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Culturally Speaking #19

By Sarah Stodola

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Why we are not supposed to think Supreme Court justices are human, too.

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Karaoke? No, Movieoke.

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A few things about this article: First, wow, even Martin Amis can have a hard time getting published. Second, well actually, I'm sure this is just a very temporary problem for him. And third, there is a glaring typo in the article, which is always a fun thing to find in the New York Times.

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Last week, I wondered whether we might all be distant relatives of each other, since nearly all of the U.S. presidents have been distant cousins. My brother, who is particularly good with numbers, later sent an email to me containing the following:

If you start counting generations back for someone born in 2000,
assuming an average of 20 years per generation (which is probably off
for the 20th century, but probably reasonable overall), sometime in the
early 15th century you have more branches on the family tree than there
were people alive at the time in the entire world. So that's the
absolute earliest you can go without being your own cousin at some
point. That's about 29 generations. And, you're almost certainly
related to yourself much closer than that. I also figured that if you
go back 20 generations, to 1660, and assuming only two kids per couple
(which is historically low), you potentially have more cousins that the
current population of the world. So, it's pretty safe to say that
you're at least that closely related to just about anyone you meet
(particularly someone of the same race/nationality).

So we're actually all just one big happy incestuous family!!!

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How people saw Robert Moses in 1939 - quite a departure from how he is remembered today.

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Trying to explain the difference between American and European cultures.

Click here for last week's Culturally Speaking.

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Sarah Stodola is the Managing Editor of Me Three.  She can be contacted at [email protected].

© 2004 Me Three