African tribe populated rest of the world

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/scienceandtechnology/science/sciencenews/5299351/African-tribe-populated-rest-of-the-world.html

The entire human race outside Africa owes its existence to the survival of a single tribe of around 200 people who crossed the Red Sea 70,000 years ago, scientists have discovered.

Research by geneticists and archaeologists has allowed them to trace the origins of modern homo sapiens back to a single group of people who managed to cross from the Horn of Africa and into Arabia. From there they went on to colonise the rest of the world.

Genetic analysis of modern day human populations in Europe, Asia, Australia, North America and South America have revealed that they are all descended from these common ancestors.

It is thought that changes in the climate between 90,000 and 70,000 years ago caused sea levels to drop dramatically and allowed the crossing of the Red Sea to take place.

The findings are to be revealed in a new BBC Two documentary series, The Incredible Human Journey, that traces the prehistoric origins of the human species.

Dr Peter Forster, a senior lecturer in archaeogenetics at Anglia Ruskin University in Cambridge who carried out some of the genetic work, said: "The founder populations cannot have been very big. We are talking about just a few hundred individuals."

I saw something similar a few years back that featured an African tribe from that area. I'm wondering if this is the conclusion of the same study. What I saw was on the National Geographic Channel in 2005.

Last month or two, I think. It was in the news just last week. That one was interesting; they think they pegged down the location where modern homo sapiens evolved. No idea if it was the same one as this one (or part of it), but...

I can't remember who it was, but they studied DNA from all over the world, and established migration patterns. The African tribe they showed had facial features that looked more Asian than African. It was a similar collaboration of genetics and archeology.

http://www.bradshawfoundation.com/stephenoppenheimer/

You are thinking of Stephen Oppenheimer whose research established the irrefutable fact that we are all descended from an original race in Africa - his work indicated there were several tribes from the original race which left Africa and populated the world. It was not just one but many according to Oppenheimer. What upsets many about the research is that we descended from Africans. But the evidence is irrefutable. There were previous studies into pigmentation. Our skin lightened as we moved away from the equator. Which means darker skinned indigenous tribes in northern and southern latitude regions, the Eskimos in particular, migrated there in "recent" history. Eventually their genetics will "lighten" the skin. Which raises the question of when "Caucasian" peoples first appeared and where they first appeared.

It is all very fascinating. One thing is for sure. God didn't create the world in seven days 6,000 years ago. More than likely it was at least 6,000,000 years ago.

Adding to the mystery is the element of plate tectonics. There may have been tribes that merely migrated as the land migrated. Millions of years ago. The original race in Africa may have in fact been the descendants of a previous race of which we have found no evidence.

The human-origins field is pretty chummy in a lot of ways. Forster basically validated much of Oppenheimer's work and a at least a few of his speculations.

As for plate tectonics, it's my understanding that humans evolved in the area we know of as the Great African Rift Valley, which is a fairly new feature, and is expanding fairly rapidly. But I had no idea it was moving as fast as you described.

--d!

No argument there!!!!

Not to sound racist or anything.

And probably not the original migrants either. Moving far enough north to where sum exposure and vitamin D were issues probably resulted in lightening skin over time.

And we weren't really colonizing in the 19th Century- we were reclaiming our ancestral homelands.

I feel so much better about that now.

Indian-Native American tribes? Were they not sea farers?

According to this theory, no one is indigenous to anyplace other than Africa, which fits nicely with some political philosophies, almost conveniently.

I think the whole thing defies common sense. I also think that had the Leakey family lived in China, everyone would now be certain that human life originated in China. But what I find fascinating is that most of the people of the world have ancient beliefs which maintain that they have always lived where they are. I think that there is only one explanation for that- human civilization originates at the top of the world. If the Arctic was once a collection of balmy islands on a warm sea, then everyone would move down slowly as their number increased. They would adapt to climate changes. But mostly, because they would never have a great crossing event, then they would believe themselves to have always lived where they live.

BTW- do any of the ancient American religions feature a crossing story? Do any of the folk histories of the Inca or the Maya or Amazon tribes tell about their 'true' origin as scientists currently believe? I'm not aware of it. As I understand it, they all have either "always been here" or "god put us here".

As for the DNA 'proof' that we all originate in Africa, I don't see why the same construct wouldn't work if we all originated in China but the core tribe moved to Africa or something like that. The reason I focus on China is because the Chinese, in my opinion, are the most likely original race. They appear to have all the genes necessary to produce three major races as we know them and the dozens of races which humans actually fall into. I can't see how you can take a tribe of pitch black Ethiopians and breed them for centuries and ever get a Swede or a Celt or a Han or a Mandarin. But it isn't difficult to imagine that you could take a Han or a Mandarin and breed them lighter or darker.

And also sounds a little ignorant of scientific fact. I guess we all originated in the Aryan region of the Himalayas and migrated to the Mediterranean and then throughout Europe and then everyone else of course was just born in the jungle which is why they are still there?

This is not theory. The DNA and archeological evidence all point to "Adam and Eve" having either been cast from the garden or having crawled up from the river bank in Africa. Ancient Africa. An Africa that existed millions of years ago.

We have a tendency, and scientists and academics are as guilty of this as anyone, to take our present understanding, ie "evidence all point" if you will, and regard it as final. Yet, one new discovery can change our view of just about everything. When that happens, there are people who say, "Wow, we are really going to have to examine everything we believed to be true." Others say, "I can shove this square peg into the existing round hole."

