Out-of-India - From Theory to Truth

[ukumar]

History of Indo-European is very interesting topic. I have been following with great interest since
I came across it on the web 15 years back. History apparently was very complicated and not explained
satisfactorily by prevalent theories. Truth has become even more difficult due to two reasons

1. Question is not purely of historic nature but has implication on identity of the people of Eurasia.
Everybody (North Europeans, Russians, Assyrians/Kurds, Iranians and Indians) has desire to be original
Indo-European. This is not to say that everybody is dogmatic about the belief but you have to
recognize that there is inherent bias in interpretion the evidence.

2. until last decade or so Linguist had monopoly over this question. They have tried to answer the
questions by interpreting little evidence available to them (the answer is kurgan hypothesis which is
basically state that Indo-European == horses). Since their assumptions are not testable, it should
only be used as collaborative evidence at best. But since they are around for >100 years, people take
them as fact and try to fit new evidence to existing model.

Fortunately Genetics is great new tool. It is slowly clearing fog and hopefully the clear picture would
start emerging soon.

I’ll summarize my thoughts on Vedic Aryan in India.

Archaeological / Literary evidence
------------------------------------------------
1. North India is culturally and linguistically Aryan since historic time (~600BC). Vedic religion and
Cultural distribution has not changed much ever since. Over last 2500 years it has been superimposed
with external religion Islam and Christianity and Internal religious development like Buddhism, Jainism and
Sikhism but underlying substrate is Aryan.

2. Main stream Indus valley archeologist (Shafer, B.Lal, Kenoyer all three featured in Edwin Bryant’ book
Indo-Aryan controversy) hold that there is continuity between Harappa and Gangetic civilization and there
is no support for intrusion of Aryan from outside of the continent. Climatic changes forced people from Indus
sites on Saraswati river to Ganga, Gujarat and south of India.

3. According Vedic literature the center of the vedic civilization was on saraswati river and later moved to
Ganges river. Look at the spatial distribution of the archeology sites in India at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zpYTGHLZHPU . That event must have happed by the middle of 2nd millennium BC. That is good evidence that
Vedic literature and Archiology are in agreement and that vedic people overlaped with Harappan.

4. Based on the spatial distribution of the indus sites above, the genetic base of the Indian population should
have solidified around 3200BC (since there is no evidence for large scale external intrusion since then). Also observe hat indus valley is populated from western side. Saraswati part of the civilization could be populated either from east or west. It is not clear. however west seems more likely.

5. Importance of the horse is based on linguistic hypothesis (Krugan) which in nutshell holds that Indo-European
dominated the Eurasia using the horse and presence of the horse is used to determine if the community was Aryan or not. Linguistic hypothesis can only be used as collaborative evidence and can’t be used as fact to disapprove other evidence.
Recent genetic evidence is going against hypothesis that Kragan was original homeland of the Indo-European. We shoule wait for more evidence for aryan dispertation with horses before using them to veto all other evidence.

Astronomical Evidence
-------------------------------
There has been good exchange between Rajesh and Manish in beginning of the thread about astronomical evidence in vedic literature. This area has been seeing some good work in last few years. It is still early stage of the research so I wouldn’t use it as main evidence yet but it is good supportive evidence.

Most notable of the Indian expert in this area is Prof Iyengar. He uploads his publications as free access here http://www.scribd.com/RNI

http://www.scribd.com/doc/20298010/Dhru ... -Pole-Star in this document he shows that Vedic people witnessed the Thuban as pole star to becoming circular star. This event happened in 2400BC.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/7001453/Comet ... yengarJGSI In this document he shows comet observation recorded in work of Parashara. There are some astronomical events chronicled in 2nd Millennium BC.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/6178143/Archa ... -2003-IJHS
http://oldthoughts.wordpress.com/2009/0 ... n-iyengar/
In above document he deals with date of Mahabharata. The dating of Mahabharata is tricky. Though Mahabharata is full of astronomical observations, not all of them are clear. Dating could change based on the how many of the observation are used. However it is clear that there was tradition of the astronomical observation in times of Mahabharata and it most likely happened either around ~1500BC or ~3000BC.

In general date of astronomical observation puts the astronomers in the Harappa time. Which is not surprising considering that Harappan were technically advance.

[Theo_Fidel]

Slight sidenote OT...

Karvadi (1952–1972[1]) was a nelore cattle bull. While still alive, it became famous as the champion bull of nelore in all the world. It came to Brazil in 1963 and was imported from India.[1] There's just ten semen samples of this animal, in the world.[2] The last sell of this semen costs US$15,000 each one.[2] Karvadi has millions of descendents throughout the world. Many of these descendents became nelore champions in their own right.[1]

---------------------------------------------------------

Also I can not believe how fortunate we are that the Meluhan dancing girl ended up at the museum in Delhi. Probably the greatest feat of artistry of the ancient period, maybe of all time IMHO. If in 100,000 years and archeologist searches for what we were, we could do worse than to say that we protected that delicate figure for posterity. Nothing like it has ever been discovered.

[shiv]

1. North India is culturally and linguistically Aryan since historic time

The word Aryan should not be used in this context IMO. It is irresponsible and ignorant and perpetuates the very racist views that are being debated here. However I admit that is merely fallout of Indians being educated in and communicating in English and learning the white European Christian context and meaning while trying to apply it to Indians from an Indian viewpoint.

The meaning of the Sanskrit word arya has a completely different connotation from The European word "Aryan" which is basically "Superior white skinned race". It's like the connection between "car" and "carpet". Both words share a few letters, but mean different things. "Arya" is not "Aryan". The word for man, for example is "aadmi". Not "aadmian". The Kannada word for man is "manushya". It is not "manushyan". Arya is arya. What is Aryan?

If North Indians are "Aryans", then they are superior white skinned races, and then everything falls into place perfectly. There is no controversy. It was never out of India The superior white skinned races from the North drove the inferior dark skinned Dravidians south. This information was well known and well established by 1901 and here is the image of a page that tells the history of India and this revisionist thread is meaningless. The white skinned northerners who brought Aryan culture to India mixed with the blackies ("black skinned heathendom" - read the words in the page pictured below) in India and produced a hybrid inferior race. It's all in there in the link, in print, and there is very little to discuss. Europeans by virtue of being the descendants of Noah's son Japheth ended up taking Christianity and remaining pure. They came to India to find the earlier fair skinned "Aryan" people had got contaminated by cohabitation with the black descendants of Noah's accursed son Ham.

