It seems that with only a few thousand surviving the eurption that we are more closly related to each other than was previously thought. Our differences are little more than skin deep. If this eruption never had occured, then maybe their would be a real differences between the various races of mankind rather than the ones we like to make up using dodgy science.Stanley Ambrose, an anthropologist at the University of Illinois, suggested in 1998 that Rampino's work might explain a curious bottleneck in human evolution: The blueprints of life for all humans -- DNA -- are remarkably similar given that our species branched off from the rest of the primate family tree a few million years ago.
Ambrose has said early humans were perhaps pushed to the edge of extinction after the Toba eruption -- around the same time folks got serious about art and tool making. Perhaps only a few thousand survived. Humans today would all be descended from these few, and in terms of the genetic code, not a whole lot would change in 74,000 years.
Actually, this is no news. IIRC, the separation of caucasoid & mongoloid race is put to around 40,000 years ago, much later than this volcanic eruption.Mycernius said:It seems that with only a few thousand surviving the eurption that we are more closly related to each other than was previously thought. Our differences are little more than skin deep. If this eruption never had occured, then maybe their would be a real differences between the various races of mankind rather than the ones we like to make up using dodgy science.
bossel said:Quote:
"...The bottleneck hypothesis offers an explanation for why human exhibit so little genetic variation, yet superficially appear diverse. It also affords an explanation for the apparent recent coalescence of mtDNA and African origins."
Nothing is settled yet.
Mycernius said:It seems that with only a few thousand surviving the eurption that we are more closly related to each other than was previously thought. Our differences are little more than skin deep. If this eruption never had occured, then maybe their would be a real differences between the various races of mankind rather than the ones we like to make up using dodgy science.
You are tempting me, but I'd just say I will go along the lines of scientific research rather than myth. I'd prefer that this didn't become a science verses religion thread.Pararousia said:Or maybe 10,000 years ago, Noah and his family continued the human race after a world wide castrotophe. Just as possible as the above. ;oD
Sorry, but I still don't see which importance should be there? Importance is always relative.sabro said:How important can Race be as a "scientific" concept if it is only based on superficial differences?
I was referring to the origin of homo sapiens & its races, not the existence of races. They are a simple fact of life, only the details are open to definition.Nothing is settled yet- on this point I agree.
Possible, yeah, but highly improbable. What Mycernius described has a much greater probability.Pararousia said:Or maybe 10,000 years ago, Noah and his family continued the human race after a world wide castrotophe. Just as possible as the above. ;oD
bossel said:Sorry, but I still don't see which importance should be there? Importance is always relative.
I was referring to the origin of homo sapiens & its races, not the existence of races. They are a simple fact of life, only the details are open to definition.
Yep, because you seem to expect some social/philosophical meaning, but you never clearly state what you expect, although I repeatedly asked.sabro said:You keep tripping over significance, meaning and now importance.
A lot. For significance, meaning & importance are always relative. Race has a certain significance to understand & to categorise homo sapiens, it has absolutely no significance for my dinner.What kind of scientific concept is race if it is insignificant, meaningless and unimportant? Are there many scientific concepts that lack significance, meaning and importance?
Nope. I'm not an elitist. That someone belonging to some intellectual elite (what a crappy concept, pretty much like racism) doesn't accept a certain terminology does not mean that I have to subscribe to that very same opinion. Furthermore, those working in the field (eg. biologists) generally do not have a problem with the concept of race, but with the related terminology (due to political pressure from the PC faction).When people with bigger brains then mine and yours are arguing over its very existence and not just details and definition, I think we can say it is far from a fact.
So what?People divide themselves into Races for all kinds of reasons that are entirely unscientific.
That doesn't mean much. You obviously have no contact to biologists. & AFAIK in the US the crappy PC faction is busy to eradicate even these -oid terms.Different people draw different lines, and almost no one I know uses seventeenth century European terms "caucasoid, negroid, and mongoloid"
You know 17th century Europeans personally?(Except possibly 17th century europeans.)
