Biowatch wrote:1. Two people from the same race are more genetically similar to each other than to someone from another race. http://genomebiology.com/2002/3/7/comment/2007

No, since that study refers to low-density sampling principal component analysis (PCA). It has been shown earlier in this thread that "race" (i.e. apparent genetic clustering) is really just an artifact of low sampling density. One you use high-density sampling, these so called "races" are not discernible.

Moridin wrote:Not so fast!

Eriksson, Anders, & Manica, Andrea. (2012). Effect of ancient population structure on the degree of polymorphism shared between modern human populations and ancient hominins. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1200567109

Already debunked. The degree of chromosome shuffling proves that the mixing occurred far too recently to be a result of ancient population structure. Basically the PNAS paper was current two years ago, but is outdated now due to new discoveries.

http://blogs.nature.com/news/2012/08/ne ... ation.html

Not so, say Reich and Pääbo in their ArXiv paper, which reports a nifty new method for determining when two populations interbred. It’s based on the fact that our maternal and paternal chromosomes reshuffle after each generation. This mixing makes the contiguous chunks smaller with each generation. Reich and his colleague Sriram Sankararaman take advantage of this feature to conclude that humans and Neanderthals interbred between 37,000 and 86,000 years ago, and probably more like 47,000–65,000 years ago.

... The PNAS paper questioning the Neanderthal admixture addresses issues swirling around two years ago, but not Reich and Slatkin’s latest work. “It’s been an issue for several years. They were right to work on this,” says Reich. But now, “it’s kind of an obsolete paper,” he says.

The idea that all human ancestors came out of Africa within the last 200,000 years is a myth based on paying attention only to mitochondrial DNA and ignoring autosomal DNA. Neanderthals and Denisovans are among the ancestors of modern humans, and likely Asian Homo Erectus is as well.

Warren Dew wrote:The idea that all human ancestors came out of Africa within the last 200,000 years is a myth based on paying attention only to mitochondrial DNA and ignoring autosomal DNA. Neanderthals and Denisovans are among the ancestors of modern humans, and likely Asian Homo Erectus is as well.

I agree, but this doesn't contradict the fact that most of the diversity of the non-africans genome is a subset of African genetic diversity.

Like John Hawks I think about 10% (maximum 15%, minimum 5%) of non-African ancestry (Neanderthals, Denisova, Asian Homo erectus etc.) in Eurasia.

Tiel wrote:

Warren Dew wrote:The idea that all human ancestors came out of Africa within the last 200,000 years is a myth based on paying attention only to mitochondrial DNA and ignoring autosomal DNA. Neanderthals and Denisovans are among the ancestors of modern humans, and likely Asian Homo Erectus is as well.

I agree, but this doesn't contradict the fact that most of the diversity of the non-africans genome is a subset of African genetic diversity.

It certainly contradicts the claim that all of the nonafrican diversity was a subset of African diversity, which was the original claim. Something that's only mostly a subset is not a subset.

Like John Hawks I think about 10% (maximum 15%, minimum 5%) of non-African ancestry (Neanderthals, Denisova, Asian Homo erectus etc.) in Eurasia.

I think it's likely a little higher than that. Hammer's analysis of the modern genome, done before we had any ancient DNA test results, suggested slightly less than 5% ancient European ancestry and about 20% ancient Asian ancestry. He was right on the European ancestry, so I think he's probably right on the Asian ancestry as well - for a total of 25% non-recent-african ancestry for nonafricans, plus or minus 10 or 15 percent. Still a minority, of course.

Warren Dew wrote:It certainly contradicts the claim that all of the nonafrican diversity was a subset of African diversity, which was the original claim. Something that's only mostly a subset is not a subset.

But it's still mostly a subset and so even with interbreeding we still have a kind of population remplacement.

Warren Dew wrote:II think it's likely a little higher than that. Hammer's analysis of the modern genome, done before we had any ancient DNA test results, suggested slightly less than 5% ancient European ancestry and about 20% ancient Asian ancestry. He was right on the European ancestry, so I think he's probably right on the Asian ancestry as well - for a total of 25% non-recent-african ancestry for nonafricans, plus or minus 10 or 15 percent. Still a minority, of course.

Well Hammer's theory is certainly interesting but I think we should be cautious about the numbers considering (as you say here) the unequal distribution of "archaic diversity" across Eurasia.

Furthermore we can't discard the possible impact of ancien african population structure as mentioned previously by Moridin. As Dienekes noted both ancien african population structure and archaic admixture probably played a role in what we are currently observing. So perhaps we really have 20% of "archaic ancestry" in some asian populations, but I think only in some relatively small "portions" of the various asian populations, I think for most of them we still have about 10% of archaïc ancestry.

Naturally I don't claim to be right that's just my bet!

Can anyone imagine what homo sapien sapiens will look like in say, a couple millennium ? The world really is a global village.

angelo wrote:Can anyone imagine what homo sapien sapiens will look like in say, a couple millennium ? The world really is a global village.

Here's the 2 possibilities ... take your pick:


OR:

Bottom pic is more likely. Artificial body parts are just around the corner so to speak.

angelo wrote:Bottom pic is more likely. Artificial body parts are just around the corner so to speak.

However, near future events may well lead us down this path:

We are still evolving, no telling what homo sapiens sapien will look like in a million years if he doesn't become extinct long before then which is the more likely scenario. But I still think the changes may be small as the human body is quite adequate the way it is, but I can imagine a homo something thinking the same thing a 100.000 years ago.I think race will no longer be valid in less than 50.000 years as the world gets smaller and smaller.

I think you're right Angelo. The lines are becoming more and more blurred as we continue to mix our genetic material away from our natural ancestral environments.

Agrippina wrote:I think you're right Angelo. The lines are becoming more and more blurred as we continue to mix our genetic material away from our natural ancestral environments.

No doubt at all. Actually my 50.000 years is a wild exaggeration. I think in perhaps another three or four generations it will become much more noticeable especially in multicultural societies that we all from the same species regardless of colour.

angelo wrote:

Agrippina wrote:I think you're right Angelo. The lines are becoming more and more blurred as we continue to mix our genetic material away from our natural ancestral environments.

No doubt at all. Actually my 50.000 years is a wild exaggeration. I think in perhaps another three or four generations it will become much more noticeable especially in multicultural societies that we all from the same species regardless of colour.

You don't think it's noticeable now?

Warren Dew wrote:

angelo wrote:

Agrippina wrote:I think you're right Angelo. The lines are becoming more and more blurred as we continue to mix our genetic material away from our natural ancestral environments.

No doubt at all. Actually my 50.000 years is a wild exaggeration. I think in perhaps another three or four generations it will become much more noticeable especially in multicultural societies that we all from the same species regardless of colour.

You don't think it's noticeable now?

Some people appear not to notice. There was a case of a black African woman been abused and called a "black bitch" and told to go back where she came from in a crowded bus here that made the news just this week.

Warren Dew wrote:

angelo wrote:No doubt at all. Actually my 50.000 years is a wild exaggeration. I think in perhaps another three or four generations it will become much more noticeable especially in multicultural societies that we all from the same species regardless of colour.

You don't think it's noticeable now?

For sure. It's noticeable right here; 4th image tending to 5th

^^^We are heading that way aren't we!!

Galaxian wrote:

angelo wrote:Bottom pic is more likely. Artificial body parts are just around the corner so to speak.

However, near future events may well lead us down this path:

Too good

The mind of this extraordinary man has speculated that mankind has about another century to find another earth otherwise it will become extinct.

I could believe that.

http://marcbrecy.perso.neuf.fr/history.html