Brown-skinned, blue-eyed, Y-haplogroup C-bearing European hunter-gatherer from Spain

For the MEGA-UMPTIETH time, no, that link and map are not about UV Index but about solar irradiance in general. UV rays are part of sunlight, and it is them that affect the skin, not all solar light:

http://www.skincancer.org/prevention/uva-and-uvb/understanding-uva-and-uvb

The levels of UV rays vary throughout the year, and in fact they have been increasing and decreasing over different areas:

http://wwws1.eea.europa.eu/publications/92-9167-205-X/fig9.3.gif

A lot of Europe has been receiving more UV rays in the past few decades than previously.


Some elementary logic, please! First you accused me of posting a map which just captures one day's UV radiation. When I pointed out it is a map of average ANNUAL radiation, you quibble that it is not relevant because somehow UV levels do NOT correlate to solar radiation!!??

Then you bring in the ABSOLUTE levels of radiation. Did I propose anywhere that a specific level of solar radiation was of any importance to the hypothesis? The point is that RELATIVE levels of exposure to the sun result in RELATIVE differences in pigmentation through the operation of positive selection for de-pigmentation mutations. Or at least that's the hypothesis which scientists are proposing, in so far as I understand it. Has it escaped your attention that, in general, pigmentation levels correlate with distance from the equator?

You know, like why polar bears are white? Positive selection of certain mutations in response to environmental differences? Simple enough concept. Unless we're going to go back and debate evolution? Do you also belong to the flat earth society?

And what on earth, pray, is the relevance of the fact that solar radiation is increasing have to do with anything? We are discussing an evolutionary process, that even if it is short as these things go, took place over the LAST 6-8,000 years or so, at least.

I don't pretend to have all the answers. Even the scientists don't have all the answers. All of these things are open to honest debate. However, I'm not going to allow totally illogical, nonsensical arguments to go un-rebutted.

You can attempt to use bullying tactics all you like; I am not intimidated.

You can also repost the same single study of a virtual handful of people chosen who knows how which you don't even interpret properly, and through which you would have us believe that the Portuguese are fairer than the Poles, ad infinitum. Your argument is as unconvincing at this moment as it was the first time you advanced the point.

(You know, when you and your cohorts run on and on about this in your attempt to prove that Iberians are somehow transplanted British Islanders or Swedes, I am so tempted to post pictures from events held at our local Portuguese American Society functions. Almost all of them from Porto, by the way, first and second generation. Very nice people, which is why I don't post the pictures. They don't deserve to be dragged into this nonsense. I don't even tell my friends from that community what kind of nonsense their supposed compatriots post about these things. I don't want to hurt them by telling them their compatriots are ashamed of the appearance of many of them.)
 
It does seem plausible that coastal populations wouldn't need to develop lighter skin to thrive in the north so the question shifts to how did more inland populations cope?

edit: Just to add to the point about the Saami, there's been an idea for a long time that the Welsh, particularly north Welsh were an older and darker strain so they might turn out to be another data point.

I don't know the answer to that question. As LeBrok speculated, perhaps a high meat diet, which would include organ meats, would have an effect. I'm also assuming these people would at least seasonally have taken advantage of the presence of fresh water fish in rivers and lakes, although I don't know how much Vitamin D that would provide. Then there's the fact that these people would be heavily clothed all year, and so even the limited sun available wouldn't reach most of their skin.

Certainly, Mal'ta, according to current knowledge about de-pigmentation snps, was dark-skinned, and he lived far inland.

Then, as I've said before, a paper could come out tomorrow that unexpectedly finds some novel gene that these people possessed, and we don't, which de-pigmented them.

(This is totally anecdotal, and so of very limited probative value, but because I have to limit my sun exposure pretty severely to avoid burning, and I can no longer tolerate Vitamin D fortified milk, my Vitamin D levels are normally very low, and I'm always being prescribed Vitamin D supplements at pretty high levels. Granted, I'm not a huge meat eater, although I do eat it at least once a day usually, and I do love my sardines and tuna.)
 
I guess Drac will probably freak out about this latest paper about North African DNA being more prevalent in southern Europe than previously estimated, especially in Iberia.

www.pnas.org/content/110/29/11791
 
It does seem plausible that coastal populations wouldn't need to develop lighter skin to thrive in the north so the question shifts to how did more inland populations cope?

edit: Just to add to the point about the Saami, there's been an idea for a long time that the Welsh, particularly north Welsh were an older and darker strain so they might turn out to be another data point.

