Out of africa myth debunked in key aspect

[TylerDurden]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3272780/Our-ancestors-left-Africa-CHINA-not-Europe-Fossil-teeth-place-humans-Asia-20-000-years-earlier-thought.html

It seems that, as time goes by, the evidence is shifting further and further back in time, thus proving the multiregional hypothesis.

[cherimoya_kid]

It always dismays me when I see how actively racism is practiced in Europe these days. I mean, I know it's a natural result of tribalism, but I'd have thought the Holocaust would have created more of a cultural taboo against it.

[TylerDurden]

This is of course, rather stupid a remark, and, ironically, an extremely bigoted, intolerant one in and of itself(such as playing the race card rather than providing decent facts to counter the new evidence etc.). And please do not change the subject just because you are  incapable of accepting new scientific evidence. Anyway, as many other reputable  scientists have pointed out ad nauseam, the multiregional hypothesis is not racist at all, and has already been proven in one of its 2 points. The Out of Africa theory has had one of its 2 main theories debunked and the other one is being increasingly challenged by  new scientific evidence like the current link provided. Come to think of it, the Out of Africa theory was always somewhat racist in that it pretended for decades that it was  impossible for humans to have interbred with the Neanderthals, let alone other types.

As regards this particular report, it is of interest for palaeos because up till now some OoA theory scientists have erroneously  claimed that humans somehow  appeared in Africa 200,000 years ago, and then stuck around for another 140,000 years  before finally moving off outside Africa. As soon as ancient hominids became fully bipedal, it would be idiotic to suggest that they would decide to stay on just one continent and not migrate for  countless further  years. Even homo erectus soon migrated outside Africa.

One standard argument made by palaeo newbies is that we humans are all evolutionarily adapted to whatever foods are in Africa or in tropical climates and they used the out of africa theory's claimed dates(re leaving Africa only 60,000 years ago  etc.)  to back up their claims. If as we see, the Out of Africa theory's dates are wrong, then such a claim  becomes unsupportable.

*Hmm, I note that CK used the ridiculous reductio ad hitlerum option
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reductio_ad_Hitlerum
 which people only use when they have lost the argument and cannot think of a suitable counter.*

 Whatever the case, us posting about newly reported  advances in scientific research on the palaeolithic era helps us to learn more about what our hominid ancestors did before the invention  of fire etc. Diet is only one aspect, exercise is another and I suspect there are many other palaeo habits or social customs that would be useful to emulate by comparison to more artificial, unnatural modern methods - well, not all palaeo practices, cannibalism and the like is likely not helpful.

[TylerDurden]

For those interested in the science of it all, it is basically a dispute between phyletic gradualism(in this case the multiregional hypothesis):-https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phyletic_gradualism

and punctuatated equilibrium(as shown by the Out of africa theory):-


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punctuated_equilibrium

[cherimoya_kid]

Geoff, I don't care when human ancestors left Africa. It looks like it probably was maybe 50k or 100k years earlier than previously thought. Mildly interesting at best, as far as I'm concerned. What concerns me is that someone who has already proven himself a racist with comments about immigrants, etc. is so interested in distancing European ancestors from African ones. It's this kind of stuff that Hitler used to justify the Holocaust. I'm not saying you're Hitler, but it's concerning. Inger made an unfortunate and disgusting comment about Jews a couple years ago, and it's just all concerning. Are we going to have to come BACK to Europe to sort your problems out AGAIN? LOL

But seriously, try to learn from your mistakes. I don't feel like getting drafted to fix your problems.

[TylerDurden]

Geoff, I don't care when human ancestors left Africa. It looks like it probably was maybe 50k or 100k years earlier than previously thought. Mildly interesting at best, as far as I'm concerned. What concerns me is that someone who has already proven himself a racist with comments about immigrants, etc. is so interested in distancing European ancestors from African ones. It's this kind of stuff that Hitler used to justify the Holocaust. I'm not saying you're Hitler, but it's concerning. Inger made an unfortunate and disgusting comment about Jews a couple years ago, and it's just all concerning. Are we going to have to come BACK to Europe to sort your problems out AGAIN? LOL

But seriously, try to learn from your mistakes. I don't feel like getting drafted to fix your problems.

Again, bigoted nonsense on your part. All I recall re Inger was that she once mentioned in passing that a previous husband/lover was Jewish. Err "big deal!". This reminds me of a past psychotic incident in New York, many eyars ago,  where a policeman was absurdly convicted of chronic  racial prejudice against blacks , despite him being happily married to a  Negro wife(mainly due to Al-Sharptonesque demonstrations convincing politicians to behave immorally and force a  wrong verdict).


Secondly, the issue re immigrants was irrelevant as regards race,anyway,  especially since many Syrians are white(just look at the photos of  the president of Syria and his wife, if you do not believe me); and the fact that most Middle-Easterners do not even want them either, even if they share the same ethnicity or religion as the immigrants. The point being that you are not per se accusing us of racism, anyway, but, actually,  of political incorrectness, the "r" word just sounds better to you . Political incorrectness is something one should be immensely proud of. Nothing worse than blindly supporting the mistakes of a particular regime.Plus, my comments re immigrants were to the point, they were deliberately violating the EU laws by ripping up their documents and pretending to be Syrians etc., and their behaviour was so blatantly in the form of greed for more cash, it was appalling. Contrast this with Austria's Turkish immigrants whose behaviour is exemplary, by contrast.

