'Inherently imperfect': Why ancestry tests are often misunderstood

Kristen Brown | Gizmodo | February 14, 2018

It’s right there in the fine print of any consumer DNA test, if you bother to read it: DNA testing can come with identity-disrupting surprises, be it an unexpected relative, genetic condition, or, in our case, heritage. But something about [the genetic test results] didn’t feel quite right.

I suspected the error might lay not in my family narrative, but in the DNA test itself. So I decided to conduct an experiment. I mailed my own spit samples to AncestryDNA, as well as to 23andMe and National Geographic. For each test I got back, the story of my genetic heritage was different—in some cases, wildly so.

Four tests, four very different answers about where my DNA comes from—including some results that contradicted family history I felt confident was fact. What gives?..........

“These companies are asking people to pay for something that is at best trivial and at worst astrology,” said Rutherford. “The biggest lesson we can teach people is that DNA is probabilistic and not deterministic.”........To Read More...

My Take - Make sure to follow the link to the original article.  As for me....I really don't care who I may or may not be related to in some other country.  Although I profess to be Serbian because that was my dad’s side of the family, I'm also half Croatian - I've been fighting with myself forever. 

I've met relatives who came here on vacation from Croatia many years ago, and they were absolutely delightful people.  My mother has gone over to Croatia on multi-week vacations twice and loved it, and they loved having her there.  But the fact of the matter is this.  If it was so wonderful there when my great grand parents moved here - they wouldn't have left, and I wouldn't be here, and I have do disire to go there.  Or anywhere else for that matter. 

I have long suspected all this DNA testing is not much more than voodoo science, and now they're claiming they can tell from our DNA what were capable of, and what we're best suited for, what make up our personalities - and a whole list of "readings" you can pay for.  Kind of like Tarot card reading.  They're selling a lot of sizzle, but not much steak in my opinon. 

There has been so much evidence to demostrate these claims from DNA testing companies is at best hyperbole, at worst, fraud, one has to ask: why do so many people fall for this?  Well, why do so many people still read their daily horoscope?   
Nuf Ced!