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I missed the relevant post at Dienekes and I'm not subscribed to the relevant magazine. Hence I'm posting on this matter somewhat late.
Whatever the case, a new subhaplogroup of Y-DNA R1b has been finally defined including all or most of African R1b1*. The defining SNP has been named V88. This lineage is found specially at the Nile area (more common in Sudan than Egypt and more in Upper Egypt than Lower Egypt) and in the Chad basin (Chadic speakers).
The authors conjecture an age of 9200-5600 BP for the haplogroup but I'd say that it should be rather from c. 16,000 BP, when rock art in the style of Europe and Anatolia (other regions high in R1b) is found in Upper Egypt. As always, molecular clock age estimates should be taken with extreme caution if not total disregard: it's much closer to pseudoscientific speculation than to empirical science.
Fluvio Cruciani et al. Human Y chromosome haplogroup R-V88: a paternal genetic record of early mid Holocene trans-Saharan connections and the spread of Chadic languages. European Journal of Human Genetics 2010. Behind a paywall.
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Update (Jan 13):
I finally put my hands on the paper (thanks to Vincent) and is quite curious. Anyhow it is worth mentioning first of all that the new phylogeny has already been added to ISOGG.
Second, it is also worth mentioning that this paper does not deal with Sudanese R1b1*, which is probably part of the new haplogroup but still awaiting confirmation.
Third, it is most interesting that, while the new R1b1a (V88) is most frequent in Central Africa (and secondarily North Africa, specially among Siwa Berbers, Egypt), two out of four basal sublineages are exclusively found in Southern Europe.
In detail:
Whatever the case, a new subhaplogroup of Y-DNA R1b has been finally defined including all or most of African R1b1*. The defining SNP has been named V88. This lineage is found specially at the Nile area (more common in Sudan than Egypt and more in Upper Egypt than Lower Egypt) and in the Chad basin (Chadic speakers).
The authors conjecture an age of 9200-5600 BP for the haplogroup but I'd say that it should be rather from c. 16,000 BP, when rock art in the style of Europe and Anatolia (other regions high in R1b) is found in Upper Egypt. As always, molecular clock age estimates should be taken with extreme caution if not total disregard: it's much closer to pseudoscientific speculation than to empirical science.
Fluvio Cruciani et al. Human Y chromosome haplogroup R-V88: a paternal genetic record of early mid Holocene trans-Saharan connections and the spread of Chadic languages. European Journal of Human Genetics 2010. Behind a paywall.
___________
Update (Jan 13):
I finally put my hands on the paper (thanks to Vincent) and is quite curious. Anyhow it is worth mentioning first of all that the new phylogeny has already been added to ISOGG.
Second, it is also worth mentioning that this paper does not deal with Sudanese R1b1*, which is probably part of the new haplogroup but still awaiting confirmation.
Third, it is most interesting that, while the new R1b1a (V88) is most frequent in Central Africa (and secondarily North Africa, specially among Siwa Berbers, Egypt), two out of four basal sublineages are exclusively found in Southern Europe.
In detail:
- R1b1a* (V88) is common in Central Africa (0-95.5% depending on the ethnicity), with some presence in North Africa (0-23.7%, this last among Siwa Berbers) and also found in West Asia and the Balcans at very low levels (0.3 and 0.2% respectively of regional composite samples).
- R1b1a1 (M18), formerly R1b1a, is located in Corsica (0.7%), though is also known (older materials) to exist in Sardinia at high frequencies and, if my memory is correct, SE France as well.
- R1b1a2 (V8) is a private lineage found only in one Tali individual (4.5%, n=22). The Tali are a Niger-Congo (Adamawa) speaking population of North Cameroon that also shows 9.1% (two individuals) with R1b1a*.
- R1b1a3 (V35) is a very small lineage restricted to Italy (two individuals, one belonging to sublineage R1b1a3a-V7), where some R1b1* (P25) was also observed (3/1173).
- R1b1a4 (V69) makes up the largest subhaplogroup of R1b1a and is found with about the same distribution as R1b1a*, that is in Central (0-62.5%) and North Africa (0-4.9%).
Conclusions? Few and cautious. The haplogroup shows a striking distribution in two branches: one in Africa (R1b1a* and R1b1a4 primarily) and the other in southern Europe (R1b1a* at very low levels with R1b1a1 as main subclade almost circumscribed to Sardinia). Based on its European distribution, apparently unrelated to Africa, it should have a timeline dating to at least Neolithic times. It might be older in Africa (see above), though I'd be willing to consider a Neolithic timescale if a consistent archaeological pattern is provided as support. A Nile area origin is very likely for this continent (but see the haplotype structure, with Central African R1b1a* at the very center - yet looks as an artifact because of the many lateral branches leading to R1b1* and other control subclades).
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Adendum (Jan 15):
Ebizur has posted some nice complementary information for this lineage, specifically the M18 subclade, in the comments section. I find it so informative that I can't but copy here:
Haplogroup R1b1a1-M18 has previously been observed in Sardinia and Lebanon.
Peter A. Underhill, Peidong Shen, Alice A. Lin et al. (2000), "Y chromosome sequence variation and the history of human populations," Nature Genetics, Volume 26:
Sardinia
1/22 = 4.5% Haplotype 2(=A3b2-M13/M63/M127)
1/22 = 4.5% Haplotype 32(=E1b1b1c1-M34(xE1b1b1c1a1-M136))
4/22 = 18.2% Haplotype 35(=E1b1b1a-M78(xE1b1b1a3a-M148))
11/22 = 50.0% Haplotype 50(=I2a1-M26(xI2a1a-M161))
1/22 = 4.5% Haplotype 56(=J2a4b-M67(xJ2a4b1-M92, J2a4b2-M163/M166))
2/22 = 9.1% Haplotype 71(=F-M89(xH(1?)-M52/M69, I-M170, J2-M172, K-M9, M62))
2/22 = 9.1% Haplotype 100(=R1b1a1-M18)
Daniela Contu, Laura Morelli, Federico Santoni et al., "Y-Chromosome Based Evidence for Pre-Neolithic Origin of the Genetically Homogeneous but Diverse Sardinian Population: Inference for Association Scans," PLoS ONE, Issue 1, January 2008:
Cagliari (southern Sardinia)
3/187 = 1.6% R1b1a1-M18
Sorgono (central Sardinia)
5/103 = 4.9% R1b1a1-M18
Tempio (northern Sardinia)
0/86 = 0.0% R1b1a1-M18
Pierre A. Zalloua, Yali Xue, Jade Khalife et al., "Y-Chromosomal Diversity in Lebanon Is Structured by Recent Historical Events," American Journal of Human Genetics 82, 873–882, April 2008:
Lebanon
5/914 = 0.55% R1b1a1-M18
(seems to have been found in 3/104 = 2.9% Lebanon Druze, 2/432 = 0.46% Lebanon non-Druze Muslim, and 0/378 = 0.0% Lebanon Christian).
Anyway, according to presently available data, the maximum frequency of R1b1a1-M18 is found in the same population in which the maximum frequency of haplogroup I2a1-M26 is found: that of the central highlands (i.e. the so-called "Barbagia") of Sardinia. Barbagia is one of the most sparsely populated areas in Europe.
______________________________
Adendum (Jan 15):
Ebizur has posted some nice complementary information for this lineage, specifically the M18 subclade, in the comments section. I find it so informative that I can't but copy here:
Haplogroup R1b1a1-M18 has previously been observed in Sardinia and Lebanon.
Peter A. Underhill, Peidong Shen, Alice A. Lin et al. (2000), "Y chromosome sequence variation and the history of human populations," Nature Genetics, Volume 26:
Sardinia
1/22 = 4.5% Haplotype 2(=A3b2-M13/M63/M127)
1/22 = 4.5% Haplotype 32(=E1b1b1c1-M34(xE1b1b1c1a1-M136))
4/22 = 18.2% Haplotype 35(=E1b1b1a-M78(xE1b1b1a3a-M148))
11/22 = 50.0% Haplotype 50(=I2a1-M26(xI2a1a-M161))
1/22 = 4.5% Haplotype 56(=J2a4b-M67(xJ2a4b1-M92, J2a4b2-M163/M166))
2/22 = 9.1% Haplotype 71(=F-M89(xH(1?)-M52/M69, I-M170, J2-M172, K-M9, M62))
2/22 = 9.1% Haplotype 100(=R1b1a1-M18)
Daniela Contu, Laura Morelli, Federico Santoni et al., "Y-Chromosome Based Evidence for Pre-Neolithic Origin of the Genetically Homogeneous but Diverse Sardinian Population: Inference for Association Scans," PLoS ONE, Issue 1, January 2008:
Cagliari (southern Sardinia)
3/187 = 1.6% R1b1a1-M18
Sorgono (central Sardinia)
5/103 = 4.9% R1b1a1-M18
Tempio (northern Sardinia)
0/86 = 0.0% R1b1a1-M18
Pierre A. Zalloua, Yali Xue, Jade Khalife et al., "Y-Chromosomal Diversity in Lebanon Is Structured by Recent Historical Events," American Journal of Human Genetics 82, 873–882, April 2008:
Lebanon
5/914 = 0.55% R1b1a1-M18
(seems to have been found in 3/104 = 2.9% Lebanon Druze, 2/432 = 0.46% Lebanon non-Druze Muslim, and 0/378 = 0.0% Lebanon Christian).
Anyway, according to presently available data, the maximum frequency of R1b1a1-M18 is found in the same population in which the maximum frequency of haplogroup I2a1-M26 is found: that of the central highlands (i.e. the so-called "Barbagia") of Sardinia. Barbagia is one of the most sparsely populated areas in Europe.
119 comments:
"I'd say that it should be rather from c. 16,000 BP"
I know you'll find it hard to believe but I'm inclined to agree with you.
We sometimes agree. As long it is not related to Wallacea or the supposed Siberian route...
Haplogroup R1b1a1-M18 has previously been observed in Sardinia and Lebanon.
Peter A. Underhill, Peidong Shen, Alice A. Lin et al. (2000), "Y chromosome sequence variation and the history of human populations," Nature Genetics, Volume 26:
Sardinia
1/22 = 4.5% Haplotype 2(=A3b2-M13/M63/M127)
1/22 = 4.5% Haplotype 32(=E1b1b1c1-M34(xE1b1b1c1a1-M136))
4/22 = 18.2% Haplotype 35(=E1b1b1a-M78(xE1b1b1a3a-M148))
11/22 = 50.0% Haplotype 50(=I2a1-M26(xI2a1a-M161))
1/22 = 4.5% Haplotype 56(=J2a4b-M67(xJ2a4b1-M92, J2a4b2-M163/M166))
2/22 = 9.1% Haplotype 71(=F-M89(xH(1?)-M52/M69, I-M170, J2-M172, K-M9, M62))
2/22 = 9.1% Haplotype 100(=R1b1a1-M18)
Daniela Contu, Laura Morelli, Federico Santoni et al., "Y-Chromosome Based Evidence for Pre-Neolithic Origin of the Genetically Homogeneous but Diverse Sardinian Population: Inference for Association Scans," PLoS ONE, Issue 1, January 2008:
Cagliari (southern Sardinia)
3/187 = 1.6% R1b1a1-M18
Sorgono (central Sardinia)
5/103 = 4.9% R1b1a1-M18
Tempio (northern Sardinia)
0/86 = 0.0% R1b1a1-M18
Pierre A. Zalloua, Yali Xue, Jade Khalife et al., "Y-Chromosomal Diversity in Lebanon Is Structured by Recent Historical Events," American Journal of Human Genetics 82, 873–882, April 2008:
Lebanon
5/914 = 0.55% R1b1a1-M18
(seems to have been found in 3/104 = 2.9% Lebanon Druze, 2/432 = 0.46% Lebanon non-Druze Muslim, and 0/378 = 0.0% Lebanon Christian).
Anyway, according to presently available data, the maximum frequency of R1b1a1-M18 is found in the same population in which the maximum frequency of haplogroup I2a1-M26 is found: that of the central highlands (i.e. the so-called "Barbagia") of Sardinia. Barbagia is one of the most sparsely populated areas in Europe.
As`always, thanks for that Ebizur. The connection between Lebanon and Sardinia suggests boats. But when was Sardinia first settled?
Thanks Ebizur. I'm copy-pasting your data with due attribution as an "addendum" to this post (if you have any problem with this just say so and I'll delete).
Anyhow, I think you should start your own blog. I'd be one of your first followers. :)
The connection between Lebanon and Sardinia suggests boats.
The connection between Lebanon and Sardinia could well belong to the Cardium Pottery period (Mediterranean Neolithic). The Biblos facies of Amuq-Biblos culture had Cardium pottery at a late period.
Other less clear contacts could have happened in relation with tholoi (present in Sardinia in the form of nuraghes but more related with Iberia or maybe SE France or with Cyprus if anywhere in the East - big date differences anyhow for this hypothetical connection anyhow)... and of course Phoenicians (but again we should see some correlation with Iberia or Tunisia, right?)
But when was Sardinia first settled? -
Like Corsica, it seems to have been "visited" already in the Paleolithic but clear settlement only dates to Neolithic times, with people migrating apparently from mainland Italy (though CP culture has its origins in the East Adriatic area).
"The connection between Lebanon and Sardinia could well belong to the Cardium Pottery period (Mediterranean Neolithic)".
I'm sure it does.
"it seems to have been 'visited' already in the Paleolithic"
But the Paleolithic population need not have arrived by any sort of boat. There's certainly no evidence of to and fro movement. It died out. How can that be? Island people don't die out. You said so yourself when I mentioned the possibility for Wallacea.
My guess is that numbers in the Paleolithis Sardinian population were not sufficient to sustain a long-term population. In other words they died out through inbreeding, a phenomenon you claim has had a minimal role during our evolution. So the Paleolithic founding population in Sardinia may have originally been just a single man and a single woman. Quite possibly arriving by accident on driftwood washed off the mainland in a flood. Paleolithic human presence on Sardinia is hardly proof of boating ability.
I can find no reference as to when the Sardinian elephant and hippo became extinct but the sardinian dhole:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sardinian_Dhole
Quote, 'It became extinct when humans began to settle on the island'. Still doesn't say when that was but I doubt that population numbers were sufficient in the Paleolithic.
All this places the appearance of efficient boating in the Mediterranean to a surprisingly recent period. How might we account for that?
Don't know. Obviously they needed boats and I'm sure that in that time boats existed in Europe. For the rest I can only say that Corsica also shows some signs of pre-Neolithic "visitation".
You are too fast to reach to conclusions on very limited data. I don't like that approach: is emotional, not scientific.
Don't you find it strange that if boats were so widespread, and humans could reach Australia 50,000 years ago, how come humans failed to establish viable populations on the Mediterranean islands until so much more recently? How might we explain it?
Don't you suspect that your theory of ancient and widespread use of boats might be an example of being 'too fast to reach to conclusions on very limited data'.
First canoes are not fit for open seas sailing, so arriving to islands beyond the horizon line seems problematic to me. Not impossible but unlikely. However in 30-40 thousand years (at least) of human presence in the area some boaters may have managed the feat, maybe accidentally, maybe using the good weather of summertime... or whatever.
What is very unlikely becomes likely if you cast the dice enough times, right?
Second, I really don't know if they might have estabilished stable colonies. The case of Crete seems to suggest they did, though is not clear what human species and has not been discovered until now. The archaeological record is always incomplete: a mere sample, which can be good, mediocre, outright poor or even non-existent.
Don't you suspect that your theory of ancient and widespread use of boats might be an example of being 'too fast to reach to conclusions on very limited data'.
First it's not a theory, just the default state of "why not?" Second, evidence is accumulating in favor of such use in different times and at different places. Third, people has always needed some sort of vessels to cross rivers and other easy to use bodies of water.
What you make is a case of "Colombus invented the canoe": an extremely challenging naval feat (crossing into Sahul) as the very source of the most basic boating skills. It just makes no sense.
You haven't addressed the problem.
"an extremely challenging naval feat (crossing into Sahul)"
You remarked a few days ago that the Mediterranean is safer for sea travel than is the more dangerous Wallacea. Yet people crossed Wallacea in some numbers at least 40,000 years before they were able to achieve the same in the Mediterranean. So the 'default state of why not?' applies to the lack of boating ability in the Mediterranean, not to the assumption it existed.
"First canoes are not fit for open seas sailing, so arriving to islands beyond the horizon line seems problematic to me".
Yet humans did it across Wallacea.
Definitively the Mediterranean is much safer than SE Asian seas. It is just a big lake after all.
What happened in Wallacea/Sahul is another distinct issue and is probably unrelated. As I have said in other occasions, the navigational capabilities of such crossing appear rather challenging for a mere canoe/raft technological level. But the mystery is there not in the Mediterranean, where what we find seems pretty normal.
One theme you may want to research is the outrigger canoe, which is not only used by Austronesians but also other groups, including Sinhalese and Andamanese. This I imagine could point to a specialized or advanced navigational capability in open waters for SE Eurasian peoples, unparalleled elsewhere.
"This I imagine could point to a specialized or advanced navigational capability in open waters for SE Eurasian peoples, unparalleled elsewhere".
And very ancient too. So you're beginning to see my point. What Wiki doesn't mention is that it's widely accepted that the outrigger dates back only as far as the Austronesian expansion, and possibly just the tail end of it. Austronesians may have invented the outrigger and transfered the technology to the Sinhalese and Andamanese. That would fit the Austronesian route to Madagascar via Sri Lanka that I mentioned elsewhere (or perhaps I didn't actually post that comment, I can't remember). Anyway, there's no-one claiming the first people reached Australia in outriggers.
"But the mystery is there not in the Mediterranean, where what we find seems pretty normal".
As I've been saying, 'normal' is no appreciable ability to reach islands, until way after humans in eastern Eurasia had been able to reach Australia and as far as the Northern Solomon Islands. So there's every chance that effective boating spread slowly through the world from there. As you know, I claim that we can interpret the haplogroup data as supporting the idea, if we're actually prepared to consider the possibility.
Just changing the subject slightly to something else you seem to be having trouble with. It's surely most unlikely that the genetic change that separates modern humans from their archaic predecessors within Africa (if, in fact, it was a genetic change) happened in the same individual in which the mutation to Y-hap A occurred. Let alone that the mutation that gave rise to mtDNA L0/L1 had occurred in his mother, meaning he carried it.
The original mtDNA L0/L1 and Y-hap A are simply two individuals of opposite sex within the same species. This species obviously had a distribution through both time and space and contained haplogroups other than L and A. And, equally obviously, the mutations L0/L1 and A occurred somewhere through this time/space continuum.
But the idea that a single male with Y-hap A and a single woman with mtDNA L1 woke up one morning to suddenly find they were a separate species from the other members of their families is surprisingly close to the idea we all descend from a single couple in a 'Garden of Eden'. In fact I'm certain that what appears to be the widespread acceptance of the idea springs from that myth.
