Ego's Journal

[suomalainen]

I am trying to understand what sounds like a community tolerance/preference to high conflict and all the “excitement” that can create. Is this a communication, power, and/or value difference (or something else)?

In my (limited) experience, this is cultural. In certain places it seems, taking advantage of people is sport, or it is a sign of being "better" or "smarter". I believe I've heard this in relation to China although I've never been / done business there. I've also seen something similar in business dealings in Mexico (but not Costa Rica or Panama) and have anecdotally had others tell me they've had similar experiences. Italy is on my personal "never do business there in a million years" since not only were my clients fucked by the opposing Italian parties, they were fucked by our local Italian counsel. Given my experiences are n=1 or 2 in these areas, always curious to read / hear about folks with broader experiences and/or local insight into these types of cultural "personalities" so to speak.

[Ego]

How does the evaluation process work as a couple versus as an individual?

There isn't really much of a process beyond just living our lives and getting a feel for a place. We are pretty in sync and generally like the same things.

I am trying to understand what sounds like a community tolerance/preference to high conflict and all the “excitement” that can create. Is this a communication, power, and/or value difference (or something else)?

I am not sure but I believe a win-lose mentality is at play. Combined with hairpin triggers. And a desire to argue. The surprise for us was that we did not experience this while in Northern Italy last year. And I want to emphasize, we met a lot of very nice people as well. Usually, the nice experiences counterbalance the not-so-nice experiences.

I've also developed an interest in genetic/ancestry research recently.

Cool! I used familysearch.org (the free LDS church genealogical website) to research my family. They are building a world family tree and have volunteers who help find connections. Every so often they will send me a message saying they found a new ancestor. BYU has a sister project called Virtual Pedigree (https://virtual-pedigree.fhtl.org/login/) that links your family tree to other previously researched trees and traced many of the ancestors on my mother's side back more than 1000 years.

[Henry]

I used familysearch.org (the free LDS church genealogical website) to research my family. They are building a world family tree and have volunteers who help find connections.

I would think a LDS member wouldn't need to look beyond their family photo album.

[chenda]

I would think a LDS member wouldn't need to look beyond their family photo album.

Mormon DNA is a thing, at least amongst the Utah Mormons. Their historic isolation and practice of endogamy (enthusiastically) has resulted in identifiable genetic traits. Which is why they tend to look rather mormony. Kind of Nordic with smiles.

[Henry]

Mormon is one thing. LDS is another. When the parameters of endogamy are your own living room, you're moving from mormony to jeffssy.

[chenda]

That was the FLDS, who have the world's highest known prevalence of fumarase deficiency, an enzyme irregularity that causes severe mental retardation brought on by cousin marriage. They are not connected to the mainstream LDS church, who fortunately have much wider parameters for mormony endogamy.

[Henry]

I stand corrected. I forgot the F. But all these cloistered religious groups that I encounter, like the various permutations of the Amish I run into handing tracks out at flea markets, give me the full willies. I just don't like encountering large groups of people where everyone looks like siblings.

[chenda]

Indeed, a healthy gene pool is a diverse gene pool.

[Frita]

In my (limited) experience, this is cultural. In certain places it seems, taking advantage of people is sport, or it is a sign of being "better" or "smarter".

In my also limited experience, I have encountered this abroad and in pockets of the US. Since a feature of the game is dishonest manipulation, it is challenging to understand the dynamic without actually experiencing it. “Sucks to be you” cultures suck.

There isn't really much of a process beyond just living our lives and getting a feel for a place. We are pretty in sync and generally like the same things.

I am not sure but I believe a win-lose mentality is at play. Combined with hairpin triggers.

Congrats on your match! If I ever have another relationship, I plan to do a better job of vetting.

And I wonder what conditions created this culture: geographical isolation, history of instability and/or conquest/occupation, loyalty as resistance, lack of economic opportunity, epigenetic trauma adaption?

I've also developed an interest in genetic/ancestry research recently. The science and available data have improved to the extent that I was able to determine with near certainty that one of my great-grandmother's great-grandfathers was a Chief of the Cayuga within the Iroquois Confederation…Because the genetic analysis is broken down by parent and particular chromosome, and I also have access to my mother's genetic analysis and that of one of my paternal-line cousins and one of my father's maternal-line cousins, I can also determine oddities such as the fact that I happenstance inherited much more genetic material from my paternal grandfather than my paternal grandmother…

Very cool! For the longest time, I have been hesitant to do any testing but am now more open. What test(s) did you use and recommended?

Mormon DNA is a thing, at least amongst the Utah Mormons. Their historic isolation and practice of endogamy (enthusiastically) has resulted in identifiable genetic traits. Which is why they tend to look rather mormony. Kind of Nordic with smiles.

