Speaker 1: I'm Baritone Day Thurston and this is Spit and I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio podcast with twenty three in me. This is
Speaker 1: the podcast that explores how DNA is changing our lives
Speaker 1: and the world around us. Today, we're delving deep into
Speaker 1: that all important topic identity. Have always been like kind
Speaker 1: of like on the Island of misfit toys, you know,
Speaker 1: and then if I find out that I actually have
Speaker 1: like a toy Home of the weird and we have
Speaker 1: an amazing duel of guests to help chart our courts.
Speaker 1: First off is the celebrated Basis songwriter and author Pete
Speaker 1: Wentz and joining him as independent academic Dr Robert Green.
Speaker 1: In addition to teaching genetics at Harvard Medical School, Dr
Speaker 1: Green is the director of the G two P Research
Speaker 1: Program at Brigham and Women's Hospital and the Broad Institute. Now,
Speaker 1: today's show is gonna be a cliffhanger resources because Pete's
Speaker 1: interested in finding out all about himself and his genetic makeup.
Speaker 1: We're gonna have him spit, that is, take the DNA test,
Speaker 1: and then in part two of the show, we'll check
Speaker 1: back in with Pete right after he gets his results
Speaker 1: to hear what he's learned. So gear up for some revelations,
Speaker 1: some realizations, and some fun. We are going to talk
Speaker 1: about genetics again through the story of discovering things about
Speaker 1: ourselves and about health. And I want to start with you, Pete.
Speaker 1: You have a fascinating background. We've all read Wikipedia and
Speaker 1: understand some about you, but I'd love to know, first
Speaker 1: of all, why are you interested in learning about yourself
Speaker 1: from a genetic perspective? Like where do you well? I mean,
Speaker 1: I think that it's interesting to know where you've come from.
Speaker 1: I think particularly I have I have three kids, so
Speaker 1: I think that that's you know, you want to pass
Speaker 1: that information along in the form of either story or
Speaker 1: medical or whatever. You know. Like, but I think that
Speaker 1: for me being like a bit of like what I
Speaker 1: would call like a kind of you know, it's like
Speaker 1: it's pretty interesting because like, you know, my three kids
Speaker 1: all have really light eyes. It's just an interesting you know,
Speaker 1: Like I think the genetics are a really wild interesting thing.
Speaker 1: Obviously I know some stories, but they're you know, stories,
Speaker 1: so it's like hard is They're not scientific, you know,
Speaker 1: so it's interesting. In the stories that you've been told,
Speaker 1: did they call you a mutt or did you come
Speaker 1: up with that term for yourself, Like no, no, no no,
Speaker 1: I you know, I'm just not a sure bread. I'm
Speaker 1: just not so like. No, no, no, I mean no
Speaker 1: one's I don't think anyone's called me. Maybe I don't know, no,
Speaker 1: but I mean it's just the suburbs that I grew
Speaker 1: up in and stuff. I just didn't I didn't look
Speaker 1: like anybody. I just didn't feel like I looked like
Speaker 1: anybody kind of, you know, I just looked like my
Speaker 1: brother and sister kind of. So that didn't like inform
Speaker 1: a ton of my personality. I don't think. Maybe it did,
Speaker 1: I don't know, but like, I think it would be
Speaker 1: interesting to know since we have more of the technology
Speaker 1: to be able to do it, Like why would you
Speaker 1: not find out? It doesn't need to be like a
Speaker 1: scary thing or super interesting thing, like you don't have
Speaker 1: to be like have royal blood or something like. I mean,
Speaker 1: it would all be nice. I guess, Robert, what do
Speaker 1: you find in terms of people's reasons for even being
Speaker 1: curious in asking this question? Pete is just he's interested.
Speaker 1: He sounds really open minded. There's nothing he's afraid of.
Speaker 1: It sounds like, but what are you seeing in terms
Speaker 1: of the folks you work with, the studies you've done. Yeah,
Speaker 1: a lot of people are interested in their ancestry and
Speaker 1: their background, and a lot of people are interested in
Speaker 1: the health aspects. And the people are interested in health
Speaker 1: aspects are interested because they want to do something with it.
Speaker 1: They want to inform their children, they want to inform themselves.
Speaker 1: They want to be empowered by the notion that they
Speaker 1: can learn something about the probability of getting an illness
Speaker 1: in the future. And when you talk about and think
Speaker 1: about your kids, thin any particular concerns or things that
Speaker 1: excite you about what you might be able to share
Speaker 1: with them, you know, through a process like this. I mean,
Speaker 1: there's just like blind spots where my family has described
Speaker 1: where we've come from. I don't really think I have
Speaker 1: specific like medical concerns. I'm interested in finding out about it,
Speaker 1: but I don't have There's nothing like that is discussed
Speaker 1: in my family or you know, or common issues that
Speaker 1: have come up you know, or whatever. But I'm still
Speaker 1: interested in finding that out. I did my own genetic test,
Speaker 1: and I also had a lot of blind spots in
Speaker 1: my family story. I grew up just with my mother.