Which brings me to another important point. Since, because you lack imagination among other things, you cite Nazism as usual, I suppose maybe if I give an example from Nazism you may get a glimmer of understanding of your  mistakes. During the Nazi period, it was normal for people to designate a whole area of Science as being  "Jewish Science", the idea being that any proponents of such theories would be banned from Universities and accused of political incorrectness of a sort  etc. You, like many Liberals/Socialists, favor many policies of the Nazis,  which is no surprise as Fascism is a form of Socialism, after all.So, for example, I once mentioned on RPF  the cold climate theory which you dismissed out of hand, not because of any evidence, but because you believed that its conclusions meant that whites were more intelligent; in actual fact, if you had bothered to check, the theory's conclusions, it would have led one to believe that Orientals were actually more intelligent. Now, I merely suggested the cold-climate  theory  as a possibility since, like the aquatic ape theory, had made some good plausible points , and discarded it later once I read a few essays on the subject which pointed out numerous flaws in it. The point being that you similiarly deliberately exclude the multiregional hypothesis simply because you foolishly and wrongly designate it out-of-hand as supposed "racist science", not because of any flaws it might have.

As regards the actual generational distance between Africans and Europeans, that is actually irrelevant per se.The multiregional hypothesis is all about evolution advancing slowly(Darwin) and the out of africa theory is all about evolution advancing fast(Gould), THAT is the main issue.Now, Darwin might have fraudulently claimed first discovery of evolutionary principles from Wallace, but, Gould, who is in favour of punctuated equilibrium, has been accused of fraud, and is widely derided as a"philosopher", not a genuine scientist.

My concern re notions of evolution happening at lightning speeds is this, for example:- according to the out of africa theory,Caucasians developed paler skin and blue eyes due to colder climates(or dairy consumption!), all that supposedly happening within a few millenia at most. Yet Orientals have lived in cold Siberian etc. climates(consuming yak milk etc.) for tens/(hundreds?) of millenia without developing such characteristics. Well, maybe it is a mixture of both fast and slow. Anyway, it is all useful data  and Science is Science, it is not "racist" or  anything else, it is just Science.


You are also suffering from delusions re your last 2 sentences. Liberals are the ones not producing way enough children in the US so your ideology will die out. The religious groups in the US such as Mormons/Mormon Fundamentalists/Muslims etc. are the ones having lots of children, so their ideas/convictions will win out, yours will die in the end. As an atheist, I am not too fond of religion, but they are far better than Socialism/Liberalism. I rather like (well, Shia) Islam and Mormon Fundamentalism of the AUB(NOT Warren Jeff's equivalent!), so I do not have to worry.

[JeuneKoq]

There's one thing you said that ticked me particularly.

"Science is Science, it's not racist, or anything else. It's just Science".

Now that is partly, if not mostly incorrect, since Sience (why the capital S? ) is a concept designed by men who are fundamentally subjective, biased and conditioned by their socio-cultural environment. Isn't "Nazi Science" science after all? To them it sure was. Science is all about trusting the researchers to be as objective and unbiased in their observations, experiments, hypothesis etc as possible without being -too- influenced by their personal beliefs, which they sure have, or ulterior motives, which they sure have.

There is only so much science to Science.


Of course I'm not insinuating that "Science" cannot be trusted at all, which is absurd. Only that Science is not absolute in the strict execution of it's principles mostly because of the nature of its maker. So not all science is worth the same.

[TylerDurden]

Of course I'm not insinuating that "Science" cannot be trusted at all, which is absurd. Only that Science is not absolute in the strict execution of it's principles mostly because of the nature of its maker. So not all science is worth the same.

The point is that individual humans or even regimes may make mistakes or even  commit outright fraud here and there or even a lot of the time, but one should judge the scientific papers in their own individual right and not just dismiss them because they contain conclusions that we do not like. Also, by "Science" with a capital "S"(!), I simply mean the general pursuit of knowledge. I mean, individuals and even regimes can be fraudulent at times and there is bias everywhere but, in general, most scientists are just trying to advance knowledge.

Whatever the case, I am glad that the current evidence re Neanderthals has debunked the out of africa notion that neanderthals were just mindless savages. That always looked suspicious to me since I had already read as a child about how complex neanderthal society was.

[JeuneKoq]

The point is that individual humans or even regimes may make mistakes or even  commit outright fraud here and there or even a lot of the time, but one should judge the scientific papers in their own individual right and not just dismiss them because they contain conclusions that we do not like.

Right, still we can be suspicious of scientific papers when we suspect them to contain flaws in their execution or in the conclusion they give, especially if we are somehow able to give a more reasonable alternative conclusion, or can explain why the researcher(s) may have made up such a conclusion in the first place (eg: an archeologist trying to promote tourism in its region, or a lab funded by some company with an axe to grind).

Not saying it's the case with what you posted. Frankly I didn't even read it yet.

Also, by "Science" with a capital "S"(!), I simply mean the general pursuit of knowledge.

That's what I thought.

I just found it funny because generally speaking the other fundamental concept people like to put a capital letter on is God And you often like to remind people: "when you take religion from men, they simply turn to another God".