I grew up in an area that was about half LDS. From my experience, there is also a certain personality (and typically lovely skin). Dare I say cookie cutter manipulative kindness? Actually I like many things about Mormans. @Henry will cringe but I feel that way about the Hutterites and Mennonites I knew too. Having grew up very religious myself, which has shaped some of my values and actions, I just balk at lack of being able to be part of the group as a true individual.

[7Wannabe5]

Since the number of ancestors you will have in any generation doubles (at most) it is fairly easy to find evidence of endogamy in any population that is geographically limited or tending towards same migration. For example, it used to be a big deal in the U.S. to be able to prove that one of your ancestors fought in the Revolutionary War or came over on the Mayflower. The European population in the Northern U.S. colonies was only around 50,000 in the 17th century. Anyone alive today projecting back to 17th century without endogamy would have approximately 8200 (2^13) direct ancestors in the generation born approximately mid 17th century, those ancestors easily producing approximately 100 million currently living descendants= approximately 1% current population humans planet. So, absent isolation and endogamy, humans become an extremely melted, melting pot of genetic material very rapidly. Because early immigration to the U.S. produced an isolated bottleneck, if you know that a handful of your ancestors were in the U.S. at the time of the Salem Witch Trials and you meet another random human who also knows they had a handful of ancestors in the U.S. at that time, the odds that you have subsequent ancestors in common is very high. Thus, my family tree crosses with one of my poly-partner's family tree in 18th century Connecticut, the family tree of the father-of-my-children also crosses with my paternal line at similar juncture in Massachusetts, and it is clear that my mother's paternal line crosses with my father's paternal line at an even more recent juncture, because I share at least .75% genetic material (5th great-grandparent in common = generation born around 1800) with around 20,000* other humans who took DNA tests on my mother's paternal side, around 7000 on my paternal line, and around 30 with whom I share ancestors born after 1800 on both my maternal and paternal line. I haven't found the ancestor(s) who exists on both lines yet, but highly likely they were among those who migrated from New York State to Ontario, Illinois, and/or Michigan in the 19th century.

However, what makes the information now available on Ancestry a bit more interesting than simple statistical analysis reveals is that your genetic material isn't completely melted and mixed with each generation. Out of the 3 billion pairs that make up the human genome, only around 5 million vary significantly within the human species, and a scant percentage of these would greatly influence a phenotypical trait, but genes are passed along in each generation in the relatively huge chunks of chromosomes with likelihood of also "clumpy" crossover rate of around 1 to 4 for each homologous pair at meiosis. Therefore, if we very conservatively estimate the number of genotypically varying phenotypically displayed and distinguishabble traits in humans at around 200, the odds that you wouldn't have inherited at least one of these traits from a given 5th great-grandparent is very small, but the odds that you might have inherited a fairly large percentage of your traits from just one of your 5th great-grandparents (even putting aside obvious pattern with sex chromosome inheritance) is also quite high. (The caveat here being that the error rate with current technological methods is the primary limitation to extending such analysis beyond 7 generations of ancestors.)

So, just for giggles (not to be confused with actual science), I very roughly researched the genetic basis for the trait of Frugality and the combination of chromosomes most likely to hold variations most likely to be influential on this trait (once again negating sex chromosomes which are also believed to be influential on this trait, because men display Frugality at more than twice the level of women.) And the remarkably humorous result was that even though only around 5% of my genetic heritage is Scottish and only 5% of my genetic heritage is Swedish, my Scottish and Swedish heritage comprises over 60% (approximately 30% each) of the make-up of the 3 chromosomal pairs most likely to be implicated in the trait of Frugality!!! The bad news here being that if the participants in this forum were isolated on an island the possibility of some members of future generations displaying extremely-extreme frugality would be pretty high, and the approximately 30% overlap of Frugality trait with Selfishness trait might become problematic!!! For example, it is also fairly well known/proven that I am genetically related to one of the few very early female members of the American Libertarian Movement through the same line from which my 5% Scottish genes originated, and I think I even somewhat physically resemble her!!!





*These numbers are much higher than would be expected due largely to fact that U.S. citizens of European ancestry are highly over-represented in the 25-30 million DNA samples submitted to Ancestry thus far.

[chenda]

There is an ex-mormon on you tube called Alyssa Greenfell who produces very engaging videos about her experiences growing up in mormonism (she now sells sex toys as a sideline) Interestingly, the oldest extant mormon temple is in the north of england. Mitt Romney's ancestors came from the area and converted prior to emigrating. One good thing I like about them is that they respond to criticism well. Some years ago there was a west end musical which roundly ridiculed the faith, and they sent missionaries to stand outside the theatres handing out leaflets to see if people were interested in learning more. Which seems a much more constructive way of responding to criticism than picketing cinemas a la life of brian or shooting up charlie hebdo.

