Comments on: We were all Africans…before the intermission

By: Karin R

Karin R — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 19:15:39 +0000

I’m teaching this right now and the more I read the more uncertain I am of anything. I’m presenting they various hypotheses to my student framed by “we really don’t have enough fossils” I just read about a new find in China that is possibly 100,000 yrs old!

By: Jennifer

Jennifer — Sat, 27 Nov 2010 19:20:31 +0000

Thanks for including the other “Indians” from North & South America

By: Razib Khan

Razib Khan — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 07:25:28 +0000

worf, the short answer is no. the long answer is you didn’t bother to read the post, as your question’s implicit answer is refuted in the very post above.

By: worf

worf — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 07:14:24 +0000

If the South Indian Brahmins are indeed farther from the Gujuratis, doesn’t this go against the view that the brahmin castes even in South India are genetically different from the other lower castes within the South?

By: Geo

Geo — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 01:15:07 +0000

This study lacks paleo-africans such as the San, Khoi, Hadza, Mbuti etc. I doubt any Eurasians come close to their genetic diversity.

By: M. Möhling

M. Möhling — Thu, 25 Nov 2010 23:54:43 +0000

> Eurausicans

what about non-subs (-> non-Subsaharans)? has a ring to it.

By: Razib Khan

Razib Khan — Thu, 25 Nov 2010 23:40:15 +0000

LWK = kenyans above.

Is there any evidence of modern human populations mixing with Homo erectus or other varieties of Homo?

yes. allusion was made to this last april.

By: TGGP

TGGP — Thu, 25 Nov 2010 22:39:32 +0000

In Darwin’s time, did people think we were most closely related to gorillas or orangutans? I have a dim recollection of someone claiming that.

By: Blackbird

Blackbird — Thu, 25 Nov 2010 22:29:38 +0000

I agree with cesar in that if Africans are just represented by West African Yorubans, much of the diversity of Africans, especially East Africans, whose ancestors are biogeographically most likely to have been involved could be responsible for the long delay between the ancestor between Non-Africans and Yorubans and the ancestor of all non-Africans.

By: dave chamberlin

dave chamberlin — Thu, 25 Nov 2010 16:21:12 +0000

“The teens of this century are going to be very exciting when it comes to reconstructing human evolutionary history. You’d be a fool to put bets on any horse at this time.”

But I’m sitting here squirming in short attention span theatre
and I can’t wait that long! Great comment Razib, just thought I’d emphasize it because it deserves repeating. It won’t calm down after that either, I won’t make foolish guesses but something tells me that the wide variances in human intellence are just waiting to cause a whole lot more excitment. Way off down yonder no doubt, quite possibly past my lifetime, but I sure would like the satisfaction of seeing the look on the face of a crationist when he gets the message, not only is evolution real, you’re next.

By: cesar

cesar — Thu, 25 Nov 2010 14:41:29 +0000

Like Dienekes, I’m slightly skeptical about the uniform 1-4% neanderthal admixture across all non-Africans. More studies need to be done before we can make this claim. Considering the genetic diversity of Africans, were they properly represented in the initial study? I’m not denying the conclusions generated. Yet, more evidence is clearly needed.

By: Earl Wajenberg

Earl Wajenberg — Thu, 25 Nov 2010 14:27:02 +0000

So we have evidence of mixing between modern humans and Neandertals. Is there any evidence of modern human populations mixing with Homo erectus or other varieties of Homo? In other words, Neandertals have gone back and forth between being classed as a separate species and being classed as a sub-species. Anything similar happening with any other human taxons?

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By: Razib Khan

Razib Khan — Thu, 25 Nov 2010 07:43:57 +0000

I saw Michael Wood’s documentary (“The story of India”) and if I remember correctly, in the first episode he claimed that modern humans left Africa, came to India and THEN spread through Eurasia (I think the phrase “mother India indeed” was used). I have not seen anything about that theory anywhere else (I am by no means an expert, so I just may not have run into it). Is there such a theory? What is it based on? and has it been conclusively killed off now (because I have not seen Razib mention it at all)?

it’s around. not total bunk. who knows? see the real eve by stephen oppenheimer. a little dated, but it promotes out of india.

I’m rather ignorant of the academic environment of that time period, so could you elaborate a bit on this? How did Darwin’s model swim against that conviction? If Africans were seen as the most primitive race, wouldn’t it logically follow that Africa would be the prime candidate for the location of human origins?

that is logical! anyway, i don’t know much about this period, but from what i’ve read most of the thinkers preferred out of asia. i think because they didn’t want to believe that the greatest species on the great chain of being was from africa.

Actually, it indicated that they weren’t a clade at all. If we look just at matrilineage or patrilineage, then non-Subsaharans more or less form a clade, with several Subsaharan clades as serial outgroups. Africans are (sort of) a paraphyletic assemblage, not a clade.

you are correct. need to fix that part.

In the model presented from Reconstructing Indian population history, what does Ep and Cp represent?

migration parameter. east asia to europe i think. doesn’t effect the model really.

By: Charles Iliya Krempeaux

Charles Iliya Krempeaux — Thu, 25 Nov 2010 03:06:47 +0000

@Razib, In the model presented from Reconstructing Indian population history, what does E_p and C_p represent?

By: Mike Keesey

Mike Keesey — Thu, 25 Nov 2010 02:59:03 +0000

“which indicated that Africans were the most basal clade”

By: omar

omar — Thu, 25 Nov 2010 02:30:34 +0000

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By: J

Thu, 25 Nov 2010 01:58:51 +0000

“In the 19th century once the idea that humans were derived from non-human ancestral species was injected into the bloodstream of the intellectual classes there was an immediate debate as to the location of the proto-human homeland; the Urheimat of us all. Charles Darwin favored Africa, but in many ways this ran against the cultural grain. Darwin’s model had to swim against the conviction that Africans were the most primitive of the colored races.”

By: Steve Sailer

Steve Sailer — Thu, 25 Nov 2010 01:03:22 +0000

Oops, if I’m going to endorse a neologism, I ought at least to spell it right: Eurausicans.