The following image is from a book "The Living Races of Man" published around 1910 or so

[shiv]

The concept of "Dravidian" cannot exist in the absence of an "Aryan". You need aryan first and need to believe in the superiority of the Aryan before you define which people the Aryan is superior to. That Aryan is clearly superior to the Dravidian. The Aryans worshipped "clean and pure" things like horse, sun, wind etc until they met and mixed with the impure inferior people, to be called Dravidians who worshipped Shiva (as per evidence of Dravidian settlements in Mohenjo daro) and the degeneracy of the faith can be seen in the way the people still worship idols shaped like the penis of this god mounted in a receptacle modelled after the vagina of his consort.

Mixture of the pure Aryans with the impure Dravidians lead to the creation of Hinduism with its caste system, where the superior and fairer people had to stay separate from the inferior darker people although they lived on the same land. That led to high castes like brahmins and darker skinned low castes.

Christianity is now in the process of rescuing the dark skinned people of the south of India (who used to be "inferior black skinned heathendom" until recently) from the brahminical tyranny of the fair skinned northerners. Of course once you are Christian, it gives you equality like blacks and whites are all equal in God's eyes. Amen.

How much of the above story is being propagated in India to this day, and how much have people who read this thread accepted as "knowledge"

[shiv]

I suppose all those intelligent superior aryans can point out references to dravidians in their old texts such as the Vedas, seeing as they have been around in India since 600 BC at least. Surely they must have recognized the inferiority of the dravidians and made notes. I have not read the Rig Veda but I am certain that dravidians must find a mention there. If Aryans are there, dravidians can't be far off can they? After all the dravidians were driven south by the northern aryans no? I believe the word "arya" is mentioned in the Rig Veda. I am sure all clever historians and sociologists know that arya==aryan.

If dravidians are not mentioned in the vedas, then who the fuk are they? And who the fuk are these "aryans"? Who Indians talking about when they speak of "aryans"? The name "Aryan" itself is loaded. It was not coined by any Indian. It is by definition a superior white skinned race that came from the Norh. If you believe that then it is very difficult to tear down any other theories that exist, including the ones I have mentioned above.

Indians are welcome to believe the "Superior white skinned northerner" theory, but they need to reconcile that with all the other theories that exist, built up around the single "fact" of the superior white skinned northerner having come to India to drive away and civilize the black. The first wave created inferior Hinduism from the dirty brown mixture of pure white aryan with impure black dravidian. The second wave of superior white Europeans are now setting us right.

And if anyone can answer these questions, please also explain to me what the "Ganges" is?

[brihaspati]

ukumar ji,
(1) the eventual migration from Sindhu to Ganga might have taken place - but latest archeological trends indicate that the more likely origin - pre-early urbanization moved from the eastern sector to the Sindhu-Saraswati western sector. Underwater archeology provides tantalizing possibilities that the south - might not be that barren either in terms of urbanization. These were probably coastal ones and hence are swallowed up in the post glacial melt.

During the last intense phase around LGM (21 kya to 26/27 kya) the Himalayan glaciers seems to have blocked up the Panchanad drainage basin [as indicated from indirect evidence of less freshwater discharge into eastern Arabian sea]. Ganga however drains a much longer tract of the Himalayas and so even if precipitation decreased it probably still had greater net outflow near its delta discharge compared to the western sector. Similarly the local SW-NE monsoon system, even if weaker would still hydrate the southern coastal perimeter - at least on the eastern side [TN coast] based on moisture from Bay of Bengal.

A combination of maritime trade all around the southern peninsula, coastal sea-based productivity, and eastern Ganga delta based early agriculture, could have given rise to a proto semi-urban, port based civilization [proto compared to what is typically taken in history] even before the end of the ice age some 12 kya.

The civilizational centre of gravity would therefore more likely start off from the east and south of the subcontinent, and spread by a combination of pressure of rising sea-levels, and rehydration of the Panchanad [we know pretty accurately now the pattern of this shift] to move from south and east to north and west. This would start happening from about 11-10 kya and accelerate in the 8-7 kya phase [in step with the known rapid periods of sea-level rise and strengthening monsoon].

(2) Arya seems to have been used more in the sense of culture and civilization. Location is not that well defined - and the later reconstructions of location in the Punjab could simply be reflecting a period of recording by the culture which by that time had colonized Punjab. It is almost impossible to decide the direction of this expansion - from the north or from the south/centre based on the rigveda alone. The earliest layers of [forget linguistics - one good thumbrule is to look at the cursory/brief/lack of details portions of the narrative] rigveda seems to indicate a period of flux where lots of people are moving around all over the subcontinent - so it could be forming when different types of living in different corners of the subcontinent are coming into each other. The most likely climatic and vegetational situation for this is the post glacial phase with an initial spurt in hydration of the northern tracts, displacement of coastal populations, then a 1000 year drying up and again accelerated hydration around 10 kya.

Marine archeology points to possible urbanization already by 8kya. So the early rigvedic refs to settlements and irrigation systems fits in very well with this phase of intra-Indian competition for resources and expansion.

Need not have anything to do with imported TFTA's. Genetically Afghans/Pashtuns seem to be here for a long long time, with a very strong eastern and Indian genetic component - and they still have TFTA ness. Just imagine proto Afghans comparing themselves with the Mundas and preening themselves as dhavals. We do not need TFTA's imported all the way from the steppes to explain the fairness-darkness conundrum.

[Theo_Fidel]

Since 1920's the story is how the advanced 'Dravidian' civilization was destroyed by the jungle loving invaders. It very well may have, but why then is the colonization of North America not called the Anglo-German invasion of NA, or the Spanish-Portugese invasion of SA. How come the 'pilgrims' heading West are not called invaders.

The way I see it as a solid DNA tested 'Dravidian', the only judgement that can be made is on the basis of behavior and actions. At a recent time such behavior was truly abysmal and such theories found resonance. As the treatment of all Indian people has improved such theories need to be quietly buried. They no longer have a function. Our ancestors all came to India from elsewhere. The timelines are muddied and things are unclear. Those who still cling to an 'invasion' hypothesis are fighting change itself.

[ukumar]

>The word Aryan should not be used in this context IMO. It is irresponsible and ignorant and perpetuates the very racist views that are being debated here

I use Aryan in purely linguistic and cultural sense. In indian context Aryan are the people who followed Vedic religion and spoke Sanskrit related language. It doesn’t mean they were either White or Superior. As you pointed out our ancestor didn’t use the word racially. Thinking otherwise is projection of European racial mindset. We need to reclaim the word from its racial meaning.
No people in the world is superior. If they enjoyed dominance in particular time in history, it is just a historical accident. Given time and opportunity other people can do the same or even better it.

