Blue eyes maybe linked to alcoholism

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oriental

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A lot of blue eyed people lived in areas with cold weather. Less sweet and starchy things to eat. Caucasian people with darker eyes came from areas where they are more honey, fruits, and grains? They got jacked up primitive booze earlier. They drunkards died off earlier. Those with higher control over booze passed on their genes?
 
Statistics does NOT give a "cause and effect" analysis. It only provides a probable linkage to two events or items. It would be more likely how many kids a blue-eyed person had rather than if he or she died earlier. People had lots of kids even up to the fifties before the pill was invented. Check old family photos and you will see large families. Polygamy was practiced in the old days so a guy would have many descendants regardless if he liked drinking or not.
 
LeBrok said:
I talked about this here:

http://www.eupedia.com/forum/thread...h-increased-ANE-admixture?p=425604#post425604
Click to expand...

I don't know if I ever read this thread; if I did, I forgot it.

I'm not quite sure what to make of this:

Hope:The alcohol dependence and ANE admix map are actaully surprising and they do seem to make the correlation you suggest.

Research with mice have shown that a mutation in the gene Gabrb1 [ and associated receptors ] affects the preference for, and excessive drinking of, alcohol.
Here is a link for any readers who may not have yet seen it:
http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/newsandev...-2013-15-15-35
Click to expand...

Which is the ancestral allele? Is it the derived allele that provides protection or the opposite? If it's the derived allele that makes you more prone to alcoholism, does it confer some other advantage?
 
According to the youtube video blue-eyed people have a higher threshold for pain i.e. they are tougher or on the other hand more "insensitive".
 
This makes sense historically: northern European peoples drank much more than southern Europeans and Middle Eastern people. For example, the Celts, Germans, and Slavs were notorious for drinking excessively. However Spaniards, southern French, Italians, Greeks, Jews and Arabs do not drink much alcohol!! During the Roman times and into the Middle Ages the Celts and Germans were considered drunkards. But why would eye color determine this??? Would a very long term use of alcohol create a dependency in the genes or alter the genes?
 
Johannes said:
This makes sense historically: northern European peoples drank much more than southern Europeans and Middle Eastern people. For example, the Celts, Germans, and Slavs were notorious for drinking excessively. However Spaniards, southern French, Italians, Greeks, Jews and Arabs do not drink much alcohol!! During the Roman times and into the Middle Ages the Celts and Germans were considered drunkards. But why would eye color determine this??? Would a very long term use of alcohol create a dependency in the genes or alter the genes?
Click to expand...
It is not a cause, it is just correlation. You can also correlate alcoholism with blond hair in Europe and pail skin, but only among Europeans. The true cause is hunter gatherer genes and predisposition. To see true effect check American Natives and Australian Aborigines for the best correlation of HGs and alcoholism. They don't have blue eyes, do they?
Now Northern Europeans have more WHG and ANE, the hunter gatherer component, than Southern Europeans. S. Europeans have more EEF and less alcoholism. That's because farmers invented alcohol and went through evolutionary changes, for thousands of years, to "deal" with alcohol.
 
Johannes said:
However Spaniards, southern French, Italians, Greeks, Jews and Arabs do not drink much alcohol!!
Click to expand...

This is a rather strange claim, considering that the peoples you have mentioned (except Muslim Arabs, for religious reasons) consume huge amounts of wine, an alcoholic beverage that is deeply ingrained in Mediterranean cultures since ancient times. Also, the distillation of fermented alcoholic liquids like wine to obtain stronger concentrations of alcohol developed first in the Middle Ages around the Mediterranean (Near East, North Africa, southern Europe), not northern Europe.
 
Drac II said:
This is a rather strange claim, considering that the peoples you have mentioned (except Muslim Arabs, for religious reasons) consume huge amounts of wine, an alcoholic beverage that is deeply ingrained in Mediterranean cultures since ancient times. Also, the distillation of fermented alcoholic liquids like wine to obtain stronger concentrations of alcohol developed first in the Middle Ages around the Mediterranean (Near East, North Africa, southern Europe), not northern Europe.
Click to expand...