Mitochondrial DNA L could have been around for any number of generations, and become quite widespread and diverse, before the mutation that formed Y-hap A occurred. And descendants of neither Y-hap A nor mtDNA L need have been in the vanguard of modern human expansion around the world outside Africa. They're simply the survivors, and may have followed the expanding margin at a discrete distance, and not necessarily together. This would explain why 'modern' humans appear in various parts of the world some time before any widely accepted dating for the origin of the modern haplogroups. And it obliterates any need to find a close correlation at all.
Well I read "widely accepted" as "Terry's opinion". If you follow the track of links, I arrived to James Hornell and this brought me to this site on string games, where they tribute him for exploring cultural connections from Senegal to the Navajo in this matter.
I don't know but as we seem to need of something better than just a anoe or raft, the outrigger seems a likely explanation, as it's very simple in concept and design, offering highly improved stability for small oceanic crossings (you also need larger boats, sails and non-perishable stocks for longer expeditions, all of which only appeared after the Neolithic surely).
Whatever the case it is you who is pointing to the fact that we "need" (I can live without knowing but you insist so much) an explanation for the particularly dramatic feat for crossing into Sahul by small groups of foragers with just canoes or rafts. The outrigger offers a simple explanation.
As I've been saying, 'normal' is no appreciable ability to reach islands, until way after humans in eastern Eurasia had been able to reach Australia and as far as the Northern Solomon Islands.
Why after? It should be before. Because that is precisely the abnormality. Carracks existed before Columbus, logically.
So there's every chance that effective boating spread slowly through the world from there. As you know, I claim that we can interpret the haplogroup data as supporting the idea, if we're actually prepared to consider the possibility.
That would mean that people would have reached West Eurasia and Europe with advanced boating capabilities of the kind allowing to cross the Mediterranean back and forth from the very first moment. We don't see that. It's just a crazy idea you have fallen in love with.
You may love the hypothesis but for me it's becoming like a hammer repeatedly beaten against my head, making me waste precious time reading your repetitive claims and rejecting their solidity once and again. It's boring and tiresome.
....
It's surely most unlikely that the genetic change that separates modern humans from their archaic predecessors within Africa (if, in fact, it was a genetic change) happened in the same individual in which the mutation to Y-hap A occurred.
I'm not saying that. Please!
You are misunderstanding me wildly in all this matter.
All I say is that if mtDNA L1 and Y-DNA A mark the most recent common ancestor (except modern admixture) between Bushmen and the rest of humans, then these two lineages must have about the same age depth, which is roughly the same as the time when Southern African natives diverged from the rest of us (some moment in MSA probably).
Otherwise you'd require a male-only migration into Southern Africa (or into wherever the rest of humans lived back then, probably East Africa).
"these two lineages must have about the same age depth, which is roughly the same as the time when Southern African natives diverged from the rest of us (some moment in MSA probably)".
That doesn't necessarily follow at all. Anyway, according to you they diverged from us one million years ago. Leaves plenty of time for haplogroups to come and go. The surviving Y-hap and mtDNA lines may not even have met up till after 'modern' humans first appeared.
"Otherwise you'd require a male-only migration into Southern Africa"
And quite possibly that could have happened. Y-hap A could have drifted out the pre-existing Y-haps which, by definition, must have been present. Same with mtDNA L1 drifting out previous lines. Or otherwise you are in fact saying that the original Bushmen consisted of a single man with Y-hap A and a single woman with mtDNA L0. Surely even the most extreme single origin supporter wouldn't be able to accept that.
"we 'need' an explanation for the particularly dramatic feat for crossing into Sahul by small groups of foragers with just canoes or rafts. The outrigger offers a simple explanation".
We don't need an explanation for it. We know it happened, and certainly not in outriggers. What we 'need' an explanation for is, why didn't humans make it to the Mediterranean islands if they possessed the same technology that let humans reach Australia?
"Carracks existed before Columbus, logically".
And Columbus existed long after the Paleolithic, so what's he got to do with it? If carracks existed in the Paleolithic why weren't humans in the Mediterranean capable of using them effectively?
"That would mean that people would have reached West Eurasia and Europe with advanced boating capabilities of the kind allowing to cross the Mediterranean back and forth from the very first moment".
So you believe technolgy was able to expand instantly around the world, even in those days before the Internet? I strongly suspect that the boating technology capable of reaching the Mediterranean islands arrived with Y-hap T. And from then on boating technology in the Mediterranean slowly improved until humans developed the technology to 'cross the Mediterranean back and forth', just before the Neolithic. But of course you believe boating technology hasn't evolved at all since the Upper Paleolithic.
Anyway, according to you they diverged from us one million years ago.
When did I ever say that regarding bushmen? That figure is for Neanderthal divergence! Seriously: you need to understand what I say and what I mean. Feel free to ask questions when in doubt but these gross misinterpretations are rather annoying.
"Otherwise you'd require a male-only migration into Southern Africa"
And quite possibly that could have happened.
I don't see any reason to support that. Hunter-gatherers normally travel with their families. A male only (mostly) migration requires a warrior society, only proper of Chalcolithic and onwards. At least Neolithic.
Or otherwise you are in fact saying that the original Bushmen consisted of a single man with Y-hap A and a single woman with mtDNA L0.
No. What I'm saying is that they consisted of a group of people that belonged essentially to mt-L1, mt-L0 and y-A. If there were other lineages, they were lost by drift.
That means that these three lineages are older, even if only slightly so, than the formation of the Khoisanid group. What in turn means that y-A can't be much younger than mt-L1.
We don't need an explanation for it.
It's you who is insisting in this issue of navigation through Indonesia as crucial. What I say is that, while modest use of boats (rivers, swamps, coastal waters) is somewhat warranted elsewhere, crossing straits of maybe 60 km width seems a much greater feat than achieved elsewhere. This is what seems to require an explanation but, agreed, we can just shrug and accept the fact that somehow they did.
I would have little problem with that shrugging off (maybe ten years from now we are presented with further evidence, why to rush?) except for your hammering insistence on the issue.
And Columbus existed long after the Paleolithic, so what's he got to do with it?.
It's an analogy:
Carrack - boat
Columbus - colonists of Wallecea and Sahul
Thought it'd be easy to spot. :/
If carracks existed in the Paleolithic why weren't humans in the Mediterranean capable of using them effectively?.
Are you kidding me? Carracks did not exist in the Paleolithic, of course.
Boats did but for whatever reason seems West Eurasians of the time were no "Colombuses", unlike Wallaceans/Sahullians.
With a fleet of a thousand ship of modern size, Heng Zhe never reached America nor circunnavigated Earth. With much more modest means Columbus and Elcano did. Not everything is just availability of technology. Technology my be a preliminary need but it's people who use that technology.
40 years ago humans arrived to the Moon. Now technology is better but humans just do not do that anymore.
Anyhow, it's not that clear anymore that people did not arrive to the Mediterranean islands. In fact it seems they did at times.
So you believe technolgy was able to expand instantly around the world, even in those days before the Internet?.
Actually it's you who is more or less claiming that: boat invented in Wallacea and suddenly transformed (in your dreams) in oceangoing technology and that "advantage" pushing certain peoples (haplogroups) westward.
Meh!
I strongly suspect that the boating technology capable of reaching the Mediterranean islands arrived with Y-hap T.
And why not R or IJ or G? Why a Y-DNA haplogroup and not a mtDNA one?
But of course you believe boating technology hasn't evolved at all since the Upper Paleolithic.
Not true. You must be kidding. I understand that sails (and related artifact: pulley, and related know-how: astronomy) evolved surely in the Neolithic and spread through the Mediterranean with the Cardium Pottery culture specially (and others in the East Med). This role of CP culture is proven by the presence of deep sea fish bones among their remains (fact).
However, you also have longboats (fact) in Epipaleolithic Denmark. So maybe it's even more complex.
I'm open minded but I don't see how can you argue for the very invention of the canoe/raft in a single point, specially somewhere not in Africa.
"I don't see how can you argue for the very invention of the canoe/raft in a single point, specially somewhere not in Africa".
Most inventions happen at a single point, usually by a single person. With help from previous developments of course, and with his or her friends' assistance. So why do you have such a difficulty accepting that various improvements in boating technology first appeared in different places around the world, one of the major ones occurring in Southeast Eurasia?
"This is what seems to require an explanation but, agreed, we can just shrug and accept the fact that somehow they did".
They obviously definitely had boats capable of such voyaging in that region. But why not anywhere else if, as you claim, such technology was widespread?
"Thought it'd be easy to spot".
It wasn't because I wasn't able to see the relevance.
"Carracks did not exist in the Paleolithic, of course".
That was my point. So why did you mention them?
"boat invented in Wallacea and suddenly transformed (in your dreams) in oceangoing technology and that 'advantage' pushing certain peoples (haplogroups) westward".
My respose, 'Seriously: you need to understand what I say and what I mean'. I'm certainly not claiming that boating technology was 'suddenly transformed' into 'oceangoing technology'. It took a great deal of perfecting before humans were capable of moving over the relatively open sea in the region. And the improved technology then spread slowly round the rest of the world. The same as most other advances in technology have done.
"And why not R or IJ or G?"
T's distribution seems to be definitely associated with an expansion through the Mediterranean. I'm certainly prepared to accept that members of R or IJ or G were carried along.
"Why a Y-DNA haplogroup and not a mtDNA one?"
We don't see a likely mtDNA candidate.
"So maybe it's even more complex".
I'm sure it is. As technology moves into any new region the locals adopt and adapt it.
"What I'm saying is that they consisted of a group of people that belonged essentially to mt-L1, mt-L0 and y-A. If there were other lineages, they were lost by drift".
Even though they were 'lost by drift' there obviously were originally 'other lineages' which had existed long before either mt-L0 or Y-A appeared. So for much of its existence the group in question consisted of lineages other than mt-L0 and Y-A. So we're back with the very unlikely belief that they both evolved at the same time, coinciding with the equally unlikely belief that this evolution coincides with the sudden change from archaic to modern human in the region. Not necessarily so at all.
"When did I ever say that regarding bushmen? That figure is for Neanderthal divergence!"
I was certain you've meant all along that modern humans descend from this African population, separated from Neanderthals one million years ago. Who are our more distant ancestors then? Spacemen?
"A male only (mostly) migration requires a warrior society, only proper of Chalcolithic and onwards. At least Neolithic".
Not necessarily. Even in hunter-gatherer groups members often switch groups.
"That means that these three lineages are older, even if only slightly so, than the formation of the Khoisanid group. What in turn means that y-A can't be much younger than mt-L1".
Either lineage could quite easily be much older 'than the formation of the Khoisanid group'. I'm not saying that they are, but there's still no reason for Y-A to have first appeared at the same time as mt-L1. It's quite possible that the Y-A mutation happened as late as just before the mt-L3 diversification. And I've seen it suggested that mt-L1 moved into southern Africa from East Africa. In which case it's not strictly an indigenous Khoi-San haplogroup at all.
But why not anywhere else if, as you claim, such technology was widespread?.
They reached Andamans, they reached Japan, Okinawa and Taiwan. There are not big islands between SE Asia and Madagascar (excepting Sri Lanka which was indeed a peninsula back then).
Furthermore all populations in those islands seem to have remained isolated since the early colonization process, clear sign that they were not all the time boating around as you claim nor that their supposed skills were a factor for some sort of conquest of the world, as you also claim.
And as you claim that the people heading to West Eurasia already had the Wallacean super-kit of oceanic travels, yes, why did they not colonized Cyprus right away?
That's the question I ask to you.
My answer is simple: Cyprus was too small to hold too many people. Maybe it could hold one or two clans but we have not yet found their remains.
The ancestors of H. sapiens as distinct from Neanderthals are not the same as the ancestors of H. sapiens as distinct within ourselves. Obviously. The first lived maybe 1 million years ago and the other maybe 200,000 years ago or less.
You do not think that the existence of sails before Columbus is the same as the existence of boats before the colonists of Sahul? Your problem, sincerely.
For me it's clearly the same. Columbus would never have gone far without sails and the ancestors of Papuans would have never gone far without boats. The technology necessarily pre-dates the feat.
...
Y-DNA T, if really associated with Mediterranean expansion as you say (I thought it was mostly a West Asian/Egyptian clade with some offshoots, just like J or E1b1b) can't be associated with boats, that obviously existed in West Europe (non-T essentially) at least in Magdalenian times, but would be if anything associated with high seas sailing (i.e. Neolithic flows, Etruscans, Greeks, Phoenicians, etc.), which is another technological stage: a very different one.
What you want to do is like comparing a nuclear reactor with a campfire!
"and the other maybe 200,000 years ago or less".
So you do believe that modern humans came from space. They owe nothing to any of Earth's previous inhabitants. You believe that Y-hap A, mtDNA L and the change to modern humans all happened over a very short period, in a single, small group.
Try this:
http://anthropology.net/2010/01/20/the-revolution-that-wasnt-a-new-interpretation-of-the-origin-of-modern-human-behavior-mcbrearty-brooks-1999/
It claims that the change to 'modern' humans in Africa was a drawn-out process. Quote:
"These items do not occur suddenly together as predicted by the 'human revolution' model, but at sites that are widely separated in space and time. This suggests a gradual assembling of the package of modern human behaviors in Africa, and its later export to other regions of the Old World".
Do you still wish to place money on your theory that mtDNA L and Y-hap A appeared at the same time and place as each other?
"why did they not colonized Cyprus right away?"
I reasonably sure that Y-hap T is found there. Have a look at its distribution and tell me it's got nothing to do with boats:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup_T_(Y-DNA)
"You do not think that the existence of sails before Columbus is the same as the existence of boats before the colonists of Sahul?"
Murray Basin Aborigines used bark rafts. Modern one as example:
http://australianmuseum.net.au/image/Aboriginal-bark-canoe-NSW
One in use:
http://images.google.co.nz/imgres?imgurl=http://www.austhistmuseum.mq.edu.au/student_research/katie/images/object06.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.austhistmuseum.mq.edu.au/student_research/katie/katie_object01.htm&usg=__L8fOiqaMvuv0djLeCBMYFIZe2As=&h=191&w=250&sz=26&hl=en&start=13&um=1&itbs=1&tbnid=JZClAggXreckYM:&tbnh=85&tbnw=111&prev=/images%3Fq%3Daboriginal%2Bbark%2Bcanoes%26hl%3Den%26rlz%3D1R2GGLL_enNZ360%26sa%3DN%26um%3D1
It's quite possible that something like this was sufficient for the original Wallacea crossing. Especially as islands would be more or less within sight of each other at times of lowered sea level.
This bark canoe technology may have been widespread, but perhaps not.
"They reached Andamans, they reached Japan, Okinawa and Taiwan. There are not big islands between SE Asia and Madagascar"
For a start Madagascar was much more recent than even the beginning of voyaging in the Mediterranean. But look where the other places are: Eastern Eurasia. It certainly begins to look as though some sort of early sea-capable boating spread through the region from somewhere within it, rather than it being part of a widely used technology. The bark canoe technology developed in Wallacea would certainly have been sufficient for use in lakes and slow-flowing rivers. So it basically spread over land, rather than by sea. But by the time it reached the Mediterranean it had become too basic to provide effective boating within that sea.
"all populations in those islands seem to have remained isolated since the early colonization process, clear sign that they were not all the time boating around as you claim nor that their supposed skills were a factor for some sort of conquest of the world, as you also claim".
Rubbish, Maju. If you can't see why the people involved in ancient salt-water crossings became isolated I'll have to explain it to you: rising sea level increased the distances required to travel between the islands. But the differing skill levels required to achieve any Wallacean crossing spread around the world.
"The technology necessarily pre-dates the feat".
As I've just pointed out any improvements in the technology spread around the world.
"is like comparing a nuclear reactor with a campfire!"
It's you who is claiming there was no progressive improvement in boating technology.
It seems that in Wallacea boating technology progressively improved, because a second movement was able to reach the Northern Solomon Islands around 30,000 years ago. I suspect the improvement involved was the development of the dugout canoe, with or without outriggers. This idea also spread and, by about 10,000 years ago, had reached the Mediterranean.
Terry, what you say is meaningless. I don't even believe in anything called "modern human behavior" and much less in the archaeological record being able to tell us much about that. Words, dance, music, hugs, perishable materials... leave no traces.
I do believe in "anatomically modern humans", Homo sapiens by another name.
"I do believe in 'anatomically modern humans', Homo sapiens by another name".
What's that got to do with boating?
As far as I know we are the only species that do it. Maybe other Homo spp. did in the past but that would not change anything.
What I mean is that the Homo sapiens of 200,000 years ago was already as brilliant (roughly) as the Homo sapiens of today, so there is absolutely no reason why they could not build rafts and, soon after, more specifically designed boats such as hollowed boats. There is no mystery in building simple rafts certainly, except maybe some basic dexterity and a few experimental trials for solidity. Hence rafts must have existed since at least 200,000 years ago, probably much earlier, since I think H. erectus was already brilliant enough for such a simple craft.
Maju : "What I mean is that the Homo sapiens of 200,000 years ago was already as brilliant (roughly) as the Homo sapiens of today, so there is absolutely no reason why they could not build rafts"
Indeed.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/court_and_social/article6991643.ece
Evidence for the world’s earliest seafaring has emerged from an archaeological survey in Crete. Tools of Lower Palaeolithic type, at least 130,000 years old, have been found on the Greek island, which has been isolated by the Mediterranean Sea for at least the past five million years, so that any human ancestors must have arrived by boat. At this date, they would have been of a pre-modern species: the earliest Neanderthalers or even Homo heidelbergensis, the species to which Boxgrove Man belonged, are among possible contenders, but no such remains have so far been found on Crete.
"What I mean is that the Homo sapiens of 200,000 years ago was already as brilliant (roughly) as the Homo sapiens of today"
Maju. There was no sudden change to modernity 200,000 years ago. Have you not read the recent post at anthropology.net?
"the Greek island, which has been isolated by the Mediterranean Sea for at least the past five million years"
I've argued elsewhere that this is almost certainly not so.
"Modernity" is a slippery term. What I say is species. Neanderthals were surely able to do whatever they were able to do but that says nothing about what our species was able (or unable) to do.
OK. I'll adjust my comment:
"There was no sudden change to a new species 200,000 years ago. Have you not read the recent post at anthropology.net?"
And any 'new' species must have come from something older.
Yes I read it: it's about a parallel species, not our species.
I want to define (arbitrarily) the scope of this discussion and getting Neanderthals in it is useless. You're just trying to re-direct the discussion back to the issue of "modern human behavior" and I just do not want.
Modern human species is the definitory concept. If Neanderthals sent rockets to Mars, that says little about Leonardo da Vinci. They are not directly related.
But Leonardo says a lot about what our species can or can't do.
The relevance of the following comments to this particular post? The processes in action at the time R1b entered Africa are simply a continuation of processes operating since our species first evolved. And they still operate.
"it's about a parallel species, not our species".
No it's not. The article deals with the development of our own species in Africa, and nothing to do with Neanderthals at all. The article shows that the evolution of our species was not a sudden event as you believe, but a slowly unfolding one, involving several populations within Africa. And easily demonstrates how modern mtDNA and Y-chromosome haplogroups need not have arisen at the same time, or even in the same small region of Africa.
