Spencer Wells: "According to DNA, race does not exist."

Another great documentary featuring Spencer Wells, geneticist, "Human Family Tree" is on tonight and in the weeks ahead on the Nat'l Geographic channel.

http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/channel/human-family-tree

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

question on college applications and scholarship applications?

don't...

no shit...

then again what is a lie without better clarification of the question? For example we are all of African origin if you go far back enough. Frankly I don't have a clue where half my family comes from. I tried to refuse to answer the question in the hospital when my daughters were born in Tennessee, but they refused to let me get away with it.

DOES use "American Indian"...

other forms do not, and I always put "Native American"...


:rofl: MAO!!!

Between all the people checking "Native American" like that, and the goobers who insist their great grandmother was a Cherokee princess, I'm sure the US government figures we're doing just dandy, and don't really need silly things like treaties or sovereignty after all!

Are you at least consistent?

Do yo also check "Pacific Islander"? After all, the American Supercontinent is technically just a really huge island, and the Pacific gets one side of it wet. Bonus points if you live on one of the Catalina, Puget Sound, or Alaskan Islands!

Or how about "African American"? After all, all humans ultimately trace their ancestry back to Africa, right?

If you live in California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, or Texas, you are also technically "Hispanic" - they even give you a white / nonwhite option on that one. After all, these states were violently stolen from Mexico, in what would today be regarded as an illegal and illegitimate war!

if you crowned west of the Yukon, you can even be an Alaskan native!

And just think, most of these boxes will allow you to check "all that apply"

Of course, those boxes have a real reason for being there. It's not idle information. It impacts such things as education, public funding, public housing, charity grants, and the like. So, while I'm happy that you're happy, do keep in mind that your chuckle does bear impact on the lives of other people.

We got a long form for the 2000 Census and one of the questions they asked was what ethnic group I considered my family to belong to. I said, Welsh, English, German, Scottish and Nordic - that is about the order of percentage of various nationalities that my ancestors have contributed to my genetics. The Nordic is a stretch since that came through William the Conquerer, but what the hay.

Apparently few white people responded with an ethnicity because I got a call from the Census Bureau wanting to know more about what I was talking about with my answer. If I listen to "ethnic" music, it is generally Celtic, not Welsh, but I appreciate my Welsh heritage as well as the other groups.

I got the idea from a friend who used to put in "Neo-Coptic Druid" as his religion on questionnaires. Baffle them with bullshit!


On another note, a program I was watching recently talked about "European Americans" to differentiate from the people who were in the Americas prior to the arrival of Columbus. I like that - I think I may start using it!

Norman? Normandy is in France, not Scandinavia.

Etymology of 'Norman':
Etymology: Middle English, from Anglo-French Normant, from Old Norse Northmann-, Northmathr Norseman, from northr north + mann-, mathr man; akin to Old English north north and to Old English man man
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/norman

I guess William the Conquerer could be called "Nordic" in a sense, then. Human geography is hard! :dunce:

"Norman" came from "Norse Man" because of the invasion and settlement of the north of France (Gaul) by Vikings.

Somewhere I have the line of descent from Odin to my father that he helped me put together for a history class. Here is one I found on the internet: http://www.renderplus.com/hartgen/htm/of-kvenland.htm William the Conqueror is descended from Duke Guillaume I de Normandie child in the 29th generation the continuation of the family tree is at http://www.renderplus.com/hartgen/htm/de-normandie.htm#name3416 - William is Fifth generation or #8.

by the Frankish King. In exchange, the vikings agreed to recognize the Frank King and convert to Christianity.

then he was definitely French

Most times you just fill it out and mail it in.

which info I got from participating in Spencer Well's genographic project. Drives those survey takers crazy.}(

N Africa, eastern Europe, and Scandinavia. U is one of the older haplogroups splitting off of R, the "mother" haplogroup. That was a bit of a surprise, since my paternal genealogy is pretty well known and documented to be Dutch and Scot going back to Norman as well (de Rhodes and de Glen). My mother's father's father is a total brick wall and I can only get back 5 generations on my mother's father's mother's side. But that matrilineal DNA came as a bit of a surprise because I have documentation for 10 generations of mothers on my mother's mother's side.

The DNA don't lie but sometimes the documentation do. There are more mysteries in heaven and earth, Horatio, etc...

