Mormon billionaire wants your DNA on the internet

[neebob]

Now here's a scary idea:

http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,595045808,00.html

Utah project to link DNA, genealogy

Genetic markers may help Web users find kin
By Carrie A. Moore
Deseret Morning News

In a move they believe will forever alter the way family history research is done, local geneticists are opening a free DNA-based genealogy database to the public this week.

The Sorenson Molecular Genealogy Foundation is expected to announce on Monday that it has established a Web site — www.smgf.org — that allows anyone who has had a simple DNA test to input information that may link them to their ancestors, both known and unknown.

Scott Woodward, chief scientific officer for the foundation established by Utah billionaire James Sorenson, said the database is the beginning of a project his organization will continue to expand in size and scope over time. The Web site is designed to build one-sided pedigree charts — or family trees — for those looking for their paternal ancestors through genetic testing. To use the database, participants must undergo an inexpensive mouth swab test done by a genetic testing company.

Once that procedure is complete, researchers process the saliva sample through a laboratory and come up with coding sequences that define specific genetic markers people carry through their Y-chromosome DNA — their father's bloodline. Those markers can then be entered into the Web site database, which searches for links with others whose genetic information matches their own.

<snip>

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. DNA for genealogical research

has been around for about a year or so. A couple of family organizations I belong to have touted their own version of it. The Mormons are hot on genealogy because they want to go back and baptize ancestors of people into their church, the idea being that they will go to heaven or something like that. Knowing some of my ancestors, they would probably object to this happening.

Intersting that it was testing the paternal lines. Mytacadial DNA follows the female bloodline, and this is the one I've heard the most about.

[izzie]

6. Interesting and the govt will not use it?

I can see it being used for family trees but will Hatch protect us?

[neebob]

11. That's why I find it scary

Not so much because it's a Mormon thing, but because of their involvement in government - and I don't mean just the public faces like Orrin Hatch and Mitt Romney. As if the government can't access and use anything they want that's on the internet to begin with.

[neebob]

9. I'm familiar with the Mormon faith

having been, um, exposed to it as a teenager. While my parents were getting married in the Manti temple, in fact, I did baptisms for the dead along with the children of other couples who were getting married and others who went along on this temple trip. I was surprised they let me do it, because you have to have a temple RECcommend - which means you're certified pure enough (by the ward bishop) to enter the temple - and I had gotten in trouble for making out with my boyfriend on the bus on the way there, and the bishop who had given me my RECcommend had personally observed my impure behavior. He made my boyfriend run around the block and then separated us for the rest of the trip.

And what's doubly amazing, on edit, is that this bishop - who was seriously committed to his job of straightening me out - never told my parents (who were traveling in a car with another couple) that I'd been making out with Dave on the bus.

I only found this article because I went to the Deseret News website thinking I might find the God-bless-Bush letter that's being discussed on another thread.

[PROGRESSIVE1]

2. Sorensen is also a Rethuglklan supporters too!

Swine!!!!!!!!!!

:puke:

:mad:

[sallyseven]

3. I know who I am and I know all my

relatives. The Mormon church scares me. My governor is a Mormon and he is scary. Beats up on the elderly,children and poor people. The unemployed get a back hand from him too. Wants to destroy public education. Tell them th shove their DNA where the light never shines.

[Cleita]

8. The elderly, children and poor people are scapegoating targets

of totalitarianism because they are pretty powerless to fight back.

[AngryWhiteLiberal]

4. All about baptising the dead into the Mormon faith...period.

The often unspoken rationale for the LDS obsession with genealogy is predicated upon a church doctrine allowing for the baptismal of the dead into the Mormon faith. Whether they use these "dead members" to pump up their estimates of members is debatable, but the doctrine is real.

JB

[AngryWhiteLiberal]

5. BTW - figures a rabidly patriarchial religion only cares about male genes.

echhhh.

JB

[Cleita]

7. It could be a good thing if it were anonymous and the

and the data base was for research only, but I wouldn't give my DNA to any Church, nor in this climate of government repression, to anyone else either no matter how well certified they are to carry out this kind of research.

[neebob]

12. Exactly, and I can't help wondering

if Sorenson has a financial stake in that simple, inexpensive DNA test. Bet he does.

[porkrind]

10. The irony ...

here is that a central teaching of Mormon doctrine is that the American Indians of North and South America are the ancestors of Jews that traveled to America thousands of years ago. Mormons call them "Nephites" and "Lamanites." This is all proposed in the Mormon scriptures, called the "Book of Mormon." Anyway, the irony here is that modern DNA analysis of American Indians reveal that they are actually descended from Asiatic people, not Jews.

Mormons are in complete denial of this, as they are on so many scientific topics. You gotta love the cult mindset. Makes sense that so many of them are Republicans.

Learn more about Mormons at http://www.exmormon.org