What is so strange about that? Of course Spaniards, Italians, French, and other Mediterranean peoples drink a lot of wine, but their wine is less potent and they dont abuse it like the North and East of Europe. Besides in the North and East they drink more distilled spirits than wine.

Take a look at this:
pca_sociocultural_plots.png

There is a correlation between extraverted persons and drinking less alcohol. This is form a study made by 23andMe:http://blog.23andme.com/23andme-research/genes-and-geography/
 
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Johannes said:
What is so strange about that? Of course Spaniards, Italians, French, and other Mediterranean peoples drink a lot of wine, but their wine is less potent and they dont abuse it like the North and East of Europe. Besides in the North and East drink more distilled spirits than wine.

Take a look at this:

There is a correlation between extroverted persons and drinking less alcohol. This is form a study made by 23andMe
Click to expand...
Once you get your information from a pseudo-scientific genealogy website like 23andme, you have already lost the argument...
 
Johannes said:
What is so strange about that? Of course Spaniards, Italians, French, and other Mediterranean peoples drink a lot of wine, but their wine is less potent and they dont abuse it like the North and East of Europe. Besides in the North and East they drink more distilled spirits than wine.

Take a look at this:
pca_sociocultural_plots.png

There is a correlation between extraverted persons and drinking less alcohol. This is form a study made by 23andMe:http://blog.23andme.com/23andme-research/genes-and-geography/
Click to expand...

You might want to look up statistics from more "official" sources:

O0WEqtE.jpg


According to their data, Eastern Europe is the biggest consumer of "spirits". In Northern Europe only Finland beats France in "spirits" consumption, while the UK and Greece are almost at the same level.
 
There's some confusion about terms here. Alcohol consumption and alcoholism are obviously related, but you can't make a perfect one to one equivalence between a country's alcohol consumption and its levels of alcoholism. A country where everybody has two or three glasses of wine a day could theoretically consume about as much alcohol as a country where most people don't drink but there's a sizable portion of the population who drink enormous quantities.

You can also be an alcoholic who drinks only wine or beer, and you can drink only spirits when you do drink, and not be an alcoholic.

As for the 23andme statistics, they now have a reference sample of over one million. The studies which some posters prefer are based on far fewer samples. Those results are also much more valuable because their chart is based on the number of people actually diagnosed with alcoholism, which is the point, not how much alcohol is consumed.

"Alcoholism or alcohol dependence is defined by the American Medical Association (AMA) as "a primary, chronic disease with genetic, psychosocial, and environmental factors influencing its development and manifestations."[h=3]Description[/h]
Alcoholism is characterized by:

  • a prolonged period of frequent, heavy alcohol use.
  • the inability to control drinking once it has begun.
  • physical dependence manifested by withdrawal symptoms when the individual stops using alcohol.
  • tolerance, or the need to use more and more alcohol to achieve the same effects.
  • a variety of social and/or legal problems arising from alcohol use.

The effects of alcoholism are far reaching. Alcohol affects every body system, causing a wide range of health problems. Problems include poor nutrition, memory disorders, difficulty with balance and walking, liver disease (including cirrhosis and hepatitis), high blood pressure, muscle weakness (including the heart), heart rhythm disturbances, anemia, clotting disorders, decreased immunity to infections, gastrointestinal inflammation and irritation, acute and chronic problems with the pancreas, low blood sugar, high blood fat content, interference with reproductive fertility, increased risk of cancer of the liver, esophagus, and breast, weakened bones, sleep disturbances, anxiety, and depression. About 20% of adults admitted to the hospital (for any reason) are alcohol dependent. Men are more than twice as likely to be alcohol dependent than women, and smokers who are alcohol dependent are much more likely to develop serious or fatal health problems associated with alcoholism.
On a personal level, alcoholism, in many cases, leads to difficulties in marital and other relationships, domestic violence, child abuse or neglect, difficulty finding or keeping a job, impaired school or work performance, homelessness, and legal problems such as driving while intoxicated (DUI)."
http://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/alcoholism