I would be very wary about DNA testing. Your DNA will be held for all eternity by a faceless corporation who could do all sorts of nefarious things with it, like deny you health insurance.

[Ego]

I would be very wary about DNA testing. Your DNA will be held for all eternity by a faceless corporation who could do all sorts of nefarious things with it, like deny you health insurance.

Also, it has never been easier to do the research without DNA results. We just started with parents and worked our way backwards. The LDS missionaries have scanned records from all over the world and AI handwriting recognition has made indexing automatic, so most of those records are now searchable. We've never done a DNA ancestry search.

[theanimal]

Cool! I used familysearch.org (the free LDS church genealogical website) to research my family. They are building a world family tree and have volunteers who help find connections. Every so often they will send me a message saying they found a new ancestor.

Thank you for sharing this. What an excellent resource! My siblings and I were surprised to find that we have ancestors who arrived to the US about 250 years earlier than we previously knew. Apparently, I have family that was born in New Jersey in 1634! Parts of our genealogy are extremely extensive, with records going back all the way to 500 BC. This has been great fun in exploring.

Sorry to hear that Italy didn't meet your expectations. Where are you two now?

[Ego]

@theanimal, glad to hear familysearch.org worked for you. While I will never be an LDS member, I am forever grateful to them. New Jersey! Wouldn't have guessed that one. Maybe you and @Henry are related.

We are now in Thailand for the fiftieth time. We spent a lot of time here in the aughts but haven't been here since 2011 or 12. It doesn't get much better than this place!

[7Wannabe5]

We've never done a DNA ancestry search.

The DNA component makes it more like a forensic logic puzzle, therefore towards the sort of extremely slow-motion "game" I prefer. It also has the advantage of revealing the 1 to 2 % of situations where genetic paternity was not as recorded. Determining the identity of my mother's biological father after determining that it couldn't possibly be my grandmother's first husband was actually kind of fun. My mother had very little emotional investment in the revelation, because she was adopted and raised by my grandmother's second husband when she was very young. She was just bummed out to learn that her biological father died wealthy and had no other children, unless they were also illegitimate and not yet DNA linked.

Thanks for the tip on the LDS site/records. It very well may be the case that they have some records not yet available elsewhere or only available for extra fee I am not willing to pay. For example, I am dead-ended on my mother's maternal line at the level of great-great-grandparents in Poland, although DNA results have narrowed the search down to 23% Western Galician (historic) heritage. At this juncture, I have identified 43 of my maximum 128 fifth-great-grandparents (the current line in the sand for DNA based verification), linking me to only around 5% of the humans whose test revealed relationship at that degree, so lots of "game" play still remains.

[chenda]

Some families have been torn apart by DNA testing, when people discovered a parent or sibling were not their biological parents or siblings, due to secret affairs, unreported rapes or undisclosed adoptions.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/stories-46600325

[Western Red Cedar]

@ego - Let me know if you plan to spend any time in the north in December. DW and I have a monthly rental in Chiang Mai lined up and plan to meet up with another forum member and their partner. Maybe a small ERE meetup is in order?

[Henry]

I read a story where a woman did one of these DNA tests and it led to identifying her grandmother as the murderer in a cold case which has to be coolest thing as who wouldn't want their Nana to be a stone cold killer.

[Ego]

@ego - Let me know if you plan to spend any time in the north in December. DW and I have a monthly rental in Chiang Mai lined up and plan to meet up with another forum member and their partner. Maybe a small ERE meetup is in order?

Excellent. Absolutely, that would be great! We expect to be there the first week in December. We are looking at booking a place now. Generally we like to run. The last time we were there we just ran in circles around the wall of the old city. Apparently, the area around the university and reservoir is much nicer for running... but I think it is way out there. Considering you are staying long-term, do you (or anyone else) have any thoughts? Thanks!

[OutOfTheBlue]

I too mostly ran around/inside the old city fortifications. There is a park in the old city (where the flower festival is held) as well, but too small for running.

Otherwise, yes, the university and the reservoir. Both are a bit outside. I think there are cheap ways to go to the university from downtown, such as the red songteaws. Something like 35 baht? Otherwise, having two wheels (a bicycle or a bike), makes these places (and many others, like the Chiang Mai loop) more accessible. Renting a bike on a monthly basis is a bit harder to find on high season, but it can cost 2,500-3,000+ baht (instead of 250+ daily).

Btw, I am back to and living in Thailand (home base). If anyone is passing from Bangkok or is in the country and wants to meet, hit me up.