May be I should have used word Indo-Aryan. Please accept my apology if you found my comments racist.

>but latest archeological trends indicate that the more likely origin - pre-early urbanization moved from the eastern sector to the Sindhu-Saraswati western sector

It may be so but the evidence is not strong enough so we must wait for more evidence. Please provide link to the document you base your opinion on. I'll be happy to change my mind.

[ManishH]

4. Based on the spatial distribution of the indus sites above, the genetic base of the Indian population should
have solidified around 3200BC (since there is no evidence for large scale external intrusion since then).

Do you have any data from ancient human remains to back the above statement. Eg. I'm specifically looking for reports that mentioned the R1a1 gene having been found in human remains in India before early 2nd millenium BC - the date claimed as aryan invasion time.

Nice post BTW.

[ManishH]

we should ponder why Europeans are less lactose tolerant than Indians if that is so?

Fine. I'm no expert here. But let's look at the lactose intolerance geographical distribution ...



Two things to note:
1. Lactase persistence is not uniform in India itself.
2. Lactase tolerance of North-West India (Rgveda is around the greater Indus region) is markedly similar to Europe.

According to wiki ...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lactase_pe ... stribution

The dairy countries like Holland and Denmark (1-4%) have even lower intolerance than Indians.

Lactose intolerance is common in steppe regions ...

http://cafe-grendel.blogspot.in/2009/04/mares-milk.html

In addition to being nutritious the higher level of sugar in Mare's milk makes it very suitable for fermenting - and it is in fact the fermented mare's milk (or 'Kumis') that is so loved on the Steppes. Nearly 90% of the people living in Inner Mongolia are lactose intolerant.

Also note the effect of snow on grazing habits of Cows v/s horses:

Cows and other bovine animals fare worse than horses when grass is covered by snow.

Now I'm not sure what is so fundamentally different in the brains of bovids and equids; but this is an observed phenomenon. This sounded so improbable to me the first time I read it; so I'm going to provide a reference for this:

Horses are easier to feed through the winter than cattle or sheep, as
cattle and sheep push snow aside with their noses and horses use their
hard hooves. Sheep can graze on winter grass through soft snow, but if the
snow becomes crusted with ice than their noses will get raw and bloody,
and they will stand and starve in a field where there is ample winter forage
just beneath their feet . Cattle do not forage through even soft snow if they
cannot see the grass, so a snow deep enough to hide the winter grass will
kill range cattle if they are not given fodder. Neither cattle nor sheep will
break the ice on frozen water to drink. Horses have the instinct to break
through ice and crusted snow with their hooves, not their noses, even in
deep snows where the grass cannot be seen.

As this article shows
http://leherensuge.blogspot.in/2010/02/ ... ommon.html

Correlation between lactase persistence gene and actual lactose intolerance is not direct. So even though the geographic distribution of lactose intolerance (figure above) actually supports AIT, I'm skeptical about using actuall occurrences of lactose intolerance.

[shiv]

Correlation between lactase persistence gene and actual lactose intolerance is not direct. So even though the geographic distribution of lactose intolerance (figure above) actually supports AIT, I'm skeptical about using actuall occurrences of lactose intolerance.

Unless we keep our minds open to the fact that this may be an example of GIGO, it might be pushed as truth.

The above observation suggest that lactose intolerance is greater among people who have been drinking mares milk in the steppes. The problem is lactose intolerance is rampant and under reported in India, apart from the fact that early weaning with cows milk is one of the factors blamed for this.

What is never discussed in gastroenterologic circles is that going for a crap 3-4 times a day is normal for India and might be considered "diarrhoea" or "frequent stool" by Europeans. That being the case mild lactose intolerance that presents as occasional "flare up" of belly upsets are self treated by dietary means in India. The number of Indians who have voluntarily given up drinking milk or using milk products is huge and many of them have an element of lactose intolerance that manifests if they restart. European diet is heavily biased towards "doodh" and "doodh products" which cannot easily be removed from the mainstream diet.

So the connection between lactose intolerance is very very tenuous indeed. Using the same logical connection it is clear that southern Africa and southern India are similar for lactose intolerance. This is proof for the now sunken continent of Lemuria that connected the black people of South India and Africa. Dalitstan/dravidstan could have a place in south India separate from the aryan north.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lemuria_%28continent%29

[ManishH]

Manish,
I hope we can both agree that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

Yes yes, I agree with you here. But since the claim is from us, the burden of proof to will be ours. I don't doubt that India has the financial power and scientific know-how to analyze the DNA of numerous inhumed remains way before the supposed date of aryan invasion.

We know about Kurgans because they bury their dead. And in temperate areas that preserved DNA. We know almost nothing of the other groups there including the Altai because they did not.

Ancient DNA has been successfuly recovered even from Altai as well as desert oases of near east.

Yes genetic clocks are imprecise but diversity is key. In any case frequency has nothing to do with origins. How did R1a1a diversity reduce so much
...
Question is always diversity. Even R1A-M17 shows maximum diversity within India. The R1a1a in the steppes was never very diverse.

Even pro-India origin geneticist caution against using diversity as an indicator of origin. Eg. see :

"The Indian origin of paternal haplogroup R1a1* substantiates the autochthonous origin of Brahmins and the caste system", 2009, Sharma et al

Although the geographic origins of haplogroup expansions can be
inferred from the frequencies, associated diversity51 and clinal patterns of
distribution, past inferences from literature indicate that such relations
are not so simple to interpret. It is observed that regions of high
frequency and high variance are not always the same. Regions with
highest haplogroup frequencies are not always sites of its origin and clinal
patterns are not obvious in binary HG frequency data.

On the topic of geographic origin, if diversity is such a teltale marker of geographic origin, what explains the fact that in the same geographic area ie. India, there is a big difference between variation; more difference than is between world-average and India. eg. from the same paper ...

In India : Kashmiri Pandits (0.52), Maharashtra Brahmins (0.28) difference = 0.24
World wide: India avg (0.38), Central Asia (0.24) difference = 0.14

This data also contradicts OIT philological studies like Shri Talageri's book, which places the origin of RgVeda people in Gangetic valley! UP brahmins' variance 0.35 v/s KP variance 0.52.

The fact is that humans have been on the move since very long. Projecting modern genetic data into the past is going to lead us to little correlation between current genes and past geographic origin. We sorely need ancient DNA data to corroborate the studies made on modern genes.

Let's not forget the caution the authors themselves show in the conclusion section of this paper ...

The observation of R1a* in high frequency ..., supporting its origin
in the Indian subcontinent.