She's the only person your maternal haplogroup will have come from (and her daughter etc.). You're just saying that the furthest back you can go on that branch isn't in N Africa, eastern Europe, and Scandinavia then, are you?

which, I guess, "could" point to Norman ancestry. I'm olive-skinned and dark in places where whiteboys shouldn't be (to put it delicately) and have a bump on the back of my head that points to Melungeon ancestry. Having quite a few generations in the Appalachians, it's very likely, but it's also something that's damned hard to prove. There are several surnames in my tree that are associated with Melungeon groups, but with as is typical, they're almost completely opaque, paperless, and being on my mother's side genetically hard to prove. On my dad's side, I've got all kinds of documentation into colonial times and back into Ireland (Scottish gentry sent beyond the Pale), Scotland, England, and the Netherlands. There's something there I'm missing because my dad also had black hair, dark skin, and blue eyes; another Melungeon trait. He claimed Native American (another Melungeon dodge to hide their ancestry, as they were discriminated against even worse than blacks or Native Americans), but I don't believe it for an instant.

I doubt I'll ever prove it absolutely, but it's still an interesting project trying, just seeing where it goes. One of these days I'll have the cash for the Y-chromosome tests. Maybe that will shed some light.

Or her family had been in England for 9000 years, perhaps:

I imagine once race as a non-issue becomes ingrained in our cultural psyche, we will move further and further away from it.

However, as long as many individuals and organizations continue to using race as an obstacle to prevent other Americans from receiving equitable treatment, it seems a rather more pragmatic approach to equity.

:hi:

Good to have more decisive info. :)

The racists are horribly insecure people, especially the 'white power' punks. They're so bent out of shape that there are so many black athletes, that they have to believe they have some advantage over blacks as a 'race'. I know that sounds simplified, but we're talking about simple minds.

No matter how many people fight it, the geneticists and anthropologists just keep working at figuring it all out.

I'm shocked at the people exclaiming racial superiority are obviously not superior to anyone. It is never anyone that really has themselves together. I don't trust a fat, broke, stupid, balding, white guy saying white people are superior.

Know we know that even genetically race makes almost know difference. The people who are superior are the people of all races that make the world a better place.

I really tire of fashions parading as science, regardless of who is doing it or why they are doing it.

Obviously I wasn't referring to DNA.

Thanks for clarifying.

:shrug:

I've been having a very interesting conversation elsewhere with someone who reports that there are Puerto Rican families in which full siblings identify as different races.

Is of a different race than he is? That really illustrates the idiocy of "race" as a definition of variations of humans.

That's what was amazing about the Puerto Rican thing- full siblings identifying as different races. It's entirely possible for two people of mixed race parentage to come out remarkably different in appearance on a racial spectrum, but race isn't simply about skin color so I do think it would be odd for full siblings to identify as different races. Obviously, history and literature are replete with stories of people doing exactly that, but it seems odd in modern times.

pure breed animals, like dogs, come from about 100 generations of inbreeding father daughters and mother sons. Yeck.

"Purebred" is an animal husbandry term which would naturally cross over into a discussion of human racial groups. But those most likely to use it would be the Aryan Nations I would think. I was reading on one of their websites that they appear to accept that all human beings have a common ancestor. What (at least) some of them believe is that other races have essentially bred themselves downward and/or become isolated over the centuries.

The original population would have to be basal. That is, identical to whatever the first "anatomically modern" human was. After that, they would have to never mindle with their descendants' descendants. Unless the Nation of Islam is right and the original humans really are living on a spaceship, this is pretty much an impossible scenario. Even the most isolated places on earth saw fairly regular genetic mixing, or came from an original population that had distinct lineages - Rapa Nui, for instance, was about as isolated as you can get on this planet, and while the population was probably fairly homogeneous, they were still descended from a variety of people from other islands, who were in turn descended from distinct Taiwanese tribes, who themselves were decended from various Asian mainlanders, who... you get the idea.

While I'm talking abut anatomically modern humans... Did you know that "species" is almost as meaningless as "race"? Seriously, if you walked down a procession of your forebearers, would would never reach a point where an individual was a clearly different species from either its immediate ancestors or descendants. You'd certainly find men, women, apes, and whatnot that are different from you, but you would never find a "missing link", a clear bridge between the species behind and the species ahead.