Speaker 1: I didn't have access to my father's side or stories
Speaker 1: of that. And I got really excited about the sort
Speaker 1: of trait and wellness sections of the results because it
Speaker 1: said I had high probability of like the musculature of
Speaker 1: a competitive elite athlete. And I'm like, Okay, science says
Speaker 1: I'm an elite athlete. That's great, Like I want to
Speaker 1: run with that. I know you used to play soccer.
Speaker 1: Are you like hoping for maybe there's a genetic support
Speaker 1: for your talent in the sport. I can tell you
Speaker 1: that there is not not need a genetic test to
Speaker 1: see that one to find that one out. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think there's an inherent thing that like where there's
Speaker 1: a probability of something. You're like, well, it says I
Speaker 1: should be Michael Jordan's, but I'm not Michael Jordan's, So like,
Speaker 1: how do I like resolve that discrepancy? You know what
Speaker 1: I mean? Like it's like probably could be weird, I guess. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And Pete, that's a great point about genetic testing in general,
Speaker 1: that people are learning from this that it's not super
Speaker 1: deterministic that just because you have a probability of having
Speaker 1: a talent, or just because you have a probability of
Speaker 1: having disease does not mean you're definitely going to get it.
Speaker 1: That's sort of one of the psychological changes that these
Speaker 1: services are promoting throughout the whole society. Here's what you
Speaker 1: probably could get, you probably won't get it, And so
Speaker 1: I'm like, so should I be worried? You know? On
Speaker 1: the trade side, it's like, well, I don't look like that,
Speaker 1: So am I wrong? Or is the science wrong? Right? Said,
Speaker 1: I'm likely have like straighter hair and not very thick hair,
Speaker 1: have super thick, wooly hair. So who's wrong here? Or
Speaker 1: is that a probability thing? Like Robert helped me understand that,
Speaker 1: Like Danny de Vito and Arnold Schwarzenegger, right, yeah, yeah, exactly,
Speaker 1: this guys standing beside each other and twins. You just
Speaker 1: gotta find your Arnold, you know. Wow, that's it. We
Speaker 1: have to find our arm this episode. But that's exactly right.
Speaker 1: You know, neither our citizenry nor our doctors think very
Speaker 1: well about probability, so we tend to simplify and if
Speaker 1: it's a probability, we see it should be that. But
Speaker 1: of course a probability means just a probability, and that's
Speaker 1: the change in genetics is happening over the last decade
Speaker 1: or two. Is it removing from thinking about genetics in
Speaker 1: terms of you will get this disease with the mutation too, Oh,
Speaker 1: you have a slightly higher or a slightly lower probability
Speaker 1: of getting something. You talked about the blind spots that
Speaker 1: you have had. But Peter, there are things that are
Speaker 1: well within the light that you know about your health
Speaker 1: history or your family history in general, in terms of
Speaker 1: the parts that make up this multi multicolor multi ethnic
Speaker 1: spectrum that that you've brought to the table. Are there
Speaker 1: things that I'm sure of? Yeah? Yeah, like what if?
Speaker 1: What did you know? Well? I don't know that, Like
Speaker 1: how sure you can be of any of it? Because
Speaker 1: people create stories to either cover things up or create
Speaker 1: stories when you don't have the information you know, and
Speaker 1: then those stories kind of like become facts as they
Speaker 1: get passed along. My maternal grandpa was second generation Jamaican American.
Speaker 1: His parents came here, but he has like light blue eyes.
Speaker 1: There's like these stories of Portuguese Jews that like I
Speaker 1: don't but I'm like, I don't know. It was like,
Speaker 1: so that sounds like such a story you would make
Speaker 1: up because you have light eyes or something. I don't know,
Speaker 1: you know, I don't know. I'm not really sure. And
Speaker 1: like Jamaica is maybe the only place that's as big
Speaker 1: of a kind of melting pot as the United States
Speaker 1: of America. So like who knows people were it was
Speaker 1: like a report. People were coming from everywhere, you know,
Speaker 1: So I don't really know, but it's it's be interesting
Speaker 1: to find out or it's not interesting. Like it's like
Speaker 1: I feel like everybody goes into these tests well that
Speaker 1: I know who we're going into them. We're going into
Speaker 1: them without saying that they're going into it for medical reason.
Speaker 1: Everyone's like we've got Native American and you know, because
Speaker 1: everybody wants to be more like you have a texture
Speaker 1: and be more like no one wants to be like
Speaker 1: just plane plane, you know what I mean. I mean, Robert,
Speaker 1: it's probably like the one area where people think that
Speaker 1: they don't want to be you know. Yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: the tests are what they come back and then like
Speaker 1: I feel like every time I've seen one, I always
Speaker 1: see like point something percent sub Saharan African for everybody.
