Is race a sign of evolution?

You did a much better job explaining it them me Beachcoma

I should have linked to some information on it for people that were not aware of that theory and wanted to learn more.

Let's not get too carried away with the bottleneck hypothesis. It sounds plausible and I'm sure that there is evidence to support such, but it is hardly Gospel.

The bottleneck hypothesis offers an explanation for why humans exhibit so little genetic variation, yet superficially appear diverse. It also affords an explanation for the apparent recent coalescence of mtDNA and African origins.

Population Bottlenecks and Volcanic Winter

The tribe of chimps with more genetic diversity than the entire human race quote I believe can be attributed to a study done by a biologist at Washington University in St Louis Mo. He is an african american. I am from St Louis and remember this quote came less than two years ago.
While evolution does account for some of the difference between the different ethnic groups, it not the only factor. In my neurobiology course (I am not sure about the specifics) I was told that babies have the ability to produce all phonics at a few months. About six months later their ability to produce sounds follow cultural norms. Example, the chinese and the rolling of their rrrrs. This becomes ingrained due to their exposure to their culture. Thus our difference are not just genetic but also based on social pressures. The environment where a group lives can favor certain body types and physical attributes. Likewise cultural norms can increase competence and social behavior that makes certain ethnic groups to be better at certain tasks. Also our brains can filter information based on our cultural basis, thus the situation with babies and their phonics. Some of these things that are not genetically linked can be changed with attention to the situation and training ie like a voice coach teaches people how to perform different dialects.

[edit on 25-2-2006 by Ibeuniquetoo]

Originally posted by GradyPhilpott
Let's not get too carried away with the bottleneck hypothesis. It sounds plausible and I'm sure that there is evidence to support such, but it is hardly Gospel.

That's true. But then again hardly any theory we currently have about the sudden decline in genetic diversity 70,000 years ago can be treated as Gospel. We simply didn't have any records dating back that far, so scientists just have to make an educated guess.

In terms of IQ, blacks have been shown to score less but that is most likely due to cultural reasons like #ty schools. For example, when blacks start going to the same colleges as White people, like a university, their IQ scores quickly catch up to match their white counterparts, like literally go up 15 points a year after they start college. In addition to that, it's likely that Asians actually are about 2 points higher in IQ by genetics. don't know about Mexicans but Middle-Easterner IQs are already the same as White IQs. So, IQ is pretty constant throughout race when all cultural norms are considered.

Athletic ability? Of course some races are better than others. You only need to look at Latinos and Asians to see this. They're #ing short, of course there average athletic ability won't be very high. Blacks actually have the highest athetlic ability since they have the same average height as white people, thicker bones = can take more damage in things like boxing, narrower hips which = they can jump higher and have more lower body strength.

So, according to scientific data, blacks could actually be the master race in terms of ability, although not by much. Yet, they haven't really accomplished much in history as a group compared to Asians, Whites and Middle-Easterners. What I'm trying to say is that race means nothing, it's really what you make of it that counts.

edit: Pale skin color in Europeans is because the less melanin you have (more melanin= darker skin), the easier it is to absorb Vitamin D from sunlight. From cave paintings, we see that the original dark skinned Europeans had a Vitamin D rich diet consisting of things like fish to make up for what their skin couldn't absorb. As they moved further inland, especially to Scandinavia, they obviously couldn't keep up that diet with seafood, so they adapted the lighter skin genes. Scientific support for this is dark brown skin on European cave drawings and an exceptionally high amount bone rickets in dark skinned minorities living in Europe before milk was fortified with Vitamin D.

[edit on 2/25/06 by RedDragon]

I found a few links to show some studies that show that an IQ is 50% genetic and 50% cultural and also By adulthood, East Asians average 1 cubic inch more cranial capacity than Whites who average 5 cubic inches more than Blacks. LINK so we are all different and most races DO have some proven differences


BTW i am Black and asian

Originally posted by ironjello
I found a few links to show some studies that show that an IQ is 50% genetic and 50% cultural and also By adulthood, East Asians average 1 cubic inch more cranial capacity than Whites who average 5 cubic inches more than Blacks. LINK so we are all different and most races DO have some proven differences


BTW i am Black and asian

Brain size has very little to do with intelligence.

you're black and asian. im white and asian and i used to be a nazi =P

[edit on 2/25/06 by RedDragon]

Originally posted by RedDragon

Brain size has very little to do with intelligence.

I have heard of a story of this one guy with that condition of having "fluid in the head"... what's that called again?

Anyway, this guy lived a pretty normal life, it didn't affect him and he had a genius IQ level of 160+. But the special thing about this guy is that a CAT scan revealed that he only had 15% of a normal person's brain.

Who says no-brains=stupid?

How can everybody be all the same if there are so many obvious visible differences? We are all similar I think is a better word to use to describe the variety amongst people. If evolution is about experience and adapting to change as defined by Darwin, then there can be racial differences due to our observation of history and archeology.