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| Are Caucasians decendents of Arabs ?
Posted: 5/20/2008 12:26:28 AM | | Genetically there is actually less variation in humans then there is in many other species. The latest evidence is that modern "races" evolved relatively late in our evolution, starting around 70,000 years ago. There is strong evidence there was a genetic bottleneck around this time where there were as few as 3,000 individuals alive at one time. We are all obviously descendants of that group of people. The most likely cause of this was a huge volcanic eruption in Indonesia(similar to the one in Yellowstone) that caused a worldwide climate cooling that brought humanity to the brink of extinction. I would have hated to be one of those people back then. My dad was in the air force and we lived in the Philippines when Pinatubo erupted and that was bad enough. | |
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| Are Caucasians decendents of Arabs ?
Posted: 5/22/2008 10:21:49 AM | Check out the Genographic Project if you want the latest scientific information on this. National Geographic has a great interactive page:
https://www3.nationalgeographic.com/genographic/ | |
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| Are Caucasians decendents of Arabs ?
Posted: 5/22/2008 11:40:21 AM | ThomasRH: take the 3000 individuals alive at the time with a grain of salt. There is no way that figure could be even remotely estimated as being accurate. Secondly, even a cataclysmic eruption in indonesia would not threaten the survivability of the species. Its happened many times before, and at no time was the species on the brink of extinction.
You're right about the modern evolution of the phenotypes, but I don't see how a bottleneck would be possible. Could you elaborate further - I would like to learn more about it. | |
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| Are Caucasians decendents of Arabs ?
Posted: 5/22/2008 3:25:03 PM |
Secondly, even a cataclysmic eruption in indonesia would not threaten the survivability of the species. Its happened many times before, and at no time was the species on the brink of extinction.
This particular eruption was hundreds of times larger in terms of volume of ash and gases released into the atmosphere, than any other eruption in human history. The effect it had on the earth was similar to a nuclear winter or large asteroid collision would be. A severe climate change and failure of photosynthesis due to blocking out the sun would have a profound impact on the human population at the time. | |
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| Are Caucasians decendents of Arabs ?
Posted: 5/23/2008 6:19:53 AM | Okay - you must be referring to the mount toba explosion, and yes it did have a significant global impact. But the only genetic bottleneck that has been accepted by scholars is that of the 2 million mark, not something that happened 75,000 years ago (although this could change as more information becomes available).
Scientists are divided as to the extent that the sapien population was affected by it in comparison to that of the erectus population, impact of migration, and that some parts of the world were relatively unaffected. Don't forget even if half the pop was wiped out, we would survive | |
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| Are Caucasians decendents of Arabs ?
Posted: 6/26/2008 2:13:54 AM | Yes. This month's Scientific America has an article on this. They are taking DNA samples from as many people around the world as they can and they have created a DNA map.
Basically Homo Sapiens came from Central/Eastern Africa right above Lake Victoria. Around 50,000 yrs ago they migrated rather quickly up and across the Middle East along the coast, India, Phillipines, the coast of China, Siberia and then the West coast of N America.
Then from 50,000 to 10,000 years ago they migrated everywhere else. Around 35,000 people from the Middle East crossed directly west into Europe. But Europeans are actually called Indo/Europeans and have been mixed greatly with Persians, Greeks, Germans, Jews, Byzantines, Arabs, Viking's ect. | |
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| Are Caucasians decendents of Arabs ?
Posted: 6/27/2008 1:11:47 PM | Arabic is a LANGUAGE. Asking if caucasians are decendents of Arabs is like asking if caucasians are the decendents of the Hebrew (also a language). So the question being asked seems to be, are caucasians the decendents of Arab-speaking peoples? I would argue that they are not simply because the Arabic language is not that old and it would require thousands of years of isolation for the phenotypic traits seen in caucasians to develop.
Are caucasians the decendents of dark-skinned African people that probably spoke a language that was NOT Arabic? I would argue in favor of this view. However, the significance of this is usually greatly exaggerated by people that believe it. Your friend was probably trying to argue what I'm saying right now, but made the mistake of believing that any person from the middle eastern region could appropriately be called Arabic; this is not the case. | |
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NERO1
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Joined: 3/8/2008
Msg: 33 | |
| Are Caucasians decendents of Arabs ?