The Welsh are an interesting group, since they're high in redheaded alleles but part of the Welsh population is quite dark skinned, from a northern European perspective. They are very high in R1b. I don't know what one should think of that. Perhaps the darker complexion, which does seem to be more in northern Wales, comes from the mtDNA of the pre-R1b Neolithic inhabitants.
 
The Welsh are an interesting group, since they're high in redheaded alleles but part of the Welsh population is quite dark skinned, from a northern European perspective. They are very high in R1b. I don't know what one should think of that. Perhaps the darker complexion, which does seem to be more in northern Wales, comes from the mtDNA of the pre-R1b Neolithic inhabitants.

Or perhaps the relatively high levels of yDNA "E" there, (in comparison to the rest of the British Isles) which might have been even higher in the past.

I've seen speculation ranging from retreating Romano-Celts to Bronze Age metal traders.
 
I guess Drac will probably freak out about this latest paper about North African DNA being more prevalent in southern Europe than previously estimated, especially in Iberia.

No doubt he'll claim they looked like this...
Northmen-Tobias-Beard.jpg



As for me, if the genes came along with this...sign me up...or rather, you 'could' have signed me up...:grin:

tumblr_llvj0iwd0s1qch0w2o1_1280.jpg


Then there's the more Levantine looking version...:)
10657116_ori.jpg
 
Photo ! what a waste of time and space giving zero information.............at least check the study below which is more beneficial

http://forwhattheywereweare.blogspot.com.au/2014/05/north-african-and-west-asian-affinity.html

:shocked:You obviously took your rude pill this morning, or maybe two. Try to not take yourself quite so seriously, and try to recognize the use of irony and humor to make a point. Also, really...after the hundreds of links I've provided on this site, which our younger members seem to never bother to read, I have to put up with this? Not appropriate, Sile.

As for that blog, I stopped reading it years ago...one of those people who has been proved to be WEFT. He also doesn't have a clue as to how PCA's or Admixture programs actually work. Oh, and has he finally conceded that maybe Basques aren't the original Paleolithic inhabitants of Europe, and that R1b may not be their marker? :rolleyes:
 
Sorry, posted in wrong thread.
 
rudeness is someone who requests info for a promised "gift" and then does not deliver.............maybe more accurate, one would call it a .....parasite.

Then again, ......some ask for everything and show/give nothing in return..............is that greed or selfishness?
 
@Aberdeen
"The Welsh are an interesting group, since they're high in redheaded alleles but part of the Welsh population is quite dark skinned, from a northern European perspective. They are very high in R1b. I don't know what one should think of that. Perhaps the darker complexion, which does seem to be more in northern Wales, comes from the mtDNA of the pre-R1b Neolithic inhabitants."


@Angela
"Or perhaps the relatively high levels of yDNA "E" there, (in comparison to the rest of the British Isles) which might have been even higher in the past."

Either of those sound possible to me. Based on nothing but spending lots of time in the more remote spots of the UK i think there were at least three layers, the oldest one(?) surviving in north Wales, a "celtic" one (actually more Bell Beaker imo) surviving mostly in the west, and lastly the various celtic/germannic layers.
 
Some elementary logic, please! First you accused me of posting a map which just captures one day's UV radiation. When I pointed out it is a map of average ANNUAL radiation, you quibble that it is not relevant because somehow UV levels do NOT correlate to solar radiation!!??

Then you bring in the ABSOLUTE levels of radiation. Did I propose anywhere that a specific level of solar radiation was of any importance to the hypothesis? The point is that RELATIVE levels of exposure to the sun result in RELATIVE differences in pigmentation through the operation of positive selection for de-pigmentation mutations. Or at least that's the hypothesis which scientists are proposing, in so far as I understand it. Has it escaped your attention that, in general, pigmentation levels correlate with distance from the equator?

You know, like why polar bears are white? Positive selection of certain mutations in response to environmental differences? Simple enough concept. Unless we're going to go back and debate evolution? Do you also belong to the flat earth society?

And what on earth, pray, is the relevance of the fact that solar radiation is increasing have to do with anything? We are discussing an evolutionary process, that even if it is short as these things go, took place over the LAST 6-8,000 years or so, at least.