So, genetics isn't the only factor. Stress and anxiety play their part, although again, the ability to handle both is probably partly genetic. People who have an extensive social support system are also less likely to be as depressed for as long than people in a culture where there is more isolation. Societal mores also have their effect. If your community punishes certain behavior, even it its only through ostracism, a good portion of the community won't engage in the behavior, lowering the statistics
 
Drinking wine with food as a regular meal habit wouldn't lead to alcoholism, I believe. I think having "liquid ( whisky?)" breakfast or lunch would be a sign of an alcohol. Look at actors who were blond and blue-eyed like Troy Donahue and Sandra Dee were alcoholics.

Would a very long term use of alcohol create a dependency in the genes or alter the genes?
Click to expand...
It would be worth studying.

If one looks at ancient times, say HG times (especially Northern Europe, Baltic Sea area), there wasn't much food especially winter. Also they fermented mead (found that out in the article on 'Games of Throne' mead of water and honey). I previously thought mead was a milk and honey mixed liquid. So drinking alcoholic mead and fresh meat or fish were probably the main course. I don't think they ate much vegetables and certainly no bread till the farmers came around. One can see that alcoholic mead being a staple refreshing drink and custom.
 
oriental said:
Drinking wine with food as a regular meal habit wouldn't lead to alcoholism, I believe. I think having "liquid ( whisky?)" breakfast or lunch would be a sign of an alcohol. Look at actors who were blond and blue-eyed like Troy Donahue and Sandra Dee were alcoholics.

It would be worth studying.

If one looks at ancient times, say HG times (especially Northern Europe, Baltic Sea area), there wasn't much food especially winter. Also they fermented mead (found that out in the article on 'Games of Throne' mead of water and honey). I previously thought mead was a milk and honey mixed liquid. So drinking alcoholic mead and fresh meat or fish were probably the main course. I don't think they ate much vegetables and certainly no bread till the farmers came around. One can see that alcoholic mead being a staple refreshing drink and custom.
Click to expand...

Here is how much beer is consumed in Europe by nations:
people-in-these-countries-drink-the-most-beer-in-the-world-beer-consumption-per-capita_chartbuilder3.png


If we are more precise in our terms and combine the North and North East into "Northern Europe" and include beer then we can definitely see the North drinks more than the South of Europe.

Here is the wine study:

Below are the top twenty countries from the Wine Institute's study. The United States comes in at 56th, drinking 10.42 liters, or just under 14 bottles, per capita in 2012.
world%20wine%20consumption%20map%202.png
Business Insider/Andy Kiersz, data from the Wine Institute​
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/map-world-wine-consumption-2012-2014-3#ixzz3f92uJqSg

Only Switzerland is in the top ten (if you can include it as a "Northern" country).
 
Johannes said:
Here is how much beer is consumed in Europe by nations:
people-in-these-countries-drink-the-most-beer-in-the-world-beer-consumption-per-capita_chartbuilder3.png


If we are more precise in our terms and combine the North and North East into "Northern Europe" and include beer then we can definitely see the North drinks more than the South of Europe.

Here is the wine study:

Below are the top twenty countries from the Wine Institute's study. The United States comes in at 56th, drinking 10.42 liters, or just under 14 bottles, per capita in 2012.
world%20wine%20consumption%20map%202.png
Business Insider/Andy Kiersz, data from the Wine Institute​
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/map-world-wine-consumption-2012-2014-3#ixzz3f92uJqSg

Only Switzerland is in the top ten (if you can include it as a "Northern" country).
Click to expand...

Wow, they drink a lot in Vatican city.
 
In the Philippines there was a Cardinal Sin during Ferdinand Marcos' time. I couldn't believe the name at first.:rolleyes::LOL:
 
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