But doesn't yet confirm the finding ...

It is, therefore, very important to discover novel Y chromosomal binary
marker(s) for defining monophyletic subhaplogroup(s) belonging to
Y-R1a1* with a higher resolution to confirm the present conclusion.

The authors' own caution against using variation and high frequency is a pointer to the flux in genetics.

[shiv]

I use Aryan in purely linguistic and cultural sense. In indian context Aryan are the people who followed Vedic religion and spoke Sanskrit related language. It doesn’t mean they were either White or Superior. As you pointed out our ancestor didn’t use the word racially. Thinking otherwise is projection of European racial mindset. We need to reclaim the word from its racial meaning.

We do not need to reclaim the word "Aryan". It was never invented in India. The inventors can keep it. The word used in the Vedas is arya. Not aryan. Aryan is a name that is heavy with racist connotations and that very racism has been projected on to Indians and has been accepted by Indians. What we can do is reclaim history as known to non racists before this aryan-dravidian bullshit was cooked up and swallowed wholesale by Indians. That is projection of the European mindset.

[ManishH]

DNA studies as a methodology and argument is quite mature, and like exact sciences, can be repeated independently and verified - and refined.

B-ji: this confidence contrasts with the caution that specialists in the genetics field themselves exhibit. To illustrate, I'll use the specific method of using allele frequency and inter-allele variation to estimate age.

Eg. see "Estimating allele age", Slatkin M, Rannala B.

The age of an allele can be estimated both from genetic variation among different copies (intra-allelic variation) and from its frequency. Estimates based on intra-allelic variation follow from the exponential decay of linkage disequilibrium because of recombination and mutation. The confidence interval depends both on the uncertainty in recombination and mutation rates and on randomness of the genealogy of chromosomes that carry the allele (the intra-allelic genealogy). Several approximate methods to account for variation in the intra-allelic genealogy have been derived. Allele frequency alone also provides an estimate of age. Estimates based on frequency and on intra-allelic variability can be combined to provide a more accurate estimate or can be contrasted to show that an allele has been subject to natural selection. ... We emphasize that estimates of allele age depend on assumptions about demographic history and natural selection.

So what are these "assumptions" that can skew results ? Let's see this paper

"Reconstructing Indian population history", Reich et, 2009 Nature

This paper brings out the fact that social customs like endogamy can cause higher average allele frequencies in India. Excerpt from the paper ...

The average pairwise FST of the remaining 19 groups is 0.0109. This is much larger than the 0.0033 in a recent study of 23 European groups
...
We considered the possibility that the high FST could be an artefact due to marriage
between close relatives, which is known to be common in southern India22, and which can exaggerate measurements of frequency differentiation

Then another demographic factor that affects genetic data ...

We propose that the high FST among Indian groups could be explained if many groups were founded by a few individuals, followed by limited gene flow.

PS: FST = Fixation index - a measure of allele frequency variation &c
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fixation_index

They are not subject to dogmatic interpretation like linguistics.

Wonder what adjective will be used for the specialist geneticists who in the above paper say the high allele frequencies do not point to their origin in India.

Unfortunately, the same "rate of mutation" argument will apply to class #2 too.
Just because you think they are of greater "import" does not mean suddenly the variability of rates will vanish for class #2. Its physics and physical laws ultimately,

Unfortunately specialists (see above) don't think the data can be explained by straightforward "laws of physics" Demographic factors and social behaviour should also be factored in.

But then earlier you also rubbished corrobaration from multiple fields as "mutual backstcratching"

[ManishH]

>but latest archeological trends indicate that the more likely origin - pre-early urbanization moved from the eastern sector to the Sindhu-Saraswati western sector

It may be so but the evidence is not strong enough so we must wait for more evidence. Please provide link to the document you base your opinion on. I'll be happy to change my mind.

ukumarji: Predicting a long wait for you; I doubt there is any such substantiated link.

[member_20317]

>but latest archeological trends indicate that the more likely origin - pre-early urbanization moved from the eastern sector to the Sindhu-Saraswati western sector

It may be so but the evidence is not strong enough so we must wait for more evidence. Please provide link to the document you base your opinion on. I'll be happy to change my mind.

From the days of 'Lemuria' & 'white mans burden', it is the white man and his scholarship that has been behaving like a monkey at the end of a leash. And all this has happened without any real investment by Indics compared to the insane amount of money spent by the people holding 'manifest destiny' on the 'imminent buddhijeevies'. With more research comming in even these dogmas will be given up. Untill now it is the common Indic that has taken on the might of organised propaganda that wants to suggest the false and suppress the fact.

[Supratik]

@Manish

Whatever that you are trying to argue is all over the place. So what's your point?

[JwalaMukhi]

I use Aryan in purely linguistic and cultural sense. In indian context Aryan are the people who followed Vedic religion and spoke Sanskrit related language. It doesn’t mean they were either White or Superior. As you pointed out our ancestor didn’t use the word racially. Thinking otherwise is projection of European racial mindset. We need to reclaim the word from its racial meaning.

We do not need to reclaim the word "Aryan". It was never invented in India. The inventors can keep it. The word used in the Vedas is arya. Not aryan. Aryan is a name that is heavy with racist connotations and that very racism has been projected on to Indians and has been accepted by Indians. What we can do is reclaim history as known to non racists before this aryan-dravidian bullshit was cooked up and swallowed wholesale by Indians. That is projection of the European mindset.

OOps! There is a huge doubt about the ancestry of present queen in queendom. Did she belong to race of lords lards such as lard lord meghanand desai or did she belong to race of Sirs such as Sir Ian Botham? Maybe I should have used the race conotation as "brit-lards" not merely as lords lards?

[member_22872]

2. Lactase tolerance of North-West India (Rgveda is around the greater Indus region) is markedly similar to Europe.

Manish ji,

on similar lines one could have as well drawn a conclusion "how come, the tolerance/intolerance of 'Dravidian south India' is similar to Steppe?" than the conclusion you have come up with to suit AIT scenario obviously. It is obvious that your conclusion doesnt follow the data you prsented, the conclusion is forced at the best to suit your notions.

I would argue that the lactose tolerance/intolerance of North West India actually resembles that of North East Africa more than Europe. It is easy to draw conclusions how we want to perceive the data the best to suit our notion.

[brihaspati]

DNA studies as a methodology and argument is quite mature, and like exact sciences, can be repeated independently and verified - and refined.

B-ji: this confidence contrasts with the caution that specialists in the genetics field themselves exhibit. To illustrate, I'll use the specific method of using allele frequency and inter-allele variation to estimate age.

