How Europeans evolved white skin (2015) • Hacker News Board

Re: How Europeans evolved white skin (2015)

#11

Post by avtar » Sat, Mar 17, 2018, 3:40 PM UTC

asveikau wrote: post #5

People are so hopelessly confused about race. I recently made the mistake of reading Facebook comments on a widely shared public post of an article not unlike this one. And... So many comments attempting to graft our contemporary divisions and yes, racism, onto a story like this. It's pretty simple to think that so many years ago, the distinctions were simply not there, to the extent where you would have seemed like…

Race, religion, nationalism, social status, me vs. you.. we’ve been at this for ages. Has there really been a point in time where the human collective consciousness hasn’t involved a sense of duality?

One supposed exchange from over 2,500 years ago: https://tricycle.org/trikedaily/buddha-talks-brahmin-suprema...

Re: How Europeans evolved white skin (2015)

#12

Post by scythe » Sat, Mar 17, 2018, 3:44 PM UTC

amriksohata wrote: post #4

I'm struggling to understand this, tallness? Didn't that only happen to some European countries in the past hundred years? Because of diet? The ability to digest milk? The Hindu civilisation is one of the oldest in the world and milk and cows are very much a first class thing, suggesting it's not jsut Europeans that could digest milk, but other culture for a very long time. Maybe I'm reading this wrong but how does t…

It's not dairy alone that causes height gain. High dietary protein correlates with production of IGF-1 which correlates with bone growth. Casein stimulates IGF-1 production somewhat more than other proteins, but not by much. Indians eat a relatively low-protein diet due to the prevalence of vegetarianism and not actually that much dairy; most of it is fermented, which, IIRC, deactivates casein.

Re: How Europeans evolved white skin (2015)

#13

Post by primaryobjects » Sat, Mar 17, 2018, 3:47 PM UTC

selimthegrim wrote: post #8

amriksohata wrote: post #4

I'm struggling to understand this, tallness? Didn't that only happen to some European countries in the past hundred years? Because of diet? The ability to digest milk? The Hindu civilisation is one of the oldest in the world and milk and cows are very much a first class thing, suggesting it's not jsut Europeans that could digest milk, but other culture for a very long time. Maybe I'm reading this wrong but how does t…

Many Indians and people of Indian descent (myself included) are in fact lactose intolerant, hence the prevalence of cheese and yogurt products.

Cheese and yogurt both have lactose.

Re: How Europeans evolved white skin (2015)

#14

Post by BjoernKW » Sat, Mar 17, 2018, 3:57 PM UTC

amriksohata wrote: post #4

I'm struggling to understand this, tallness? Didn't that only happen to some European countries in the past hundred years? Because of diet? The ability to digest milk? The Hindu civilisation is one of the oldest in the world and milk and cows are very much a first class thing, suggesting it's not jsut Europeans that could digest milk, but other culture for a very long time. Maybe I'm reading this wrong but how does t…

Isn't it obvious? So their heads are closer to the Sun and don't freeze up ;-)

Regarding skin tones: What often registers simply as 'black' or 'Asian' from a predominantly white perspective comprises a wide variety of phenotypes and backgrounds, just as there's considerable variation in how white people from different regions or countries look.

Re: How Europeans evolved white skin (2015)

#15

Post by deadbunny » Sat, Mar 17, 2018, 4:01 PM UTC

asveikau wrote: post #5

People are so hopelessly confused about race. I recently made the mistake of reading Facebook comments on a widely shared public post of an article not unlike this one. And... So many comments attempting to graft our contemporary divisions and yes, racism, onto a story like this. It's pretty simple to think that so many years ago, the distinctions were simply not there, to the extent where you would have seemed like…

> It's pretty simple to think that so many years ago, the distinctions were simply not there, to the extent where you would have seemed like a crazy person trying to impose them. And yet all people wanted to do on that thread was talk about present differences.

Far of "the other" has existed about as long as humans.

Re: How Europeans evolved white skin (2015)

#16

Post by badosu » Sat, Mar 17, 2018, 4:02 PM UTC

alejohausner wrote: post #3

So vitamin D is the driving factor: either you lose melanin, or become lactose tolerant, or you die. With dark skin, you can't make enough D from sunlight. If you can't drink milk, you can't get it from diet. Either way, ancient Northern Europeans had to mutate into pale-skinned milk drinkers, because their land is not very sunny. Cool.

The study also points out that there's evidence for sexual selection as well.

Re: How Europeans evolved white skin (2015)

#17

Post by toasterlovin » Sat, Mar 17, 2018, 4:02 PM UTC

primaryobjects wrote: post #13

selimthegrim wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many Indians and people of Indian descent (myself included) are in fact lactose intolerant, hence the prevalence of cheese and yogurt products.

Cheese and yogurt both have lactose.

Most people can consume cheese and yogurt, but cannot consume raw milk. This is the distinction commonly meant by lactose tolerance (whether it holds up to a technical analysis or not).

Re: How Europeans evolved white skin (2015)

#18

Post by fouc » Sat, Mar 17, 2018, 4:13 PM UTC

toasterlovin wrote: post #17

primaryobjects wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cheese and yogurt both have lactose.

Most people can consume cheese and yogurt, but cannot consume raw milk. This is the distinction commonly meant by lactose tolerance (whether it holds up to a technical analysis or not).

I assume you meant raw pasteurized milk. I've seen anecdotal claims that drinking actual raw milk causes an increase in lactose tolerance, the hypothesis being that you lose some beneficial bacteria during the pasteurization process (not to mention various proteins are denatured).

Re: How Europeans evolved white skin (2015)

#19

Post by giardini » Sat, Mar 17, 2018, 4:18 PM UTC

I was surprised to see the article state "The modern humans who came out of Africa to originally settle Europe about 40,000 years are presumed to have had dark skin, which is advantageous in sunny latitudes."

"presumed"??!!

I've always thought there was some scientific evidence for this and not mere presumption. Is there not some evidence about the skin coloration of our African ancestors of different periods?

Re: How Europeans evolved white skin (2015)

#20

Post by irrational » Sat, Mar 17, 2018, 4:19 PM UTC

asveikau wrote: post #5

People are so hopelessly confused about race. I recently made the mistake of reading Facebook comments on a widely shared public post of an article not unlike this one. And... So many comments attempting to graft our contemporary divisions and yes, racism, onto a story like this. It's pretty simple to think that so many years ago, the distinctions were simply not there, to the extent where you would have seemed like…

You might want to read some introductory anthropology textbooks. For as long as there have been humans it has been us against them. Them/the others/the strangers/the not us are dangerous and cannot be trusted. There are specific rituals that an other must go through to become a part of the community - the means by which one of the others can become one of us. What separates us from them? It might be skin color, it might be language, it might be religion, it might be you live in the mountains and we live in the valley, you are a herder and we are farmers, you are rural and we are urban, you have curly hair and we have straight hair, etc. ad naseum.