Speaker 1: I don't know, Like I guess it's just like the
Speaker 1: cradle or some of it's interesting and some of it
Speaker 1: maybe like we're a lot more similar than we are
Speaker 1: probably that different, honestly, right, Yeah, Yeah, that's one of
Speaker 1: the sort of most uplifting messages about genetics is how
Speaker 1: much we share in common between each other and how
Speaker 1: little is divided among us. I want to focus on
Speaker 1: what you said, Pete, about what you know may not
Speaker 1: be a fact. It could just be a story, and
Speaker 1: it could be covering for something that we didn't know,
Speaker 1: or creating something because we knew the opposite. And in
Speaker 1: science and in what we understand about genetics, can you
Speaker 1: talk about, Robert, how there's also stories there that we
Speaker 1: get attached to that may not necessarily be factual. Sure,
Speaker 1: you know that there has been a story in genetics
Speaker 1: that came from the very first discoveries that were made
Speaker 1: that if you have a certain mutation or change in
Speaker 1: your DNA, you're gonna get that disease. And that's true
Speaker 1: for a few diseases, and that kind of became our
Speaker 1: mental story, and it got backed up by all these
Speaker 1: cops shows, where you know, if you find the DNA
Speaker 1: in the field, it definitely identifies the killer. I'm glad
Speaker 1: we finally we're able to blame Hollywood, Thank you for
Speaker 1: doing I will keep doing that because genetics isn't that way.
Speaker 1: Most of genetics that we've really discovered has been probabilistic.
Speaker 1: If you have this particular marker or the set of markers,
Speaker 1: you're at a increased risk, sometimes a very small increased
Speaker 1: risk for heart disease or cancer or something else. So
Speaker 1: one of the confusing aspects of this is that there
Speaker 1: will be markers like the b r c A markers
Speaker 1: in some direct consumer geneic tests that do put you
Speaker 1: at a dramatically increased risk, and then there's lots of
Speaker 1: other markers that simply give you a little bit of
Speaker 1: probabilistic information. One of my concerns is that we're getting
Speaker 1: this information. We learned that we have this higher chance
Speaker 1: of something horrible or just something interesting, but you know,
Speaker 1: off of the plane path. But there are also other determinants, right,
Speaker 1: Because if genetics alone are our destiny, what about the
Speaker 1: air quality, what about our diet, what about how much
Speaker 1: we go to soul cycle? And so how are we
Speaker 1: supposed to balance what we have control over versus you know,
Speaker 1: what we were born with. Again, a very small proportion
Speaker 1: that people are going to have some kind of mutation
Speaker 1: that really dramatically increases their chances. But for most of
Speaker 1: us heart disease, cancer, diabetes, they are way more dependent
Speaker 1: on your lifestyle. They're way more dependent on your weight,
Speaker 1: your exercise, whether or not you smoke or not, things
Speaker 1: like that. How's your lifestyle? Um, you know, I have
Speaker 1: a certain assumption about your your world in in terms
Speaker 1: of the lifestyle that's really really unhealthy. But maybe yours
Speaker 1: is healthy. Well, I have three kids, so don't sleep ever, right.
Speaker 1: I think that like the rock and roll excess lifestyle,
Speaker 1: this generation of musicians, at least we saw we were
Speaker 1: like raised watching behind the music. You're just like, oh,
Speaker 1: well that's how that one ends, you know whatever. I
Speaker 1: don't know we do we were never really like that band,
Speaker 1: you know or whatever. Yeah, I mean, I don't think
Speaker 1: my lifestyle is like I worked out before I came
Speaker 1: here today, you know. I mean I don't. I don't
Speaker 1: think it's it's actually a requirement anyone who does this show.
Speaker 1: You have to exercise before you come into the studio.
Speaker 1: I don't smoke a drink. I don't do drugs. Sounds good, yeah,
Speaker 1: probably probably okay, probably this episode probably with dr Green,
Speaker 1: You're probably all right, So when you get your director
Speaker 1: consumer jack testing, it's probably not going to show you
Speaker 1: anything extremely scary. How do how do you think about
Speaker 1: Pete sharing these results in terms of how it changes
Speaker 1: your story within your family, for those you came from
Speaker 1: and for those you've helped create, or how it affects
Speaker 1: you know, what you put out into the world in
Speaker 1: terms of authorship, music, lyrics, etcetera. I think it's really
Speaker 1: good as far as like sharing with my kids and
Speaker 1: my family. I don't know about you know, sharing what
Speaker 1: you share with the world. I think that like it
Speaker 1: or not, people like alter the way they think when
Speaker 1: they have preconceived ideas. You know. It's just it's an
Speaker 1: interesting thing. I think that's really specific too. Somebody who
Speaker 1: just kind of doesn't really fit in anywhere that like
Speaker 1: the minute you put out where you do fit in.