Caution is a hallmark of exact sciences based methods - unlike the dogmatics of linguists, who base their entire theory on empirical observations, and feel absolutely no shame in having no caution about such empiricism. I think you choose to ignore even what you quote. I said, conclusions can be repeated independently and verified, and when more evidence accumulates - refined. That is how science progresses. Science usually throws away its own earlier axioms that were relatively successful in explaining previous observations onlee if a new axiom explains the further accumulation of data with a simpler one, but which still can show the earlier axiom as an approximation or direct consequence of the newer axiom.

Compare that with the linguistic tactics you seem to favour. New observations almost impossible for historical languages, and any new collateral evidence from other fields have to be forced into the steppenwolf theory - no matter how ridiculous they become logically. For the linguists, the axiom is supreme - evidence must be "expertly interpreted" according to the peer group dogma, and its a nice entrenched interest too. Once you land up in the "professional interpretation" zone, any explanation that suits the entrenched interest is justified.

Eg. see "Estimating allele age", Slatkin M, Rannala B.

The age of an allele can be estimated both from genetic variation among different copies (intra-allelic variation) and from its frequency. Estimates based on intra-allelic variation follow from the exponential decay of linkage disequilibrium because of recombination and mutation. The confidence interval depends both on the uncertainty in recombination and mutation rates and on randomness of the genealogy of chromosomes that carry the allele (the intra-allelic genealogy). Several approximate methods to account for variation in the intra-allelic genealogy have been derived. Allele frequency alone also provides an estimate of age. Estimates based on frequency and on intra-allelic variability can be combined to provide a more accurate estimate or can be contrasted to show that an allele has been subject to natural selection. ... We emphasize that estimates of allele age depend on assumptions about demographic history and natural selection.

So what are these "assumptions" that can skew results ? Let's see this paper

"Reconstructing Indian population history", Reich et, 2009 Nature

This paper brings out the fact that social customs like endogamy can cause higher average allele frequencies in India. Excerpt from the paper ...

The average pairwise FST of the remaining 19 groups is 0.0109. This is much larger than the 0.0033 in a recent study of 23 European groups
...
We considered the possibility that the high FST could be an artefact due to marriage
between close relatives, which is known to be common in southern India22, and which can exaggerate measurements of frequency differentiation

Then another demographic factor that affects genetic data ...

We propose that the high FST among Indian groups could be explained if many groups were founded by a few individuals, followed by limited gene flow.

PS: FST = Fixation index - a measure of allele frequency variation &c
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fixation_index

Since you are so fond of the year 2009 for genetics, and obviously you know what to look for in genetics - can you have a look around that time for the papers by a predominantly Indian researcher group that estimated the "possible start of strict endogamy" and splits into such mutually exclusive endogamous groups in "south India" at what historical period? Then use the above papers solemnly cautious "propositions" to estimate how much diversity would be possible between that estimated start and now?

They are not subject to dogmatic interpretation like linguistics.

Wonder what adjective will be used for the specialist geneticists who in the above paper say the high allele frequencies do not point to their origin in India.

I think I mentioned that earlier geneticists worked on smaller data sets, and as data sizes increased - later geneticists refine earlier conclusions. You make a very smooth professional historian/linguist jump in using the statement that they make - a proposition that "diversity" could be explained by "natural selection" within endogamy is a conclusion that diversity onlee happened out of such natural selection within endogamy. The "could" is a cautious statement that saves the skin of the researchers if this proposition is rejected by further data and studies. For you it is the straw to cling to to save your steppenwolf axiom.

Unfortunately, the same "rate of mutation" argument will apply to class #2 too.
Just because you think they are of greater "import" does not mean suddenly the variability of rates will vanish for class #2. Its physics and physical laws ultimately,

Unfortunately specialists (see above) don't think the data can be explained by straightforward "laws of physics" Demographic factors and social behaviour should also be factored in.

But then earlier you also rubbished corrobaration from multiple fields as "mutual backstcratching"

I think you have a long way to go to grasp how current scientific argumentation proceeds. When I said that rate of mutation is not subject to arbitrarily dogmatic interpretation - I was absolutely correct. Mutations are correlated to active chemical and radiation interventions - but in the absence of proof of extensive use of artificial nuclear industry products or immensely diversified modern chemical industry in the pre holocene [and premodern] such human made effects on DNA mutation is almost impossible to assume. This leaves purely environmental massive changes in natural radiation and appearance of mutagenic chemicals the major sources of any "natural" change in the mutation rate. The appearance or emergence of such mutation would not be affected by natural selection by humans and would proceed according to well known and verified probabilistic arguments.

I think you fail to understand the difference between "diversity" and "sequential accumulation" of mutations. A very naive first reading of paleogenetics thinks it is "diversity" which is the single most important indicator of origins. Not so. It is the order of accumulation of mutations that indicate order of emergence of types. So that even if you claim that rate of mutation changed dramatically in spot X compared to spot Y, an identified mutation locus appearing in the exactly the same spot in the same sequence at two different periods has such a low probability that it is almost negligible.

As for mutual backscratching - I dont know whether its the linguists method or otherwise, you are choosing to ignore what I repeatedly accused linguists and historians of. What you refer to as corroboration is not mutually independent corroboration. I have suggested to people to look into the deeper assumptions used in linguists, archeology and history wherever interpretation of historical narratives/texts/inscriptions are concerned. Here each refers to the other for calibration. If X calibrates on Y, who then calibrates on X - it is not corroboration, and effectively becomes a tautology.

[brihaspati]

By the way ManishH ji,
my post based on the 2012 paper going against the steppenwolf hypothesis - was clearly stated to be not dependent on variable mutation rates. I illustrated in terms of order of appearance of mutations.

[brihaspati]

ukumar ji,
if I remember correctly - there was an article quoted here on the forum about the earlier start of urban/proto-urban settlements in continuity with SSC - in the eastern part and a gradual expansion in number and spread to the west. I am not sure, but it could be Acharya ji who might have posted it.

[brihaspati]

Looking at the lactose intolerance map quoted above - we can see three hotspots of lactose tolerance. One in west Africa, one in UK-Ireland, and one around the mouth of Sindhu. To even imagine that this supports AIT - requires further axioms to reject both the West African as well as the Sindhu mouth as origin points.

The intervening zones of less tolerance that surrounds and isolates each of the three - needs explanation. For Asia - the claim will be that lactose intolerant steppe and central Asians [especially Turkic and Mongol populations] wiped out the continuity. But note that there was no such massive wiping out theory accepted to isolate the West African - which is indicated by the wiping-out as seen for the central African belt right from north to south.