I'm really big on India and China. I find them fascinating. I would imagine that if you could depopulate the places which have been under continuous civilization for as long as even folk history would have it, if you dug deep you would find all sorts of things which would change how we perceive the "origin" of mankind and civilization.

Let's look at the myth of the Tower of Babel in terms of anthropological and archealogical evidence. Around 6,000 years ago, give or take 1,000 years here or there, several civilizations just suddenly appeared. Out of nowhere apparently although each has a creation myth.

What they all share, all these ancient civilizations, is the time frame measured by their calendars. Which is belied by anthropological and archeaologial evidence. And more recently by DNA evidence. All of which again irrefutably has established that we originated as one race in Africa. Really shakes up the foundations of "Western" society although it also shakes up the foundations of "Eastern" society which it turns out share racist attitudes towards the forgotten continent as Africa is often referred to. Forgotten. As in "out of sight, out of mind."

There is also the question of how they all shared similar knowledge of agriculture and architecture and mathematics and astronomy - all the knowledge of "modern civilization."

So where did they obtain the knowledge? Read the story of the Tower of Babel. And keep in mind it is myth.

I like intervention theories/myths.

The level of scientific illiteracy that I encounter on this board boggles my mind sometimes.

What a morAn...

Maybe a little off the topic, but not really since the OP article mentioned homo sapiens.... When do you suppose the guy in your picture will start calling for that to be changed to hetero sapiens?

The Shawnee creation myth is similar to other Algonquin creation myths in maintaining that the people who are now the Shawnees originated from a different world- an island balanced on the back of a giant turtle-and traveled to this one. According to Shawnee myth, when the first people were on the island, they could see nothing but water, which they did not know how to cross. They prayed for aid and were miraculously transported across the water. The Shawnees are the only Alonguin tribe whose creation story includes the passage of their ancestors over the sea, and for many years they held an annual sacrifice in thanks of the safe arrival of their ancestors to this country.

http://www.geocities.com/SouthBeach/Cove/8286/myth1.html

Could the "miracle" have been a gigantic tectonic shift?

Your logic is confusing. Further, it seems you're throwing away the evidence because you love the Chinese. Believe whatever you want, but if you are receptive to understanding the science behind man's origins, I suggest that you watch Spencer Wells The Journey of Man. It aired on PBS a few years ago. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Journey_of_Man:_A_Genetic_Odyssey.

Here's an excerpt from the reference above.

"The earliest groups of humans are believed to find their present-day descendants among the San people, a group that is now found in western southern Africa. The San are smaller than the Bantu. They have lighter skins, more tightly curled hair, and they share the epicanthal fold with the people of East Asia, such as the Chinese and Japanese."
Part 1 of 13
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OV6A8oGtPc4

As for your lack of understanding variant skin coloring, I suggest
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_skin_color#Genetics_of_skin_color_variation

Why are slanted eyes so common to the East? Why Anglo properties to the North? Why tanned skinned natives in the Americas? Was it all selective process through tribal warfare?

the effects of various migration patterns. I've seen some speculation that the slanted eyes evolved in Siberia in response to the snow glare.

No reason why you should expect all humans everywhere to look the same.

Vitamin D is a vitamin that is necessary for life, but is not obtained mainly through food.

The body manufactures vitamin D in the skin through exposure to sunlight, and specifically ultra violet (uv) rays. The further north you go, the less vitamin D you can make. Vitamin D is routinely added to milk in North America because it is not sunny enough for many kinds of people to reliably produce enough vitamin d.

Melanin, the brown pigment that makes dark skinned people brown, protects people in the tropics from getting skin cancer, so it is very adaptive there. (In Africa, albinos have shortened lifespans and lots of medical problems.)

But melanin interferes with vitamin D production by filtering harmful uv rays. So the further people moved north, the more the balance between skin protection and vitamin D production shifted toward light skin. When that African tribe moved north, over many generations the lightest were selected by the environment for survival as the darker ones died earlier from vitamin d deficiency. Similarly in the tropics, darker people were selected for survival as lighter people died of skin cancers.

The scientist actually journeyed and follow the DNA path from Africa to Asia, through Russia and down to the southwest U.S. There was a man in Afghanistan who had a genetic connection to where the path split and some went west and others went east. Interesting show, but I cannot remember the title.

sounds like what you are talking about.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6258753633440143133

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Journey_of_Man:_A_Genetic_Odyssey.

Part 1 of 13
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OV6A8oGtPc4

since I do not have cable. It was narrated by the actual scientist who had done the genetic testing and he would travel the route and stay with the people along the way including a small group in the frozen lands of Siberia and ending up with some native Americans in SW U.S.

according to Battlestar Galactica's final episode in the series.

;)

Grace Park played the Cylon that became our Eve in the Battlestar Galactica.

Who wouldn't want an ancestor like that?

I was reading a book about Melungeons, more specifically a woman's search to find out what the "family secret" was. In the process she discovers that a lot of people aren't what they think they are, while others are. She also takes a good shot at knowitall scientists, who deal with nonconforming information by simply declaring it to be nonconforming while maintaining that everything else they believe is as sound as it would be absent the nonconforming information.