Speaker 1: I guess when you find that out, then people are like, oh,
Speaker 1: I had a pegged right the whole time, you know,
Speaker 1: or whatever. Whereas when you're just like, well, I've never
Speaker 1: never been really part of any community, you know, it's
Speaker 1: like a little weird to like think that you might
Speaker 1: be a part of one or something. You know, like
Speaker 1: I've always been like kind of like on the island
Speaker 1: of misfit toys, you know, and then if I find
Speaker 1: out that I actually have like a toy home, you know,
Speaker 1: I'd be weird. I guess it's to home. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: you might be adopted by some other communities. When when
Speaker 1: you doc are thinking about people sharing their information, you know,
Speaker 1: the idea of privacy and control over our genetic information
Speaker 1: is a hot topic. It feels like it's complicated. What
Speaker 1: are some of the outlines and contours of that decision.
Speaker 1: It's a huge area for all the reasons you mentioned.
Speaker 1: We have a study going on now where we're sequencing
Speaker 1: newborn babies, and when we approach the parents in the
Speaker 1: hospital of newborn babies and say hey, would you want
Speaker 1: your infant sequenced, about eight or of them say no.
Speaker 1: And the biggest reason they say no is concerns about
Speaker 1: privacy and discrimination for those babies, because we just don't
Speaker 1: have it down yet to protect those babies or any
Speaker 1: of us from intrusion, from hacking, from possibility of discrimination.
Speaker 1: So it's a big issue. It needs to be solved.
Speaker 1: M Having said that, I think that genetics is just
Speaker 1: growing faster and better, and I do believe that eventually
Speaker 1: the benefits are going to outweigh these concerns for many people.
Speaker 1: So I'm bullish on genetics, but it's a huge it's
Speaker 1: a huge and realistic concern. Kind of sucks that people
Speaker 1: discriminating against babies didn't it right, Yeah, babies. All babies
Speaker 1: are kind of great. They are. There's I mean, I've
Speaker 1: met maybe three I didn't like, but that's out a hundreds,
Speaker 1: Like it's a really low ratio. Most babies are great.
Speaker 1: You've met my three children. It's all kind of like
Speaker 1: a get movie gatica, you know what I mean a
Speaker 1: little bit because the one guy like has none of
Speaker 1: the right stuff, but like just has something inside of
Speaker 1: him that just drives him to like swim across the lake.
Speaker 1: Or the secret is that I never saved anything for
Speaker 1: swimming back exactly, which is great. That's like such a
Speaker 1: good line that. Yeah, so clearly he did have the
Speaker 1: right stuff. Maybe the test didn't reveal it. Is there
Speaker 1: an example, Pete from not from the genetic side. But
Speaker 1: what I read about you, and I'd love you to
Speaker 1: correct me if I'm wrong, is that you chose music
Speaker 1: in part because it felt like more of a challenge,
Speaker 1: you know, in your younger years, versus some of the
Speaker 1: sports and other activities you were doing. First of all,
Speaker 1: can you fact check me? Is that sure? Yeah? I
Speaker 1: think that's kind of true. Yeah, that's true. I mean
Speaker 1: it's like a feeling, so it's hard to be like
Speaker 1: really factual. But I'm sitting here right now I can
Speaker 1: say that I felt it felt true. And how would
Speaker 1: you describe your persistence in music? Like you've been in
Speaker 1: this industry, I think longer an average. You've evolved through it,
Speaker 1: You've done a bunch of other things, but you still
Speaker 1: making music right. Well, I mean I think that it's
Speaker 1: anyone when you find something that you're passionate about that
Speaker 1: goes beyond hobbyists, you know, because there's plenty off I
Speaker 1: have like zilion hobbyists, you know, or whatever, but there's
Speaker 1: something that like you're actually like people are like, oh,
Speaker 1: they refer tun as like your career or whatever. You know.