The British Isles got isolated around 6kya from mainland. Before that it was either impossibly heavily wooded [and hence clearing on a scale equired for grazing impossible before late bronze age] or ice covered to support milch cows. So let us assume that the origin point there that we see - was not a result of early origins but concentration due to being chased out of Steppe/Eastern Europe? How massive was the lactose intolerant central-Asian steppe replacement of earlier supposedly lactose tolerant Europeans across the northern European highway? Any genetic evidence of such massive inflow? Nope!

What about the strange oasis of tolerance in central Arabia? The intolerant Turkic/Mongoloids wiped out the tolerants all around but left a small refugia in central-Arabia right across the crosroads of ancient trade routes and migration routes? If wiping out was not done by steppes hordes in Africa - who wiped them off? Surely the western Africans could have have walked across with their cattle along the subsaharan trans-African route!

It is now usually suggested as a safe alternative to assume that selection pressures give rise to lactase persistence to appear in populations independent of each other. The convergence among academics towards this - I guess came about quicker - when they realized that otherwise they have to show genetic commonalities between Bedouin Arabs, east African Tutsis/Rwandans, and northern Oiropeans.

So by current state of hypotheses - this map does not support AIT.

[shiv]

I just want to point out one "mischievous, misleading" data point in that lactose intolerance paper which seems to be written by geneticists and not anyone who deals with live humans. It is alleged that "natural selection" favoured the presence of lactose tolerant people in some populations.

Actually this may well be the height of bullshitting and it is always fascinating to see that in a so called scientific work. I will try and be brief. For "natural selection" to occur and favour some set of genetic traits, the advantage should be a survival advantage. That is to say that the trait should lead to survival of individuals with a particular trait/mutation while those that do not have that trait/mutation die before they can propagate their genes leading to a reduction in proportion of those genes in a population over time.

Lactose intolerance is hardly a killer disease leading to "natural selection" from the deaths (over several generations) of entire populations with lactase deficiency. So this entire lactose intolerance map being connected with survival absolute bullshit and must be called out for what it is. The argument that the map support AIT is a strawman and no more time must be wasted on it.

[ManishH]

Please reread my post - I'm not in favour of using lactose intolerance data for this issue.

I'm skeptical about using actuall occurrences of lactose intolerance.

The poster venug was the one who raised this issue initially asking if there is any significance of this data.

[member_22872]

The poster venug was the one who raised this issue initially asking if there is any significance of this data.

Manish ji,

My original question to you was about what you said here on page 7:

ManishH said:
See, cattle domestication has been independently done by many civilizations. I wouldn't be surprised if you find natives of pampas in south america very lactose tolerant too.

ManishH ji,

But why should we be worried about lactose tolerance of South Americans? we should ponder why Europeans are less lactose tolerant than Indians if that is so?

So as you see, you were already answering to the lactose tolerant question which wasn't raised by me. And more over if you were so "skeptical" about the relevance of lactose tolerance/intolerance, you should have said so again on page 8 and stopped, but not go about presenting data so as to substantiate your claim, since you tried to substantiate your claim, it doesn't make anyone believe that you were actually "skeptical" about it. I merely didn't understand the relevance of lactose tolerance of South Americans while discussing AIT. If you were skeptical about lactose relevance in studying migration theories, you wouldnt have taken pains to find wiki articles and posted in the first place. I feel you are throwing out names and arguments to suit you. That's all from me on this.

[member_20317]

So even though the geographic distribution of lactose intolerance (figure above) actually supports AIT, I'm skeptical about using actuall occurrences of lactose intolerance.

==

I'm skeptical about using actuall occurrences of lactose intolerance.

[brihaspati]

shiv ji,
indulge me. I find the "selection pressure" for survival argument too cute to kick it off outright!

Assume that selection pressure for survival selected "lactose tolerance" in north-European populations. The suggested reasons are better use of livestock for nutrition of adults, and source of vitamin D [all the malformed pubis and defective birth canal arguments - which would be the bit you point to - survival until reproducability]. The same need is connected to the so-called selection pressure for fairness. Now also assume that R1A1 appeared in those north Europeans and not in India.

Apart from the whole illustration I gave about appearance of younger clades in a nearly continuous gradient away from India towards Europe - which is being totally ignored - let us assume that R1A1 Europeans who are out of necessity lactose tolerant and fair, start moving down towards India. If they were also strictly endogamous - after the lactose persistence gene had evolved and been naturally selected - this trait will remain genetically [The lactose persistence gene is dominant in the allele]. Regardless of whether selection pressure exists any more or not.

So when they come and replace the older Indian non-R1A1 male population entirely [so that their future diversity can be explained by their strict endogamy ] they will still carry the lactose persistence gene and then modern Indian populations should be lactose tolerant. Same argument goes for fairness as a survival strategy to generate vit D. Once evolved, strict endogamy would preserve fairness [random overlap between the multiple melanin sites would still be mixing switched off states - and remains overall predominantly switched off]. This would mean that all Indians should be fair now [since all of India's diversity "could be == must be" explained by strict endogamy of south Indians] and all Indians, especially south Indians should be all fair.

The other possibility of course is that maintaining strict endogamy - they were unable to withstand carcinogenic effects of tropical sunshine, and were gradually wiped off. But then they would also wipe off with them their r1a1.

One way out of this is of course the assumption that Europeans already lost their selection advantage before they reached India - which would imply that they were not strictly endogamous, and that they dropped off their milch cows - but they turned strictly endogamous suddenly when they reached India.

Further - since the bos primigenius was most likely domesticated in the tropical south-and-west Asia, and hence taken to Europe - the intermediate people who took them to Europe [these cannot be Nordic R1A1's since they originated in Europe onlee] either did not survive their journey to Europe and all died off immediately after handing over their cows to the natives , or did not develop lactose tolerance - as otherwise their remnants left over the steppes would still have traces of lactose persistence - or that they domesticated cows but never drank its milk.

If the cows went to Europe over land, there is no reason for steppenwolfs to become lactose intolerant while in steppe. Since the intolerance is found at latitudes similar to European heartland and at least the sun-vitD connection would still pressurize, and as for food sources - livestock would still be important in the steppes as primary before large scale wheat and buckwheat cultivation. Only salvation is assuming that Turkic and mongol hordes pushed out the lactose tolerant R1A1 Europeans from the steppes into the north-west, and those steppenwolf R1A1's who came to India came before the Turkic advance, were not endogamous, and also lost their lactose tolerance while in transition - or came before domestication of cattle.

