nordtvedt's website.
• The comment that surname research on the internet is like a blog is problematic. Alun also admits he cites ISOGG's website. What is the difference in essence between ISOGG and a large project?
• Genetic genealogists are not always silly. As a surname project admin I am personally always careful to make sure distant relatives have been tested before making any suggestions. Then I word in terms of the common ancestor being the person whose DNA profile had been reconstructed. Of course many accepted published sources do no such thing when it suggested it had discovered the DNA profile of Niall of the Nine Hostages. So this can not be a reason for banning information from genealogists.
• To me it is obvious that famous people claims are a major part of what both geneticists and genealogists claim in published sources. Call it genealogy if you want, but it can not be the reason for keeping famous people sections out of Wikipedia.

In summary, verifiability is the problem, not genealogists. We should stick to the main issues.

1. Is the E1b1b famous section not good enough? (I don't really have a very strong position on it. I tend to think it is, but if not....)

2. If there is good work out there which is hard to cite, what are the possible solutions?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 09:07, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Another point I should possibly address. I am not sure if I have Alun right on this, but he seems to imply that there is a difference in kind between male lines defined by very old UEPs like M-35, and STR signatures and more recent branching. I think this is not correct. The E1b1b article discusses sub-clades also, with the defined ones getting more and more recent with no limit likely in this trend, and any look at the source articles will show that STR branches, showing much more recent "genealogy" is very relevant to the subject. The science relevant here involves looking at more than just UEPs. Having discovered M35 in a few people would have taught us nothing. And there is no black-white difference between old and recent relevant here.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 09:18, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

I think the famous members are quite useful. I think they help add an immediate human interest to the page, which is good. And I think it's the kind of information that readers looking up a particular page find interesting and valuable. Therefore my inclination would be to keep this information, if it seems credible. Jheald (talk) 09:40, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

So could you therefore explain how we get good verifiability then? This is not an RfC, we don't include the opinions of unreliable sources in Wikipedia, as far as I know. When information is not reliable, then it's not reliable. So the question is really how we determine the reliability of the information. It would also help if you gave a reason why you think biographical information about obscure individuals is pertinent to the article, rather than why you think it's of "human interest", after all no one is saying that we should not include these articles in Wikipedia, and no one is s aying that we should not include even links to the articles. I'm just saying that the actual biographical information is irrelevant to the article. Alun (talk) 21:28, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Alun, a side remark for sure, but it seems a little overblown to equate "famous" with "obscure". It is clear that you are not personally interested in these sections, but to try to keep presenting this as an argument about relevance seems to be a waste of time, because it is POV. This has to be a discussion about verifiability as far as I can see? And I think no one is disagreeing that there is a bit of a problem concerning how to treat the online sources which are so favoured by genetic genealogists. (However saying they are simply blogs again just distracts from the more realistic concerns you have, because it is clearly a debateable generalization.)--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 19:06, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

I feel that a short list of people who are proven to belong to a particular haplogroup is useful in a haplogroup article. The story of human migration has been deduced by the spread of present-day populations, so such a list will provide a point of interest and comparison. In my view the list should follow the same format as that used for lists of people from towns, notable school alumni, etc. In other words the list should contain nothing more than a name, a brief description and a reference (eg, Joe Bloggs, poet and author, reference). If a suitable reference cannot be found to prove that the person belongs to a specific haplogroup then the name should not be in the list. Derived haplogroups are possibly more problematic, but as long as the claim has been made in a reliable source then I see no reason why such a person cannot be included. Some such claims (eg, Genghis Khan, where the famous person is a possible explanation for an observed pattern of closely matching haplotypes) might be best included as a short paragraph within the body of the article. Surname projects websites, pedigrees submitted to SMGF and Y-search entries are primary sources and should not be used as references. No one doubts the hard work put in by surname project admins, but such projects constitute original research. The conclusions drawn from these projects need to be subjected to the peer review process to be validated. Not all project admins will necessarily draw the right conclusions from their DNA results and pedigrees and it is not for us to make judgements about the quality or otherwise of their work. Surname project admins must therefore publish their results in a reliable source. They could for example submit articles to JOGG or to a local family history society publication. In addition, external links to surname project websites and Y-search entries should not be used in the body of the text as I believe this is in violation of WP:EL. Dahliarose (talk) 23:00, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I'd add that people included in such lists should at least be famous enough to have their own Wikipedia entry?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 08:49, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

But I'd also like to question the above approach at least a bit, because it is still mainly based on quite debatable generalizations that could be interpreted as heading towards some fairly controversial conclusions...