I bought the test kit, returned my samples, and got my results back. My Y Chromosome haplotype is I1-uN1, common in Norway. Halopgroup I was brought to Europe 25,000 years ago by a Late Stone Age culture called the Gravettian.

I love this stuff!

I collect notes on this stuff, and according to what I've got the I haplotype goes back some 24 thousand years (give or take a few thousand) -- but it almost certainly originated in Europe rather than arriving with the Gravettian mammoth-hunters, who moved in from southern Russian about 30 thousand years ago.

I1, which is a subtype of I, is slightly younger yet. One note I have says "I1a originated in Franco-Cantabria and spread to northwestern Europe after the Last Glacial Maximum. Its maximum frequency today is in Norwegians (38.9%) and is frequent in Scandinavia and Germany (25%)."

The Last Glacial Maximum was about 20,000 years ago, when the ice sheets reached their greatest extent and northern Europe was uninhabitable. When the ice started to pull back, people moved north again.

Franco-Cantabria, where I1 began, consists of southern France and northern Spain -- which is to say, the area with all the really great cave paintings. Which I think is incredibly cool, even cooler than Russian mammoth-hunters.

Do you think its worth the price

Actually most of the cost is actually a donation to a kind of charity fund that funds programs for preserving indigenous cultures.

They found that my haplogroup is A... which seems on the mark to me. :D

I also did DNA Tribes and had rather interesting results with that one!

There are a lot of differences between human lineages, and most of them are pretty interesting, in a "Huh, I didn't know that!" kind of way. Some of these differences are even medically important - Sickle cell, lactose tolerance, and the odd quirks of the Native American immune system that make Indians resistant to parasitic diseases, at the expense of immunity to bacteriological or viral diseases, for instance.

Genetically, there are some quite identifiable divisions between human groups, enough that the Genographic Project can even exist. The trick is, even though genetics can tell you that your ancestry comes from Africa, or Asia, or wherever, what it can't tell you is, "you are black" or "You are Asian"

It's not that there are no such things as races in genetics, so much as there are no clear boundaries between them, no line in the Sahara where "white" ends and "black" begins. We can tell where African lineages mostly are, and we can tell where European lineages mostly are, but we can't find the actual border between the two. Basically while geneticists can see "African genes" and "European genes", there is no place that is "all African" or "all European" (or, wherever else you want to look).

So the statement that "race doesn't exist in genetics" is kind of true, kind of false. There are marked and identifiable genetic differences in humans from different regions around the world, fairly easy to identify when you look. However the social construct of race simply doesn't exist in genetics, because people like to have sex, and "race" has never been much of a barrier for that.

And either way, it's a pretty narrow scope. even when you consider the relatively large differences between a guy from Finland and a guy from oaxaca... they're still more similar to each other genetically than two puppies from the same litter.

But there is in sociology. Race and ethnicity are social constructs that are totally arbitrary, having no relationship to actual physical categories. Race is defined in two ways: 1) self identification by the individual and 2) identification of the individual by social groups.

Even within a theoretical genetically homogeneous group, there would be some pretty noticeable variations between indivicuals with regards to skin tone, hair type and color, and facial shape; the features that are the basis of the social construct of race.

I'm just pointing out that "race doesn't exist in genetics" isn't entirely accurate. It's accurate enough for shorthand usage, I suppose, if the point you're trying to convey is something like "we're more similar than we are different" or "there's no clear divisions between human ethnic groups" - which are both true, and more accurate.

That is why I took the trouble to correct your statement. There is no physical basis for the concept of "races" period. It is *strictly* a sociological construct. If you got into the details of trying to defend your proposition, you would see quickly see it fall apart.

Might I suggest you pick up some literature on human evolution, anthropology, and genetics? "The Ancestor's Tale" from Richard Dawkins, a book I'm currently reading, touches on it, and I'm sure he has covered it more thoroughly in other works, as has Jared Diamond, and many other writers, anthropologists, and evolutionary biologists. I suspect that either i'm communicating it poorly, or you're not understanding me.

My proposition is pretty simple. While the social divisions of race are essentially meaningless, there are distinct genetic lineages of humans. Without that fact, the entire project the link in the OP takes you to would be completely impossible. The fact that we can trace human migrations and mingling through genetic tests is conclusive proof that there are identifiable, distinct, and traceable lineages. Otherwise this Genographic project would always get a result like "you are from Earth" which while surprising for some, is pretty much well-understood by most without a need for a test.