All of which then adds to the fun.

[member_20317]

the intermediate people who took them to Europe [these cannot be Nordic R1A1's since they originated in Europe onlee] either did not survive their journey to Europe and all died off immediately after handing over their cows to the natives

at this point New Delhi Virus can be brought in somewhere. No kya? All died because of NDM. Hence proved.

[brihaspati]

Actually, on second thoughts - if the Turkics pushed out steppe r1a1's after cattle domestication and lactose persistence developed in r1a1 in the steppes, then their assumed branch who came down to India would still show lactose persistence. In that case lactose persistence should increase towards the south-east corner of the peninsula and not get bunched around the mouth of Sindhu - because the R1A1 descendants seem to dominate the so-called Indian strictly endogamous populations.

So there must have been a Turkic invasion before the domestication of cattle in south+west Asia. But then who took the bos to R1A1 north Europeans? Or was it an innovative mother cow who got so frightened by the epicanthic folds of the apocalyptic humans that she jumped into the sea and swam across the eastern Mediterranean to seek refuge with the Nordics?

[ManishH]

unlike the dogmatics of linguists, who base their entire theory on empirical observations

B-ji, with due respect; it is bad form to accuse an entire academic group when it is not present here to defend itself. Nevertheless, you need to give excerpts from current linguistics textbooks to prove your assertions about so called "dogma".

Compare that with the linguistic tactics you seem to favour. New observations almost impossible for historical languages,

Again a wrong assertion. Linguistics has constantly refined models based on discovery of epigraphs. Eg. discovery of Hittite, Tocharian etc have shaped how PIE looks today. See evolution of Schleicher's fable from 1878 to now.

In some cases, Linguistics has predicted phonetic features even before their discovery in epigraphs. Eg. laryngeals in Hittite, labiovelars in Mycenaean greek.

Details have also been posted on GDF/Linguistics thread; but you continue to ignore these facts.

can you have a look around that time for the papers by a predominantly Indian researcher group that estimated the "possible start of strict endogamy"

This is the closest I can find to what you describe. Chakravarti A 2009b. "Tracing India’s invisible threads." Is this the one you refer to ? If yes, please post relevant summary from the paper, since this is not openly available.

Mutations are correlated to active chemical and radiation interventions - but in the absence of proof of extensive use of artificial nuclear industry products or immensely diversified modern chemical industry in the pre holocene [and premodern] such human made effects on DNA mutation is almost impossible to assume. This leaves purely environmental massive changes in natural radiation and appearance of mutagenic chemicals the major sources of any "natural" change in the mutation rate. The appearance or emergence of such mutation would not be affected by natural selection by humans and would proceed according to well known and verified probabilistic arguments.

Specialists themselves mention several unknowns in mutation rates, beyond chemical/nuclear factors, so your confidence appears to me as an aberration. From the 2012 paper that you referred :

The mutation rate priors applied to these calculations were those proposed in Xue et al. [19] based on Zhivotovsky et al.'s rate estimates [37]. There are differences between mutation rates that appear to accumulate over multiple generations (an “evolutionary rate”) versus those that accumulate from generation to generation (a “genealogical rate”) [38], which appears yet unresolved.

From wiki:

The human mutation rate is higher in the male germ line (sperm) than the female (egg cells), but estimates of the exact rate have varied by an order of magnitude or more.

Turns out there are some geneticists who believe in infallible accuracy of mutation rates. Unfortunately for you, they end up arriving at conclusions opposite to yours. Why is that ? Eg. in

"DNA Genealogy, Mutation Rates, and Some Historical Evidences Written in Y-Chromosome. II. Walking the Map" (J. Genetic Genealogy, 5, No. 2, 217-256 (2009)

Presently, 16% of the male Indian population, or approximately 100
million peo- ple, bear the R1a1 haplogroup’s SNP mutation
(SRY10831.2), with their common ancestor of 4,050±500 ybp, of times
back to the Andronovo archae- ological culture and the Aryans in the
Russian plains and steppes . The current “Indo-European” Indian R1a1
haplotypes are practically indistinguishable from Rus- sian,
Ukrainian, and Central Asian R1a1 haplotypes, as well as from many
West and Central European R1a1 haplotypes. These populations speak
languages of the Indo-European language family

my post based on the 2012 paper going against the steppenwolf hypothesis - was clearly stated to be not dependent on variable mutation rates. I illustrated in terms of order of appearance of mutations.

Thanks for considering that mutation rates may be variable and not "laws of physics".

Can't help but note a few thins about the 2012 paper you refer to:

1. It uses Y-STR for dating. There is much scpeticism about this in the genetics community.

"The peopling of Europe and the cautionary tale of Y chromosome lineage R-M269", 2011, Busby et al,

Our analysis reveals no geographical trends in diversity, in contradiction to expectation under the Neolithic hypothesis, and suggests an alternative explanation for the apparent cline in diversity recently described. We further investigate the young, STR-based time to the most recent common ancestor estimates proposed so far for R-M269-related lineages and find evidence for an appreciable effect of microsatellite choice on age estimates. As a consequence, the existing data and tools are insufficient to make credible estimates for the age of this haplogroup, and conclusions about the timing of its origin and dispersal should be viewed with a large degree of caution

2. It doesn't take into account SNP markers; unlike Klyosov09

3. It constructs split trees amongst populations only in and around Afghanistan. If someone like you picks it and extrapolates this partial partial data to determine the origin of the entire IE family, that's a bit too ambitious.

We applied BATWING [36] to compute candidate population splits in the modal tree among regional populations within and around Afghanistan in order to test whether BARRIER-identified population separations also showed older splits, exploring multiple combinations of populations.

4. Doesn't corroborate results with ancient DNA data; unlike Klyosov09

To settle the origins question, a much wider analysis of splits taking into account other regions of the world needs to be made. Then let us see corroboration of these split trees that formed out of modern DNA samples, with actual ancient DNA samples too.

You want to derive credibility from the year of publication 2012 v/s 2009 somehow.

[ManishH]

venug garu: I'm sorry; you're indeed right and I'm wrong. I looked at the conversation history and I was replying to Theo_Fidel who originally raised the lactose issue.

PS: Do believe me that I was skeptical about correlation, you can see there are no edits to my post. Request you to please stick around the conversation.

[member_22872]

Manish ji, I am to gain from the knowledge, you, Theo ji, Bji and others have and are imparting any ways. So you are doing a honour to me by sharing knowledge what you all have anyways, so please don't apologize.

[shiv]

it is bad form to accuse an entire academic group when it is not present here to defend itself.