I don't pretend to have all the answers. Even the scientists don't have all the answers. All of these things are open to honest debate. However, I'm not going to allow totally illogical, nonsensical arguments to go un-rebutted.

You can attempt to use bullying tactics all you like; I am not intimidated.

You can also repost the same single study of a virtual handful of people chosen who knows how which you don't even interpret properly, and through which you would have us believe that the Portuguese are fairer than the Poles, ad infinitum. Your argument is as unconvincing at this moment as it was the first time you advanced the point.

(You know, when you and your cohorts run on and on about this in your attempt to prove that Iberians are somehow transplanted British Islanders or Swedes, I am so tempted to post pictures from events held at our local Portuguese American Society functions. Almost all of them from Porto, by the way, first and second generation. Very nice people, which is why I don't post the pictures. They don't deserve to be dragged into this nonsense. I don't even tell my friends from that community what kind of nonsense their supposed compatriots post about these things. I don't want to hurt them by telling them their compatriots are ashamed of the appearance of many of them.)

Some "elementary logic" is apparently what you lack when it comes to this topic. You keep bringing up a map that is NOT about UV radiation but about sunlight in general. When you are corrected about this then you keep either claiming that you already knew it (if that's so, then why do you keep on posting it when it is in fact NOT about the UV Index?) or you just ignore it and keep on posting the same map misleadingly as a "UV radiation map" anyway.

Apparently correcting your misinformation regarding UV rays is a "bullying tactic" to you. I actually think it's the other way around: when someone persistently ignores when he/she is corrected and keeps on pushing the same misinformation it's what's really closer to a "bullying tactic".

The Candille et al. study is one of the very few that has actually bothered to check the pigmentation "predictions" based on a few SNPs with actual observed pigmentation measurements, so instead of criticizing it (because it did not show what you wanted to hear, namely: Italians supposedly being "lighter" than Iberians) you should be praising it (scroll back to your earlier posts in this very thread where you were implying how skin reflectance observations supposedly match "predictions" based on SNPs while you were attacking "Fire Haired", when the fact is that they don't seem to go hand in hand very well.)

And the only ones trying to pretend that someone (i.e. Italians) are really Central/Northern Europeans who have somehow been transplanted in southern Europe it is you and your "cohorts" around here.
 
I guess Drac will probably freak out about this latest paper about North African DNA being more prevalent in southern Europe than previously estimated, especially in Iberia.

www.pnas.org/content/110/29/11791

Not at all, as it has already been discussed a bunch of times around here. The paper centers around IBDs (which is just shared ancestry, it does not really say much about the origin of this shared ancestry or when did it exactly happen), not really about admixture in the usual sense. And I am not the one who "freaks out" at the results of that study when it comes to their actual admixture analysis, but certain others around here (see threads about that study to find out who "they" really are.)
 
Not at all, as it has already been discussed a bunch of times around here. The paper centers around IBDs (which is just shared ancestry, it does not really say much about the origin of this shared ancestry or when did it exactly happen), not really about admixture in the usual sense. And I am not the one who "freaks out" at the results of that study when it comes to their actual admixture analysis, but certain others around here (see threads about that study to find out who "they" really are.)

The focus on IBDs is intended to do precisely that - determine the origin of the shared ancestry. It shows that the apparent high level of North African ancestry in Iberia is indeed that, and not simply a result of shared deep ancestry from the Middle East. The article says this.

"Using genome-wide SNP data from over 2,000 individuals, we characterize broad clinal patterns of recent gene flow between Europe and Africa that have a substantial effect on genetic diversity of European populations. We have shown that recent North African ancestry is highest in southwestern Europe and decreases in northern latitudes, with a sharp difference between the Iberian Peninsula and France, where Basques are less influenced by North Africa (as suggested in ref. 48). Our estimates of shared ancestry are much higher than previously reported (up to 20% of the European individuals’ genomes). This increase in inferred African ancestry in Europe is due to our inclusion of seven North African, rather than Sub-Saharan African populations. Specifically, elevated shared African ancestry in Iberia and the Canary Islands can be traced to populations in the North African Maghreb such as Moroccans, Western Saharans, and the Tunisian Berbers. Our results, based on both allele frequencies and long shared haplotypes, support the hypothesis that recent migrations from North Africa contributed substantially to the higher genetic diversity in southwestern Europe."
 
