It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with genealogy. (Discuss) For a book, see Ancestors: 900 Years in the Life of a Chinese Family. An ancestor is a parent or (recursively) the parent of an ancestor (i.e., a grandparent, great-grandparent, great-great-grandparent, great-great-great-grandparent, great-great-great-great-grandparent, and so forth). Two individuals have a genetic relationship if one is the ancestor of the other, or if they share a common ancestor. In evolutionary theory, species who share an evolutionary ancestor are said to be of common descent. However, this concept of ancestry does not apply to some bacteria and other organisms capable of horizontal gene transfer. Assuming that all ancestors are unrelated, an individual has 2n ancestors in the nth generation before him and about 2g+1 total ancestors in the g generations before him. In practise, however, it's clear that the vast majority of ancestors of humans (and indeed any other species) are somehow related. Consider n = 40: the human species is surely more than 40 generations old, yet the number 240 dwarfs the number of humans that have ever lived. Some cultures place great reverence on ancestors, both living and dead; contrastingly, people in more youth-oriented cultural contexts may display a lesser degree of veneration for elders. In other cultural contexts, some people seek providence from their deceased ancestors; this practice is sometimes known as ancestor worship or, more accurately, ancestor veneration. As far as contribution to ones autosomal DNA is concerned ( this does not include Y-chromosomal DNA or mitochondrial DNA) and assuming that none of one's ancestors had children with relatives (even distant relatives), an individual has 1296 ancestors going back 36 generations.Still assuming that none of one's ancestors had children with relatives, one's 37th generation ancestors do not contribute to one's autosomal DNA ( an individual has .000000001 % of the same DNA as a 36th generation ancestor).[citation needed] [edit] See also Ancestry (United States) Genealogy Ancestor worship Cousin Descendant Family Family relationship Most recent common ancestor Kinship and descent Ethnicity Legendary progenitor