I note you're quite prepared to accept that Y-hap R1b expanded to a large extent unaccompanied by any specific mtDNA but are still obsessed with the matching of Y-hap A and mtDNA L. But there's a further problem.
You would presumably like to match Y-hap CDEF's exodus from Africa with mtDNA L3's, in the form of M and N. Personally I'm prepared to separate all three, but once we connect them we run into problems.
By the time mtDNA L3 appears the mtDNA diversity in Africa is already extensive and ancient. We have L0 in both South and East Africa, L1 in West Africa and in the Pygmies, L2 in West Africa, L4 and L5 in East Africa and, you claim, L6 in Yemen. But for the period postulated for the emergence of modern haplogroups from Africa we find that Y-chromosome diversity is pitiful. Just two, A and B. Doesn't that suggest that modern Y-hap diversity originated more recently than modern mtDNA diversity?
The article deals with the development of our own species in Africa...
The last post at Anthropology.net deals with Neanderthals building wooden structures to divide habitation spaces at Abric Romaní.
Whatever the case my whole point is that I don't care if Neanderthals or H. erectuses were able to send rockets to Titan or not... just that AT LEAST, since the formation of our species, people with modern style ingenuity must have existed.
I don't even believe in that concept of "modern human behavior". Modern human behavior to me means computers, cars and rock'n roll. Such thing is of course circumstantial not anything intrinsic to our species. But ingenuity is pretty much intrinsic to our kin, so people were able to reason that, if wood floats... then raft!
Eureka!
Doesn't seem so hard. Meh, they were able to make fire too, you know, which is something much more challenging conceptually.
I note you're quite prepared to accept that Y-hap R1b expanded to a large extent unaccompanied by any specific mtDNA...
You are again misinterpreting me. I suspect that R1b or a subclade of it such as R1b1b2a1 may be parallel to mtDNA H (both have star-like patterns and very similar distributions). However I don't know for sure because the genetic landscape is complex enough to be cautious about this (it could be a more downstream clade such as K as well).
You would presumably like to match Y-hap CDEF's exodus from Africa with mtDNA L3...
They match almost perfectly. Why not? It makes almost perfect sense. Very simplfied:
Y-DNA A - mtDNA L0 and L1
Y-DNA B - mtDNA L2
Y-DNA CDEF - mtDNA L3
Too simplified but yes: they are quite clearly organized that way, more or less. L5, L4 and L6 are too small to really alter the picture.
Doesn't that suggest that modern Y-hap diversity originated more recently than modern mtDNA diversity?.
Only if you have faith in the molecular clock over common sense.
I'm never too sure about how trustworthy is common sense but I'm pretty sure that the molecular clock is bullshit.
"The last post at Anthropology.net deals with Neanderthals building wooden structures to divide habitation spaces at Abric Romaní".
I'm not talking about 'The last post at Anthropology.net'. The enthusiasm with which you dismiss any evidence contradicting your beliefs is amusing. It must spring from you Jesuit upbringing.
Then what are you talking about?
Ah, ok. Found the link. It is an argumentation on what can be considered "modern human behavior", with climbing highlands and boating to islands said to be part of it.
Didn't make much sense of it but I really don't think there is anything that can be said to be "modern human behavior". It's a fallacy.
"Found the link. It is an argumentation on what can be considered 'modern human behavior', with climbing highlands and boating to islands said to be part of it".
I don't think so. It does link behaviour to the earliest modern human fossils: 'The appearance of Middle Stone Age technology and the first signs of modern behavior coincide with the appearance of fossils that have been attributed to H. helmei':
http://anthropology.net/2010/01/20/the-revolution-that-wasnt-a-new-interpretation-of-the-origin-of-modern-human-behavior-mcbrearty-brooks-1999/
Nothing about 'boating to islands' although it does mention 'the use of aquatic resources'. It claims the behaviours indicating modernity 'do not occur suddenly together as predicted by the “human revolution” model, but at sites that are widely separated in space and time'.
'If on anatomical and behavioral grounds H. helmei is sunk into H. sapiens, the origin of our species is linked with the appearance of Middle Stone Age technology at 250–300 ka'. The article even 'goes so far as to exhort Africanist researchers to consider that these early innovative behaviours dating back over 200,000 years may themselves have directly prompted morphological changes to early humans as they evolved into what we refer to as anatomically modern'.
The article itself at:
https://www.hss.caltech.edu/~steve/files/mcbrearty.pdf
Quote:
"We describe evidence from the African MSA to support the contention that both human anatomy and human behaviour were intermittently transformed from an archaic to a more modern pattern over a period of more than 200,000 years".
Your comment:
"Only if you have faith in the molecular clock over common sense".
It's got absolutely nothing to do with 'the molecular clock'. But your 'common sense' idea is that somehow in a population of something in the order of 10,000 individuals (plus or minus) at some time suddenly, overnight, all the men became Y-hap A and all the women became mtDNA L0 or L1.
I still don't see which is your point re. that article of Tim and how it fits in this discussion.
But your 'common sense' idea is that somehow in a population of something in the order of 10,000 individuals (plus or minus) at some time suddenly, overnight, all the men became Y-hap A and all the women became mtDNA L0 or L1.
Not overnight, drift happened along time. If no expansion happens about 50% of the haploid diversity can be lost every single generation in such a small population (a rough guess).
Whatever the case, Y-DNA A and mtDNA L1 are the last haploid connections between the Khoisan population and the main one (after we disregard "recent" inputs). That means that they diverged soon after the formation of these two haplogroups (or while they were being formed). Soon here can mean several thousand years perfectly, of course, just that that is the signature we have of that divergence at the genetic level.
We have signs of further Y-DNA arrivals to Khoisans after Y-DNA A, notably B2b and E1b1b1g, surely related with contacts with Tanzanian click-speakers but these have virtually no A, much less of the clades found among Khoisan. For me the case is clear in favor of A and L1 being more or less of the same age (they also have a similar distribution through the rest of Africa, in case we could have any doubt).
But you can believe what you want. I'm bored of arguing about everything.
"I still don't see which is your point re. that article of Tim and how it fits in this discussion".
I'll admit it doesn't fit directly to this discussion, except indicating a continuity of process. But the point is to emphasise that Y-haps and mtDNA can be surprisingly independent, and probably were at the first appearance of Homo sapiens.
"Not overnight, drift happened along time".
So any 'original' population would have contained other haplogroups besides A and L, until that drift was completed. So mtDNA L0 and Y-hap A could have appeared at any time over the lifetime of these earlier haplogroups, several tens of thousands of years.
"Soon here can mean several thousand years perfectly, of course, just that that is the signature we have of that divergence at the genetic level".
Exactly. So it's much more than just possible that mtDNA L and Y-hap A can be separated by 'several thousand years perfectly'. And need not actually have arisen in the same region, just somewhere in Sub Saharan Africa.
"Y-DNA A and mtDNA L1 are the last haploid connections between the Khoisan population and the main one"
But certainly neither are confined to it. Either could have arisen anywhere within their common distribution, or even outside it, if they have been drifted out in the region of origin.
"For me the case is clear in favor of A and L1 being more or less of the same age"
Not at all necessarily so, as I hope I've made clear.
"I'm bored of arguing about everything".
Just one more thing though. At last I've actually found evidence for the 'Great southern coastal migration theory', using boats. But it's probably in the other direction, and long after humans had left Africa.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup_T_(Y-DNA)
It's even spread through the Horn of Africa south of the Bab al Mandab (and up into the Ethiopian Highlands). Y-hap T in India is concentrated in the Ganges Delta, along the coastal lowlands of Andhra Pradesh, then at the Indus mouth and south from there along the lowland coast, past the Gulf of Kutch to the Gulf of Cambay. furhter west it's found right around the Persian Gulf (including the Eastern Arabian Peninsular), up through the Tigris/Euphrates Basin, ultimately reaching the Southeastern Caspian Sea. Then right round the Mediterranean's northern shore (with a dash in Tunisia), especially in the Levant, coastal Anatolia, Dalmatia, Italy and into Iberia, with a touch at the mouth of the Rhine. There are outposts around lakes in eastern Kazakhstan and parts of the northeast Baltic.
So there you have it: The Great Southern Coastal Migration.
I'll admit it doesn't fit directly to this discussion...
Then shame on you for making me waste my time on that irrelevant point.
So mtDNA L0 and Y-hap A could have appeared at any time over the lifetime of these earlier haplogroups, several tens of thousands of years.
Y-DNA A is found also among groups other than Khoisan, same for mtDNA L1 (not L0, that seems somewhat older and exclusive of Khoisan) and roughly along the same "ancestral" axis of East Africa and, to a lesser degree, its extension to West Africa. That's why I think that they coalesced about the same time and that they represent the last genuine point of contact between proto-Khoisan and the main branch. They existed before the first major split.
So it's much more than just possible that mtDNA L and Y-hap A can be separated by 'several thousand years perfectly'.
Sure, whatever. We are talking within a timescale of 200,000 years. A few thousand years are a normal margin of error in such circumstances.
And need not actually have arisen in the same region, just somewhere in Sub Saharan Africa.
Well, from the viewpoint of haploid lineages, before that split there was surely only one population. After that split there were two populations that interacted only slightly, if at all.
One population means one single region, probably East Africa. At least that's how I see it.
... if they have been drifted out in the region of origin.
That would require a too complex scenario, not just for the main population but also for other branches like Pygmies, Hadza, Sandawe... too many coincidences for me to take seriously.
But believe whatever rocks your boat... I mean: your dusty feet (as boats are impossible, unthinkable...)
...
As for Y-DNA T, I see nothing special on it being distributed among Semitic-speakers in The Horn. Semitic languages are ancestral from West Asia.
"Y-DNA A is found also among groups other than Khoisan, same for mtDNA L1"
Exactly. So why would the population either first appeared in be just that people? My advice to you is to disconnect mtDNA and Y-chromosome. I guarantee it will be a better indication of what has actually happened. See what you come up with.
"As for Y-DNA T, I see nothing special on it being distributed among Semitic-speakers in The Horn. Semitic languages are ancestral from West Asia".
So what's 'Semitic' about the Y-hap Ts in India? Or in Europe? And in The Horn is it confined ust to Semitic-speakers? Is there any connection at all between Semtic-speakers and Y-hap T other than coincidence? Another example of 'The enthusiasm with which you dismiss any evidence contradicting your beliefs'.
So why would the population either first appeared in be just that people?.
Are you paying any attention to what I say. I did not say that, I said that mtDNA L1 and Y-DNA A appeared BEFORE the separation of these two branches (or while the process of divergence was still not complete).
So what's 'Semitic' about the Y-hap Ts in India? Or in Europe?.
Nothing but at least in Europe it has a West Asian origin too (not sure about India atm). What's wrong with you? Can you get the idea and stop arguing about nothing at all. I like a good debate but a nonsense discussion... well, no.
And in The Horn is it confined ust to Semitic-speakers? Is there any connection at all between Semtic-speakers and Y-hap T other than coincidence?.
It is confined to Semitic speakers indeed (Somali and Amhara). The only non-semitic pockets are in Kenya (where it can be attributed to Somali or Persian Gulf influence) and the R1b people of lake Chad (more interesting maybe but surely derived from Sudan/Egypt).
I don't believe in coincidences but I don't believe in your wacko theories on boat peoples either.
I'm sending Tim a few comments regarding Y-hap T for him to post at either anthropology or remotecentral. So I look forward to your objections there.
I originally intended to let Maju off the hook for this little blunder, but I think it is important that I clarify the distribution of haplogroup T-M70 in Africa according to presently available data.
Haplogroup T-M70 has not been found especially frequently among Semitic speakers in Africa. Published data suggest that haplogroup T-M70 is more common among Cushitic-speaking populations(including Somali, Oromo, and Iraqw) than it is among neighboring Semitic speakers in Africa (e.g. Amhara). I suspect that Maju may have confused "Semitic," the name of a rather young and well-defined language family that includes Arabic, Hebrew, Aramaic, and Amharic, with "Afro-Asiatic," the name of a broad and somewhat controversial language phylum (sort of like "Altaic") that has been proposed to unite the Semitic, Cushitic, Chadic, Berber, and Ancient Egyptian language families.
Furthermore, the population of northern Cameroon in which haplogroup T-M70 has been detected is not one of the Chadic-speaking populations that have great percentages of their males belonging to haplogroup R1b1a-V88, but rather a branch of the Niger-Congo-speaking ("para-Bantu," in a sense) Fulbe.
Fulbe, Cameroon (Cruciani et al. 2002)
2/17 = 11.8% A3b2-M13/M219
1/17 = 5.9% E1b1-PN2(xE1b1a-DYS271, E1b1b1-M35)
9/17 = 52.9% E1a1-M44
3/17 = 17.6% T-M70
2/17 = 11.8% R1-M173(xR1a1-SRY10831.2, R1b1a1-M18, R1b1b1-M73, R1b1b2-M269)
However, haplogroup T-M70 has not been detected in samples of Fulbe from Guinea-Bissau (n=59), Sudan (n=26), or Burkina Faso (n=20).
*Hands to head*
I claimed that Somalis are Semitic! My bad!
It's just that Terry drives me mad with his obsession with "the chosen peoples of the holy canoe". After what can be at least one year of hammering with the same unlikely but obsessive idea, and after he last claimed that Crete was connected to the mainland in the LGM, I just tend to reject all his claims in this sense without further consideration.
Anyhow, he could document himself on Y-DNA T details before starting making what sounds like the same old wacko claim again. If he had done so, he would have been the one correcting me and not you, Ebizur.
As for the Chad people, I did not know. But it's pretty odd that it's found ONLY among the Fulani or Lake Chad and not among any other Fulani population, right? Peuls are a quite odd people with many local founder effects that don't seem to correlate with their recent origins in westernmost Africa.
"After what can be at least one year of hammering with the same unlikely but obsessive idea"
And you're still making up unlikely fairy stories about people zooming around the world in boats, even in H.erectus times. I've told you why boats are not necessary to explain people on Crete, even if it has never been connected to the mainland.
"he would have been the one correcting me and not you, Ebizur"
Excuse me. I wrote:
"So what's 'Semitic' about the Y-hap Ts in India? Or in Europe? And in The Horn is it confined just to Semitic-speakers? Is there any connection at all between Semtic-speakers and Y-hap T other than coincidence? Another example of 'The enthusiasm with which you dismiss any evidence contradicting your beliefs'".
"But it's pretty odd that it's found ONLY among the Fulani or Lake Chad and not among any other Fulani population, right?"
You will see why that is once Tim puts up my essay. I'll give you a clue: 'Lake' Chad. Have a look at how Y-hap T is distributed around the world. I understand that the Fulani are actually a combination of originally various people, possibly united as recently as the Mali Empire.
Ebizur. Are you the person responsible for the excellent entry regarding Y-hap T on Wiki?
I've told you why boats are not necessary to explain people on Crete, even if it has never been connected to the mainland.
See what I mean?! It's a torture!
It doesn't matter that there is zero direct evidence against the existence and use of boats and that boating seems a most likely explanation (quite many kilometers and several islands in between). For him it's enough that there is a slight possibility of a tsunami causing such colonization... because he BELIEVES that it has to be some other way.
In the holy name of Occam's Razor!
Crete: large sea distance: boat. Even a toddler can understand that but not those who have FAITH in some wacko theory they happen to fancy.
Excuse me. I wrote:
"So what's 'Semitic' about the Y-hap Ts in India? Or in Europe? And in The Horn is it confined just to Semitic-speakers? Is there any connection at all between Semtic-speakers and Y-hap T other than coincidence?.
That's not any correction. They are questions, not answers.
Correction: "not this way, that way"; ignorance: "is it that way?" (ignorance is legit but not when in the next and previous post you pretend deep wisdom on the same matter).
You are the one bringing here Y-DNA T (quite out of context) and saying you're gonna make Tim work for you reformatting and publishing some texts of you on this haplogroup (and of course the leit motiv of Terry's existence: prehistoric boating). You should know what the heck are you talking about, right?
You will see why that is once Tim puts up my essay...
Why don't you publish your own blog, Terry? It's extremely easy with Blogger. You just have to fancy a name for it, chose a pre-defined appearance and start publishing right away.
No need to email articles in .doc format that Tim needs to painfully edit himself before publication (.txt format, plain text, would be a lot easier).
But most importantly: you'd publish directly and assume total responsability (for good or bad) and no need to tell me: "wait till Tim does..." because it'd be you who'd publish.
I understand that the Fulani are actually a combination of originally various people, possibly united as recently as the Mali Empire.
Actually not. Mali was lead by the Mande (Ghana by the Snonike and Songhai by the Songhai).
The Fulani do appear as a distinctive population by autosomal genetics and should have been much more isolated than other West African peoples since long ago, even if their language is Niger-Kongo.
The great expansion of the Fulani from the West Afircan plateaus (Futa Toro in Senegal and Futa Djallon in Guinea) happened only in the Modern Age, when they filled the power vaccuum caused by the Moroccan invasion of Pasha Joder in search of the fabled gold of Sudan. They gradually conquered the Western Sudan (Sahelian West Africa) and established a number of sultanates, destroying in the meantime one of the most important historical records of the area: the Haussa archives.
They were deeply involved in the slave trade and were often fanatic Muslims. Their power vanished though as France (and secondarily Britain) conquered the region in the late 19th century.
For whoever has interest, Terry's article on Y-DNA T (and L) has been published already at Remote Central. Of course his main point is that the distribution of these two lineages somehow "disproves" that boats and rafts existed at all before people started their colonizing adventure in Indonesia and Australasia.
Apples and oranges to me but whatever.
"Crete: large sea distance: boat".
OK. I give up. I accept your word for it that hippos, elephants and myotragus all arrived on the various Mediterranean islands by boat.
"They are questions, not answers".
They were questions supposed to alert you to the fact that your reply was stupid.
"Actually not. Mali was lead by the Mande (Ghana by the Snonike and Songhai by the Songhai)".
I agree. I was confusing Fulani and Mandinke. Sorry.
"Of course his main point is that the distribution of these two lineages somehow 'disproves' that boats and rafts existed at all before people started their colonizing adventure in Indonesia and Australasia".
Thanks for providing the link but that is not the gist of my argument. I point out that Y-T is distributed through all the regions that should have already been occupied by any great coastal migration, and the distribution also shows that T's migration was from east to west. This surely suggests very strongly that no ancient coastal migration had ever happened before T's. Which in turn suggests very strongly that humans in the west did not have the boating capability for such a migration before T arrived. I admit it doesn't actually 'disprove' the existence of boats, but it certainly indicates that their existence is unlikely.
As for starting another blog. I'll try to make it easier for Tim but surely there are far to many already.
"They were questions supposed to alert you to the fact that your reply was stupid".
Sarcasm is not too apparent in written form. And, anyhow, if you pretend to keep a serious discussion, I'd suggest to stay direct and informative.
"I accept your word for it that hippos, elephants and myotragus all arrived on the various Mediterranean islands by boat".
I did not say that. I said that elephants and hippopotamus swim very well. What's a myotragus?
