When Humans Faced Extinction

BBC ^ | 6-10-2003 | Dr David Whitehouse

[blam]

I don't know they didn't mention that the 'super-Volcano Toba eruption 75,000 years ago was the culprit for the reduction in the human population.

Somewhere in Indonesia I read that human activity had been discovered just above the Toba ash level, I wonder what happened to these people?

[stanz]

ping for a later read.

[blam]

"Analysis revealed a close genetic kinship between two hunter-gatherer populations in sub-Saharan Africa - the Mbuti pygmies of the Congo Basin and the Khosian bushmen of Botswana. "

The Khosian Bushmen are physically unique among humans alive today. The females have a skin 'apron' over their genetial area and the men have a perpetual semi-erect penis. Their children are also born with Mongoloid spots.

[far sider]

Humans may have come close to extinction about 70,000 years ago, according to the latest genetic research....The study suggests that at one point there may have been only 2,000 individuals alive as our species teetered on the brink.

The actual number was 8 and it happened a lot more recently than that.

[Publius6961]

Still beating that "out of Africa" dead horse, I see...

[EggsAckley]

Very interesting article. And you certainly know how to draw a crowd.

~</;o)

[smith288]

The Khosian Bushmen are physically unique among humans alive today. The females have a skin 'apron' over their genetial area and the men have a perpetual semi-erect penis. Their children are also born with Mongoloid spots.

There goes the "I just came out of the water" excuse...sucks to be them...hehe

[PatrickHenry]

PING. [This ping list is for the evolution side of evolution threads, and sometimes for other science topics. FReepmail me to be added or dropped.]

[jdege]

70,000 years is getting pretty close to the sudden emergence of culture in humans. A lot of folks believe that occurred because of the evolution of language.

I don't think it's impossible that this marked such a fundamental change that all who didn't have it couldn't compete.

Remember, when you're reading these reports, what they don't say. They don't say (or shouldn't) that this group of 2000 were the only humans alive. Just that all humans alive are descendents of those 2000, and not of any others.

I don't find it impossible to believe that those groups who had developed language simply stopped breeding with those that had not, and over the 30,000 years between the genetic choke-point and the archeological record of ubiquitous culture, simply supplanted those proto-humans who did not have the genetic capability for language.

[blam]

"Somewhere in Indonesia I read that human activity had been discovered just above the Toba ash level, I wonder what happened to these people?"

Mungo Man may represent the dead-end line of humans that survived the Toba super-volcano explosion 75,000 years ago.

There is an on-going argument to reduce the age of Mungo Man so that he fits into the 'Out-Of-Africa' theory. His DNA is unlike any human alive today, yet he has the body of 'modern humans.' (They're pulling their hair out over this one)

[LiteKeeper]

read later

[steve-b]

I don't find it impossible to believe that those groups who had developed language simply stopped breeding with those that had not

Yeah, it's hard to get anywhere with somebody who doesn't understand "If I said you have a beautiful body would you hold it against me?"

[blam]

"Still beating that "out of Africa" dead horse, I see..."

Not me. I don't believe the 'Out-Of-Africa' BS. I'm a 'multi-regionalist.'

[blam]

"They don't say (or shouldn't) that this group of 2000 were the only humans alive. Just that all humans alive are descendents of those 2000, and not of any others. "

I agree. See my post #10. I expect there are other Mungo Man types out the yet to be discovered. I also believe we are Neanderthals but the DNA does not support that view. (Neanderthals may be the most recent dead-end at 27,500 years ago.)

[ClearCase_guy]

Is it reasonable to assume that in 70,000 years, a group of 2000 Africans could mutate and provide the world with White people, Asian people, blondes, red-heads, Watutsis, pygmies, and Eskimoes? Evolution can perform such wonders in such a short time-frame?

I second the earlier poster who said the size of the human population after the cataclysm was only 8 and the date of the cataclysm was not long ago at all.

[farmfriend]

bump and ping

[<1/1,000,000th%]

This is what usually happens when the fast food places close for the holidays.

[blam]

Redheads 'Are Neanderthals'

"Researchers at the John Radcliffe Institute of Molecular Medicine in Oxford say that the so-called “ginger gene” which gives people red hair, fair skin and freckles could be up to 100,000 years old."

[dsc]

Well, if a group of 2000 Africans could not "mutate and provide the world with White people, Asian people, blondes, red-heads, Watutsis, pygmies, and Eskimoes...in such a short time-frame, how did 8 do it?

[Mike Darancette]

Somewhere in Indonesia I read that human activity had been discovered just above the Toba ash level, I wonder what happened to these people?

Aside from having a headache from the noise they may have died out from the environmental degradation the followed the eruption.