Who dunnit?

[XFool]

Ancient Britons built Stonehenge – then vanished. Is science closing in on their killers?

The Guardian

New clues from an ancient plague are pushing us to rethink where Britons were ‘really’ from – and the answer is complicated

"Two weeks ago, Pooja Swali from the Crick Institute announced the discovery of Yersinia pestis, the bacterium that causes plague, in the dental pulp of three people who died about 4,000 years ago – two in Somerset and the other in Cumbria. This finding is astonishing in its own right because it pushes back the earliest evidence of plague in England by several millennia. But the discovery may also help to solve one of our greatest prehistoric mysteries: why did the people who introduced farming to the British Isles suddenly vanish shortly after they built Stonehenge some five millennia ago? "

[stevensfo]

Ancient Britons built Stonehenge – then vanished. Is science closing in on their killers?

The Guardian

New clues from an ancient plague are pushing us to rethink where Britons were ‘really’ from – and the answer is complicated

"Two weeks ago, Pooja Swali from the Crick Institute announced the discovery of Yersinia pestis, the bacterium that causes plague, in the dental pulp of three people who died about 4,000 years ago – two in Somerset and the other in Cumbria. This finding is astonishing in its own right because it pushes back the earliest evidence of plague in England by several millennia. But the discovery may also help to solve one of our greatest prehistoric mysteries: why did the people who introduced farming to the British Isles suddenly vanish shortly after they built Stonehenge some five millennia ago? "

Great article. Thanks!

One of the links inside is just as amazing:

https://www.theguardian.com/science/201 ... is-reveals

The first modern Britons, who lived about 10,000 years ago, had “dark to black” skin, a groundbreaking DNA analysis of Britain’s oldest complete skeleton has revealed.
The fossil, known as Cheddar Man, was unearthed more than a century ago in Gough’s Cave in Somerset. Intense speculation has built up around Cheddar Man’s origins and appearance because he lived shortly after the first settlers crossed from continental Europe to Britain at the end of the last ice age. People of white British ancestry alive today are descendants of this population.

Steve

[genou]

One of the links inside is just as amazing:

https://www.theguardian.com/science/201 ... is-reveals

The first modern Britons, who lived about 10,000 years ago, had “dark to black” skin, a groundbreaking DNA analysis of Britain’s oldest complete skeleton has revealed.
Steve

There will be approximately zero of his DNA in any living Briton : https://youtu.be/3-vHByC14bc ( it is long, but it's very good )

[ursaminortaur]

One of the links inside is just as amazing:

https://www.theguardian.com/science/201 ... is-reveals

There will be approximately zero of his DNA in any living Briton : https://youtu.be/3-vHByC14bc ( it is long, but it's very good )

In the past it was believed they white skin developed about 40,000 years ago but recent evidence suggests that it may not have developed until 7000 years ago.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/7000-year-old-human-bones-suggest-new-date-for-light-skin-gene/

An ancient European hunter-gatherer man had dark skin and blue eyes, a new genetic analysis has revealed.

The analysis of the man, who lived in modern-day Spain only about 7,000 years ago, shows light-skin genes in Europeans evolved much more recently than previously thought.

The findings, which were detailed today (Jan. 26) in the journal Nature, also hint that light skin evolved not to adjust to the lower-light conditions in Europe compared with Africa, but instead to the new diet that emerged after the agricultural revolution, said study co-author Carles Lalueza-Fox, a paleogenomics researcher at Pompeu Fabra University in Spain.

Sunlight changes

Many scientists have believed that lighter skin gradually arose in Europeans starting around 40,000 years ago, soon after people left tropical Africa for Europe's higher latitudes. The hunter-gatherer's dark skin pushes this date forward to only 7,000 years ago, suggesting that at least some humans lived considerably longer than thought in Europe before losing the dark pigmentation that evolved under Africa's sun.

[servodude]

The findings, which were detailed today (Jan. 26) in the journal Nature, also hint that light skin evolved not to adjust to the lower-light conditions in Europe compared with Africa, but instead to the new diet that emerged after the agricultural revolution, said study co-author Carles Lalueza-Fox, a paleogenomics researcher at Pompeu Fabra University in Spain.

Oh dear Carles?!

I'm sure they know what they are saying but they've managed to phrase it in a way that implies there's an intent.
Which to be honest is a lazy short hand that we use when talking about selection but it's bloody important that it doesn't get out in to the lay community because it fuels all sorts of eye rolling cant.

Lamarck gets a hard rap (probably unfairly) because he believed that we could direct evolution through the environment - so if we are to be consistent we should try and make sure this stuff is discussed in a way that doesn't repeat his mistakes.
I would hope no one would believe that the reason Africans are smaller (on average https://www.dryukselyurttas.com/post/average-height-men-and-women) than Europeans else is because those that left evolved to pull fruit from taller trees - but there's a superficial plausibility so I can see why Lamarck formed his views on giraffes

Stuff happens in the genome by random and shagging - if it reduces viability it falls out, occasionally it provides an advantage and it can spread further, mostly it just hangs about

And then there's epigenetics to make things even more interesting

but there's no intent

[servodude]

One of the links inside is just as amazing:

https://www.theguardian.com/science/201 ... is-reveals

There will be approximately zero of his DNA in any living Briton : https://youtu.be/3-vHByC14bc ( it is long, but it's very good )

Are the Beaker people considered modern britons? (Which is where I think the last big replacement was)
...damn I'll have to watch it now

[kempiejon]

Coming over here. Bah. What's wrong with just cupping up the water in your hands? Bloody Beaker folk.