Talk:Most recent common ancestor

Human MRCA
I have deleted the statement that the human MRCA may be as recent as 3000 years ago as it is not supported by the sources. The first is about a computer model and the second, 'JC Virus Evolution and Its Association with Human Populations', says "this virus should not be used as a marker for human population history". Dudley Miles (talk) 18:02, 19 August 2018 (UTC)
 * @Dudley Miles - this is a theory with high likelihood, not a categorical truth. The word "may" is the key. A lot of prehistoric knowledge is essentially result of models. I would not write off so easily a mathematical model or a model based on a virus so closely associated with humans, specially when more than one model give similar results.
 * My own genealogical research showed me that a closed community of one thousand individuals today, are all related to everyone who lived there 6 generations ago. Assuming 20-25 years per generation this means 100-150 years. The mathematical model expresses this more generally with a formula and deduces the time range for the whole world population. What is wrong with that? An indication of the approximate range for truth is better than complete ignorance. Publishing a range is a call for improvement which is better than censorship. Cobanyastigi (talk) 02:33, 20 August 2018 (UTC)


 * , following our policies and guidelines is not censorship. We rely on sources that meet our criteria for reliability and back the text we are using them for. Neither of these sources seem to do that. Our own opinions, experience or research are irrelevant. By the way, @ by itself does nothing, if you wish to notify someone you need to do something such as - and you have to get it right the first time, you can't fix it. If you get it wrong you need a new and signed post.  Doug Weller  talk 13:16, 20 August 2018 (UTC) Ironic, I couldn't see that your name was spelled with a y because my software was underlining it for spelling.  - my bad for not using preview.  Doug Weller  talk 13:18, 20 August 2018 (UTC)

Isn't the current statement about 200,000 years also just local research of what random contributors thought to be logical? No cites and odd edits from one dim wording into other. 84.50.190.130 (talk) 14:50, 5 August 2020 (UTC). Agree. The current statement “It is almost certainly less than the age of either the Y-MRCA or the mt-MRCA, estimated at around 200,000 years.” would have one thinking the MRCA is on the order of 200,000 YA when both modeling (Chang et al) and genetic results from Europe (Ralph and Coop), the best data we have, indicate MUCH closer timeframes. The article should reflect this.

Also used in evolution of tumour cell lines within one cancer/patient
MRCA is Also used in evolution of tumour cell lines/clones within one cancer/patient  - Rod57 (talk) 13:12, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

Human MRCA "almost certainly lived in East Asia"?
This doesn't seem accurate. And the statement is not even supported by the one (I would argue low-quality) source. Nikki Lee 1999 (talk) 12:07, 18 December 2020 (UTC)

Why was this revision undone>

 * "The MRCA of all humans alive today almost certainly" https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Most_recent_common_ancestor&oldid=959975986

The "alive today" was reverted. The stated reason was that "Article is about scientific view, not religious one", but that doesn't make any sense at all. Nearly all scientific studies that discuss MRCA are considering only people alive today, which is why that qualifier was added. See for example here: https://www.nature.com/articles/nature02842. Note that I am a scientist and published on this topic. Sswamida (talk) 00:55, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
 * I agree and apologise as I am the editor who reverted, I am not sure why. However there are problems with the whole paragraph. It appears to be stating one theory as if it is a universally accepted view and the references are unsatisfactory. One is a newspaper, which is not a reliable source for science, and the other is on an unrelated subject. I suggest you re-write the paragraph and add a reliable source.

Thanks. I'll do that when I get a chance, but first want to suggest a larger alteration. MRCA is really not the right term to be using here, because it usually refers to genetic common ancestors, not genealogical common ancestors. In my work, I used the term MRUGA, to mean "most recent universal genealogical ancestor." This makes it possible to tersely and clearly discuss the difference between e.g. the y-MRCA (Y-Chromosomal Adam) and MRUGA (genealogical universal ancestors. So, with your permission, I was want to see about reworking the article with that terminology, making some of these distinctions clear. What do you think? Sswamida (talk) 03:00, 18 March 2021 (UTC)


 * This would need a discussion involving other editors. I suggest you propose a move using NewName . See Template:Requested move. Dudley Miles (talk) 21:40, 18 March 2021 (UTC)

Existence of MRCA not discussed
No reason is given for having a common ancestor. The argument is simple, but has to be included, eg, why could life not have evolved twice on earth? If there is life elsewhere in the universe, is there a common ancestor? Neutron230 (talk) 17:29, 6 June 2021 (UTC)