[Doctor Stochastic]

I think it's interesting to use synchronic genetic testing to get a diachronic map of ancestry. It's like looking back on a road once travelled.

[Virginia-American]

I think it's interesting to use synchronic genetic testing to get a diachronic map of ancestry. It's like looking back on a road once travelled

I don't have the exact quote in front of me, but Joseph Greenberg said something to the effect that "synchronic breadth allows us to look back into diachronic depth". He was discussing how the fact that there are something like 700 Native American languages allows us to reconstruct parts of the ancestral language, even though it was last spoken more than 12,000 years ago.