Speaker 1: Like the way I think that at least I'm set
Speaker 1: up as a human is like I'm like, well, this
Speaker 1: is the path that I'm on, and I can bend
Speaker 1: this path around different ways and stuff, but I'm on
Speaker 1: like a basic kind of path. Yeah, so I think
Speaker 1: that that's probably what what it's been. And I think
Speaker 1: as far as like the lenitivity is like this is
Speaker 1: so not part of the genetic desk or whatever. But
Speaker 1: it's like the people that I've you know, surrounded myself
Speaker 1: with who are like really helpful and good support network
Speaker 1: and help me keep me accountable, but inspire me that
Speaker 1: kind of thing. You know, how would you describe what
Speaker 1: you're up to in music right now versus what you
Speaker 1: might have been doing twenty years ago, ten twenty years ago,
Speaker 1: Like if someone was like music will being like this
Speaker 1: cloud or whatever, you know, it's just like this stickle things,
Speaker 1: you know. So it's just the way people consume music
Speaker 1: is so different, you know, like my nine year old
Speaker 1: listens to songs, listened to a little oozy and then
Speaker 1: listen to like a Queen song and then like people
Speaker 1: can curate their own lives now, you know. And so
Speaker 1: I think music is more important than it has ever been,
Speaker 1: you know, because to borrow an idea that my friend
Speaker 1: Evan said, like, no one goes like, you know, I'm
Speaker 1: feeling the saddest I've ever felt. Let me like open
Speaker 1: an app right now, you know, whatever, Like everybody listens
Speaker 1: to music. You can set your watch two different things
Speaker 1: you've done in your life and the way songs have
Speaker 1: made you feel. And in the nineties you're listening to
Speaker 1: like Wu Tang or what you know, like whatever it is,
Speaker 1: like musical markers and and and like for sure you
Speaker 1: like go back and listen to a lot of that
Speaker 1: music and some of it doesn't hold up and some
Speaker 1: of it does. And so I think it's it's just
Speaker 1: how people take in music and how people take in
Speaker 1: entertainment now is just very different than it was when
Speaker 1: we started. And it's kind of interesting to be a band.
Speaker 1: It was part of the tail end of like this
Speaker 1: other version of it, you know, and then was at
Speaker 1: the start of the new version of it. And I
Speaker 1: think the chasm has never been wider between artists. There's
Speaker 1: these all these artists that like if you only kind
Speaker 1: of pay attention to mainstream culture, you probably don't really
Speaker 1: know about them. But they're like massive, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean, And they're like just under the surface, and
Speaker 1: I think that people like listen to them and interact
Speaker 1: with them in ways that people probably aren't really paying
Speaker 1: attention to. Well, you know, there's a kind of a parallel.
Speaker 1: I hope it's not too much of a stretch in
Speaker 1: science and in the genetics world, because many people see
Speaker 1: what we're talking about today direct to consumer genetics, the
Speaker 1: democratization of certain markers as the gateway to a whole
Speaker 1: new world of bio hacking, of evolving ourselves. People compare
Speaker 1: this to the electronic revolution. And then the same way
Speaker 1: that we couldn't imagine carrying around all this music from
Speaker 1: the cloud in our pockets, people are talking about how
Speaker 1: everything we do will be interacting with our biology, with
Speaker 1: our genetics, with our other Oh mix are proteo mix,
Speaker 1: our transcripto mix, our metabolo mix are microbiomics. And this
Speaker 1: kind of big data, big biology future is perhaps presaged
Speaker 1: in some ways by what you're describingload your consciousness, right,
Speaker 1: just like I was reading about that the other day,
Speaker 1: Wild Wild, Yeah, No, I thank you for seeing that connection.
Speaker 1: I don't think it's a big stretch at all. I
Speaker 1: think what we saw happen with music was an early
Speaker 1: marker of what we're seeing happen to everything else, from
Speaker 1: finance to personal health. The same way that I'm discovering
Speaker 1: new music because of my pattern of interaction with the
Speaker 1: music I've known. I may discover new parts of myself
Speaker 1: through genetics because of my pattern of interaction, you know,
Speaker 1: with the environment around me over time. Think the idea
Speaker 1: of a personal genetics playlist just occurred to me. Pete,
Speaker 1: you're gonna think this has nothing to do with genetics.
Speaker 1: How have the stories of you that you grew up
Speaker 1: with that you've learned influenced music you've been making. I'm
Speaker 1: not sure that like particular stories have influenced it, but
Speaker 1: I do think that it's a weird thing where like
Speaker 1: when you feel like you're not really like part of
Speaker 1: a tribe, it makes it easier for you to set
Speaker 1: your own course. I think, you know, in some ways,
Speaker 1: like I remember reading the Gladwell book where he talks
Speaker 1: about like the people who are the near misses. So
Speaker 1: like when the bombings happened in London, I'm talking in
Speaker 1: World War two, Yeah, the blitz that the people that
Speaker 1: were blown up obviously they had one path and then
Speaker 1: the people who were far away from the bombings were
Speaker 1: completely terrified. But the people that were like the near
Speaker 1: misses were fortified and because of that they like, we're like, no,
Speaker 1: we're staying here and it does something. And I think
Speaker 1: that maybe not just feeling like you're part of a thing,
Speaker 1: like it just makes it so your destiny in your
Speaker 1: head can be whatever it is, and if you fail,
Speaker 1: it doesn't really matter because you weren't you just never
Speaker 1: had something. You really weren't supposed to be an investment
Speaker 1: banker or whatever. Yeah, you know, so like it for
Speaker 1: me personally, it sent me up in a way where
Speaker 1: I was like pervious to all this because yeah, like
Speaker 1: you said, there wasn't like an expectation, like I don't
Speaker 1: feel like I like look like anybody else or feel
Speaker 1: like anybody else. I think that for a lot of
Speaker 1: people that's like really sad, but like for me at least,
Speaker 1: and I think for my brother and sister, like, oh
Speaker 1: that's cool. Well I can just like start my own
Speaker 1: community and I can find my own friends, and it's
Speaker 1: like the inception of who you are or something, you know,
Speaker 1: like not having the stories or not having the community
Speaker 1: kind of like lets you create whatever it is. And
Speaker 1: I also want to live forever. Pete, You've mentioned that
Speaker 1: you have three children. You're obviously very musically talented. Are
Speaker 1: you starting to see any musical talent in your children.
