Charlie Bell wrote:
...
All it takes is one region, somewhere in the world, with negligible
cross-contamination probabilities. If this exists, people in the
middle of it will not be descendants of Genghis Khan, Charlemagne,
or whoever.
One small region that's managed to stay TOTALLY isolated for 10,000
years?
Charlie--
I'm not arguing against a figure of 10,000 years, that's a long time.
Alberto and others were pushing for a much lower figure, around 1000
years, for EVERYONE to share ancestry from some person who lived then.
...
limits). Or do you really think you had 2,147,483.648 *individual*
ancestors 30 generations ago? No, of course not - family trees
converge as well as diverge.
Yes, I've got that point. In one big homogeneous population, you
don't have to go back that far before everyone has exactly the same
ancestors. My point is that until quite recently, the World was
NOT an homogeneous population.
Third, totally isolated populations tend
to die out.
You mean because of genetic drift, or what? I imagine that
would take awhile. Couldn't a population of a few hundred
be isolated for over 1000 years and survive? (Again, I'm
not taking issue with the general argument. I just feel that
1000 or 2000 years is too small a number.)
...............................................................
Here's a candidate group with "low cross-contamination probability",
the native inhabitants of North Sentinel Island in the Bay of Bengal.
Here's a quote, from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentinelese
The Sentinelese remain skeptical and generally hostile to any
approaches from outsiders.
In 2006, Sentinelese archers killed two fishermen who were fishing
illegally within range of the island, and drove off the helicopter
that was sent to retrieve their bodies with a hail of arrows.
Living on a worthless island and shooting arrows at everyone
who approaches seems to reduce the likelihood of interbreeding
with outsiders. : )
They are probably not the best example, since they have been
directly exposed to outsiders from the sea for ages. But I
like their style, and their case is well known.
Their are other candidate groups. Google "uncontacted peoples".
---David
Hail of arrows Maru
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