Ellington

A new (partially in beta) site, http://www.myheritage.com, offers the use of face recognition software to help in genealogical research. If you think that's interesting, they also offer a free face recognition scan so you can see which celebrity you resemble. Wild, huh?

Well, I tried it (you have to register and upload a picture to get the results), and I could not believe (sort of) what the results were.

Okay, here are the resemblance percentages:

Son Ye-jin (actress from South Korea): 60%
Mira Sorvino (US actress): 60%
Venus Williams (tennis star): 57%
Karl Malone (retired basketball player): 50%
Kim Hee-sun (actress from South Korea): 49%
Benita Ferrero-Waldner (Austrian diplomat): 48%
Sade Adu (Nigerian/English entertainer): 48%
Sammi Cheng (Hong Kong actress from China): 46%

Of course, photos of each celebrity were included with the percentages. So, according to the software results, I resemble three black celebrities, three Asian celebrities and two Caucasian celebrities. Therefore, I broke even with the black and Asian celebrities. No wonder kids used to call me "Black Chinese" when I was little!

Anyway, I like these sort of projects because it reminds me that all of us are more alike than different. A similar project called The Human Race Machine shows what you would look like if you were another race. The person who demonstrated the machine on Oprah said that the DNA of all humans is 99.97% alike. That small fraction of a difference determines ethnicity.

Deep.

Previous Comments

ID

105797

Comment

Oh yeah...More about The Human Race Machine at http://www.wolfmanproductions.com/racemachine.html or http://www.nancyburson.com/human_fr.html which includes an awesome quote: "There is only one race, the human one. The concept of race is not genetic, but social. There is no gene for race. The Human Race Machine allows us to move beyond differences and arrive at sameness. We are all one."

Author

LatashaWillis

Date

2006-04-21T23:01:35-06:00

ID

105798

Comment

Oh, this is clever! When I try the photo from this site, I get: Goran Ivanisevic 60% Frederick Chopin 58% Fritz Lieber 52% Jessica Alba 51% (okay, now it's getting ridiculous) Viktor Yanukovych 50% (does he know he looks like Jessica Alba?) Shinzo Abe 49% Julio Cortazar 46% Pierre Laval 46% Lech Walesa 45% Herbert Marcuse 45% Chopin is the only one of the bunch who really looks like me; I think the reason I match Ivanisevic is because the pose is similar (hand is blocking lower left chin). So I tried one of my old full-on photos, and got: Chow Yun-Fat 56% Tom Cruize 53% (probably only because he has facial hair in this photo) Lise Meitner 50% Johnny Depp 48% Friedrich Engels 47% (they're just matching me with random bearded guys) Ray Liotta 46% Rajiv Gandhi 45% And Rajiv is the only one of the bunch who really looks like me--that is a pretty striking resemblance, actually... Oh, heck, I've got a photo of Antonin Scalia here and I can't resist... David Oddsson 68% Robert Redford 59% Ben Kingsley 59% Willem Dafoe 58% Penelope Cruz 57% Okay, so I look like Jessica Alba, and Scalia looks like Penelope Cruz. Well, I've still got a photo of Sojourner Truth here; let's see... Wole Soyinka 50% Marc Chagall 49% Anthony Hopkins 45% Maria Sharapova 45% Hopkins: "So you see, Jay, Maria is going to play a younger Sojourner Truth, and then I'm going to play her as she was later in life..." Cheers, TH

Author

Tom Head

Date

2006-04-22T01:09:07-06:00

ID

105799

Comment

And agreed on race and genetic characteristics. Scientists have found no single gene that determines any specific racial trait--and, in fact, biology and sociology are in agreement that race is a social construct. The only relationship between race and genetics is through distant family connections, and even that can be pretty sketchy. Without spoiling the plot of the documentary, some of the least "white" looking African-American volunteers turned out to have European-American genes. If you figure that homo sapiens sapiens is about 50,000 years old, and that we all have common ancestry (and it would be really improbable that we don't), then you have to ask what kind of genetic differences could really come about in 50,000 years. And the answer is: Really transitory, superficial ones. Cheers, TH

Author

Tom Head

Date

2006-04-22T01:21:14-06:00

ID

105800

Comment

Tom, I'm so glad you found this! What a blast! Here's my list, a mix of complimentary, funny and "who?": Kiefer Sutherland 72% Shahrukh Khan 72% Ben Affleck 72% Jean Cocteau 71% Martin Sheen 68% Vladimir Nabokov 67% Cristiano Ronaldo 66% Matt Groening 66% Takeshi Kitano 66% Pavel Nedved 64% With a different picture, I got this list: Tony Blair (ick) 74% Heath Ledger (definitely NOT ick) 74% John Travolta 73% Kiefer Sutherland 73% Zbigniew Preisner 73% Alec Baldwin 72% Shahrukh Khan 72% Alan Shearer 71% Robert Redford 71% Bruno Walter 70% Now I gotta go look up some of these people.... Best, Tim