I point out that Y-T is distributed through all the regions that should have already been occupied by any great coastal migration, and the distribution also shows that T's migration was from east to west. This surely suggests very strongly that no ancient coastal migration had ever happened before T's. Which in turn suggests very strongly that humans in the west did not have the boating capability for such a migration before T arrived.
My counter argument:
1. It's Y-DNA detached of any apparent mtDNA pair, unless you're thinking in M1 (would fit somewhat for the African part).
2. If Y-DNA T and L made some sort of coastal migration from East to West, this can hardly disprove that there was an older coastal migration from West to East long before.
3. Your main point has been all the time that boating arose in Wallacea (Indonesia for starters) but if the new Y-DNA macro-lineage MNOPS is confirmed, then there is nothing upstream of T that ever reached so far East. So the farthest East that T might have began its spread, based on the Wikipedia map you posted, would be Bengal. However I can't confirm this extreme because I don't know the geographical structure of T and your article doesn't dwell on it (I hoped you'd research the haplogroup's structure but nope). Based only on frequency, it'd look like T spread from West Asia, and not just with Phoenicians. But Neolithic flows look likely in many cases and, if it had a Neolithic spread, then bye bye to your hypothesis.
... but surely there are far to many already.
What really matters is not how many there are but how informative they are and whether that helps the author to keep his/her work handy for him/herself and any possible reader.
It also allows for expositions that are to a great extent detached from the riff raff of discussion (though this can always take place in the comments section - if enabled).
"I did not say that".
You certainly implied it. All sorts of animals could reach Crete yet supposedly 'advanced' humans couldn't get there without the assistance of boats. So presumably other animals also required them. Can you provide any evidence at all that elephants or hippos have ever entered any stretch of salt water? I doubt it very much.
"What's a myotragus?"
It's not actually Cretan. It was an antelope/goat found on the Balearic islands until humans reached there. So not entirely relevant, but I'd advise you check on the dating of extinctions on the Mediterranean islands. I think it will turn your beliefs around a bit. There were dwarf deer and large rodents on Crete that are supposed to have got there since the Mediterranean last filled, so we're not just dealing with elephants and hippos.
"It's Y-DNA detached of any apparent mtDNA pair"
Why on earth should it be paired with any particular mtDNA? Surely, like most sailors today, they'd just pick up women from their neighbours as they passed through. I've told you before you need to detach Y-haps from mtDNA. You still haven't seen that, have you.
"If Y-DNA T and L made some sort of coastal migration from East to West, this can hardly disprove that there was an older coastal migration from West to East long before".
It becomes very unlikely though. If a particular Y-hap can rapidly occupy all of a particular ecosystem the implication is that that ecosystem was unoccupied. Y-hap T does seem to miss the apparently ideal Orissa coast and Mahanadi river. It also doesn't move far up the Ganges, so perhaps those regions were already occupied. The Indus was certainly appropriated by Y-hap L. But Y-hap T definitely occupied all the possible coastal or riverine habitats west of India.
"then there is nothing upstream of T that ever reached so far East".
We don't know that for sure, especially as most members of the MNOPS branch are definitely eastern, including most K*s.
"I don't know the geographical structure of T and your article doesn't dwell on it (I hoped you'd research the haplogroup's structure but nope)".
As far as I know there are only T1, T2 and T3. So its spread was rapid, certainly once it left West Bengal.
"it'd look like T spread from West Asia, and not just with Phoenicians. But Neolithic flows look likely in many cases and, if it had a Neolithic spread, then bye bye to your hypothesis".
Why bye bye? It fits perfectly. I've always argued that occupation of the Mediterranean was late, perhaps just slightly pre-Neolithic. Anyway T's arrival in the Mediterranean would be only a little later than movement out to the northern Solomon Islands. I'll admit I didn't make it clear that Y-hap Ts expansion doesn't derive from the first Wallacea crossing. Perhaps NOP does that. But that's a separate argument.
"What really matters is not how many there are but how informative they are and whether that helps the author to keep his/her work handy for him/herself and any possible reader".
I'm afraid I'm not very computer savvy at all.
As Julien said clearly in our parallel discussion at AVRPI, megafauna can swim. I'm not really into paleozoology but I suppose he's right. Can you stop making captious confusionist branchings and go direct to the grain?
Why on earth should it be paired with any particular mtDNA?.
Why not? Are you proposing a migration involving only men? I don't buy into your sailors story. Or did not Austronesians, the most famed sailors of prehistory, bring their women with them, regardless that they also picked local women in some areas? Aren't we seeing Asian mtDNA in Madagasca, for instance?
If a particular Y-hap can rapidly occupy all of a particular ecosystem...
It does not. Y-DNA T is not more than 10% anywhere (except that Peul group of Lake Chad).
You are reading too much in a minority clade.
We don't know that for sure, especially as most members of the MNOPS branch are definitely eastern.
That's precisely my point. MNOPS is (if confirmed) a brother lineage of T, that leaves 2/3 K sublineages (T and L) being restricted to the Western macro-region, what strongly suggests that K did not originate in SE Asia but in South or West Asia.
As far as I know there are only T1, T2 and T3.
I know that much, thanks. What I would like to know is what distribution have these three sublineages, in order to extimate the origin and spread pattern of T as a whole (or as parts).
FYI, the FTDNA T (former K2) Project, has clustered haplotypes in three groups, roughly equivalent to T*, T2 and T3 (T1 is a private lineage). However their members seem all of European ancestry, what helps little.
So its spread was rapid...
Why? If it only has three subclades (two in practice), is anything but a star-like structure, which is the signature of a swift expansion. Two sublineages only rather suggest that it branched out in a process of slow, irregular growth.
Possibly T2 and T3 have somewhat different geographic origins and expansion processes. However so little is known about the clade that I prefer not to speculate too much.
(continues)
(continued)
... certainly once it left West Bengal.
Why Bengal? How can you know the origin of this lineage without even analyzing its structure? Why would the origin be at one of the extremes of its range? Why not in West Asia (maybe the Zagros area) which would seem better placed to originate such expansion, either within a Paleolithic or Neolithic time frame?
You read the facts only with the aim of making them fit with your preconceptions. That is cheating!
Why bye bye? It fits perfectly.
In your wildest dreams only. T and Wallacea have no connection whatsoever:
1. T is not found east of Bengal.
2. It's "father" lineage K has highest basal diversity around Iran, so it has a South or West Asian origin.
3. It's "grandfather" IJK does too.
4. It's "great-grandfather" F has highest diversity in South Asia, and hence originated there.
So, unless you want to go back to the CF node, you can't make any ancestral connection between T and SE Asia or anywhere East of Bengal.
And if you go back to the CF node, then we would be discussing the OoA migration and the early Eurasian expansion.
Do not cheat the facts, please. Do not cheat science.
I've always argued that occupation of the Mediterranean was late...
The Mediterranean will not save your Wallacea pet conjecture.
Anyway T's arrival in the Mediterranean would be only a little later than movement out to the northern Solomon Islands.
What kind of mad correlation are you making between Y-DNA T and the Solomon islands? I just don't see any connection whatsoever.
I'll admit I didn't make it clear that Y-hap Ts expansion doesn't derive from the first Wallacea crossing.
It has absolutely nothing to do with Wallacea. There's no T east of Bengal and all points to no ancestor of T ever going beyond that point at all.
...
I'm afraid I'm not very computer savvy at all.
Can you write? That's all you really need to know. Blogging is for dummies, not for programmers.
"Are you proposing a migration involving only men? I don't buy into your sailors story".
So it's completely accidental that Y-hap T is distributed almost totally along coastlines and along major rivers?
"Aren't we seeing Asian mtDNA in Madagasca, for instance?"
Yes, but not necessarily from the Austronesian place of origin. In the Pacific Austronesian-speaking people are very much associated with Y-hap C2 and mtDNA B. So it seems there was considerable swapping of mtDNA and even Y-chromosomes.
"Y-DNA T is not more than 10% anywhere"
So? Other people borrow technology and move in once humans have become established in any region.
"You are reading too much in a minority clade".
Every clade has a history, no matter how minor the clade. I'm arguing that the distribution of Y-hap T strongly points to a coastal expansion. If you can see it as showing something else please enlighten us.
"What I would like to know is what distribution have these three sublineages, in order to extimate the origin and spread pattern of T as a whole"
Unless we can find the detailed sequence of evolution (which I doubt) it probably wouldn't tell you too much. I presume it breaks into regional varieties, as do virtually all othe rhaplogroups.
"Possibly T2 and T3 have somewhat different geographic origins and expansion processes".
But at one stage they were a single haplogroup, with at least one defining mutation having occurred in a single individual.
"How can you know the origin of this lineage without even analyzing its structure?"
Then you have the nerve to go on to say, 'T and Wallacea have no connection whatsoever'. How can you be so sure?
"Why not in West Asia (maybe the Zagros area)"
What on earth would make it take to the sea from there?
"What kind of mad correlation are you making between Y-DNA T and the Solomon islands?"
How about dugout canoes?
"That's precisely my point. MNOPS is (if confirmed) a brother lineage of T, that leaves 2/3 K sublineages (T and L) being restricted to the Western macro-region"
Hang on. MNOPS is a clade that includes several haplogroups know simply as K, so mostly SE Asian. And, along with the two branches T and L, descends from F. We can't say for sure where T and L originate. But we still have MNOPS in Wallacea.
"It's 'great-grandfather' F has highest diversity in South Asia, and hence originated there".
For a start how many times do you need to be told that 'highest diversity' does not equal 'origin'. We know that several Y-haps labeled simply as F are spread through India to Sri Lanka and into SE Asia. But there are three more haplogroups within F* that have been specifically given other letters: G, H and a third one (in turn subdivided further).
I strongly suspect that the first of the three, G, has always been somewhere round the Caucasus/Zagros. Neither it nor its ancestors have ever lived in India. In other words it's a branch of F left behind as other haplogroups moved into India.
The second branch, Y-hap H, is a branch of F that eventually spread right round India.
Now for the third branch of F* given other letters. First off it branches into two.
I'm reasonably sure that the first branch, IJ, was another Y-hap left behind as the other F haplogroups moved into India. That is until J2 had evolved and moved into India with the Neolithic. J1 is basically south of the Zagros, J2 through Anatolia and the Zagros, and Y-hap I north of the Caucasus, from where it eventually entered Europe.
But what about the second branch, TLMNOPS? It probably came into India with H and the several Fs. It broke into three: Y-haps T and L, and a third one; which again has been further subdidvided and given new letters. Various haplogroups within this third clade have been given the letter K, spread from India through SE Asia and out into Australia, New Guinea and Melanesia. Perhaps Y-haps T and L accompanied the original K haplogroup into SE Asia.
There are four other haplogroups within K* that have been specifically given other letters: S, M, NO and PQR. I'm quite prepared to accept that only S, M, K2, K3 and K4 actually made it across Wallacea. But they share a single point of origin with the three other haplogroups: K1, NO and PQR. Perhaps they separated into east and west Wallacean groups?
Humans had reached Australia by 50,000 years ago but I'd bet lots of money on it not being Y-hap F. So I'd guess that members of Y-hap K arrived round Wallacea about 40,000 years ago, and picked up the fairly basic boating technology of the region. And off they went: across Wallacea in turn, but NO and PQR were off back north along the coast and west along the rivers. PQR emerged onto the Russian Steppes by 35,000 years ago. But around Wallacea boating had kept improving and by 25,000 years ago open water boating had improved enough for people to reach the northern Solomom Islands. Perhaps the dugout canoe. This improved open water boating also moved west, along the coast this time. By 12,000 years ago it entered the Mediterranean. With Y-hap T.
"So it's completely accidental that Y-hap T is distributed almost totally along coastlines and along major rivers?"
What haplogroup does not? Not only the planet is full of such geographic accidents but we humans tend to live near coastlines and rivers, rather than where there is no water.
But... I don't see clear that T has that distribution anyhow in any particular manner. You would have to persuade me that the distribution of this lineage is particularly coastal-riverine in any sense. Somalia is dry like almost the Sahara, Lake Chad (a dead-end drainage lake) does not belong to any major river basin and anything that arrived there must have crossed between basins, the same that anything arriving to Crete must have crossed the sea.
Some Y-DNA T is clearly Phoenician (East Sicily, Cadiz, Ibiza, Tunisia) anyhow, what may give you the wrong impression. Jews may have also helped to scatter the lineage around. Being a minority lineage, you should be particularly careful to its associations with other lineages either regionally or in general.
"In the Pacific Austronesian-speaking people are very much associated with Y-hap C2 and mtDNA B".
Ok. But that looks like a local founder effect to me. Yes or yes?
"I'm arguing that the distribution of Y-hap T strongly points to a coastal expansion. If you can see it as showing something else please enlighten us".
I'm bored of looking at that map: T is mainly a West Eurasian haplogroup that appears on first sight to have a West Asian center of scatter (post-Neolithic?) Apart of the Phoenician founder effects and the dual logic of West/East Arabia Peninsula colonization from the North, it does not look as anything particularly "coastal" in this area.
Oddities are The Horn (Somalia may be partly coastal but neither Oromo nor Amhara are or have been historically coastal at all - highlanders in fact), Lake Chad Fulani (a local founder effect) and a couple of states in East India. In Europe and West Asia it does not look particularly coastal at all, excepted the Phoenician founder effects.
I can think in Neolithic or even post-Neolithic flows in most cases, at least as provisional idea, and only a clearer knowledge of the internal structure of the lineage can tell us more. So far all the sublineages of T (T*, T2 and T3) seem to have been sampled only in Europe, the rest is a big question mark.
"Unless we can find the detailed sequence of evolution (which I doubt) it probably wouldn't tell you too much. I presume it breaks into regional varieties, as do virtually all other haplogroups".
So far we don't have that knowledge. we know of 2 subhaplogroups, three haplotype clusters and, at least on first sight, they look similarly scattered and mixed through Europe. Tell me if you find something more.
"Then you have the nerve to go on to say, 'T and Wallacea have no connection whatsoever'. How can you be so sure?"
I have argued that in a very reasonable manner above. Please address my argumentation or don't waste my time with vague circular pointless comments like this one.
"What on earth would make it take to the sea from there?"
First, I don't see any particular sea connection. In any case, Sumer, Elam and its descendants of Semitic and Indoeuropean language were connected by sea to very different places, including India and East Africa. In other cases it's a clear Phoenician marker. So less generic "sea" and more specific seas and sea routes, please. Vagueness can't be an argument but a waste of time for all.
""What kind of mad correlation are you making between Y-DNA T and the Solomon islands?"
How about dugout canoes?"
Absurd. Not worth commenting.
"Hang on. MNOPS is a clade that includes several haplogroups know simply as K, so mostly SE Asian. And, along with the two branches T and L, descends from F. We can't say for sure where T and L originate. But we still have MNOPS in Wallacea".
Not sure what you mean. If the new structure holds up, then K is split basally in:
- L
- MNOPS
- T
Whatever happened to the MNOPS guys, it's after they split from T and L (so it's quite trivial). L and T are not found east of India, so K must have a "Western" (South/West Asian) coalescence, just like all its ancestors until at least macro-haplogroup F.
No Wallacea anywhere.
For a start how many times do you need to be told that 'highest diversity' does not equal 'origin'.
Unless you can muster a better logic, such as migration from different sources, that would need to be explained case by case, it should mean origin. I don't think we can apply that multiple migration alternative for the early Eurasian expansion. I don't see how it could be.
So for me (and most population geneticists), in principle, highest basal diversity mean likely origin. Not 100% for sure in all cases but it's the most parsimonious explanation in more than 90% of cases.
Otherwise you'd have to propose alternative patterns of how such greater diversity might have accumulated and which are their sources.
"But what about the second branch, TLMNOPS? It probably came into India with H and the several Fs. It broke into three: Y-haps T and L, and a third one; which again has been further subdidvided and given new letters".
Your logic is faulty:
1. mtDNA does not support a West Asian origin for any branch of the Eurasian fraction of Humankind.
2. Neither of the Y-DNA OoA top-level haplogroups looks like original of West Asia: not D, not C and certainly not what matters most here: F.
3. West Asia was then surely inhabited by Neanderthals.
4. F split into F1, F2, F3, F4, G, H and IJK. All them found in South Asia, with the possible exception of G, which would be if anything the earliest spearhead of West Eurasian coloniation from the Y-DNA viewpoint (or not: MC age estimates for this lineage suggest it's very recent, though, as you know, I don't swallow these conjectures easily).
5. IJK should have split, IMO, in the Iran-Pakistan area. Again IJ appears as one of the oldest lineages migrating westward. As no IJK* or IJ* or even I* exists anymore, I understand that IJ itself is a founder effect of the migrant groups that colonized West Eurasia early on.
6. K, as adressed above, looks like splitting again in the Iran-Pakistan area, with an uncertain role for other parts of South Asia. As some of the K(xL,MNOPS,T) seems to be within MNOPS, we can hardly adress this step from the whole K diversity. The three major lineages can shed some light though and they look again like centered in the Pakistan area.
7. MNOPS, if confirmed, probably represents the F migration eastward, into Sahul (M, S) and East Asia (NO). P would then be a back-migrant lineage. But this is another story. Just to say that that P does not look particularly sea-oriented either, rather the opposite, with a marked inland/steppe distribution in fact. Rather than boats, one would think that clothes was what allowed the P people (and probably also their NO relatives) to thrive. But rather speculative again.
"Humans had reached Australia by 50,000 years ago but I'd bet lots of money on it not being Y-hap F".
It's the kind of bet that will not be resolved in our lifetime probably. It could be that it was C4 people only but this lineage is phylogenetically at least at the same level as IJK and, in practical terms, probably younger. C4 and S could have perfectly arrived to Australia together or within a short interval or time.
In my little exercise on Y-DNA timeline, S appeared as 40 Ky old, while C4 looks younger (30 Ky). However this may well be an artifact or our limited knowledge of the SNPs in those lineages and hence I'd consider seriously the possibility that S and C4 arrived to Australia together c. 50 Kya (or in rapidly successive batches if that fancies your expectatives better).
...
If you have any minimal reason on your Wallacea boating hypothesis, the only Y-DNA haplogroup that could be derived from such a SE Asian originated expansion would be P, not T. However P looks like rather continental oriented in its distribution. So maybe not after all.
"What haplogroup does not?"
Most of them don't. Especially not sit along the coast and twist up virtually all the rivers along said coast.
"Somalia is dry like almost the Sahara"
It is now, what with the drying climate and overgrazing by goats. But any number of rivers still flow southeast from the Ethiopian Highlands to the Indian Ocean and are lined with forest even today.
"Lake Chad (a dead-end drainage lake) does not belong to any major river basin and anything that arrived there must have crossed between basins"
During pluvials Lake Chad is much expanded, as are the river systems running into it, and across the catchment boundary into the Nile.
"Some Y-DNA T is clearly Phoenician (East Sicily, Cadiz, Ibiza, Tunisia)"
I suspect most of it in the Mediterranean is pre-Phoenician, but I have no problem accepting that some branches entered the Med with them later.
"But that looks like a local founder effect to me. Yes or yes?"