Because I am European. Chinese et al. may very well use their own terminology. I can't really see your point here.If we are going to use race as some deliminator, why not use a non-European such as the Chinese, Japanese, Dinka, Somoan or Navajo system?
Why antiquated? Genetics is a rather recent development & can very well be applied to the systematics.Is there some reason why the antiquated European system is superior to any of the other 17th century systems?
Don't know. At least our PC faction is not (yet) quite as fascistic in its attempts to dictate science what it should do.Maybe you europeans just have sharper eyes?
Finally, it is affirmatively argued that the close genetic similarities of the entire human race reflect linkages between people, an ancient history of population connections and mate exchanges, or, in other words, gene exchange.
Could you rephrase that in a way I can understand? I never heard of "la la" relativism.sabro said:The science community as I understand it always argues against the "la la" relativism that goes against the systematic reason, dialectics and materialism that is at the core of all science.
Then now you agree with the concept of race? There is valid, reliable DNA research which can be used to distinguish members of differing races with reproducable results.There is a consistent method to science, a validity, reliability and ability to reproduce results.
Since we don't really know why gravity exists or what it exactly is, what is the definite meaning? The scientifical concept of gravity also has no importance for my dinner. I'd recognise that my slice of bread falls to the ground without any scientific background.Gravity is a significant, important concept with a definite meaning.
Yes, I see that. The faster I eat, the older I get. Or did I get that wrong? :ramen:Relativity- very important.
Atomic theory: -yes, obviously without this theory I wouldn't be able to put butter on my bread (BTW, since you talked about antiquated concepts, this one is quite old)The atomic theory, laws of thermodynamics, evolution, the carbon cycle and global warming are all significant, important and have a distict meaning.
You weren't very clear before. You kept on talking about some alleged meaning that should be there, even after (IIRC) I already stated that the meaning is relative. It's relevant for certain areas of biological/medical/etc. research, but else?And I have not asked for any social/philosophical meaning- just for a basic pedestrian run of the mill daily use type meaning. When have I ever cared about philosophy?
I'm not in the US, but what I read about this is that your funding may be cancelled if you don't publish according to certain political standards.Who is this PC faction and how do they exert pressure?
Publishers obviously do. Certain faculties probably do, too.Who cares if anything or anyone is politically correct?
Which science are they involved in?Look at Rush Limbaugh, Howard Stern and all the other talk jockies. If they went PC they'd be off the air.
Nice example, esp. since the authors had great trouble because of this. Pictured as racists by the PC faction, IIRC, they even got bomb threats. How politically correct!Books like the Bell Curve sell millions of copies on the basis that they offend many.
Is it? There are some 112 different atoms. Didn't you say something about when the number of differentiation is 60 it becomes meaningless? What's more, there is even differentiation in one element, the atom may have varying numbers of neutrons.An atom an atom.
"universally agreed upon by the majority" sounds interesting. Which probably makes UG a non-scientific concept as well.the use of a pre-scientific taxonomy to classify homo sapiens that is not universally agreed upon by the majority of people in the field lacks meaning.
Even if that were true, so what? How many Persians are biologists?Persians [...] don't consider themselves either mongoloid or caucasoid.
For an English major, this is a quite poor argumentation. How many scientific terms are widely understood in the general population? Are all those not understood by an arbitrarily asked housewife invalid?For a term to have meaning it must have a shared denotation (and connotation) for both the sender and reciever. Race seems to be lacking in this parameter.
Outsiders? Then the Europeans who did the classification were neither caucasoid, negroid, mongoloid or altschicht? Were they ETs?I'm fairly certain that every isolated population with sufficient language found a good way of classifying outsiders like this, but is that science?
Nope, it's language. I'm German talking English to you, hence I use the English & where the English is unknown German terminology. I could use the Chinese one, but I doubt you would understand that.You pick the eurpean terminology because you are european? Is that science?
It is quite obvious that you don't want to understand. Appearance is only a minor marker of race.if it is merely a sorting by superficial appearance.
Why should eg. Chinese adopt English terminology? They sometimes do, but to force them is quite imperialist.if few can agree on the terminology
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