Sorry Manish, this is a weak and pointless argument because any author who is now retired or dead or unavailable cannot be criticized or questioned. Like the grand poobah of Islam himself. Because there are others to use this argument and beat down dissenters.

By using this argument no one need say a further word because the Aryan invasion theory has already been proven and is in print - from the image I linked earlier. No one can argue against that because the author/s are not present to defend themselves. The idea that a self proclaimed academic work should not be criticised because the authors are not present to defend themselves is a pathetic non-defence.

In the age of the internet it has become more and more difficult for people to use this useless line of defence simply because a lot of authors are available openly to defend their viewpoints.

[ManishH]

Authors and ideas should be criticized, very heavily lashed indeed.

But here, the whole academic discipline of Linguistics has been heaped with the blame of dogma. I hope you see the difference.

[shiv]

Authors and ideas should be criticized, very heavily lashed indeed.

But here, the whole academic discipline of Linguistics has been heaped with the blame of dogma. I hope you see the difference.

Everyone bases his judgement on what he knows. I have in my possession a series of papers where "linguistics" experts did everything that internet fora are accused of doing. I will post the relevant passage - which was a refutation and defence of his work by one Mahadevan, whose work was supported by another well known linguistic researcher Asko Parpola

Response to Internet Discussions about Our Work
In a 2004 paper, Farmer, Sproat, and Witzel claimed that the Indus civilization was illiterate and
that Indus writing was a collection of nonlinguistic symbols. The publication of our paper in Science
elicited hostile reactions from them, ranging from off-the-cuff dismissive remarks such as “garbage
in, garbage out” (Witzel) to ad-hominem attacks and saturation of internet discussion groups with
attempts to discredit our work by calling two artificial control datasets in our study “invented data
sets” (Farmer). Sproat and others in the meantime sought to construct counterexamples to our
result.
Here, we respond to their arguments in a point-by-point fashion.

When authors in the community of people calling themselves experts in linguistics come down to what seems like a street brawl in response to criticism of their work, the entire community is open to criticism. This kind of fight is akin to the nuclear yield saga where I believe that the entire community of nuclear scientists in India was brought down a notch by public washing of their dirty linen.

Clearly all is not healthy and humming smoothly in the field of linguistics. There are other "scientific specialities" with their own "experts" that have been created by fake and racist dogma. I think "Phrenology" and "Ethnology" are in that category.

[shiv]

About a month ago I attended a talk by David Frawley in Bangalore. The man is a deeply scholarly person and more Hindu than I am. I asked him only one question - i.e whether we should give up the term Hindu because it was imposed as a label. He said no and gave a very eleant reason why that should not be done. But I digress.

Here are his views on the origins of this "Aryan"/"Dravidian" business. I think this page is a must read for anyone who looks at this thread. Frawley's language is simple and easy to understand and makes it a pleasure to read

http://www.hindunet.org/hindu_history/a ... ley_1.html

[brihaspati]

ManishH ji,
you do tend to repeatedly ignore what I say : I did not say variable rates of mutation is supported by me. I clearly said two things which you need to think and then try to understand:

(1) my arguments about accumulation of mutations based ridiculousness of your steppenwolf hypothesis is not dependent on any "possible" "variable rate" of mutation. All I was repeatedly saying was that my illustration was using order of appearance arguments and I was not dependent on any possible variability in that line of argument.

(2) the physics laws about mutation is about the possible mechanism of arrival of mutations. You seem to be unaware of the basic fact that the mutations used in paleodna studies for timing purposes - are metabolically inactive - they are chosen from within those sections of the sequence that are turned off by terminal codons. As such natural selection factors cannot have any significant effect on their socio-economic selection and hence greater accumulation in one branch of humans compared to another. [for your naturals election logic to be valid - it means that non-active mutations are correlated with particular active portions of sequences - something no one has been crazy enough to claim so far, as far as I know].

Dont know whether it is deliberate or not - but you seem to be again unaware [or perhaps not looked into the technical literature itself] that the "variability" you dote on, is variability in estimates between different research groups and different researches. The basic physics and chemistry of mutation in non-metabolically active mutation sites remains unchanged - whether you like it or not or whether it supports AIT or not. As data sizes grow these variabilities in estimates of rate will decrease as it happens in all experimental sciences.

Further I also explained that because they are metabolically inactive, selection pressure will not change the appearance of those metabolically inactive mutations - and hence we cannot have different physical laws governing the appearance of such mutations in the same historical period and contiguous localities [thereby no great natural radiation or mutagenics differences].

(3) I had clearly mentioned that earlier geneticists came to conclusions based on smaller data sets, lesser coverage of populations, and they had to take into account established dogmas about who came from where and who took what from whom - established by your linguists and historians schools. So the earlier you go in such papers and research - you will see tacit assumptions about PIE, AIT, etc - as so prominently displayed in the paper you quote [which you obviously quoted for this reason -as you seem never to find the geneticist papers that do not proceed on assuming the holy sanctity of PIE or AIT.]

It was I who had to quote the 2012 paper, and the paper is freely available.

(4) Are you really aware of how paleodna research goes on - how samples are collected, difficulties in obtaining them in desired reach and coverage? the early genealogy projects worked on lesser numbers. SNP markers have only recently been accumulating ins ufficient numbers to make sense. Wait a bit more and I can humbly suggest that ongoing research I am aware of will only jeopardize the AIT/steppenwolf hypotheses even more.

YSTR is not problematic on its own -its just about the number of them that are being used or available for studying.

But again, I would request you to follow through on my illustrative post on the accumulation of younger clades in the Afghanistan case. Even if you impose extreme and convenient variability [to stretch every interim conclusion towards AIT and PIE] the order of appearance argument remains valid.

[brihaspati]

ManishH ji,
I have also explored your quotation and resulting consequences of the "could be==must be" explanation of Indian genetic diversity based on strict endogamy together with steppenwolf, lactose persistence/intolerance, fairness etc. Would you like to respond to that?

[brihaspati]

Appearance of ancient DNA is a strawman argument, because unlike living or surviving populations, ancient DNA extracted from the ground has selection bias imposed by survivability conditions in soil, or funerary rites. Further it does not contradict earlier migration to the area where the dna is found from the zone where DNA has not been found yet.

This is why the back-calculation from current populations [subject to correction of known and independently confirmed recent migraton patterns and their effects] is an alternative, which does work based on a solid logical chain of arguments.

When the ancient DNA argument is inconclusive, but the back-inference from current populations is conclusive to a degree much greater than the inconclusive ancient-DNA inference - we have to go for the back-inference.