Yes. But it's still an example of a differing male/female sailors' haplogroup connection. Someone picked up someone else not originally associated.
"T is mainly a West Eurasian haplogroup that appears on first sight to have a West Asian center of scatter"
So the presence of T in India is irrelevant? Talk about Eurocentric!
"dual logic of West/East Arabia Peninsula colonization from the North, it does not look as anything particularly 'coastal' in this area".
Excuse me. Even though you claim to be 'bored of looking at that map' you obviously haven't looked at it enough. T does not show up on the western side of the Arbian Peninsular at all. And to say there's nothing 'particularly coastal' on the eastern side is to completely ignore the fact that it spreads right around the Persian Gulf, and even out along the Oman coast.
"Somalia may be partly coastal but neither Oromo nor Amhara are or have been historically coastal at all - highlanders in fact)"
And there are no rivers in the highlands?
"a couple of states in East India"
Coinciding remarkably closely with the rivers flowing into the Coromandel Coast, along with the mouths of the Indus and Ganges. Not connected to coastal or riverine environments? I think you need to do a course in basic geography.
"Whatever happened to the MNOPS guys, it's after they split from T and L (so it's quite trivial)".
We have no way of knowing where that split took place. Just because 'L and T are not found east of India' doesn't mean they were never there. There is no Y-hap D east of about 90 degress and no Y-hap E west of about 60 degrees. But they have a common origin so one of them must have originated beyond the region they're now found in.
"so K must have a 'Western' (South/West Asian) coalescence".
And that's why five of it's branches are confined to just the eastern side of Wallacea, and only three are spread to the west of it? And, using your own logic (regarding T and L not being found east of India) those five haplogroups must have developed east of Wallacea. Your statement, 'No Wallacea anywhere' is clearly incorrect.
"you'd have to propose alternative patterns of how such greater diversity might have accumulated"
Selection leads to loss of diversity, obviously. A particular haplogroup might suffer selection until it is able to enter a new habitat. At which time it will diversify considerably. But that centre of diversity will not be its place of origin.
"As some of the K(xL,MNOPS,T) seems to be within MNOPS, we can hardly adress this step from the whole K diversity".
Much of the 'K diversity' occurs across Wallaces line, so it doesn't fit your beliefs. And therefore you can safely ignore that piece of evidence.
"The three major lineages can shed some light though and they look again like centered in the Pakistan area".
And it's completely incidental that you ignore the minor lineages? Of course it's most probable the lineages considered minor are that way because they have never moved beyond their place of origin, and so they are of no interest to researchers examining the origins of Western Eurasians.
"It could be that it was C4 people only but this lineage is phylogenetically at least at the same level as IJK and, in practical terms, probably younger".
At your link you have C diversifying at 60K, which makes sense to me. Gives it time to arrive in Australia even that early. Surviving C4 may well diversify no more than 40K. But diversity of C as a whole is older, so that in no way means that C4 arrived in Australia just 40K ago.
Ok, so Georgia and Azrbaijan are coastal, Ethiopian highlands are coastal, lake Chad is coastal (specially the Fulani people, so well known for their sailing feats through the Sahel), the East European steppe is coastal and so is Uyghuristan. North Italy is coastal, as well as Extremadura and Aragon in Spain.
Please!
I suspect most of it in the Mediterranean is pre-Phoenician.
Cadiz, Ibiza, West Sicily and Tunisia were the hearland of the Phoenician colonial empire. Just look at any history book.
The Eastern European and North Italian spread would seem to relate to Neolithic but the specifically Central/West Mediterranean one looks clearly Phoenician. However some presence in the Atlantic may be originated in some other processes (Neolithic, Indoeuropeans, Jews).
So the presence of T in India is irrelevant? Talk about Eurocentric!.
It is not irrelevant but first of all we'd need to know the structure of the haplogroup. It can well be part of "randomized" Neolithic flows.
There might be something coastal in that area of the Indian ocean but obviously it does not relate directly with the Mediterranean part. The node (and a potential origin) is clearly in the West Asian highlands (Zagros-Taurus region).
Notice also that the blanks do not necesarily mean zero, just not found/tested.
And there are no rivers in the highlands?.
See how you bend the evidence to fit your convenience, you damn cheater! There are rivers everywhere: absolutely everywhere but in the deserts.
I think you need to do a course in basic geography.
I think you do. What's so particular about "the Coromandel coast"? In fact the data says Andrah Pradesh, you don't know where exactly in there - you read too much (or too little) according to what is convenient to you.
We have no way of knowing where that split took place. Just because 'L and T are not found east of India' doesn't mean they were never there.
Occam!
There is no Y-hap D east of about 90 degress and no Y-hap E west of about 60 degrees. But they have a common origin so one of them must have originated beyond the region they're now found in.
No, because DE* is found in both regions, so D and E surely evolved locally after the initial migration from undefined DE.
Btw, I think you have your geography here totally confused.
And that's why five of it's branches are confined to just the eastern side of Wallacea, and only three are spread to the west of it?.
Only one it seems: MNOPS. This issue needs clarification but I'm all for MNOPS right now: it would explain a lot of things.
And, using your own logic (regarding T and L not being found east of India) those five haplogroups must have developed east of Wallacea.
There's nothing "east of Wallacea", except New Guinea and the vastness of the Ocean. If MNOPS would not exist, then I'd agree that K would appear to have a SE Asian (not Pacific Ocean) core but MNOPS seems to solve this matter by adding a new node downstream of K for all the oriental K (plus P).
Selection leads to loss of diversity...
No way. Selection needs of diversity: diversity is what allow species, and populations within them, to adapt in a flexible manner to unpredictable environmental changes. Selection tends to preserve diversity.
And it's completely incidental that you ignore the minor lineages?.
Re-read. I'm not ignoring them, just that at this particular moment we still don't know for sure which one of them are part of MNOPS and which are not. Some "K" was mentioned in the paper that proposed this new clade but we don't know yet which is within and which is out. Probably the oriental K-number clades are all within, as are all the oriental K-letter ones. It's just logical but I don't have confirmation yet.
At your link you have C diversifying at 60K, which makes sense to me.
Remember that I said that C is ill studied and that I did not trust too much the conclusions reached for this particular clade.
C4 probably expanded anyhow upon arrival to Australia, as did S. Expansion (diversification) would seem to relate quite directly with colonization events. But please take the dates in that post with some salt: it's just an exercise. I just meant to emphasize that S and C4 might well have arrived together (more or less) and expanded in parallel.
I'll first go back to some of your comments from yesterday because there are just too many comments today showing you don't actually understand or even look at geographic distribution at all. And it will cover some of the doubts you still have. First:
"C4 and S could have perfectly arrived to Australia together or within a short interval or time".
Unlikely. Y-haps S and the Ks (2, 3 and 4) are alomost certainly more recent to Australia/New Guinea than is C. Y-hap C through the region is geographically differentiated at the deepest level: island SE Asia (C2), New Guinea (C6) and Australia (C4). And, now that most Indian C* has been reclassified as C5, most C* is spread right round the South China Sea and into Wallacea.
On the other hand Y-haps S and the Ks through Australia, New Guinea, Melanesia and island SE Asia are not differentiated geographically until well downstream of the F node.
"I don't see clear that T has that distribution anyhow in any particular manner".
I invite you to take a look. The only important environmental consideration Y-hap T had with regard to their watery environment seems to have been that mountains not come right down to the water's edge. Otherwise Y-hap T is spread right along the coast and up the rivers all the way between the Ganges and the Atlantic coast of Europe. Have another look if you can't see it yet.
But mysteries remain. Why not T on the Dalmatian coast, or the Rhone Valley? Already too populated? And why is Italy different? Perhaps T came into Italy on a wide front, from both the Adriatic and Tyrrhenian Seas, and all along the coast. Your observations concerning the existence of two T haplogroups may be relevant.
"Somalia may be partly coastal but neither Oromo nor Amhara are or have been historically coastal at all - highlanders in fact"
Although the Polynesians arrived in New Zealand by sea they rapidly moved inland to take advantage of the as yet unexploited resources. So they were by no means confined to the coast. Likewise with Y-hap T.
"Oddities are The Horn"
Perhaps it was uninhabited when T arrived. As seems to have been the case with the Mediterranean islands.
"What haplogroup does not?"
Yet later you write:
"Just to say that that P does not look particularly sea-oriented either, rather the opposite, with a marked inland/steppe distribution in fact".
Can't make up your mind?
"the only Y-DNA haplogroup that could be derived from such a SE Asian originated expansion would be P"
I think you're beginning to see the light. I knew you'd get it eventually. That's why I've persevered. I've never claimed that R and Q came from Wallacea. But it's been obvious to me for ages that P did. I doubt that the M242 mutation that defines Y-hap Q happened before P had emerged from northwest India. However R may be a different story. Take a look at this map from wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:GlobalR1a1a.png
Note: R1a with two centres. One on the Steppes, probably associated with the Indo-European expansion. And one centre in India. Guess where? Along the Indo-Gangetic Plain.
"Some Y-DNA T is clearly Phoenician (East Sicily, Cadiz, Ibiza, Tunisia) anyhow"
The Mediterranran islands were first inhabited 10-12,000 years ago whereas the Phoenicians are less than 3000 years ago. T basically gets to all the islands. By the the time Phoenicians appear the people around the Mediterranean are already a real mixture, including Y-hap E (from Tunisia?). And between the time of the first islanders and the Phoenicians we have farmers moving through, probably Y-hap J, possibly along with G. But Y-hap R1b managed to hold out along the Atlantic coast.
I agree that R1a arrived in Europe with the Indo-European languages. The same haplogroup probably took the languages into India as well, but the problem there is that R1a probably came from India in the first place.
Y-hap N came into Europe from somewhere east of the Urals relatively recently. But may be associated with the Finno-Ugric languages. That just leaves the problem of who carried the LBK into Europe? and the problem of how old is R1b in Western Europe? Where does Y-hap I fit in?
I agree with you now that T and L might both originate in India. Of course technology travels independently of Y-haps to some extent. It's just that T and L took up the idea of the dugout canoe that K1 had brought in from further east. And at the other end Y-hap M took the same idea to the Northern Solomon Islands.
Some remarks not covered:
"What's so particular about 'the Coromandel coast'"?
Have a look at a topographical map of India.
"There might be something coastal in that area of the Indian ocean but obviously it does not relate directly with the Mediterranean part".
Perhaps not 'directly' but it certainly 'relates' to it.
"Only one it seems: MNOPS"
MNOPS actually includes four Ks as well: K1, K2, K3 and K4. So east of Wallacea we have M, S, K2, K3 and K4. West of it we have NO, P and K1.
"There are rivers everywhere: absolutely everywhere but in the deserts".
And T makes it up every one of them all the way round the Indian Ocean. Except where mountains reach the coast.
"The node (and a potential origin) is clearly in the West Asian highlands (Zagros-Taurus region)".
More likely in Mesopotamia, along the two rivers. Have another look.
"Selection needs of diversity"
It may 'need' diversity but it 'leads to' loss of diversity, by definition. So your comment, 'Selection tends to preserve diversity' is obviously incorrect.
Re. haplogroup C4 and C*: I don't see how anything you say contradicts what I say. Why would that impede C and S moving together (or with 5000 years of difference, would not make much difference from our perspective) through Indonesia. If C seems SE Asian in orgin, so does MNOPS, so they might well have been living side by side in SE Asia first of all, yes or yes?
Re. haplogroup T:
Yes, why not Dalmatia or the Rhône or the Eastern coast of Spain or Southern Italy other than the Phoenician influenced areas of Sicily?
T in Europe looks affected by Neolithic movements and that's why I guess North Italy has so much T, because initially North Italy was much affected by a wave from the Illyrian province... who came overland... and who were related but also different from those who spread CP through the Southern and Central coasts earlier and who were not so clearly in colonizing mode.
So we have T going overland and non-T going by the first clearly deep ocean sailing and fishing culture of Mediterranean Europe. Just the opposite of what you say. At least for this region.
"Although the Polynesians arrived in New Zealand by sea they rapidly moved inland to take advantage of the as yet unexploited resources".
We are not talking of a remote desert island of the Pacific Ocean but of the heartland of Humankind, inhabited since "always", people who speak non-Semitic Afroasiatic languages, which are generally acknowledged to be native of either the Horn or the Nile. People who have mostly local haplogroups...
Can't make up your mind?.
Can you read what I write as I intend it to be read. No haplogroup has a non-riverine non-coastal distribution. That's only logical because there are rivers everywhere and because the sea is generally beneficial for our lives, providing us with food and generally improving the climate.
But of all Y-DNA haplogroups P could be argued to have a relatively inland distribution, mostly because Q and R1a do have that Eurasian continental spread (but not R2 or R1b). And Q only before Beringia, of course: in America they apparently followed the coastal route.
"I think you're beginning to see the light".
I think you're again talking like a prophet. Instead of acknowledging the limitations of your doctrine (you pretend it to be a theory but it's just a belief) you come with these religious catchphrases, as if you were in a moral crusade. Beware of your own self, Terry.
P could not "come from Wallacea". SE Asia is one thing and Wallacea is just a small marginal area of it. When I say SE Asia I think Indochina (Thailand, Burma, Vietnam, etc.) and maybe Sundaland at most. Wallacea is already 9/10 of the way to the end of the world. It's a near-terminal station not a major distribution center like the one at Indochina.
I don't see anything important in the R1a1a distribution: it's obviously not meaningful re. P as a whole, not even too much re. R1a1a itself. However I do think that P might have originated in Northern South Asia but not because of such a remotely distant sublineage as R1a1a, which is not different from any of the others (the various Rs and Qs).
You are again looking at what you want to look and not at what really matters: basal diversity and in general diversity at every single phylogenetic level.
Back with T:
"T basically gets to all the islands".
Not in the West Mediterranean. Here it goes to some very specifically "Phoenician" islands (West Sicily, Ibiza and Cadiz almost an island but only colonized with Phoenicians, not before) and, curiously enough several inland countries such as Aragon and Extremadura. In the Hesperides, T has a clearly Phoenician affinity (though there might have been other processes re. Aragon and Extremadura: maybe Indoeuropeans, maybe Jews, maybe very specific Neolithic/Chalcolithic founder effects).
I agree with you now that T and L might both originate in India.
I have not said that. In wait of better structural knowledge, what the distribution suggests is West Asia for T and AfPak for L (highest and very central among Quetta Pashtuns). IMO L might have spread, along with J2 (and maybe part of R1a), within the South Asian Neolithic process, which is centered in Pakistan.
"It's just that T and L took up the idea of the dugout canoe that K1 had brought in from further east".
Fantastic Wallacea. The problem is that it's just imaginary. We don't know if K1 has anything to do with MNOPS and common sense suggests it does not. Do you even know where K1 is found?
On your last remarks:
Coromandel coast: again: what's so peculiar about it. And do you even know for sure that Andrah's T is at the coast? Or is it found in Hyderabad?
T relates some Telugu people with some Dutch people, fine. R1a1a does in a very much more clear and strong manner. So where's your logic?
"MNOPS actually includes four Ks as well: K1, K2, K3 and K4".
I do NOT KNOW that. Do you? If so, please provide a source.
T is not present in all rivers (almost non-existent at the Nile or the Rhine or the Ganges, for example. T is important in mountainous areas like Elam (SW Iran), southern Ethiopia, Extremadura...
Mesopotamia was not apparently populated before the Neolithic, when it was colonized from the North Zagros area.
You have a selective perception of the evidence and hence faulty logic. Sad but true.
And well, selection clearly favors the preservation of diversity. Because selection is not a process of mere specialization, which is rather the exception than the rule, but a process of survival, which is normally much better for non-specialists. Check this post for a reference on how selection favors diversity.
It is normally other processes which cause loss of diversity, notably founder effects and drift.
Peter A. Underhill, Peidong Shen, Alice A. Lin et al., "Y chromosome sequence variation and the history of human populations," Nature Genetics, Volume 26, November 2000:
Haplotype 88 (=T-M70)
1/28 = 3.6% Morocco
1/88 = 1.1% Pakistan + India
1/106 = 0.94% America [i.e. nominally indigenous Americans]
Haplotype 89 (=K1-M147)
2/88 = 2.3% Pakistan + India
By the way, Maju, the (supposedly) indigenous haplogroup K Y-DNA in Australia does not belong to haplogroup S-M230. Australian K* has been excluded from almost every known subclade of K-M9 except for T-M70 and M-P256(xM1-M4/M5, M2a-M177/SRY9138) as far as I recall. When I reviewed the results of studies of indigenous Australian Y-DNA a couple years ago, I was struck by the fact that none of the authors who had found K-M9(xR1-M173) Y-DNA in a sample of indigenous Australians had reported screening their samples for M70, which should be considered to be either a ridiculous oversight or else a hint of something nefarious.
Sure, there are very curious things with some of the haplogroups in America. I already commented a couple of times (not sure where) about P(xR,Q), which seems to exists at low levels in NW America (Natives). In another paper (where Native American P* could still be R2 - but unlikely IMO) it was suggested to be related by haplotype to Mongol P* (which could be R or not). I am intrigued by such stuff but have been unable to find further info.
The presence of T at low levels among Native Americans also seems to suggest some odd connection with West Eurasia and/or South Asia... but again I fail to see any apparent connection with SE Asia or Australasia.
What you mention about Australian K* is indeed interesting but unless the phylogeny is resolved somehow we can only speculate wildly. At the moment we don't even know if MNOPS stands or not and what part of K-other might it include.
It is intriguing but I don't buy on the boat theory nor I see how the current knowledge could support it (much less, as Terry claims, oppose the coastal migration model for the OoA, which I find quite reasonable).
"the heartland of Humankind, inhabited since 'always'"
We don't know that at all. Humans have come and gone from various regions with changing climate from long before Australopithecus appeared.
"Wallacea is just a small marginal area of it".
Hardly 'small' or 'marginal'. It includes all of the Philippines except Palawan, all of Indonesia east of Java, the Celebes, Timor, the Moluccas, Halmahera and a multitude of smaller islands.
"I don't see anything important in the R1a1a distribution"
Of course not. You never see anything important in evidence that contradicts your beliefs.
"T in Europe looks affected by Neolithic movements and that's why I guess North Italy has so much T, because initially North Italy was much affected by a wave from the Illyrian province"
I was sure that until now you were claiming T as Phoenician.
"Not in the West Mediterranean. Here it goes to some very specifically 'Phoenician' islands"
Excuse me. It also gets to Crete, the Balearics, Sardinia, Corsica and Cyprus. Those pesky Phoenicians sure got around.
Regarding Lake Chad. Have a look at the guys in this photograph and tell me they're not in a dugout canoe:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6261447.stm
And some more information on Lake Chad:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Chad
Quote:
"Lake Chad is believed to be a remnant of a former inland sea which has grown and shrunk with changes in climate over the past 13,000 years. At its largest, around 4000 BC, this lake is estimated to have covered an area of 400,000 km², (approx. 154,000 sq miles). Lake sediments appear to indicate dry periods, when the lake nearly dried up, around 8500 BC, 5500 BC, 2000 BC, and 100 BC."
