What is DNA?
2025-06-29 19:02 It is the very substance our genes are made of.  Usually it is depicted as a rope ladder twisted like a helix.  One can say the molecule is shaped approximately like that.  It is in turn built from four smaller molecules.
Why inbreeding is a bad idea
2025-06-25 13:13 It seems like humanity is particularly sensitive to inbreeding.  If so it is because evolution has changed our ancestors too quickly.  The locomotor system has changed considerably in 3.5 million years.
Why the eugenicists were wrong
2025-06-19 17:29 Eugenics arose at a time when the pace of evolution was unknown. Charles Darwin himself thought it was a very slow process. But many of his admirers believed it went at breakneck speed.
The blonde and blue-eyed myth
2025-06-04 10:50 Here in northern Europe there is a widespread myth of an earlier homogenous appearance.  Before a certain point in time all the area’s inhabitants would have been blonde and blue-eyed.  Nazis would add strait hair and strait noses to that.
Peoples of the wheel
2025-06-02 13:11 Proto-Indo-European was the first proto-language identified by linguists.  This based on similarities between Ancient Greek, Latin and Sanskrit.  Unfortunately, it took long before one could say something about where it had been spoken.
Peoples of the sail
2025-04-25 17:02 I call the Austronesians peoples of the sail since they spread agriculture by literally sailing out into the world.  Most areas they came to had no agriculture earlier.
The deficiencies of the Americas
2025-04-18 17:25 Towards the end of the last ice age North and South America were populated. Since the seas were lower then there was no Bering Strait. People could simply walk to Alaska. However, the way south from there was almost entirely ice-covered.
Australia’s infertility
2025-04-10 13:33 There is considerable uncertainty on when Australia was populated.  Certain are the current human species reached it on rafts.  Likely they were built from bamboo.  What we know is the straits being too wide to see across.
Eurasia’s biogeographical advantages
2025-04-04 12:53 Before the current human species Eurasia was inhabited by other species.  So it had been for more than 1.5 million years.  This has given organisms some opportunity to adapt to humans.
Africa’s biogeographical disadvantages
2025-03-27 19:56 When I talk here about Africa I mean Sub-Saharan Africa.  Historically the Sahara has consisted a greater barrier than the Mediterranean.  Most from Africa’s north coast are more similar to Europeans than people south of the Sahara.