These lineages have their own varied genetic makeups, and tend to be more prone to certain physical and physiological traits than other groups. Some of these are completely trivial, such as nose shape, eye color, or even earwax consistency. Others are actually important - epidemiology recognizes that certain groups are more vulnerable to certain diseases, or more prone to genetic disorders than others. For instance, did you know that your T-cells probably work differently from mine? Your immune system gives priority to bacteria and viruses, mine will target parasites first. This is why my people had such a hard time with smallpox, and why Europeans couldn't really settle the tropics.

This is a genetic trait almost exclusive to people of Siberian or precolumbian American origin. However it is not "racial" - There are "white" people who's immune system will go after parasites first, and there are "indians" who are pretty good against disease. But it's a sound bet that anyone who has a parasites-first immune system, has ancestors that would qualify for "indian" even if that person themselves looks nothing like those ancestors and would be lumped into a totally different "race". The variance is because, as I said, people like to have sex, and "race" has never been a real barrier. So you end up with "whites" who have strong Western Hemisphere genes, you get "blacks" who have genes most common to Northern Europe, you get "Indians" with lots of African genes, etc.

I never once said that race - as in the social construct - had any genetic backing behind it, as you seem to think I did. In fact I'm saying quite the opposite - genetics proves that the social concept of race is invalid, because nobody is "pure", to use a term. There are no clear genetic divisions between, say, "whites" and "blacks" because, very simply, they've been diddling the hell out of each other at various meeting points for at least nine thousand years, and not all the miscegenation laws in the world have ever stopped it. The descendants from these couplings migrated one way or the other, bringing their parents' genes with them, and their descendants did the same, maybe even met a new "race" and repeated the process, ad infinitum.

However... It's plainly visible that there are genetic differences in various groups of people, differences that tend to be found in broadly definable groups, which can be used to trace an individual's ancestors. if you have the gene that causes sickle cell, you clearly have African ancestors - which often, but certainly not always - correlates with being "black". If you have "shovel teeth" then somewhere in your family there's someone from east Asia or precolumbian America - even if you do not fit that "race"

Get what I'm saying? I realize it's a complicated and frankly thorny subject. But we're not "all the same" and pretending we are leads to problems just the same as overemphasizing our differences does.

But I did understand you. However I see where there is a crook in the discussion that we can clear up. The OP is discussing "race", not lineages. As I wrote in my first response, "race and ethnicity are social constructs that are totally arbitrary, having no relationship to actual physical categories.

Reread this and think about what your point was: "It's not that there are no such things as races in genetics, so much as there are no clear boundaries between them, no line in the Sahara where "white" ends and "black" begins. We can tell where African lineages mostly are, and we can tell where European lineages mostly are, but we can't find the actual border between the two. Basically while geneticists can see "African genes" and "European genes", there is no place that is "all African" or "all European" (or, wherever else you want to look)."

You are making the very clear statement that in "genetics" there ARE races. What is odd is that you are then quoting the very evidence that DISPROVES the "race" concept behind RACISM to support this (still) false claim. My remarks were prompted by this paragraph.

As demonstrated by your numerous, good examples, there are a number of legitimate ways of defining groups by physical characteristics, however the social construct that is considered "race" isn't one of them nor is it valid to use it as if an "almost fit" means that it is.

You make clear that we are in complete agreement so I'm now just giving feedback on the way you are wording this. You acknowledge that "race" is a distinct concept from those represented by concepts like "lineage". However I'd point out that the line of argument you pursue tends to blur this very important distinction. For example, when you write "While the social divisions of race are essentially meaningless, there are distinct genetic lineages of humans", that *can* be seen as coming to the "race is biological" conclusion through the backdoor.

I think the strength of the OP is that although the conclusion that "physical races do not exist" has been a conclusion from physical antho for many, many years; recent work in genetics has been conclusive. I don't see it as saying "We are all the same" in any sense beyond the factual one that we ARE 99.6% the same. To stress the differences as strongly as you did in your first post, to me, says that you wish to perpetuate the focus on distinctions that really don't matter. My real point is that the "complicated and thorny" nature of the subject requires us to be extra vigilant as to how our words can be read.


PS My undergrad work was cultural anthro.

The point I'm making is that the blunt statement "according to DNA, Race does not exist" is inaccurate, even while being broadly factual.