Those dry periods would surely tend to push people away from boating into adopting some other method of survival. For example pastoralism.
"Do you even know where K1 is found?"
India. Do you know where K2, K3 and K4 are found?
"I do NOT KNOW that".
You did very much 'know that' when I'd simplified my diagram connecting Y-haps with mtDNA by collecting all the Ks on a separate line. You argued vehemently that the Ks were simply the same type of regional varieties of the same clade as were IJ, T, S, M , NO and P. But now that IJ, T and L have been separated out you have changed your ideas about Y-hap K. Is that because the geographic separation of the Ks makes holding on to your belief a little shaky?
"which should be considered to be either a ridiculous oversight or else a hint of something nefarious".
I'd go for 'ridiculous oversight'. Was the paper dealing specifically with Australia or were the Australian samples just part of a wider picture? Taking the samples further may not have been relevant to the researchers.
It's actually very difficult to find any recent information regarding Australain Aborigines.
"Australian K* has been excluded from almost every known subclade of K-M9 except for T-M70"
And isn't that interesting?
"Hardly 'small' or 'marginal'. It includes all of the Philippines except Palawan, all of Indonesia east of Java, the Celebes, Timor, the Moluccas, Halmahera and a multitude of smaller islands".
Small and marginal, just as I was saying...
It does not include Philippines anywhere I look and Wallace line, the western border of Wallacea, runs south of Philippines anyhow. But even if you add Philippines, it'd still be small and marginal in the context of Eurasia and Africa.
I was sure that until now you were claiming T as Phoenician.
No. You always misunderstand me (intentionally I suppose).
Excuse me. It also gets to Crete, the Balearics, Sardinia, Corsica and Cyprus.
"16.7% (9/54) of Balearics in Eivissa". Eivissa is the Catalan name of Ibiza, FYI. Cyprus and Crete are not in the West Med, but Cyprus was indeed colonized from the Phoenician area. The presence in Crete belongs exclusively to Oropedio Lashitiou, a village genocided by the Venetians and resettled with other Greeks from outside the island:
"... the plateau has been continuously inhabited since then, except a period that started in 1293 and lasted for over two centuries during the Venetian occupation of Crete. During that time and due to frequent rebellions and strong resistance, villages were demolished, cultivation prohibited, and natives were forced to leave and forbidden to return under a penalty of death. Later, in the early 15th century, Venetian rulers allowed refugees from the Greek mainland (eastern Peloponnese) to settle in the plain and cultivate the land again".
Your lack of detail is so annoying. You just look at a map and assume that every detail is there. Maps are not reality but representations (and sometimes poor representations).
The presence in Corsica is no doubt of mainland Italian origin. Read a bit about the history of Corsica before making weird claims, please.
I don't say all Y-DNA T in Europe is of Phoenician origin. Some may come from other areas, notably the Balcans and East Europe. But in the Mediterranean there are a lot of places very tightly associated to Phoenician/Carthaginian colonization: Cadiz, Tunisia, Ibiza and West Sicily are very clear. And, while I don't think it's the case for Corsica, this island was also a Carthaginian province (of course). But it were Cadiz and Ibiza, this one with a very peculiar Phoenician-looking haplogroup composition and the former being the most notable Phoenician colony west of Carthage, which gave me the main clue. Because they are very specific places and not wide areas.
The devil is in the details. Pay attention to the details, please. For instance, looking at the details, one might argue that Y-DNA T in Sicily might be of Greek origin and not Carthaginian as I presumed.
Whatever the case, the map only depicts what has been detected (and known by the author of that article/map) and the blank areas are not equal to zero by default.
But you just look at a map (which can be better or worse but probably imperfect) and without making any further effort, you adapt it to your pet theory and claim that it represents a coastal migration and blah blah.
I just hate that attitude and the time it makes me waste, really.
"Regarding Lake Chad. Have a look at the guys in this photograph and tell me they're not in a dugout canoe"...
LOL. Have you tested them for their haplogroup? Are they even Fulani? I doubt it because Fulani are typically land herders, not river/lake people.
Wasting my time again.
Lake Chad is believed to be a remnant of a former inland sea... At its largest, around 4000 BC...
Now tell me something interesting, like about the Fula people and their oceanic travels with cows and all. LOL. You are a joke: the Fulani did not live at Chad ever before Modern Age. They only expanded in the last centuries. They are original from westernmost Africa, Senegal and Guinea highlands (plateaus). At most they have been tentatively associated with the Neolithic paintings at Tassili n'Ajjer (NW Niger) which depict a way of life very similar to that traditional of Fulani people: herding cows forth and back through the Sahel.
Instead in the area there are other peoples who are traditionally very associated with rivers, like the Sao, who are the typical fishermen of the Niger.
"Do you even know where K1 is found?"
India.
Good boy. Where in India? You are making a lot of this haplogroup, you should know where it's found and how it relates to your mythical Avalon... I mean: Wallacea.
You did very much 'know that' when I'd simplified my diagram connecting Y-haps with mtDNA by collecting all the Ks on a separate line. You argued vehemently that the Ks were simply the same type of regional varieties of the same clade as were IJ, T, S, M , NO and P.
Not IJ, which has never belonged to K.
I do know that K1, K2, K3 and K4 are distinct sublineages of K, exactly as the others (just that less numerous or less studied at least). But MNOPS is a new proposed haplogroup and we don't know which subclades would belong to it exactly. We know about the large ones: M, NO, P and S but not about the small K-number ones.
At least I don't know. The paper that proposed it is behind paywall and I have only seen a graph that included "K" under MNOPS (but excluded T and L). Obviously this refers to some K-other but what exactly I don't know.
Do you? You are the self-proclaimed K-expert who is building crazy theories on such things. So you buy the damn paper and send me a copy. Thanks in advance.
Until you do, we can't discuss further these details.
Y-DNA haplogroup T has been found throughout at least the eastern half of Crete, and not only in the Oropedio Lasithiou.
Laisel Martinez, Peter A Underhill, Lev A Zhivotovsky et al., "Paleolithic Y-haplogroup heritage predominates in a Cretan highland plateau," European Journal of Human Genetics (2007) 15, 485–493:
Heraklion Prefecture
2/104 = 1.9% E1b1b1-M35(xE1b1b1a-M78, E1b1b1c-M123)
7/104 = 6.7% E1b1b1a-M78
2/104 = 1.9% E1b1b1c1-M34
(11/104 = 10.6% E1b1b1-M35 total)
8/104 = 7.7% G2a-P15
3/104 = 2.9% I-M258(xI1-M253, I2a-P37, I2b1-M223)
5/104 = 4.8% I1-M253
3/104 = 2.9% I2a-P37
1/104 = 1.0% I2b1-M223
(12/104 = 11.5% I-M258 total)
2/104 = 1.9% J1-M267
2/104 = 1.9% J2a-M410(xJ2a4-DYS413≤18)
28/104 = 26.9% J2a4-DYS413≤18(xJ2a4b-M67, J2a4d-M319)
7/104 = 6.7% J2a4b-M67(xJ2a4b1-M92)
1/104 = 1.0% J2a4b1-M92
8/104 = 7.7% J2a4d-M319
(46/104 = 44.2% J2a-M410 total)
1/104 = 1.0% J2b-M102(xJ2b2-M241)
1/104 = 1.0% J2b2-M241
(48/104 = 46.2% J2-M172 total)
(50/104 = 48.1% J-M304 total)
3/104 = 2.9% T-M184
9/104 = 8.7% R1a1a-M198
9/104 = 8.7% R1b1b2-M269
1/104 = 1.0% R1b1b1-M73
1/104 = 1.0% R1b1-P25(xR1b1b1-M73, R1b1b2-M269)
(11/104 = 10.6% R1b1-P25 total)
(20/104 = 19.2% R1-M173 total)
Lasithi Plateau
2/41 = 4.9% E1b1b1a-M78
3/41 = 7.3% G2a-P15
1/41 = 2.4% I-M258(xI1-M253, I2a-P37, I2b1-M223)
2/41 = 4.9% I2a-P37
(3/41 = 7.3% I-M258 total)
1/41 = 2.4% J1-M267
1/41 = 2.4% J2a4-DYS413≤18(xJ2a4b-M67, J2a4d-M319)
3/41 = 7.3% J2a4b-M67(xJ2a4b1-M92)
(4/41 = 9.8% J2a-M410 total)
(5/41 = 12.2% J-M304 total)
3/41 = 7.3% T-M184
2/41 = 4.9% Q-M242
8/41 = 19.5% R1a1a-M198
12/41 = 29.3% R1b1b2-M269
3/41 = 7.3% R1b1-P25(xR1b1b1-M73, R1b1b2-M269)
(15/41 = 36.6% R1b1-P25 total)
(23/41 = 56.1% R1-M173 total)
Lasithi Prefecture
2/23 = 8.7% E1b1b1a-M78
1/23 = 4.3% E1b1b1c1-M34
(3/23 = 13.0% E1b1b1-M35 total)
1/23 = 4.3% G2a-P15
1/23 = 4.3% I2a-P37
1/23 = 4.3% J2a-M410(xJ2a4-DYS413≤18)
6/23 = 26.1% J2a4-DYS413≤18(xJ2a4b-M67, J2a4d-M319)
2/23 = 8.7% J2a4b1-M92
1/23 = 4.3% J2a4d-M319
(10/23 = 43.5% J2a-M410 total)
1/23 = 4.3% J2b-M102(xM241)
(11/23 = 47.8% J2-M172 total)
2/23 = 8.7% T-M184
1/23 = 4.3% R1a1a-M198
4/23 = 17.4% R1b1b2-M269
(5/23 = 21.7% R1-M173 total)
Fair enough. Though, just for the record, Oropedio Lashitou and Lashiti Plateau are the same thing (names in Greek and English respectively). Lashiti prefecture however is larger.
But I insist: I'm not saying "every T in the Med is Phoenician". It can be of Greek, Anatolian or other (mainly Balcanic of West Asian) origins. Or whatever. A lot of peoples have sailed those waters since Neolithic. What I think is that it does not look like a single uniform process and that only better knowledge of the structure will tell us something about it.
While we can't discern what and where is T2, T3 and T*, we can say very little about the distribution patterns of this clade, other that it has a center of gravity at West Asia.
Ebizur, as we are at it, do you know if T has been tested for in Sudan? Because it'd look the natural place to look for the node between Upper Egypt, The Horn and Lake Chad, considering what we know about R1b1a and E1b1b.
Maju said,
"Fair enough. Though, just for the record, Oropedio Lashitou and Lashiti Plateau are the same thing (names in Greek and English respectively). Lashiti prefecture however is larger."
All that goes without saying as a matter of course, but please do forgive me for paraphrasing.
It's "Lasithi" (Λασιθι), and not "Lashiti," by the way.
Maju said,
"Ebizur, as we are at it, do you know if T has been tested for in Sudan? Because it'd look the natural place to look for the node between Upper Egypt, The Horn and Lake Chad, considering what we know about R1b1a and E1b1b."
I do not recall having seen any SNP-tested case of T-M70 in any sample from Sudan. Underhill et al. (2000) have tested the Y-DNA of 40 individuals from Sudan for the M70 mutation and have found all to be negative, but they also have not found even one case of T-M70 in their sample of 88 Ethiopians, yet it is known from other sources that members of haplogroup T-M70 are present in the majority populations of Ethiopia (i.e. Oromo and Amhara). Hassan et al. (2008) have found K-M9(xL-M11, O-M175, P-M74) Y-DNA, which may belong to T-M70, in 6.0% (3/50) of a sample of Gaalien Arabs and 3.0% (1/33) of a sample of Copts, both from northern Sudan.
"And well, selection clearly favors the preservation of diversity".
It seems you don't understand selection. Selection involves limiting the number of individuals in a population able to produce the next generation, whether we're talking about 'natural' selection or we're down on the farm. How can limiting the number of parents favour 'preservation of diversity'? Your link deals with processes in place to re-establish diversity after selection has reduced it.
"No. You always misunderstand me (intentionally I suppose)".
You constantly mention the Phoenicians when talking about T in the Mediterranean. Here's a list of the times you've claimed T to be Phoenician there. I have a little time on my hands:
"Some Y-DNA T is clearly Phoenician (East Sicily, Cadiz, Ibiza, Tunisia) anyhow" (I wrongly presumed the non-Phoenician T was that outside the Mediterranean. You are far from clear in what you mean here).
"In other cases it's a clear Phoenician marker" (I took that to mean outside the Sumerian region, and certainly refered to the Mediterranean).
"Cadiz, Ibiza, West Sicily and Tunisia were the hearland of the Phoenician colonial empire" (Pretty definite connection there between T and Phoenicians).
"but the specifically Central/West Mediterranean one looks clearly Phoenician" (pretty unequivocal there too).
"Not in the West Mediterranean. Here it goes to some very specifically 'Phoenician' islands (West Sicily, Ibiza and Cadiz almost an island but only colonized with Phoenicians, not before) and, curiously enough several inland countries such as Aragon and Extremadura. In the Hesperides, T has a clearly Phoenician affinity" (And again).
In fact I can't find a single statement where you don't connect T in the Mediterranean with the Phoenicians. Would you like to try to find one?
"I'm not saying 'every T in the Med is Phoenician'".
You basicaly were until Ebizur posted his detailed information. Thanks Ebizur.
Sorry. That last post is mine but I didn't notice my wife's email was still connected.
I didn't know if you knew or if every possible reader might know.
"It's "Lasithi" (Λασιθι), and not "Lashiti," by the way".
Yah, I was never too good at Greek. In fact I never studied it formally. I think I also misspelled "Lasithiou" (correct spelling now) by suppressing the second "i".
"Hassan et al. (2008) have found K-M9(xL-M11, O-M175, P-M74) Y-DNA, which may belong to T-M70, in 6.0% (3/50) of a sample of Gaalien Arabs and 3.0% (1/33) of a sample of Copts, both from northern Sudan".
Thanks for the data. As always, it's very informative.
"It seems you don't understand selection. Selection involves limiting the number of individuals in a population able to produce the next generation"...
Yes but the scythe only culls those that are severely disadvantaged, not whatever is just mildly disadvantaged here but also mildly advantaged there.
You treat the forces of selection in a very rigid way, as if there was a single such force. But they are many and often contradictory. Maybe strength is good but dumbness bad, so what happens with a dumb giant? Or with a smart wimp? What happens to the giant when provisions are short and have to be rationed (he dies first, read on Scott's expedition to the South Pole for a good reference). The secret of collective survival, not individual one, is to hold enough diversity so there's always some who have good chances of surviving any random event.
If all are perfectly adapted to certain pressure and that pressure vanishes, they may find themselves ill-adapted to other pressures. This is a typical case of over-specialization and, in the long run, specialists die off. Generalists, like seagulls, rats, roaches and humans are the ones who survive best. Of course certain level of specialization is unavoidable but too much of it is harmful, even if it may seem good in the short run.
In the end, it's not the individual but the community who survives. The commuity usually includes more or less related people but these are anything but identical twins.
Your link deals with processes in place to re-establish diversity after selection has reduced it.
Not actually. It deals specially with adaptation to short term variance by means other than the purely genetic. But the key, IMO, is that it implies generation of diversity at nearly any cost (some of the newly diverse individuals may die or otherwise be unsuccessful) because diversity is what allows for survival, not fixation. Fixation, if too severe, is a sure recipe for catastrophe, because the selective pressures are not singular but plural, diverse and contradictory.
In all (or at least most) of those statements the Phoenician clue is only applied to the Western Med, and in most very clearly listed the likely Phoenician sites where T is found. You just extended that to whatever your mind wanted to think.
It was meant as a falsation of your hypothesis: if all (or most) West Med islands and coastal enclaves have Y-DNA T because of Phoenician colonization, then it's not the signature of Paleolithic boaters as you claimed so wildly.
And I stand by that.
"You treat the forces of selection in a very rigid way, as if there was a single such force. But they are many and often contradictory. Maybe strength is good but dumbness bad, so what happens with a dumb giant? Or with a smart wimp? What happens to the giant when provisions are short and have to be rationed (he dies first, read on Scott's expedition to the South Pole for a good reference)."
It's very straightforward
Your dumb giant will do worse than a normal giant so obviously the net effect will be to make dumbness rare.
Your smart wimp will do better than a normal wimp so obviously the net effect will be to make smart people more common.
Your giant when food is short would do worse than an average sized man so the net effect would be to make giants rare.
But the key, IMO, is that it implies generation of diversity at nearly any cost (some of the newly diverse individuals may die or otherwise be unsuccessful) because diversity is what allows for survival, not fixation. Fixation, if too severe, is a sure recipe for catastrophe, because the selective pressures are not singular but plural, diverse and contradictory.
A 1% net fitness disadvantage to a trait will lead to it becoming very very rare. That the actual trait becomes rare do to specialization does not mean that certain allele is rare, just that the genetic potential to express it is dormant More controversially, genetic variabilty can increase without most of those who have the genetic factor for the rare trait expressing it; lots of rare variants are buffered out of expression. In a few people the allele will come through to expression and will aid survival.
Evolutionary capacitance.
A new trait spreading does not necessarily entail a concominant spread of a gene variant it might have been there all the time in a minority of people without being expressed.
The dumb giant, etc. example was just a very limited illustration of some of the huge diversity that is involved in every single generation in every single population in selective evolution. Experiments show that different isolated populations with the same environmental pressures evolve differently, they also show that they retain diversity and that this (latent) diversity is critical in further adaptations, as the environmental pressures change all the time.
One reason why the pressures change it's that they are not mere climatic and physical constraints but also a biological conflict (and sometimes cooperation) between the various species, including microbes. Almost always advantages have also hidden costs and disadvantages have hidden bonuses.
So I stay put: evolution is hardly straightforward. The only thing that seems straightforward is that once a trait has been fixated there's no way back (we, mammals, can't go back to be fishes with gills, for instance, but we can exploit the seas with novel strategies, as do whales). So fixation and in general loss of diversity is potentially dangerous because it's burning bridges.
A 1% net fitness disadvantage to a trait will lead to it becoming very very rare.
I don't believe that. 1% is so ridiculously low that is not substantially different than what can happen by mere chance. In order for evolutionary advantages to have any chance of sweeping other than random, IMO, they must have clear statistical significance and 1% net fitness (however they measure it) is not significant.
And another problem is how to measure this "net fitness advantage", something I see less than clear.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_capacitance.
The article (a short stub actually) does not seem to support your thesis. It basically says it's all unclear.
A 1% advantage will mount up over 100 generations, ie with the offspring of those successfuly reproducing with the factor conferring the 1% advantage would inexorably come to predominate. I think fixation would mean an alelle had stood the test of time. It takes an very very long time for a mutation to go to fixation in that time it obviously would have proven equal to any circumstances had already met, hence any it would be likely to meet in the future.
A truly novel challenge would require a population to change quickly which would be difficult considering the time it takes for a random mutation to spread. The "evolutionary capacitance" hypothesis would explain how populations can have the genetic variability necessary to react to novel circumstances despite appearing to be quite similar due to Canalisation, ie "the ability of a population to produce the same phenotype regardless of variability of its environment or genotype."
