Hi John,
[Quoting earlier Birdman letter] "I have not really tried to follow the 'origins of man' theories because they seem to change about twice a week. Furthermore, there is such an incredible amount of junk science, from Java Man to the attempts to suppress data like the Kennewick man, jeez, seems like nothing can be relied on."
You've definitely seen through their bullshit!
Here is an example of that; a 'leading' genetic researcher, who is quoted in the new issue of Discover magazine, lying in order to prevent laymen from understanding the implications of the data. The article 'blurb' that someone posted on a list said:
"Humans are all so closely related that our entire population shows less genetic diversity than that of a small group of chimpanzees. It's almost as though we all came from the same town - and perhaps we did. ... [the article] is based on a study by Marcus Feldman, a population geneticist at Stanford University; Noah Rosenberg, a computational biologist at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles; and Lev Zhivotovsky, a geneticist at the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow. They examined short, repetitive fragments of DNA called microsatellites, markers found in every person. 'We used 377 markers that are generally located in noncoding regions of the genome, ones that are likely to be neutral, where there is no natural selection involved,' says Rosenberg. The beauty of microsatellites is that they mutate frequently and at a steady pace, enabling scientists to infer from them when human populations first diverged from each other. Studying those mutations in 1,056 individuals clustered in 52 populations groups around the world ..."
I wasn't able to find the article on the internet, because it's in the Jan '04 issue, so I looked up the research the article was based on and caught this jerk in a fraudulent misrepresentation of the data. I think it is evident that they know what they are doing, because there is an 'arrow of purpose' in the consistency of their misrepresentation, so lets just call it what it is: LYING. I can give you some examples confirming that view, by quoting such people themselves. Feldman, and his research associates are mentioned in a paper by David Rotman, called "GENES, MEDICINE, AND THE NEW RACE DEBATE" from Technology Review; Jun2003, Vol. 106, issue 5, pg 41. The title is a tip-off, & the abstract mentions the "Danger of looking for genetic variations among racial groups." Well, that says it ALL: the DANGER of these genetic discoveries! Now, do you really think that, if these discoveries were actually showing that 'we are all the same' and 'we are all Africans', these people would think that was 'dangerous'? You know better; they would hail these discoveries as proof of their contentions that 'we are all Africans'. But we don't have to infer their motives: they tell us, in that paper, what they fear and why. First, they tell us that the HapMap (just a name for a sort of 'index' of haplotypes) "will make it possible to spell out in great detail the genetic differences between people from different parts of the world." So, "Sociologists,bioethicists, and anthropologists WORRY that the genetic data could be manipulated to give an air of BIOLOGICAL CREDENCE to ETHNIC STEREOTYPES, to revive discredited RACIAL CLASSIFICATIONS, and EVEN to fuel bogus claims of FUNDAMENTAL GENETIC DIFFERENCES between groups." [emphasis mine]. Those sociologists, bioethicists, and anthropologists are what I call 'political scientists', though I include afrocentrist and PC researchers of all kinds in my term. It is just that the afro-PC elements have captured those three disciplines, so that they speak (bleat) with one voice, while elsewhere surly muttering continues. A 'bioethicist' is someone who is so smart, well connected, highly educated, and morally exalted they know what is right and wrong and are authorized to tell you how to think, speak, and act ... sort of like the Pope, but with divisions. I like to think they are talking about MY work in that "EVEN ... FUNDAMENTAL GENETIC DIFFERENCES ..." category! "Here's the rub", says Troy Duster, a sociologist, "...The danger", he says, [there it is again, that DANGER] is that people will associate those differences with racial groups. ahhhwhooowhooo. Jonathan Kahn, bioethicist, suggests that, "it is all too easy for biological and genetic categories to become conflated with racial ones.