The Candille et al. study is one of the very few that has actually bothered to check the pigmentation "predictions" based on a few SNPs with actual observed pigmentation measurements, so instead of criticizing it (because it did not show what you wanted to hear, namely: Italians supposedly being "lighter" than Iberians) you should be praising it (scroll back to your earlier posts in this very thread where you were implying how skin reflectance observations supposedly match "predictions" based on SNPs while you were attacking "Fire Haired", when the fact is that they don't seem to go hand in hand very well.)

That is totally incorrect. You have obviously not READ the papers at the links which I have provided upthread. Reflectance data was indeed part of the analysis in more than one of those papers, as was actual laboratory analysis.

It isn't worth my time to discuss this any further with someone who won't even read the pertinent papers, just like I don't bother to discuss the age of the earth with Creationists. You can repeat your tired argument based on a single study one thousand times and it still won't wash. You are convincing no one.

And the only ones trying to pretend that someone (i.e. Italians) are really Central/Northern Europeans who have somehow been transplanted in southern Europe it is you and your "cohorts" around here.

However, I can't let that last deluded comment stand. DO NOT associate me with some twenty something year old Lega Nord extremists on the skin head sites you frequent. They don't speak for me, nor for the vast majority of Italians. You know nothing of Italian history or Italian attitudes toward other Europeans. Italians want to claim an affinity with Germans? Only in a parallel universe. My parents and grandparents are turning somersaults in their graves as we speak. We are a people of diverse phenotypes, particularly in the north and Tuscany, which can resemble those of neighboring countries, especially in certain border areas, but, in general, we look only like ourselves, and that is more than fine with me.

Show some proper pride in who you are, for goodness sakes, and stop trying to smear other people with racist filth.
 
The focus on IBDs is intended to do precisely that - determine the origin of the shared ancestry. It shows that the apparent high level of North African ancestry in Iberia is indeed that, and not simply a result of shared deep ancestry from the Middle East. The article says this.

"Using genome-wide SNP data from over 2,000 individuals, we characterize broad clinal patterns of recent gene flow between Europe and Africa that have a substantial effect on genetic diversity of European populations. We have shown that recent North African ancestry is highest in southwestern Europe and decreases in northern latitudes, with a sharp difference between the Iberian Peninsula and France, where Basques are less influenced by North Africa (as suggested in ref. 48). Our estimates of shared ancestry are much higher than previously reported (up to 20% of the European individuals’ genomes). This increase in inferred African ancestry in Europe is due to our inclusion of seven North African, rather than Sub-Saharan African populations. Specifically, elevated shared African ancestry in Iberia and the Canary Islands can be traced to populations in the North African Maghreb such as Moroccans, Western Saharans, and the Tunisian Berbers. Our results, based on both allele frequencies and long shared haplotypes, support the hypothesis that recent migrations from North Africa contributed substantially to the higher genetic diversity in southwestern Europe."

IBDs do not tell us definitively when or in what direction such "shared ancestry" went, plus what Botigué herself understands as "recent" (even as little as only 2 or 3 centuries ago) is already suspicious regarding the methods and conclusions:

http://www.tdx.cat/bitstream/handle...0367FEDDFA24193EFFC2EAAF81FF1.tdx2?sequence=5

"Focusing on the North African component at k=6, we found that a migration event from North Africa to Europe would have occurred at least 8-10 generations ago (approximately 240-300ya) in Spain, and at least 6-7 generations ago in France and Italy (Figure 2)."

Historically considered, such a possible relatively recent time frame sounds more like a from-Europe-to-Africa influence due to such things as colonialism/imperialism than the other way around.

Also, their definition of "North Africa" is rather strange, since they seem to exclude Egypt from it: "whereas southeastern European populations share more IBD segments with Egypt and the Near East."

Bottom line: imprecise stuff, as pointed out by others already.
 
That is totally incorrect. You have obviously not READ the papers at the links which I have provided upthread. Reflectance data was indeed part of the analysis in more than one of those papers, as was actual laboratory analysis.

It isn't worth my time to discuss this any further with someone who won't even read the pertinent papers, just like I don't bother to discuss the age of the earth with Creationists. You can repeat your tired argument based on a single study one thousand times and it still won't wash. You are convincing no one.