It's not correct, as far as I can see. 1% extra advantage, means that the carrier has 1% better chances that other individuals in order to successfully reproduce. In 100 generations, the chances are exactly the same: 100x100/100 vs. 101x100/100. Even with an advantage of 100% you only double your chances. Check the maths just in case I did something wrong anyhwo.
Of course, measuring evolutionary advantage looks very difficult because the possible traits and subtle variances of such traits and possible circumstances they may meet are close to infinite.
In the end it's pure Chaos and you are trying to order Chaos, when is Chaos which rules order. Any order ("fitness" or whatever) is just one of infinite possible subsets of Chaos and, as such is finite and subject to entropy (death, disintegration).
A truly novel challenge would require a population to change quickly which would be difficult considering the time it takes for a random mutation to spread.
Not really: aren't Northern Europeans (by ancestry) living in tropical places like Australia? They are obviously ill adapted to such climate but they are still flexible enough to manage. And skin color is about the most extreme variance among humans with a fitness value. Of course the darker types in such populations have a slight advantage and should, on the course of many millennia, prevail (everything else equal).
One of the problems anyhow is the "everything else equal", because obviously Australian Aborigines are the best adapted but they face other challenges of social and economical nature currently, which offset their biological advantage. Measuring all those other challenges is nigh on impossible even for well known populations, so speculating on what has pushed (if anything) a trait to become dominant through Prehistory is quite meaningless in most cases. Randomness (founder effect, drift, etc.) explains silly traits such as nose shapes or hair textures much better than conjectures on their possible adaptative values.
The "evolutionary capacitance" hypothesis would explain how populations can have the genetic variability necessary to react to novel circumstances...
Sure, makes sense. But I would not say that the accumulation of random trivial diversity is per se adaptative: rather it's Chaos at work (Chaos always works) generating nonsense that eventually might (or not, probably not in most cases) become adaptative because of a change of circumstances.
It's nonsense diversity and phenotype versatility what are most adaptative... but precisely (paradoxically) by means of being not too adaptative (non-specialized).
"1% extra advantage, means that the carrier has 1% better chances that other individuals in order to successfully reproduce".
That 1% applies each generation and becomes significant in just a few generations, unless the population is expanding. A poplation expanding in numbers is not the situation for most species, even for humans before the Neolithic. A 1% survival of particular parents' offspring means a corresponding 1% loss of other parents' offspring in the population. Loss of diversity. In the next generation we get another 1% which basically means 2% of the population have the improved survival and the next 4%, then 8 and so on. So in the case of a particular haplogroup having a survival advantage the complete change of haplogroup would be relatively rapid.
"aren't Northern Europeans (by ancestry) living in tropical places like Australia? They are obviously ill adapted to such climate but they are still flexible enough to manage. And skin color is about the most extreme variance among humans with a fitness value".
Pale skin colour is of very little disadvantage to modern Australians because of the artificial fact of clothing. Lack of economic clout is hampering the survival of the more climatically adapted Aborigines. So survival in that continent has nothing to do with skin colour.
"if all (or most) West Med islands and coastal enclaves have Y-DNA T because of Phoenician colonization, then it's not the signature of Paleolithic boaters as you claimed so wildly".
However we know humans reached all the islands in the Mediterranean long before the Phoenicians first appeared. T is basically the only possible candidate spread completely enough to be a candidate for the first expansion. Unless you're claiming that none of those original haplogroups have survived. They have all been replaced more recently. Yet you argue strongly against those who suggest haplogroups in Europe are Neolithic at the earliest. another example of changing your perspective to fit your beliefs?
"Yes but the scythe only culls those that are severely disadvantaged, not whatever is just mildly disadvantaged here but also mildly advantaged there".
But if the population is not actually growing in numbers the scythe will cut deeply into the mildly disadvantaged. Individulas who have any sort of survival advantage will come to represent an expanding proportion of the population, and so an expanding proportion of haplogroups belonging to individuals with that original advantage. Anyone who has reared any sort of livestock will realise that. Although you've possibly already rad this you might follow it better now:
http://remotecentral.blogspot.com/2008/03/human-evolution-on-trial-pedigrees-by.html
"That 1% applies each generation and becomes significant in just a few generations"...
Not really. For instance, in the hyper-simplified unreal case of EP=2, where there are two alleles A (normal) and B (slightly adaptative: +1%), the chances are almost 50% for each choice and you can end up in any generation with AA, AB or BB. Ok, the chances for BB are slightly higher but insignificantly so. It's not really different from drift.
In reality everything is much more complex, starting with determining on paper which is the exact advantage of any given allele (and for any of the almost infinitely variable circumstances their carriers can find in life), so...
"So in the case of a particular haplogroup having a survival advantage the complete change of haplogroup would be relatively rapid".
Not per above but also not because the Y chromosome and the mitochondria carry only a minimal amount of the individual genes (in the case of females only the mitochondria, so even less so). Individual fitness surely has almost nothing to do with haplogroups (there may be a correlation sometimes but that would be about all).
"Pale skin colour is of very little disadvantage"...
Well, it happens to be surely the most clearly adaptative trait that shows ecological differences among humans. I can't think of any other right now. So if the most adaptative trait of humans can be neutralized so easily... imagine those with just 1% advantage.
"However we know humans reached all the islands in the Mediterranean long before the Phoenicians first appeared. T is basically the only possible candidate spread completely enough to be a candidate for the first expansion".
What about J2b? Doesn't J2b, as well as other haplogroups, like E1b1b, follow the coastal pattern of Cardium Pottery?
Anyhow Sicily was inhabited before CP, at least since Epipaleolithic. I imagine that they still have some ancestral lineages like R1b, the same they have a lot of mtDNA H.
It's not like you find anywhere T above 10% of frequency, often much less, so your argumentation of sweep just doesn't make any sense.
"But if the population is not actually growing in numbers the scythe will cut deeply into the mildly disadvantaged".
Maybe. But how do you measure advantage? It's always relative and can be epigenetic, as well as genetic, and also a cultural matter. It has to be an advantage much larger than just 1% anyhow to make a clear difference. A 100% advantageous trait in my previous example would still only have 66.67% chances of fixation... and 33.33% chances of extinction. Unless it's an infinite advantage (or disadvantage, as an error that causes the embryo to die in the womb ALWAYS), you'll never have 100% chances for your trait to sweep to fixation with you in the lottery of life.
That's a crucial difference between real life and breeding: in real life a perfectly healthy animal can still die before reproducing, while in breeding the breeder will make as sure as possible that the specimen conceives a lot; much more than would happen in the best natural scenario, where even the best stallions have only a tight window of a few seasons to reproduce as much as possible before they are removed from their "throne" by some younger upstart (typical case among mammal males - circumstances vary a lot between species and, of course, gender).
A 100% advantageous trait in my previous example would still only have 66.67% chances of fixation [...]That's a crucial difference between real life and breeding: in real life a perfectly healthy animal can still die before reproducing,
Yes; but a mutation can arise more than once you seem to be talking about a mutation's chance on just one of these occasions. In a favourable environment a mutation that fails due to 'bad luck' will be likely to be taken up when it recurs . Of course the greater the population size the less time till the mutation pops up again. A small population will maybe need to react faster than the spread of an alelle; that's what I was getting at when I mentioned canalization and evolutionary capacitance.
White Australians get enough cancer for UV to be a selection pressure. But UV is a very weak selection pressure. You're assuming the Black Africans' and Europeans' skin colour is the result of UV but in fact there are nativre north Americans and Siberians who live at the same or greater latitudes as Europeans and who don't get a lot of vitamin d in there diet who are not white or anything like it. In the same way there are the !Kung who get by very well in the high UV (due to altitude) Kalahari with ligh brown skins that make a mockery of the idea that black Africans have very dark skin to protect them from UV. In fact black Africans are 'black' even on parts of the body that are never exposed to the sun unlike all other dark skinned ethnic groups native Australians included.
Incidently, a photo of two mice of the same age one has been genetically modified to have high vitamin D activity, try and guess which is which. Here.
It's from Vitamin D, nervous system and aging
I was a bit careless there, sorry. The correct link for Vitamin D, nervous system and aging
"Yes; but a mutation can arise more than once"...
In practical terms, SNPs (mutations senso stricto) only happen once each many many million years.
"... you seem to be talking about a mutation's chance on just one of these occasions".
Of course, I'm oversimplifying. But for each occasion the chances are those. Randomness can perfectly annihilate adaptative traits, as they only offer better chances not any certainty. If you play any sort of game of odds, like blackjack, you will know it is that way: you can lose with 21 and win with 17.
Overall there is a tendency to favor the most adaptative traits and suppress the least adaptative ones. But a tendency is not any automatic certainty for every one of such traits, and very specially not for those traits that are only mildly adaptative or deleterious, who don't play with odds significantly different from a truly neutral trait.
You also have to consider that most individuals are, to begin with, very well adapted: their lineages have gone so far, so they are good enough. Meanwhile novel mutations only rarely are advantageous: most are deleterious or just neutral. So for evolution is a lot easier to pick a neutral trait that is already fairly common and put it to a novel use somehow. That "somehow" is where the tricky part is: it may be via epigenetic modifications, cultural exploitation of such trait or fortunate combination of two or more of such neutral genes to form a complex trait that is somehow more adaptative.
A gene such as the lactose tolerance allele might have been dormant in West Europeans for millennia before cattle and milk (other than the mothers') arrived. It might have been common at unknown levels, it might even have been fixated by drift (as it's neutral in absence of dairying) or whatever. But what is almost sure is that it did not mutate just because people began having sheep: it was surely favored (somewhat - how much?) by that new factor but must have existed before, behaving as a neutral (trivial) allele.
In fact it's just a polymorphism of a gene that all mammals must have to survive early on in our lives. Its absence among babies and toddlers may be deadly but its presence among adults is trivial. It's a paedomorphic trait, just like blondism, certain facial features (short flat nose for instance), etc.
Siberians and NE Asians in general have fairly light skin. This trait may have co-evolved in both regions (regressing to darker, but not brown/black, shades in tropical America). The high population densities allowed in the unusually warm climate of North Europe since the end of the Ice Age have no parallel anywhere else and I presume that the extremely pale phenotypes found in that area are only a recent evolution, maybe by exploitation of genes already present in other European populations and/or accumulation of such advantageous traits to create an even more milky skin color.
Whatever the case, what these differences evidence is that there is no determinism in how evolution can proceed. East Asians have different pigmentation strategies than West Eurasians and they seem to work well for them. Much about these adaptations is not yet well known, though it seems to protect from skin cancer almost as well as high melanin even with fair skins.
It's an interesting case of convergent, yet divergent, evolution. It shows clearly that there is no determinism on how people or other species adapt to their environment. Different strategies may be equally valid. And the existence of such diversity of adaptations is good for the species overall because it allows humankind to have a huge reservoir of genetic potential for whatever may come... or almost.
Addendum: way too many crucial events in effective survivability are unrelated to genes or the fitness these may confer.
For example, check this article at SD today: it seems that stress in early life, something that the individual genome is unable to affect, dramatically affects lifespan. I have dealt elsewhere in this blog on how stress in early life causes epigenetic alterations that affect a whole life, so there's much more in circumstances than in just the genetic base.
I am positive that people's intelligence, for example, is highly affected by early life circumstances, such as nutrition, traumas, education, etc. and not just by genes.
In practice it's never "everything else equal", in fact it's always "everything else wildly different", so predicting the result even with the best genetic fundamentals is simply impossible.
"Ok, the chances for BB are slightly higher but insignificantly so. It's not really different from drift".
But we're dealing with a changing base population each generation. Even 'insignificantly higher' survival will mount up over generations. In each generation the chance of BB increases. So BB actually increases exponentially, even if from just a very small basal proportion to start with. So even at a survival advantage of just 1% the B variant can completely replace the A over generations. Technically I suppose we should refer to the genes as being B and b, with b being the recessive that eventually displaces the B dominant. I agree that 'In reality everything is much more complex', but we're dealing with the hypothetical case of a single gene providing 1% survival advantage.
"Individual fitness surely has almost nothing to do with haplogroups (there may be a correlation sometimes but that would be about all)".
In most cases I doubt that the survival and expansion of particular haplogroups has anything at all to do with the genes on the mtDNA or Y-chromosome. It has everything to do with whatever particular cultural or technological advantage the particular haplogroup possesses.
"Doesn't J2b, as well as other haplogroups, like E1b1b, follow the coastal pattern of Cardium Pottery?"
Yes. But as you say, 'Sicily was inhabited before CP'. In fact most Mediterranean islands were occupied before Cardium pottery expanded through them. And neither J2b nor E1b1b are as widespread through the islands as is T. As you say, J2b and E1b1b tend to be associated with 'Cardium Pottery'.
"It's not like you find anywhere T above 10% of frequency, often much less, so your argumentation of sweep just doesn't make any sense".
I'm certainly not claiming T replaced previous haplogroups, so 'sweep' has nothing to do with the situation. In fact I'm basically saying that the newer Neolithic haplogroups now outnumber the earlier arrivals.
"But how do you measure advantage?"
Simply by counting the proportion of individuals in the population that have the gene each generation. If the proportion is increasing by as little as 1% the gene is providing a survival advantage. Anyway our discussion is based on the hypothetical case of assumed 1% survival advantage. I agree it's possible in domestic breeding to actually measure production advantage (and so survival in the herd for example) but in nature survival is always more complicated, as you keep reminding us.
"It has to be an advantage much larger than just 1% anyhow to make a clear difference".
I've explained above why it need be only 1%. The proportion of the advantageous gene in the base population keeps increasing, with genes responsible for any survival advantage whatsoever ultimately increasing exponentially.
"in real life a perfectly healthy animal can still die before reproducing"
In which case its genes don't count as 'survival'.
"In practical terms, SNPs (mutations senso stricto) only happen once each many many million years".
I agree with you on that one.
"You also have to consider that most individuals are, to begin with, very well adapted"
That's true. And it's why we're seriously considering a survival advantage of just 1%.
"But what is almost sure is that it did not mutate just because people began having sheep"
It might have in a way. It's possible that epigenetic factors associated with adult milk drinking encouraged mutations in that portion of the genome, one of which became succesful.
"it seems that stress in early life, something that the individual genome is unable to affect, dramatically affects lifespan".
But that doesn't affect survivability in an evolutionary sense. A longer lifespan belongs pretty much at the end of reproductive life.
If it's a novel mutation, it's carried by just one person initially. That means it has all the chances to be drifted out early on in any non-growing population, even if hyper-adaptative.
Only if it survives for long enough then that process you say begins to make any sense. But it's painfully slow anyhow because the estimated advantageous odds are truly insignificant and any other advantage by someone else would neutralize them or even make them negative.
Again you are assuming "all else equal" but in reality all else is wildly unequal.
So even at a survival advantage of just 1% the B variant.
1% of 1 is (rounded to the next entire number) zero. 1% of 49 is still zero by the same method. You need first to reach a numeric threshold to even consider your chances meaningful at all.
Then it would happen what you say if everything else would be equal, but in practice it's not. So it's a mere abstract notion because there are many mutations, epigenetic effects and other unmeasurable randomness competing in that game in reality. It's only theoretical.
But as you say, 'Sicily was inhabited before CP'.
From Italy, yes.
In fact most Mediterranean islands were occupied before Cardium pottery expanded through them.
Not really. From Crete westwards, and excepting Sicily, all those islands were only colonized or at least clearly colonized with the arrival of Neolithic, which West of Crete means CP. Sure, there are some indications of earlier visitors in Corsica and Sardinia but nothing that can say that they were continuously inhabited by any sort of thriving population, not at all.
See this map:
- Majorca: c. 10% J2, c. 15% E1b1b+G, c. 10% I, almost no T (Kx(P))
- Minorca: c. 20% E1b1b, almost no T
- Ibiza: c. 20% T (Phoenician probably!), c. 25% other East Mediterranean clades.
All have of course more than 50% R1b.
In fact I'm basically saying that the newer Neolithic haplogroups now outnumber the earlier arrivals.
In the Mediterranean islands all or nearly all is Neolithic, Sicily excepted. In some cases much is in fact post-Neolithic, as seems to be the case with Ibiza, a small island where to make a founder effect seems quite easy.
Are you suggesting that the expansion of T through the Med is pre-Neolithic? C'mon!
It's possible that epigenetic factors associated with adult milk drinking encouraged mutations in that portion of the genome, one of which became succesful.
I don't think genetics works that way. Epigenetics may buy some time but making cheese, eating lentils or whatever else, is a simpler solution than waiting for an extremely unlikely random mutation to happen. In fact most Neolithic peoples in West Eurasia did exactly that: they ate cheese.
Why exactly is the lactose tolerance allele so common in Western Europe? Probably for some absolutely random founder effect, the same that other genes are (Y-DNA R1b, mtDNA H, Rh-, etc.)
"it seems that stress in early life, something that the individual genome is unable to affect, dramatically affects lifespan".
But that doesn't affect survivability in an evolutionary sense. A longer lifespan belongs pretty much at the end of reproductive life.
Not in Paleolithic times possibly. If the median age was 35 and you died at 20...
"I am myself and my circumstances" said Ortega y Gasset. In this case we could well say: "I am my genes and their circumstances".
"If it's a novel mutation, it's carried by just one person initially. That means it has all the chances to be drifted out early on in any non-growing population, even if hyper-adaptative.
Only if it survives for long enough then that process you say begins to make any sense. But it's painfully slow anyhow because the estimated advantageous odds are truly insignificant "
Newly evolved fur coat a quick hit in Nebraska (New Scientist, 27 August 2009 )
'Normally, to achieve such a rapid evolutionary shift a species needs to have an alternative version of a gene already in circulation. A change in conditions – such as trees becoming darker as they get covered in soot, in the case of the peppered moth – can then provide the selection pressure that causes the alternate gene to spread. But in deer mice the new version of Agouti spread rapidly from a standing start.
Woodruff says that these "de novo" mutations – which occur after a species has encountered the situation where they will be useful, rather than before – may be more important for evolution than biologists think.
If the Agouti mutation occurred in just one mouse, the chances of it spreading rapidly through the whole population would be slim, which is why newly arising mutations like this have been thought to be unimportant.
But Woodruff points out that mutations can occur while an animal is in the womb. If this occurs early enough, the mutation may be present in many of its sperm or egg cells. Then the animal could have several offspring with the mutation, making it easier for the mutation to spread.
He says, "Beneficial mutations occur by both mechanisms: pre-existing variations and de novo mutations. The debate is, what is the proportion of the two?"'
How do they know that the trait did not exist some 10,000 years ago. Molecular clock speculation? Ha!
Actually, with MC techniques, assuming they'd be correct and perfected, which they are not, you can only pinpoint the moment of expansion, not the moment of the original mutation.
Anyhow, mice have generation times that are much shorter than in humans (a year or two for them is like a century for us) and litter sizes that are many times the ones of our species, which seldom has more than one child at a time. So 10,000 years for mice would be like 1-5 million years for us, maybe more than the time of existence of the genus Homo!
