I googled the amount of people that lived on earth throughout its entire history, it’s roughly 108 billions. If I take 1 person and multiply by 2 for each generation of ancestors, at the 37th generation it already outnumbers that 108 billions. (it’s 137 billions). If we take 20 years for 1 generation, it’s only 740 years by the 37th generation.
How??
(I suck at math, I recounted it like 20 times, got that 137 billions at 37th, 38th and 39th generation, so forgive me if it’s not actually at 37th, but it’s still no more than 800 years back in history)
In: 1391
It’s because you share a lot of ancestors with a lot of people , like a lot a lot.
Think of it this way , your great great grandmother ( 3 generations back ) has one one sibling , let’s say each generation has 2 kids. That means that your grandmother has a sibling and 2 cousins , then your mother has a sibling and 2 cousins and 4 second cousins and it means you have a sibling , 2 cousins 4 second cousins and 8 third cousins. So there’s 16 people in 3 generations who share the same great grand parents on one side and it doubles every generation essentially.
Now factor in people used to have like 4 kids back in the old days so you would have absolutely enormous amounts of third cousins in just 3 generations since in just three generations back you will have 3 siblings , 16 first cousins , 64 second cousins and 256 third cousins that all share one of the same sets of great grandparents
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