Which other studies besides Candille et al. bothered to actually check if the skin pigmentation "predictions" based on a few SNPs for a selected number of sampled populations matched actual observed values by means of skin reflectance?

However, I can't let that last deluded comment stand. DO NOT associate me with some twenty something year old Lega Nord extremists on the skin head sites you frequent. They don't speak for me, nor for the vast majority of Italians. You know nothing of Italian history or Italian attitudes toward other Europeans. Italians want to claim an affinity with Germans? Only in a parallel universe. My parents and grandparents are turning somersaults in their graves as we speak. We are a people of diverse phenotypes, particularly in the north and Tuscany, which can resemble those of neighboring countries, especially in certain border areas, but, in general, we look only like ourselves, and that is more than fine with me.

Show some proper pride in who you are, for goodness sakes, and stop trying to smear other people with racist filth.

Are the likes of Borghezio or Bossi only "twenty something" years old? "Twenty-something" nutjobs are certainly not the only ones making up the ranks of northern Italian separatists.
 
I find this thread very interesting. It is curious because I saw a documentary that claimed light eyes originated in Turkey and that was well accepted. Back then I thought, "Why if we were capable of developing light eyes, couldn´t it have happened multiple times before and again because of the same stimulus?". La Brana man comes along and seems to indicate he had no Turkish origin. Instead people have used his genes as proof of a homogeneous reality. I don't understand that there is such a rush to judgement about ONE person's DNA being sequenced as being representative of the whole of Europe 7000 years ago. He is afterall one of the first people of this era to have his Y Chromosome discovered, we may never know about the rest. If our society fell apart, and 7,000 years later someone found a Romani burial and said, "Ah, this is what Europeans once looked like", it wouldn't be untrue but it also wouldn't be representative. The faces of Europe have probably always been diverse. Which one was the most prevalent is no doubt rather hard to prove on such scant evidence. Just think about the burial practices we have today, we burn a huge amount of our dead. We know that funeral pyres, dismemberment of the dead and burial in ways that do not preserve the body have existed for thousands of years. We are stuck examining people who died sometimes in odd ways such as Ötzi and La Brana man. Wouldn´t the contexts in which these bodies have been discovered be like a modern person dying today as a wanderer or on the fringes of the local society being discovered in the future?

People could build in the time of La Brana 1's death. Why was he holed up in a cave up a mountain? Does this imply that he was representative of those who lived in settlements or that he was on the fringe of the local society? Considering fairly complex settlements existed back then such as in Turkey, when you find someone dead in a cave, sure it preserves them better, but does it represent society back then?

My main curiosity about this is that, considering this article leads us to assume that the process of modern whiteness evolved in only a few thousand years, why do they think it couldn't have happened multiple times from whenever a culture entered the environment that allowed whiteness to evolve? If we are expected to believe anatomically modern humans were in Europe for 40,000 years, why does the discovery of one readable DNA trace get used to prove anything about the people who had been there before and after?

There certainly must be a missing stimulus that causes whiteness that we have not discovered. I am just sceptical about the use of one 7000 year old skeleton as proof of anything other than himself. It´s just clutching at straws based upon the small amount of evidence discovered. There was a stupid report in the paper that blondes are dying out which probably seemed true to the researcher. This was based upon blondness not being very resilient. Then I went to Scandinavia and saw that young children who had one African parent and a Swedish one would have darker skin and African faces but golden afro hair on multiple occasions. In the same way when I met Swedish families who had a middle eastern/persian parent and a white parent, the children came out pale with bright red hair and dark brown eyes. It leads me to believe the more we learn the more confusing things get, so trying to make a rule is unwise.

On the subject of gingers, the Romans were in awe of how largely red headed the people of Caledonia were. Oddly, every Italian girl I have met in England has had a thing for freckles and ginger hair. It goes to show that what is rare is often found beautiful and exotic away from it´s origin. With that, a lot of Jewish people are and were historically red haired which may have originated in a similar way to my middle eastern friends red haired children. Middle eastern plus lighter skinned admixture perhaps makes red hair, Shakespeare often portrayed Jewish characters with red wigs. The proudest man I ever met was a Pakistani man with a red moustache, he explained to me it made him incredibly popular back home. What is a disadvantage in some cultures is something to be proud of for others.
 

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