So not sure which is your point.
10,000 years in mice is not "quickly", not at all.
He says, "Beneficial mutations occur by both mechanisms: pre-existing variations and de novo mutations. The debate is, what is the proportion of the two?".
That's what he says. Should I believe him? Why?
Evolution seems to be faster than the simple spread of mutations which makes me think there are a few tricks up evolution's sleeve.
Maybe. We don't know everything. But Chaos is pretty fast, provided there are enough variety of ingredients in the cupboard. Otherwise, the cook (evolution) can only make a very limited array of dishes.
It's all up to what can Grandma Nature cook with. Guess that now and then black pepper mutates into cinnamon but her customer, Mr. Evolutionary Pressure is always too much in a hurry to be able to wait for the new ingredient to be produced spontaneously.
"If it's a novel mutation, it's carried by just one person initially. That means it has all the chances to be drifted out early on in any non-growing population, even if hyper-adaptative".
And usually, if not always, recessive. Giving it even more chance of being drifted out before it has any chance at all of producing a phenotype. In fact a recessive can only become fixed in a population after some level of inbreeding, a fact you seem reluctant to accept.
"But it's painfully slow anyhow because the estimated advantageous odds are truly insignificant and any other advantage by someone else would neutralize them or even make them negative".
No. We're assuming a survival advantage of 1%. So once the double recessive appears the gene will expand, possibly rapidly, eventually replacing the original dominant.
"1% of 1 is (rounded to the next entire number) zero. 1% of 49 is still zero by the same method".
Aren't you being deliberately obtuse, again? What population consists of just 49 individuals? Especially seeing it's usually accepted a population needs to contain 500 individuals to be sustainable long term. So what's 1% of 500?
"All have of course more than 50% R1b".
Probably indicating a later arrival.
"all those islands were only colonized or at least clearly colonized with the arrival of Neolithic, which West of Crete means CP".
You used to claim that humans had boats in the Mediterranean 'since always'. So why are you now claiming a much later arrival? The islands you mention (Majorca, Minorca and Ibiza) are the most isolated islands so it's hardly surprising that T is basically not found there. I'd presume the original boats into the Mediterranean were fairly primitive.
"Are you suggesting that the expansion of T through the Med is pre-Neolithic? C'mon!"
Expansion of something through the Med is pre-Neolithic. Crete, Cyprus, Sardinia, Corsica. And T is certainly more widespread than is J.
"If the median age was 35 and you died at 20..."
You could still have several children.
"Woodruff says that these 'de novo' mutations – which occur after a species has encountered the situation where they will be useful, rather than before – may be more important for evolution than biologists think".
And epigenetics offers an explanation for how they might occur.
"If the Agouti mutation occurred in just one mouse, the chances of it spreading rapidly through the whole population would be slim"
Not if it offered a survival advantage. The fact that the agouti gene is so widespread in small mammals suggests that it does have survival value.
"you can only pinpoint the moment of expansion, not the moment of the original mutation".
And that delay is because, as I pointed out above, the recessive gene takes time to even appear in the population. Selection cannot operate until it does so.
"Ibiza: c. 20% T (Phoenician probably!)"
On what grounds do you assume T is Phoenician there? Is T the most common Y-hap along the Levant coastline? Or confined only to regions around the Mediterranean that Phoenicians colonised? And did Phoenicians make up the vast majority of the population in regions where they set up trading depots?
"How do they know that the trait did not exist some 10,000 years ago".
From the article (which may or may not refer to MC), 'genetic analysis performed by Catherine Linnen of Harvard University and colleagues found that back then the deer mouse genome didn't contain the genes for light fur. That means the trait arose from a new mutation which rapidly spread through the local deer mouse population'.
"That's what he says. Should I believe him? Why?"
Because he's studied the problem for years and is an expert?
Terry: if an allele is recessive, then it's like neutral in that state: it gets no increased chances of either success or defeat because in its recessive state it's dormant. That's how recessive disabling illnesses like hemophilia persist: carriers with both alleles do not show any sign of having them.
"In fact a recessive can only become fixed in a population after some level of inbreeding"...
Or founder effect. Or drift, why not?
Or by being adaptative. A hypothetical recessive gene for paleness might be hidden in its recessive state while the climate does not demand it and even may be essentially neutral in its manifestation in certain climatic conditions like those of most of Europe. But when colonists headed into the Far North after the Ice Age, then such allele may have become adaptative and selected for quite naturally.
I'm not saying it's that way, just an illustrative hypothetic scenario. Recessiveness just means that it becomes dormant where an alternative allele is present.
Blood group 0 is recessive but is the most common blood group globally and it seems it evolved several times.
So once the double recessive appears the gene will expand, possibly rapidly, eventually replacing the original dominant.
Well, that's just a possibility. It's not proven in any single case I have ever heard of. It's an interesting possibility in any case and might explain why high melanin seems somewhat dominant over low melanin variants in humans.
However Mendelian dominance is not necessarily the case, partial dominance/recessiveness seems to exist as well. Even it may be the case that several different genes are interacting in complex and subtle manners, as happens with human pigmentation. Real genetics is much more complex than the basic Mendelian model.
... it's usually accepted a population needs to contain 500 individuals to be sustainable long term.
In the discussion on Crete at AVRPI, Andrew mentioned that as few as 10 reproductive individuals (5 of each gender) could well be enough to guarantee the viability of a population. Checking the link, which is a discussion in fact, nobody seems to be really sure and a lot may depend on the individual genetic quality of the founders. A real case is Pitcairn island, where 15 men and 12 women created a perfectly viable population. That's quite less than 49 and I imagine that many founder effects among humans were caused by similarly tiny populations, maybe even smaller.
Forager bands typically consist of 20-30 individuals, even if they relate in somewhat larger groups of 100-150 people and belong maybe to larger ethnicities. In the far north actually they work in even smaller groups, almost at nuclear family level.
"All have of course more than 50% R1b".
Probably indicating a later arrival.
Why? It makes no sense to me. The Balearic islands were colonized from SE France, where R1b is high. Sardinia was colonized from central Italy and the R1b1a found in the island, and which looks among the oldest lineages, along with I2a, looks directly derived from Italy.
You are assuming maybe that the CP carriers were some sort of specific isolate population. They were not: they were in many cases just the aculturized natives and the culture took more than a thousand years to spread from Albania and Yugoslavia to Southern Portugal, enough time for all kind of admixtures. T is just one of the various lineages they carried, if at all.
In fact it's so rare in Iberia outside of certain areas, notably the main Phoenician outposts of Cadiz and Ibiza, that I doubt it's even of Neolithic origin in this part of the world. J2b, I2a, E1b1b or G2 are much more evenly distributed, something we should expect from a Neolithic lineage after so many millennia. T instead is pretty much localized in the Phoenician colonies and, very thinly, in SW Iberia.
You used to claim that humans had boats in the Mediterranean 'since always'.
Having a boat is not the same as being a sailor. You can tempt fate by going deep into the sea with kayak or canoe but most sane people would just not do such a temerity.
Boats do not mean oceanic navigation automatically. You know that and you know that I say that, so why do you insist in being a confusionist?
The islands you mention (Majorca, Minorca and Ibiza) are the most isolated islands so it's hardly surprising that T is basically not found there.
Actually Ibiza alone has more Y-DNA T than any other island in whole Mare Nostrum. What the heck are you talking about?
I'd presume the original boats into the Mediterranean were fairly primitive.
Cardium Pottery culture ships? Are you kidding? We don't know exactly how they were because there are no remains but they were almost for sure pretty good for their age, because they not only reached all islands and remote coasts but it's also attested that the fished deep water fish. Those were not anymore just boats but true sailing ships. I even speculate if they might have invented the pulley in order to raise and fold the large sails they surely used- but maybe this was not strictly necessary yet. Whatever the case, they were the initiators of navigation in West Eurasia, maybe together with Epipaleolithic Danes, who also had longboats (this one left remains in of those peat bogs of the north).
By this time we are not anymore talking of mere boats but of something clearly bigger and more seagoing, and surely of sails too (otherwise how could they go into the deep seas forth and back all the time?)
You make up a theory on something you read to some guy on Wallacea and you aren't able to read about Epipaleolithic and Neolithic Europe before going into wild speculations about what kind of navigation might have existed at the very beginnings of West Eurasian sailing age? What's wrong with you? Are there not public libraries in New Zealand or what?
Expansion of something through the Med is pre-Neolithic. Crete, Cyprus, Sardinia, Corsica. And T is certainly more widespread than is J.
This sentence is ill-constructed and can't really be understood. How could it be pre-Neolithic if there was only basic boating before CP and there's no clear evidence of any crossing except of the narrow straits of Messina and Gibraltar? You are building a crazy epic out of nothing!
T is not more widespread than J either. You can't be serious. Maybe in tropical Africa but that would be about it.
I don't deserve this craze!
I quit this discussion, really. Anyhow it's all off topic.
Just a last note:
On what grounds do you assume T is Phoenician there?
On the grounds that in all the area the only other spot where it's found at such levels is Cadiz which is a totally new Phoenician foundation, the first Phoenician colony ever (by their own accounts) and the most important Phoenician city ever west of Carthage.
Because he's studied the problem for years and is an expert?
This acritical attitude of submission to authority is religious, not scientific.
He doesn't sound convincing anyhow and his reliance on the MC hypothesis does not make his ideas sound more credible but less so.
And, yes, they are speculating on MCH grounds, they have not gone to fossil mice and tested their aDNA.
"if an allele is recessive, then it's like neutral in that state"
Exactly. It has every chance of being drifted out, as you say. But heterozygosity itself aids survival so that may help reccesive genes survive.
"Or founder effect. Or drift, why not?"
But the ultimate product of such phenomena in bringing out double recessives is still inbreeding.
"But when colonists headed into the Far North after the Ice Age, then such allele may have become adaptative and selected for quite naturally".
But it can still only be 'selected for' once the double recessive appears. And a double recessive can only appear once two people with it produce offspring. If the mutation has happened only once those two people must be related, although possibly a huge number of generations back.
"partial dominance/recessiveness seems to exist as well".
And is actually quite common. In fact it offers one explanation for how an advantageous recessive may be prevented from being easily drifted out.
"Even it may be the case that several different genes are interacting in complex and subtle manners"
Again, probably the normal situation. And that's why it's so difficult to achieve large production increaes with artificial selection. You improve one thing and it has a flow on effect disrupting something else.
"Andrew mentioned that as few as 10 reproductive individuals (5 of each gender) could well be enough to guarantee the viability of a population".
That's his view, and not generally accepted. The population of several threatened species are being slowly increased but it takes careful control of who breeds with who, otherwise fertility drops off rapidly.
"A real case is Pitcairn island, where 15 men and 12 women created a perfectly viable population".
I pointed out at the time that that population was extremely varied. And it only lasted a couple of hundred years. Hardly long term.
"Forager bands typically consist of 20-30 individuals, even if they relate in somewhat larger groups of 100-150 people and belong maybe to larger ethnicities".
Such groups invariably have times when they get together with much larger groups, or in contact with other groups who do so. To claim they have existed in such small, isolated, inbreeding groups for any meaningful number of generations is completely wrong.
"T is just one of the various lineages they carried"
I agree that T was not alone. But it's the only really widespread one through most of the Mediterranean, and we have to explain that. 'Phoenician' is not adequate. They were not noted colonisers and probably were a minority even in Carthage and Cadiz.
"T instead is pretty much localized in the Phoenician colonies and, very thinly, in SW Iberia".
And in Italy, Crete, Cyprus, Corsica and Sardinia.
"Boats do not mean oceanic navigation automatically".
True. But why is there such a huge time gap between oceanic crossings in Wallacea and oceanic crossings in the Mediterranean?
"I quit this discussion, really. Anyhow it's all off topic".
Yes. You've got really stupid about it.
Man: T is not so widespread through the Mediterranean, specially not the West Med, where it's almost something exotic. Instead T seems frequent in the steppes, just like J2 again.
You dare say: "And in Italy, Crete, Cyprus, Corsica and Sardinia".
In Italy it is in the North, that was colonized overland and not from the sea, not in the South.
In Crete, Corsica and Sardinia it seems to have very limited distribution. I have not seen any reliable data, except for Crete in all this discussion. And the data for Crete shows it's limited to certain areas and not widespread as would be expected from an ancient clade. The more I look at the Med the less "ancient T" I see anywhere. And that's true for Europe as for North Africa.
But why is there such a huge time gap between oceanic crossings in Wallacea and oceanic crossings in the Mediterranean?.
There is not that huge leap. West Eurasians were making, not counting Crete, strait crossings >20,000 years ago (Gibraltar) and c. 30,000 years ago (Sicily) but were (mostly) restricted to narrow straits most of the time. It's just common sense.
Wallaceans just were plain crazy... or there was some island that does not exist anymore. That's a serious possibility because it's Wallacean crossings which demand explanation, not the scarcity of them in West Eurasia. Getting into a boat and going into the depths of the ocean without knowing what's on the other side is not something any normal person would do, right?
"Anyhow it's all off topic".
OK. Back to the topic of Y-hap R1b in Africa. The African Y-hap is related only distantly to European R1b, and presumably they separated before R1b had even entered Europe. The fact the African R1b is found in Sardinia is hardly proof of a route to Africa via Europe. R1b had probably become established somewhere in Western Asia before it entered either Africa or Europe, because its relation R1a is spread thickly through Western Asia, as well as along the Indo-Gangetic Plain. Therefore R1b most probably entered Africa via the Levant, the traditional route both into and out of Africa.
So, what is Y-hap R's deeper history? It forms a single branch of P*. And P is just one of eight related clades, the product of an apparently star-like expansion. As for the inclusion of the various Ks within this clade: The original paper that separated T and L from K specifically states, 'Also of great interest is the updated Y-chromosome phylogeny, with two new branches (star: M522 that join IJ and KT, and diamond: M525 that unifies KMNOPS)'. Couldn't be more straightforward.
Back to the star-like expansion. A second Y-hap (NO), in the form of O and N, is found through India, East Asia and Southeast Asia (O) and across Northern Eurasia from the Saami to the Inuit (N). The Y-hap is too widely spread for us to be able to claim anything definite about its place of origin.
The third haplogroup, K1, is found in India. It doesn't matter in what part, but I understand through India, Sri Lanka and Pakistan.
That's three of the eight members of the star: K1, NO and P. The fourth one, Y-hap K3, is found in Indonesia and Melanesia, and presumably originated somewhere within that region. The fifth, K2, is found in Australia and New Guinea. Again it probably originated somewhere within that region. Next, K4 has much the same distribution as K2 but extends out into Melanesia, and even out into Oceania.
That's six of the eight. We're left the remaining two: S (New Guinea, Melanesia and Australia, and probably originating within that region) and M (spread from eastern Indonesia out into the Pacific, as far as Fiji).
So where is the centre of that star-like expansion? Five of the eight clades obviously originate somewhere between Melanesia and Indonesia. And it's by no means impossible that the other three originated there too.
"OK. Back to the topic of Y-hap R1b in Africa".
Good. :)
"The African Y-hap is related only distantly to European R1b, and presumably they separated before R1b had even entered Europe".
This is something I have not totally clear. I see highest R1b basal diversity in Italy, though admittedly only slightly higher than in West Asia. I also see great basal diversity in Italy for R1b1a and for R1b1b2(xR1b1b2a1).
"Therefore R1b most probably entered Africa via the Levant, the traditional route both into and out of Africa".
It's possible but it's found at greater numbers (and diversity probably too) levels the further south you go (more in Upper Egypt than Lower Egypt, more in Sudan than in Egypt, so if you propose a crossing of the Red Sea in the anti-biblical direction, I'd take it as valid too. And if someone proposes a crossing from Italy into NW Africa, I'd consider it as well - though at this moment I think it's very much unlikely.
There is nothing to suggest that the Sinai desert is any "traditional route". Semitics backmigrated to Africa first by the Bab-el-Mandeb and other Red Sea crossings (Eastern Egypt was Arab already in Roman times) and we have no further clear evidence on what may have happened before. Between Africa and Asia there is the Red Sea primarily... and loads of more or less desertic lands. The Red Sea looks like an oasis in comparison often.
"So, what is Y-hap R's deeper history? It forms a single branch of P*. And P is just one of eight related clades, the product of an apparently star-like expansion".
This is very difficult to determine at this stage. The various phylogenetic levels of K are only being clarified right now and, as you surely know, it will take months or probably years till they are satisfactorily resolved.
The original paper that separated T and L from K specifically states, 'Also of great interest is the updated Y-chromosome phylogeny, with two new branches (star: M522 that join IJ and KT, and diamond: M525 that unifies KMNOPS)'. Couldn't be more straightforward.
Yes, it could be more "straightforward" because the terminology is not ISOGG: KT is not any haplogroup: K is, and it includes T, etc.
Also not being open access, I (and probably you too) can only speculate on the details of this new proposed phylogeny. Even ISOGG seems confused and has not yet incorporated this super-lineage to its "official" phylogeny, and certainly it does not mention anywhere that K1-4 or other K* could be within the proposed MNOPS. It seems that the author believes that some K(xL,M,NO,P,S,T) also belongs to the new MNOPS macro-haplogroup but is not clear which clades exactly, neither to me nor to ISOGG nor to Wikipedia, so quick to adopt the new proposed phylogeny.
In my humble opinion, K is likely to end up with 4 basal lineages: K1, L, MNOPS and T, which suggests a centroid in South Asia, probably towards Pakistan. The derived haplogroup MNOPS would hence have 7 sublineages: K2, K3, K4 (assuming these are not rearranged somehow: a problem is that we know too little about these minor lineages), M, NO, P (or NOP) and S.
So, if the MNOPS proposal stands, it's likely it represents a SE Asian/Oceanian specific lineage that expanded in Asia as NOP or NO and P separately, most likely the latter.
This is the most parsimonious interpretation of the current confuse data. If correct, it would mean that a K sublineage, MNOPS (or pre-MNOPS) migrated eastward from South Asia, scattered around Oceania and backmigrated as the important P and NO haplogroups, that dominate nowadays the Eurasian Y-DNA landscape.
Somehow all these K forths and backs would seem associated with mtDNA N (and R), right? Though not to fine detail maybe, they are almost the only Eurasian haplogroups that have been going forth and back through tropical Asia after the initial M explosion.
"If correct, it would mean that a K sublineage, MNOPS (or pre-MNOPS) migrated eastward from South Asia, scattered around Oceania and backmigrated as the important P and NO haplogroups, that dominate nowadays the Eurasian Y-DNA landscape".
Thanks. I've been trying to convince you of that for ages (and everyone else). I was able to deduce the basic outline from J. D. McDonald's 2005 haplogroup map, but with the increase in data since that time we can now see the picture even more clearly. You may well be correct in placing K1 tentatively with T and L in India.
"Somehow all these K forths and backs would seem associated with mtDNA N (and R), right?"
Again I find myself in total agreement. And I had deduced exactly that from the same haplogroup maps.
Ok, glad that we finally come to some sort of agreement. FYI, I have just posted a map on what might have been the spread of Y-DNA in Eurasia early on.
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