Speaker 1: I think I see some interest in the way things work,
Speaker 1: you know, and the inner workings, and everyone wants to
Speaker 1: like open up the clock and look at the inside
Speaker 1: of the clock and the way that it works. I
Speaker 1: come from like a family that's Philadelphia lawyers, so it's
Speaker 1: like all litigation. It's again like the thing that we
Speaker 1: talked about is like you can't let what your potential
Speaker 1: be determined by what you've theoretically could become. As a parent,
Speaker 1: I don't want my kids to feel like they have
Speaker 1: big shoes to feel. I don't want my kids to
Speaker 1: feel like they need to be driven to the point
Speaker 1: of feeling like they're broken in order to succeed, you know.
Speaker 1: I don't know. I just think you see it's like
Speaker 1: a little bit early, but I think at some point
Speaker 1: you see like where somebody's naturally headed and you try
Speaker 1: to like magnify that. Probably, but I don't know. I
Speaker 1: don't see, Like like my nine year old takes piano
Speaker 1: lessons and stuff like that, and he's, like I said,
Speaker 1: he's interested in the inner workings and why songs or
Speaker 1: pop songs and like what's different about this song and
Speaker 1: then that song that's kind of where we're at. I
Speaker 1: think I have a follow up question for you. You
Speaker 1: sound like a great dad. Oh man, will you agree
Speaker 1: my dad? I'm ready, I'm ready to say. I mean,
Speaker 1: what's the difference between three and four? Really? You know,
Speaker 1: I can just like slide right into that family. That's great.
Speaker 1: You know, on the scientific and genetic front, do we
Speaker 1: know anything about proficiency and certain activities sports music through
Speaker 1: through genetics? Almost all of these personality traits and talent
Speaker 1: based things are definitely have genetic foundations, but they are
Speaker 1: probably due to so many genetic markers that are so
Speaker 1: complex that you won't be able to measure them, if ever,
Speaker 1: for a long long time. So that's one of the
Speaker 1: areas I think we have to be careful. There are
Speaker 1: kind of bottom feeder companies that are already out there
Speaker 1: saying we can predict whether your child is going to
Speaker 1: be a sprinter, we can predict whether your child is
Speaker 1: going to be a musician, and we should be cautious
Speaker 1: about that. And can you like you can like, uh,
Speaker 1: you could like spin up one of those babies. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, I mean I'm totally serious. So I have
Speaker 1: two boys and my third as a girl, and her
Speaker 1: doctor was like, you know, prepared for a boy. You know,
Speaker 1: I've definitely heard people talk about that you can like
Speaker 1: spin what you wanted, spin it up in like a
Speaker 1: lab or something, right, you can if there are reproductive
Speaker 1: technologies to pick a boy or a girl. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: we didn't do it because I feel like you if
Speaker 1: you end up and then the person has like some
Speaker 1: special difficulties in life, you're like, did I create those
Speaker 1: difficulties for that person? We're gonna face that, and Janice
Speaker 1: is going to play a role in that as we
Speaker 1: anticipate all these markers and then you can pick embryos
Speaker 1: that particularly carry the markers that you want. But again,
Speaker 1: we're just going to have to admit that the complexity
Speaker 1: of some of these traits intelligence, personality, musical ability, athletic ability, health,
Speaker 1: health risks are mostly multi factorial, and they're very heavily
Speaker 1: dependent on the context you live and the parenting you get.
Speaker 1: So I would say being a good parent is way
Speaker 1: more important than your genes and most of them. And
Speaker 1: could you imagine like you spin up like a Serena
Speaker 1: Williams and then the person is like not good at tennis?
Speaker 1: Like how crazy would that be? For the you know,
Speaker 1: like I would be imagined that would be insane. You know, Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're gonna be disappointments. Yeah, they're right. I mean like
Speaker 1: it's got to happen. Yeah, it probably will. It probably will.
Speaker 1: Thank you for validating that. I think everybody in the room,
Speaker 1: I felt like, gave me a look when I said
Speaker 1: you could spin up the thing. But I've I've seriously
Speaker 1: been told that, and I gave you that look because
Speaker 1: I'm like, it's it sounds horrible, and I'm sure it's
Speaker 1: technically possible. I think there's some areas of the world
Speaker 1: with different ethical valides where it's happening. So it's going
Speaker 1: to be a new challenge unfortunately. Well, and we're on
Speaker 1: the cusp of being able to edit genes, and we
Speaker 1: get there and you've got these embryos in front of you.
