Tag: visualization

Narrated Animation

The visualizations shown in today’s screencast were done with Many Eyes, which is another very cool piece of software. But what I realized while making them is that narrated animation is really the secret sauce. Analytical software, whether it’s Excel or GapMinder or Many Eyes or something else, is necessary but not sufficient. The stories that people will understand, and remember, are the ones that have been performed well. Now I’m no Hans Rosling, and you certainly won’t see me swallow a sword at the end of this screencast — as he amazingly does at the end of this video. But I will be trying to emulate his example when I tell stories with data. And I’m struck, once again, by the way in which screencasting can bring software interaction to life.

from data to understanding, perhaps?

DNA Heritage

I submitted my DNA anonymously to IBM for a research project, and from the mutations in my Y-chromosome alone, they identified me as haplotype N LLY22G, which pegs the Uralic language of my family and the locale of northern Scandinavia / Eastern Europe. With only my DNA, they identified my family origin on the map above to within a few km, and traced it back to the veritable “Adam” in Africa, from whom we are all descendants.

I wonder how granular these will get eventually. The beginning of the tree is well-known and comparatively easy. Still, welcome to total history beta 1.
2022-03-04:

8 ka BP, 17 women reproduced for every 1 man. An analysis of modern DNA uncovers a rough dating scene after the advent of agriculture. A member of the research team hypothesizes that only a few men accumulated lots of wealth and power, leaving nothing for others. These men could then pass their wealth on to their sons, perpetuating this pattern of elitist reproductive success. Then the numbers of men reproducing, compared to women, rose again. “Maybe more and more people started being successful.”. In more recent history, as a global average, 5 women reproduced for every 1 man.