Posted: 6/27/2008 9:06:32 PM | Not descendants of Arabs at all, no. Arabs are Caucasoid / Caucasian peoples themselves; they are Semitics (linguistic and cultural designation), who are a branch of the peoples who came out of Africa and settled in the deserts of the Middle East.
Technically speaking, all modern humans are the descendants of humans who would actually likely have looked more like black Africans, really. Although perhaps not identical to the way black central Africans look today; perhaps more like some of the aboriginal islanders look in the South Pacific for example. Some anthropologists have also said the KhoiSan bushmen of southern Africa are a good guess at a remaining modern-day people who likely resemble something like the earliest humans in Africa might have looked.
Other changes in the human face and figure as we know it today evolved over millennia spent in other locales with radically different environments from the original African homeland. The paler skin (ranging from tan and olive to very very pale white) and the different hair types, etc, all evolved as people moved north, the human eye became 'slanted' in the far East for example, even skull shapes eventually changed with time (so that today scientists can often tell whether someone was Caucasian, Negroid , or Mongoloid just by their skulls).
If you look at some of the aboriginal peoples of New Guinea for instance, our earliest human ancestors may have been something like this. The KhoiSan Bushmen are I believe the oldest people still in existence in the world.
KhoiSan Bushmen: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c246fZ-7z1w
Kombai people, New Guinea: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qaemxNIg9UE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3DeVovHw1RY | |
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| Are Caucasians decendents of Arabs ?
Posted: 6/27/2008 9:40:18 PM | From what I have read, the reason skin color changed was due to how far north/south you were. When you go closer to the poles, you got less sunlight which meant you got less vitaman D, so peoples complexion got lighter to allow the body to absorb more sunlight. Not really sure about red heads, they are compared to every one else very rare, something like only 5% of the world population.
To the original question, we are probably decended from arabs, but they are probably decended from africans.
Also I'm not causcasion/white, I am northern european american. If everyone else gets to be something american, why can't I. | |
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| Are Caucasians decendents of Arabs ?
Posted: 6/27/2008 9:58:08 PM | Instead of saying Arabs, I am going to take the meaning as all relavant Middle Easterners. Homo sapiens were in Europe at least 40,000 years ago. At this time homo sapiens were also in the middle East. Modern day Caucasions and middle easterners defitnetly share genestic traits from both of these ancient races due to migrations from thier nomadic life styles over 1000's of years.
One thing is certain, is that Humans began as a black race. Skin color is directly linked to Latitude on the Earth. It has to do with Vitimin D. We get our Vitimin D from the sun reacting with our skin. Too much Vitimin D can kill you and also too little. Since people living in africa get exposed to more harsher sun, thier skin is black wich helps reduce the vitimin D reaction from the sun, so keeping thier vitimin D levels at normal. Likewise for people living in the North. Thier skin is white because they get less Sun exposure. The white Skin allows for a increased Vitimin D reaction, thus keeping thier vitimin D levels at normal. As you move North or South you get a mixture of skin color, wich is appropiate for the average amount of sun exposure. This is why Black People who live in extreme northly areas, suffer from vitimin D deficientcy. This is also why white people Tan when they get too much sun exposure. Science says it takes about 10,000 years for a white race to go completly black if they moved into Africa, or a black race to go white if they moved to Canada. | |
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| Are Caucasians decendents of Arabs ?
Posted: 6/27/2008 11:40:46 PM |
Also I'm not causcasion/white, I am northern european american. If everyone else gets to be something american, why can't I
Wow, finally someone says this! Do you know how many times I have pointed out to people that Black Americans are refered to as "African Americans" While White Americans are RARELY referred to as European Americans (I'm talking TV, media, movies, magazines, etc.)
Seems like a lot of European Americans ignore their European ancestry and simply say "Oh, I'm White American." Before everyone pounces on me, let me say that there is NOTHING bad about doing this. It just seems as if the term White American suggests that they are some how more American than "African Americans" aka Black Americans or "Mexican Americans". Personally, I find the European American term more accurate.
(opens can of worms) | |
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