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Let's get to the heart of what this is: a crude pseudoscience. While DNA call tell you a few obvious traits, like sex and ancestry with high confidence, almost

Let's get to the heart of what this is: a crude pseudoscience. While DNA call tell you a few obvious traits, like sex and ancestry with high confidence, almost everything else is speculative (i.e. they are LIKELY to have such and such other traits, but in reality they may not have any of those traits at all). This is 21st century phrenology.

epmaybe 9y ago
You know what would be interesting, though probably also flawed? Looking at mRNA. The reason DNA wouldn't work that well is because a lot of DNA we have isn't actually coded into the traits we present. I think this is what happens at a fairly abstract level: DNA -> RNA(whole) -> Splicing out of non coding (introns?) portions of the RNA -> RNA(coding) -> some more pre-processing -> mRNA -> Proteins Those proteins are most likely what help us look the way we do. So going a step back, mRNA could be an interesting target for understanding what genes are actually on and coding how we look. An obvious flaw from the get go: mRNA is extremely difficult to extract from human tissue. Yields are super low in laboratories, and is consistently an issue in molecular biology research. And you'd have to design a primer to amplify the amount you obtain, that matches up with every strand of mRNA necessary to get a good idea of what someone would look like. Not to mention there's probably some step I'm missing in this process that would affect the role of mRNA. Something like microRNAs, maybe?
danblick 9y ago
I think you're being too dismissive. What makes you think that with a large library of genomic data (only recently available) and a large corresponding library of quantified facial measurements you wouldn't be able to build a useful predictive model? I'm sure it's not perfect but I wouldn't be so quick to say it's impossible. (The science is being developed by Craig Venter, who may be a jerk but he's often been a jerk at interesting frontiers in science.) https://www.economist.com/news/science-and-technology/21728613-facial-technology-makes-another-advance-researchers-produce-images-peoples https://www.economist.com/news/science-and-technology/217286... https://www.technologyreview.com/s/608813/does-your-genome-predict-your-face-not-quite-yet/amp/ https://www.technologyreview.com/s/608813/does-your-genome-p... In support of your argument though, I think it would very hard to build a model that was precise enough to distinguish two people who already look alike. (You probably couldn't use these generated facial predictions to pull a single individual out of a database of photos.)

epmaybe 9y ago

You know what would be interesting, though probably also flawed? Looking at mRNA. The reason DNA wouldn't work that well is because a lot of DNA we have isn't actually coded into the traits we present. I think this is what happens at a fairly abstract level: DNA -> RNA(whole) -> Splicing out of non coding (introns?) portions of the RNA -> RNA(coding) -> some more pre-processing -> mRNA -> Proteins Those proteins are most likely what help us look the way we do. So going a step back, mRNA could be an interesting target for understanding what genes are actually on and coding how we look. An obvious flaw from the get go: mRNA is extremely difficult to extract from human tissue. Yields are super low in laboratories, and is consistently an issue in molecular biology research. And you'd have to design a primer to amplify the amount you obtain, that matches up with every strand of mRNA necessary to get a good idea of what someone would look like. Not to mention there's probably some step I'm missing in this process that would affect the role of mRNA. Something like microRNAs, maybe?

danblick 9y ago

I think you're being too dismissive. What makes you think that with a large library of genomic data (only recently available) and a large corresponding library of quantified facial measurements you wouldn't be able to build a useful predictive model? I'm sure it's not perfect but I wouldn't be so quick to say it's impossible. (The science is being developed by Craig Venter, who may be a jerk but he's often been a jerk at interesting frontiers in science.) https://www.economist.com/news/science-and-technology/21728613-facial-technology-makes-another-advance-researchers-produce-images-peoples https://www.economist.com/news/science-and-technology/217286... https://www.technologyreview.com/s/608813/does-your-genome-predict-your-face-not-quite-yet/amp/ https://www.technologyreview.com/s/608813/does-your-genome-p... In support of your argument though, I think it would very hard to build a model that was precise enough to distinguish two people who already look alike. (You probably couldn't use these generated facial predictions to pull a single individual out of a database of photos.)