[no doubt!] And when they do, a lot of mischief can occur". This exalted being knows that we ordinary Folk are not to be trusted with dangerous genetic knowledge. Duster admits that "...to map differences between various populations while avoiding the DANGERS of RACIAL STEREOTYPES is a conundrum without an answer." He doesn't openly say the truth should be withheld from us vulgar rabble, but it is clearly implied, here and elsewhere in the paper, that genetic researchers had better come to the right 'conclusions' in the information they divulge, lest 'racists' discover that science has proved their commonsense perceptions! Feldman's Discover article is clearly a case of keeping the public from learning the 'dangerous' truth! Feldman says we are just one homogenous family from the same village. But, Feldman's lab researchers reported " ... detailed data on gene samples from individuals from 52 populations..." and the bottom line was " ... that how people categorized themselves - whether they called themselves black or white or asian - correlated closely with the genetic categories." So, you see Feldman is LYING, rather than just dumb or honestly mistaken. He knows he is contradicting the evidence of a study done by his own lab. This same paper mentions that there are about 10 million SNPs [single nucleotide polymorphisms] in the human genome. Feldman looked at 377 microsattelites, out of those millions of SNPs, and says that proves we are just one village. Don't you suppose he picked those 377 BECAUSE they are all common to all populations, so he can compare minor variations? Of course, but then he implies that everybody having those same, carefully chosen microsattelites is proof we are 'all the same'! Also he picked 'junk DNA' sites; coding DNA has been shown to correlate with racial groups so well that cops can trace a headless, handless, 'muti' corpse in the Thames river back to a specific locale in Africa, so they can't use THAT to claim 'we are all Africans'. And the mtDNA is coming unraveled on them, revealing distinctly different lineages for Africans and Eurasians, so it is better not to mention THAT. So he uses 'junk' DNA, and finds 377 SNPs, out of millions, that show 'we all came from the same village'. But this is the same data, that spelled DANGER to those political scientists, just written up two different ways! This is the SAME data set that showed people's perceptions of whether they were black, white, or asian correlated with the genetic data. No problem: just LIE about what it MEANS; Discover magazine isn't going to question you ... or allow anyone else to call you on it! Feldman used 'junk' DNA instead of the coding regions, which are so strongly correlated with race, but even his carefully chosen data DIRECTLY CONTRADICTS HIS STATED CONCLUSIONS. Here's more about that from, DOES RACE EXIST, Sci. Am.,DEC 2003. That article talked out of both sides of the mouth, trying to deny race in the sense we Folk loyalists understand it, but admitted the genetic correlation. "...we needed 60 polymorphisms to assign individuals to their continent of origin with 90% accuracy. To achieve nearly 100% accuracy, however, we needed to use about 100...". This same article mentions that Noah Rosenberg and Jonathan Pritchard FORMERLY OF FELDMAN'S LABORATORY used the SAME data-set (375 polymorphisms from 1000 people of 52 ethnic groups) and found that, "...by looking at varying frequencies of these polymorphisms they were able to distinguish five different groups of people whose ancestors were typically ISOLATED by oceans, deserts, or mountains: sub-Saharan Africans; Europeans and Asians west of the Himalayas; east Asians; ... Melanesia; and Native Americans. They were also able to identify subgroups within each region that usually corres- ponded with each member's self-reported ethnicity." Now does that sound like Feldman's "one village", or is he a telling a bald-faced LIE? You have to wonder if those researchers left Feldman's lab in disgust! In closing, let me quote from the abstract of, Human Genetic Diversity: Lewontin's Fallacy. (BioEssays, Aug2003) "In popular articles that play down the genetical differences among human populations, it is often stated that about 85% of the total genetic variation is due to individual differences within populations and only 15% to differences between populations or ethnic groups. ...this argument ignores the fact that most of the information that distinguishes populations is hidden in the correlation structure of the data and not simply in the variation of the individual factors." In other words, this is a disingenuous argument, and those who make it know that. They are using this analytical 'sleight of hand' to obfuscate. Figures, and data, don't lie, but liars figure, and they are the only ones our media-masters will publish.
Best Regards, RAF
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