It's sort of like the statement "Evolution does not explain the origin of life" that the Creationists love to use. Factually, it is correct. Evolution doesn't explain that. But that's because the origin of life simply isn't a question in evolution. To that degree, the statement is factually true, yet still very inaccurate.

Similarly, race is not even a consideration in genetics. The huge variety among human lineages, and frequent interbreeding between all of them, makes the concept of "race" a useless concept genetically. This isn't to say that there is "no such thing" - The social construct of "race" is based off of genes being expressed in physical appearance, and certain lineages tend towards common physical features. However these are trends, not rules, and the "background noise" is at such a high level that the concept becomes meaningless.

A more accurate statement is that "race is meaningless in genetics" rather than "DNA says race doesn't exist"

That's all I'm getting at. We're both basically arguing over semantics, looks like :)

But I think this reading would bring some clarity to the discussion. I'm trying it through Google Book's access, so I don't know how much you'll be able to read. The book is Marvin Harris's "Theories of Culture in Postmodern Times" and the chapter is "The Boasians" pg 67-77.

http://books.google.com/books?id=t_Iy78J0r-8C&dq=Marvin+harris+post+modern+cultural&printsec=frontcover&source=bl&ots=EvqkM5WtVT&sig=4u5u1Wl0Sq2U3ZhZ0kk9_zMjGGo&hl=en&ei=qJmdSpbvGY2L8QaEpq2oAw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2#v=onepage&q=&f=false

If you haven't read Harris, I highly recommend his work.

There is more genetic variation within the races then there is between the races, and therefore you cannot necessarily identify an individual as being part of a genetic community.

In fact it's even more complicated than that. But it is certainly not true to say "DNA shows there's no such thing as race." For example, DNA controls skin color, so DNA determines whether a person appears to be Africa or appears to be Swedish.

Here is what genetics actually showed us in recent decades, along with anthropology and paleontology.

All humans originate from Africa -- and probably from northeast Africa. Because all modern humans came "out of Africa" all the genetic variation in the world is still contained in communities in northeast Africa -- from around Ethiopia, down through Kenya.

As people left that area for the other parts of Africa, the middle east, Europe, Asia, and eventually the Americas and Australia, small groups of settlers colonized new areas. These small groups eventually created populations with similar phenotypes.

The problem with conventional race views is that they would lump, for example, the South African Tswana as being part of the same "race" as the people in Kenya. In fact because of migration, the Tswana are as distinct from the people of northeast Kenya as are the Swedes. There is more genetic variation within certain "African" groups as between Tswana and Swede.

So what is erroneous is to say that a distinct group of "black" people are as closely related as some foundational group that is also "black" such as exists in northeast Africa.

But that doesn't mean that there is no genetic basis for observing that Swedish couples produce white babies and both Tswana and northeast African couples produce black babies because of their DNA.

Remember, you wrote "But it is certainly not true to say "DNA shows there's no such thing as race."

All your argument basically consists of is to say that a single observed physical characteristic constitutes "race" and therefore since that characteristic is genetically determined, "race" has validity.

You are treating "race" as if it were somehow clearly and consistently defined. It isn't. What does this mean, "The problem with conventional race views"?

What are "conventional race views"? Is that the view of "blacks" held by residents of Tokyo, Nairobi, Kingston Jamaica, or Biloxi MS?

Which of those "conventional views" of race defines "race" as simply as your final paragraph indicates? The answer is "none of them do". All are much more complex than your example and all differ radically from each other.

The FACT is that THAT is what is meant by 'race'; nothing more, nothing less. You are improperly redefining it.

and determine whether the bones are from a European, African, Asian, or Native American? :shrug:

In medicine race does exist. Sort of.

This article a few weeks ago shows how there is a racial difference (sort of) in treatment of hepatitis C or how interferon works. Most people of african descent have one form of DNA that makes the interferon treatment not effective for them, most people of east asian descent have another that makes it work well and most but not an overwhelming majority of european descent have a form that allows it to work well. So if a physician has an african american patient with hep C, they damn well better do a genetic test to make sure they don't go through a treatment regimen that won't work and will make them sicker. But it might, so test. Same with european descent people.

THere are also high blood pressure medications marketed for african americans (in america) since they work better than many of the common ones.

That there would be subtle differences in metabolism of various drugs.

