> This led to a demographic explosion, so that in a few hundred years Yamnaya descendants numbered many tens of thousands and were spread from Hungary to eastern China.
Don’t they mean western China here?
Ancient-DNA study identifies originators of Indo-European language family
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Re: Ancient-DNA study identifies originators of Indo-European language family
#62[dead]
Re: Ancient-DNA study identifies originators of Indo-European language family
#63Re: Ancient-DNA study identifies originators of Indo-European language family
#64Earlier quoted context omitted.
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I’m sorry, where do you get that communist countries negates genetically science? A quick search shows that Cuba, for example has plenty of geneticists, researchers and healthcare initiatives around hereditary diseases…
They are likely referring to Lysenkoism. This was the USSR's alternative to natural selection, partially because they believed natural selection was not compatible with Marxism. (There were other justifications, but this is the one relevant to the parent comment)
"Some Marxists, however, perceived a fissure between Marxism and Darwinism. Specifically, the issue is that while the "struggle for survival" in Marxism applies to a social class as a whole (the class struggle), the struggle for survival in Darwinism is decided by individual random mutations. This was deemed a liberal doctrine, against the Marxist framework of "immutable laws of history" and the spirit of collectivism."
Re: Ancient-DNA study identifies originators of Indo-European language family
#65> This led to a demographic explosion, so that in a few hundred years Yamnaya descendants numbered many tens of thousands and were spread from Hungary to eastern China. Don’t they mean western China here?
yeah definitely. Probably in reference to: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tocharians
Re: Ancient-DNA study identifies originators of Indo-European language family
#66David Reich, one of the principal authors of the study in question, wrote a book a few years back titled "Who We Are and How We Got Here", which I quite liked (https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2605841954). It predates some of this research, obviously, but it does have a chapter on the Indo-European origin question, along with chapters on a lot of other interesting paleo-DNA research.
Re: Ancient-DNA study identifies originators of Indo-European language family
#67Earlier quoted context omitted.
I’m sorry, where do you get that communist countries negates genetically science? A quick search shows that Cuba, for example has plenty of geneticists, researchers and healthcare initiatives around hereditary diseases…
They are likely referring to Lysenkoism. This was the USSR's alternative to natural selection, partially because they believed natural selection was not compatible with Marxism. (There were other justifications, but this is the one relevant to the parent comment) "Some Marxists, however, perceived a fissure between Marxism and Darwinism. Specifically, the issue is that while the "struggle for survival" in Marxism app…
Yeah Lysenkoism is what I was referring to about flat out denying genetics. But a softer version of genetics denialism has been a running theme historically.
Marxists are committed to a sort of historical determinism that requires social conditions to be more important than biology in a way that's not scientifically defensible. That's why they were the first to research classical conditioning, why they continue to support pseudoscience like linguistic determinism, why they've experimented so much with "brain washing" (e.g. trying to program prisoners of war through propaganda) etc.
Some of this stuff (like conditioning) has turned out to be useful. Some of it (like Lysenkoism) turned out to be tragically catastrophic. But all of it is an attempt to make science subservient to political needs.
Re: Ancient-DNA study identifies originators of Indo-European language family
#68I haven't read the papers in detail, but can someone explain how genetics can be used to trace spread of languages? For context, you don't need population movements for a language to spread (it is similar to religion). See this article for a logical explanation: https://medium.com/incerto/a-few-things-we-dont-quite-get-ab...
You can’t. But if population A and population B share a ancestor X years ago, and they also speak languages that appear to have drifted apart by X many years, the inference that their ancestor spoke a common proto-language is the simplest explanation.
Well you can and in fact they have narrowed down the language to a haplogroup even. R1b in the case of greek for example
Re: Ancient-DNA study identifies originators of Indo-European language family
#69David Reich, one of the principal authors of the study in question, wrote a book a few years back titled "Who We Are and How We Got Here", which I quite liked ( https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2605841954 ). It predates some of this research, obviously, but it does have a chapter on the Indo-European origin question, along with chapters on a lot of other interesting paleo-DNA research.
He was on the Dwarkesh podcast last August to provide some lay person friendly synopsis and updates to “Who We Are.” Worth listening to even if you have read the book (in my mind at least).
Warning, link has an auto play when I opened it (but don’t let that minor obnoxiousness dissuade you from listening).
Re: Ancient-DNA study identifies originators of Indo-European language family
#70Related HN posts [1], [2]. Fun facts, the most common words of Indo-European Family are surprisingly very similar across Sanskrit (S) English (E) German (G) [3]. Pitara (S) Father (E) Vater (G) Matara (S) Mother (E) Mutter (G) Bhratara (S) Brother (E) Bruder (G) Duhitar (S) Daughter (E) Tochter (G) [1] New insights into the origin of the Indo-European languages (147 comments): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=369…
Could you explain in non-specialist language how similarities between these modern languages now has anything to do with their relationship from some earliest common ancestor? How is that explanation better than convergent evolution or overfitting hallucinations?
When I look at the difference between modern and “old English” they seem to have changed quite a bit [0]. When I read an etymological explanation [1], it sounds like a just so story.
0. https://www.reddit.com/r/etymology/comments/9ouweu/how_engli...
1. https://www.pimsleur.com/blog/words-for-father-around-the-wo...