Author

Tim Kynerd

Date

2006-04-22T08:30:52-06:00

ID

105801

Comment

OK, my attention span sucks, obviously. Kudos to L.W. for finding this. (I *was* sort of wondering why Tom would resemble a South Korean actress, but hell, what do I know? :-P) Best, Tim

Author

Tim Kynerd

Date

2006-04-22T08:57:06-06:00

ID

105802

Comment

OK, my attention span sucks, obviously. Kudos to L.W. for finding this. (I *was* sort of wondering why Tom would resemble a South Korean actress, but hell, what do I know? :-P) That's okay, Tim. There's something about Tom's replies that is hypnotic. By the time you finish reading his posts, you think the whole thing was his idea to begin with! I almost forgot that I started this thread after reading that detailed reply! Good job, Tom! Also, thanks for the PBS link. I saw their documentary years ago and was looking for the associated link for some time now. If you figure that homo sapiens sapiens is about 50,000 years old, and that we all have common ancestry (and it would be really improbable that we don't), then you have to ask what kind of genetic differences could really come about in 50,000 years. And the answer is: Really transitory, superficial ones. You know, whether one believes in evoluton or the Creation, either way, it doesn't add up to me that all humans would not have a common ancestry. There are parrots, chickens and penguins, but they are all birds. There are German Shepherds, Chihuahuas and poodles, but there all dogs. HUMANS are the ones who put classifications on these species to determine their worth, not nature. That's why you can get a mutt at an animal shelter for $50, but you may have to take out a small loan to get an Afghan hound. The dogs could care less. That's why I was able to get my mom a Shih-Tzu/Dachshund mix for free. The Shih-Tzu didn't turn up her nose at the Dachshund and say he wasn't good enough to mate with. HUMANS are the ones who make it a big deal, which is also why interracial dating had been such a wedge issue for decades. It's a shame how society predetermines what class you belong to based on if you have skin the color of sand or cocoa, hair the texture of wool or flax, eyes the shape of sand dollars or almonds, etc. We are all, as Nancy Burson puts it, HUE-mans. We are all part of one race, the human race.

Author

LatashaWillis

Date

2006-04-22T11:57:20-06:00

ID

105803

Comment

This is hilarious!! Okay, this is what I got: Natalie Wood 70% Aishwariya Rai 68% Naomi Campbell 67% Romy Sneider 66% Ashley Judd 66% Amrita Rao 64% Alyssa Milano 64% Kate Hudson 61% Jessica Lange 61% And, at last glance, I look like NONE of those women. Although, Natalie Wood was totally hot. Although, for some reason I love the fact that I look like several well known Middle Eastern women. I have a thing for Middle Eastern women.

Author

Lori G

Date

2006-04-22T13:57:53-06:00

ID

105804

Comment

Roger Ebert once famously said that Aishwariya Rai was the most beautiful woman on Earth. Maybe his ideal of feminine beauty is really Ali Greggs! My craniofacial eccentricities give me a vaguely Asian Indian browline, and I've had it pointed out to me on more than one occasion that while I'm a pretty bland looking white guy, if my skin were a few shades darker I'd make a really good-looking Indian. Cheers, TH

Author

Tom Head

Date

2006-04-22T14:18:41-06:00

ID

105805

Comment

BTW, Latasha -- There's something about Tom's replies that is hypnotic. By the time you finish reading his posts, you think the whole thing was his idea to begin with! I almost forgot that I started this thread after reading that detailed reply! Good job, Tom! That red tint you might see on your monitor is me blushing my fool head off. Thanks. :o) Cheers, TH

Author

Tom Head

Date

2006-04-22T14:20:25-06:00

ID

105806

Comment

That red tint you might see on your monitor is me blushing my fool head off. Thanks. You're welcome... My craniofacial eccentricities give me a vaguely Asian Indian browline, and I've had it pointed out to me on more than one occasion that while I'm a pretty bland looking white guy, if my skin were a few shades darker I'd make a really good-looking Indian. ...and you did it again!!!! LOL

Author

LatashaWillis

Date

2006-04-22T22:28:27-06:00

ID

105807

Comment

Ali, I think it's a complement to be compared to Natalie Wood. Plus, Naomi Campbell came up on my list when I used another picture. Maybe we're cousins! :-P

Author

LatashaWillis

Date

2006-04-22T22:31:54-06:00