Speaker 1: You can go in and edit which ones you want
Speaker 1: to do exactly right. How does it not go sideways
Speaker 1: and become like eugenics or something? How does it not
Speaker 1: go that direction? Yeah, great question, No easy answers, man.
Speaker 1: I think we just got to keep ourselves tethered to
Speaker 1: the truth even as we think these expansive ideas and
Speaker 1: enjoy this new expansive space. There's a lot of marketing
Speaker 1: going on, there's a lot of corporations pushing this, but
Speaker 1: there's also some correctives. Even our government, which is not
Speaker 1: usually seen as sort of cutting edge, has initiated this
Speaker 1: project called All of Us, which is going to enroll
Speaker 1: a million Americans, very diverse backgrounds, including people who do
Speaker 1: not have a lot of money, and they're going to
Speaker 1: offer them information about themselves, including genetic information about themselves.
Speaker 1: So there's some correctives place I think that are pretty
Speaker 1: exciting that will balance the marketing efforts to go forward
Speaker 1: as well, and in terms of how we keep it
Speaker 1: to the positive route when the GPS as opposed to
Speaker 1: the like Gattica in the eugenics type route, I think
Speaker 1: staying involved and invested in that conversation is a part
Speaker 1: of it. There's this balance that I feel about determinism
Speaker 1: versus probability, versus freedom, and and it's not necessarily even
Speaker 1: versus it's it's a inclusion of all those things. And
Speaker 1: so Pete, the absence of some story for you was
Speaker 1: liberating and you could forward your own path and set
Speaker 1: your own GPS. You also may discover that you're part
Speaker 1: of communities you didn't even know yet, and hopefully that's
Speaker 1: enhancing for you and and not threatening. And I think
Speaker 1: you know, for the wider field of genomics and personal genomics,
Speaker 1: we want that balance. We want to belong more than
Speaker 1: ever to a group, to a tribe. We also don't
Speaker 1: need to feel bound and determined by what the was.
Speaker 1: Probably results tell us that we can still set our
Speaker 1: own course. I want to thank both of you for
Speaker 1: highlighting what's possible and not necessarily deterministic out of this.
Speaker 1: I'd like to thank Pete Wins for being here. Has
Speaker 1: been a real pleasure having you on SPIT. And Dr
Speaker 1: Robert Green, thank you very much for all your CONSUCT
Speaker 1: appreciate it was great. So a few weeks ago I
Speaker 1: sat in this room with Pete Wentz of entrepreneurial rock
Speaker 1: star fame, and he hadn't yet done his genetic test.
Speaker 1: Uh in the weeks since he did in fact SPIT
Speaker 1: and we got on the phone with him to talk
Speaker 1: about what his results were, what surprised him, what contradicted
Speaker 1: his experience or expectations, and what he took away from
Speaker 1: the whole thing. Take a list. I want to first say,
Speaker 1: welcome back to the show, Welcome back to Spit. When
Speaker 1: last our heroes met, you were about to do what
Speaker 1: show title is, You were about to spit to be
Speaker 1: able to get your test results. Can you talk to
Speaker 1: me first about taking the test? What was the process?
Speaker 1: Were you able to generate the required saliva? Did you
Speaker 1: drop the vial? Like? Tell me about that part. Oh? Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's just it's a lot more spirit thinks that people
Speaker 1: think or would realized. But it's pretty simple. Kid is
Speaker 1: very self explanatory. So it's just pretty easy to do.
Speaker 1: I think it's one of those ones that's very hard
Speaker 1: to screw up. Good well, congratulations on passing stage one.
Speaker 1: And when you when you first logged in and started
Speaker 1: seeing results, what's the first thing you saw. I think
Speaker 1: the first thing I saw was under like ancestry. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it's just like kind of like, I'm pretty
Speaker 1: mixed bag. You know, there was a lot more mixed
Speaker 1: than I expected. I guess I don't know. You had
Speaker 1: spoken when when last we met. You talked about not
Speaker 1: being part of a tribe and that was part of
Speaker 1: the way you grew up and there was some strengthen that.
Speaker 1: Did you find out that you're a part of any
Speaker 1: tribes or communities that you didn't know about what that
Speaker 1: you suspected, but we're confirmed. That's really like with any
Speaker 1: Portuguese Jews. Were there any Portuguese Jews? I don't think so.
Speaker 1: I think that the interesting thing that and this is
Speaker 1: probably the nature of the world history, is that probably
Speaker 1: due to the fact that like so many people were
Speaker 1: in for migration or just my you know, like whatever.