• Firstly, can you please make it clear what this means in practice? I take it means removing all the pictures etc? But how is making an article less colorful somehow more correct? If the problem is verifiability, then this will not be solved this way.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 08:49, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
• Stating that an off-wikipedia resource can not be used because it is original research is twisting the rules. Original research is not allowed to be published for the first time on Wikipedia, and obvious get-arounds like self-published webpages are also against the rules. However when it comes to other resources, there should not be arbitrary rules brought in to forbid their use?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 08:49, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
• I think whatever the approach is to genealogical sources on Wikipedia, the approach needs to take account of how genealogical information works. In general good pedigree information is a very verifiable piece of information because it refers to information that anybody can check fairly easily. It is not the same as someone who publishes data on a webpage, for example claiming certain lab results, which no one can check. Of course any genealogical source, like any source at all, might contain mistakes, but again, the same could be said for any source at all. The point is whether it can be easily cross checked, surely?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 08:49, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
• SMGF employs people to check pedigrees. They might not always get it right, but the same thing can be said about other references used in Wikipedia. I don't see how they are any different from any other research organization that might be used for Wikipedia.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 08:49, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
• The E1b1b article's references include two published works and these are clearly also part of what is being questioned. Once again, this looks a bit like arbitrary rules are being brought in against genealogical resources which are not consistent with Wikipedia norms.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 08:49, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
• Surname projects are not only doing "hard work". Let's confront this subject. They are also organizations which people are to a certain extent interested in, in their own right. If the Clan Donald's DNA project says that they have Somerled's DNA signature, wouldn't it be quite questionable to say that this is just a bit of self published original research? Does the public really want to be protected from such a claim? If necessary, the Wikipedia article should use the reporter's style: "The Clan Donald DNA project has claimed...". None of the problems we have with verifiability come from "self-published" original research as it is defined in Wiki-jargon. It is in fact the opposite: they are not interested enough yet in Wikipedia.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 09:03, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Just finished reading the discussion above, and I have to disagree with the contention that the so-called "famous members" sections of the various haplogroup pages are trivia. Taking the E1b1b article that started this whole argument as an example, mentioning a few real-life examples of well-known people that readers can recognize who actually carry the clade seems to me to be very relevant to the article. The latter seems to be a subject of considerable interest to the reading public, with many articles written on the topic both here on Wikipedia (e.g. 1, 2, 3) and in the popular press (1 2, 3), as well as some genetic studies published in peer-reviewed journals (1, 2). If there's a concern about the relevance of mentioning that so and so was the inventor of such and such, that information was only included in the text to make it easier for readers to identify the famous E1b1b member in question. Sort of like the "President" descriptor in this study on Thomas Jefferson and the former haplogroup K2. The same goes for the photographs. It's one thing to state that John C. Calhoun was an E1b1b carrier; it's quite another to assert as much, identify him as a Vice President of the United States, and show a photograph of him for good measure. I think most persons would agree that the latter process is a lot more informative than a simple listing of names or worse, no mention of famous clade members at all. Causteau (talk) 10:24, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

We seem to be approaching a consensus view that famous people should be listed in haplogroup articles. It is now a question of deciding the format. We can only work within the existing framework of Wikipedia guidelines. These have been agreed over a number of years by the community and are unlikely to be changed. If anything the criteria, especially for sources, are more rigorous than they were in the past. If the projects articles are to become good articles and featured articles then these guidelines will have to be followed. The points Andrew raises are covered in Wikipedia:Reliable Sources in which it is stated that "Articles should rely on reliable, third-party, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. This means that we only publish the opinions of reliable authors, and not the opinions of Wikipedians who have read and interpreted primary source material for themselves." There is no bias against genealogical sources on Wikipedia. They just have to meet the same requirements as those used for other subjects. In other words, the data simply has to be published by a third-party source and not be self-published (eg, in a blog or an Ancestry pedigree or on the researcher's own website). Clan McDonald's claim to have the Somerled signature is self-published research so we shouldn't be quoting from it. If they publish it in a reliable source then we can quote from it. The Jefferson paper quoted above is a good example of a reliable source. SMGF is debatable as a source, but I would guess if they had the haplotype of a famous person then they would make it known in a press release or published paper which could then be used as a source. I don't see any reason why pictures of famous people with a particular haplogroup cannot be used in a haplogroup article so long as the claim is covered in the article and is supported by a reliable source. It should not however be necessary to provide biographical details within a haplogroup article. These details belong in the article on the person. The famous people do not necessarily have to have a pre-existing Wikipedia article, but they should be notable enough to warrant a Wikipedia article. There is a systemic bias on Wikipedia and many notable people in countries such as India and China for instance do not yet have Wikipedia articles. Dahliarose (talk) 13:29, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

I do not see how the Clan Donald and SMGF come under the definition of self-published sources, but even if they do see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Verifiability#Using_self-published_and_questionable_sources_as_sources_on_themselves --Andrew Lancaster (talk) 19:00, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

The Clan Donald website on FTDNA is a primary source. The project results and the admin's interpretation of those results are original research. This research has to be validated in a third-party publication, and preferably in a peer-reviewed publication. If this process is not followed anyone with any theory, however outrageous, could simply publish it on their own website, then write a Wikipedia article claiming their theory as fact and quoting their own website as a reference. The pedigrees published on SMGF are also primary source material, like pedigrees published on Ancestry and the IGI, and censuses. In addition, the names of living people are not revealed in SMGF pedigrees so I cannot see how they can be used to prove that a famous person has a particular haplotype. You might be able to deduce the name of the person from the pedigree but that would require original research. This is the problem with the William Harvey section in the Haplogroup E1b1b (Y-DNA) article. The section is original research because the claim is not made in a reliable source. If the Harvey surname project admin could perhaps write up the research, describing how the haplotype has been proved, and publish it in say the Kent Family History Society Journal [6], then it will have been subjected to the requisite third-party process. The journal is what is known as a secondary source. The self-published sources section you quoted only applies to non-controversial facts. You need to read Wikipedia:No original research. Note in particular the following statement: "Wikipedia articles should rely mainly on published reliable secondary sources and, to a lesser extent, on tertiary sources. All interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source, rather than original analysis of the primary-source material by Wikipedia editors." Dahliarose (talk) 23:39, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Are contour maps WP:OR or WP:SYN?

Contour maps showing haplogroup frequencies and variances are increasingly common and popular, although perhaps a little problematic. So HGH Wikiproject watchers should perhaps look at the interesting discussion going on at [Alun's talkpage http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Wobble#Maps]. I understand his claim to be that only reformatted exact copies of contour maps from published articles should be allowable on Wikipedia.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 09:39, 26 December 2008 (UTC)