Sub-Saharan Africans are a good example. A West African looks a lot different than an East African, and both look different than Bushmen of southern Africa, and all three are quite distinct genetically. The East Africans drove the racialist physical anthropologists of 100 years ago crazy because their skull proportions were very similar to those of "white" people. Human populations have not been isolated long enough for human genetic diversity to "congeal" into distinct populations with definite boundaries, making racial "boundaries" drawn on a map completely arbitrary and more often than not based on stereotyped physical features that may not be useful form a population genetics standpoint.

How many races are there?

The question is meaningless. One, or a thousand, depends on the resolution of the population genetics data you are looking at. That doesn't mean there are not "racial differences", it just means that the human population structure does not have the time depth necessary for clear classification of populations into subspecies, different genes give different answers, typical of a species that has spread out relatively recently is is very mobile.

It's meaning lies in the way it addresses the heading from your other post, where you claim that better than saying "DNA proves race does not exist" would be to say "classical racial categories do not exist".

As I read that, you are asserting that non-classical racial categories *do* exist. Otherwise there is no distinction between the OP and your position.

??

Starting with the impression that there is a difference between your position and the OP you get a different take-away than reading it after your more detailed explanation: "Sub-Saharan Africans are a good example. A West African looks a lot different than an East African, and both look different than Bushmen of southern Africa, and all three are quite distinct genetically. The East Africans drove the racialist physical anthropologists of 100 years ago crazy because their skull proportions were very similar to those of "white" people. Human populations have not been isolated long enough for human genetic diversity to "congeal" into distinct populations with definite boundaries, making racial "boundaries" drawn on a map completely arbitrary and more often than not based on stereotyped physical features that may not be useful form a population genetics standpoint."

So what is the difference between "race" and "classical racial categories"? That still isn't clear.

Anthropologists do not mean to deny differences between human populations when they say "races do not exist", though many people take it that way, hence the hysterical accusations of "political correctness" by racialist right-wingers. Just because there are "racial differences" between populations does not mean it is possible to divide up our species definite races. So "race" in the strict sense does not exist, but genetic differences between any two populations do exist and those differences can be called "racial".

It states clearly the correct conclusion from the evidence - race does not exist. I don't agree with trying to tap dance around the objective determination that science arrives at when comparing actual reality to a primitive belief system oriented around limited observations of physical human characteristics. When you attempt to, let me say, 'sugarcoat' it for the bigots, all it does is feed their bias an alternative way to confirm its beliefs.

I vote for adhering to clear language that directly and accurately reflects the best findings on the topic. Please note where you started the first post - with the implication that physical race exists - and where you ended the last - with the statement that races exist. I'm not sure a bigot would get much more than that out of your effort at communication.

Thank you for the answer, though. I do understand perfectly where you are coming from and other than phrasing, we obviously are of one mind.

I used to post an an anthropology/human genetics message board that was often trolled by racists and that was my usual argument given to neutralize the "uber-PC libruls are denying that people are different" BS spewed by the racists.

Everything I see on that site seems to indicate the oposite.

is the only race.

There is no proof that Bush is a primate.

inherent in such observations.

When humans migrated to the temperate (thanks to the Gulf Stream) but extremely far northern latitudes of Europe, they either had to lose their skin pigment or suffer Rickets due to lack of Vit. D from decreased sunshine.

That same low skin pigmentation is a negative when these people move south, where they tend to get more burns and cancer.

Mountain people around the world share many of the same characteristics, probably because mountain life is so different from life in the lowlands.

Prior to making the statement I quoted in the OP, he said that our genetic differences are only skin deep because of the adaptations you mention.

I've also read that a important mutation that makes Northern European skin so light did not exist as late as 8,000 years ago.

It was a terrific program and I really enjoyed it.

Stupidity should be physically painful.

Only one layer do humans differ from one another, the skin layer.

http://www.cosm.org/

Gonna be a lot of mad white people. LOL! Every man and woman -- light, dark, big, small, curly, straight, brown, blue -- can be traced back to the beginning to Scientific Adam and Scientific Eve to *gasp* Africa.

:shrug:

Some of us are pale Africans and some are darker Africans. That's it. Zip. No race. Just a human race.

They were able to find the whole human family tree in a street fair in Queens. That's how diversified the neighborhood was. I liked how they ended it by putting all the different branches back into Africa where it all began at the end. Also, the two surprised African Americans who ended up with the Europeans was fun.