Speaker 1: It's like I think when you find the European side
Speaker 1: of you, you're like, oh, yeah, that's like my you know,
Speaker 1: old country or whatever. But I had a lot of
Speaker 1: moms side people from the Caribbean and from Jamaica, and
Speaker 1: made me realize that there's finding out a ton of
Speaker 1: people that are like from Jamaica, you know, like people
Speaker 1: are coming there from other places, or there's a lot
Speaker 1: of the like Nigerian and Iberian and East African and
Speaker 1: stuff and summer heart that like really piece it together,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, Because it's like, yeah, I
Speaker 1: don't know, like when was the last time like someone
Speaker 1: from my family was like Nigeria, you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: Like I mean, I wish it was probably sooner than
Speaker 1: it actually was. No, No, that makes sense when you
Speaker 1: described Jamaica. You've reminded us that it's like a port. Yeah. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, it served as a port, and so in
Speaker 1: some ways it sounds like it was a genetic port
Speaker 1: as well. From a genetic perspective, it's hard to be
Speaker 1: from Jamaica, and that's kind of a way station for
Speaker 1: for genes from from other parts of the world. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like we didn't come back like Jamaican, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean? Right right, and on the characteristic side or
Speaker 1: on any of the traits stuff. I mean. I I
Speaker 1: remember in my results finding out it said that I
Speaker 1: was going to be less likely to be able to
Speaker 1: match a musical pitch, which I was like, first of all,
Speaker 1: you're wrong. I have perfect tonal recall. I'm amazing. But
Speaker 1: I'm curious for you to anything stand out from your
Speaker 1: traits kind of results that you're you're willing to share.
Speaker 1: It's interesting because you think you're saying it's some stuff
Speaker 1: that I'm like, some stuff from like I don't know.
Speaker 1: I got one back and said less likely to consume caffeine,
Speaker 1: and I was like, oh my god, I drink so
Speaker 1: much coffee. I was like, I don't know where, Like
Speaker 1: it's very interesting of all that you look through in
Speaker 1: your results, what's stood out the most, what was the
Speaker 1: most interesting, whether it was surprising or not, whether it
Speaker 1: confirmed in expectation or not. Totally you're like, oh, that's
Speaker 1: that's notable. Tell me about that, yeah, totally. Um. The
Speaker 1: thing that I was expected was like, you know, like
Speaker 1: I've always felt a little bit like a big mix
Speaker 1: or mud or something, and I really there was like
Speaker 1: a lot of like maybe this is for everybody. So
Speaker 1: I haven't seen anybody else's test results obviously, um, so
Speaker 1: I don't know, but there was a lot of like
Speaker 1: fo this four you know, four percent gonna you know,
Speaker 1: or something like that. Like I was like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: like it's interesting, and I got a feeling and maybe
Speaker 1: it's not like going to be like obviously like subsident
Speaker 1: and African for people, but like that we're all pretty
Speaker 1: much a big mix. I mean no, maybe not we're all,
Speaker 1: but a lot of us are probably like kind of
Speaker 1: a mix, you know, because people have you know, the world.
Speaker 1: We live in a very global place. And like there
Speaker 1: was something peaceful about that where I was like, you know,
Speaker 1: your neighbor probably have a mix in his is making
Speaker 1: more like European, but I'm sure it's a big blend
Speaker 1: as well, you know. And there was something that like
Speaker 1: was reassuring to me about that a little bit, you know,
Speaker 1: like there's something that like felt like maybe that's like
Speaker 1: one of the like solutions for our world is that, like,
Speaker 1: I mean, we're all really different, so we're all really
Speaker 1: different than each other, but in a weird way that
Speaker 1: makes it is all kind of similar because we're all
Speaker 1: so different, you know, and that like I don't know
Speaker 1: that I need to find somebody who had, like I
Speaker 1: don't know how I'm gonna find somebody who has the
Speaker 1: exact mix a similar mix of me, even like my
Speaker 1: siblings or something, so like maybe you don't need somebody
Speaker 1: who like looks like you, it feels like you maybe
Speaker 1: you find people who would just like increase your happiness
Speaker 1: or like makes the world feel like it's a little
Speaker 1: bit smaller for you, and that's good enough. I don't know,
Speaker 1: it's kind of cheesy, but like I actually that I
Speaker 1: felt that. Yeah, I actually kind of did feel it.
Speaker 1: Thank you for sharing that. I I feel it through
Speaker 1: the phone line from you. The idea that what we
Speaker 1: have in commonon is our difference is a beautiful concept
Speaker 1: and one that science may help us find more common
Speaker 1: than not. So thank you again, see good luck with
Speaker 1: whatever is next in your life. I appreciate the extra time. Right,
Speaker 1: have a great one, man, I want to dig in
Speaker 1: more on today's topics and guests. Check our show notes
Speaker 1: and if you enjoyed the episode, share it with a friend,
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