white or black?

what color were the first human species to walk the earth? just wanted to know i'm tired of hearing bs. please provide proof.

Originally posted by cornholio
what color were the first human species to walk the earth? just wanted to know i'm tired of hearing bs. please provide proof.

Maybe you know something I don't, but I really don't think anyone on here is old enough to remember what color the first humans were, so what kind of proof are you talking about?


What does it matter anyway?

Ever occur to you that it might be neither? there are other races out there than just African and European,you know.

This reminds me of all the posts about whether Jesus was black or white. People have gotten so caught up in the Black and White issue, that to them, they are the only two colors on earth.

Originally posted by ThatsJustWeird

Originally posted by cornholio
what color were the first human species to walk the earth? just wanted to know i'm tired of hearing bs. please provide proof.

Maybe you know something I don't, but I really don't think anyone on here is old enough to remember what color the first humans were, so what kind of proof are you talking about?


What does it matter anyway?

some guy posted a link to native caucazoid africans(berbers)living in northern africa. i though that everyone would be black because of the heat.

oh and the proof i was looking were scientific studies

[edit on 20-7-2004 by cornholio]

This might interest you:

BBC

New DNA evidence suggests "African Eve", the 150,000-year-old female ancestor of every person on Earth, may have lived in Tanzania or Ethiopia.

A genetic study has shown that the oldest known human DNA lineages are those of East Africans. The most ancient populations include the Sandawe, Burunge, Gorowaa and Datog people who live in Tanzania.

Researchers found a very high amount of genetic variation, or diversity, between the mitochondrial DNA of different individuals in these populations.

Mitochondrial DNA is passed down exclusively through the maternal line. The longer a population has existed, the more variation accumulates in its DNA lineages.

To be honest, i really don't care who was the first race to walk the earth. I don't even think it matters about if it was blacks or whites. Its not going to effect my life.....

Originally posted by cornholio
some guy posted a link to native caucazoid africans(berbers)living in northern africa. i though that everyone would be black because of the heat.
[edit on 20-7-2004 by cornholio]

I don't think it works quite like that! It's not just a suntan! The whole area around the Mediterranean is pretty mixed up racially, and a google image search for "caucasoid" brings up the standard north african/ south european faces you'd expect.

As for the first humans though, Homo Sapiens appear to have originated in the African rift valley according to current theory, and spread out from there. Other species, like the Neanderthals, etc appear to have co-existed for a while in Northern Europe, but the jury is still out as to whether they interbred at all and whether that strain makes up part of modern human stock. Most anthropologists think not, but some do.

Anyway if the first Homo Sapiens (humans) did originate in the Rift Valley then it's likely they had dark skin colour. (our closest relatives like chimps and gorillas have dark skin). Having said that an "original" human from 100,000 years ago, even if he were dark skinned, would probably look different to modern africans.

Sorry, no links, this is just stuff I read, but if I come across anything interesting I'll post it.

I have rarely seen this topic discussed without seeing a racial shouting match break out, so congratulations so far. On AOL boards and other places I've been, scratch an anthropologist- find a racist (probably because in prior generations anthropology has specifically been used to justify racism- Nazi Germany is a brilliant example.)

On to the question though- it seems unlikely that whites came first. There are several reasons for this:
1. There is a such thing as albinos- you can get lighter traits from darker parents, but to my knowledge, lighter parents can't have much darker offspring (unless somebody's been unfaithful and tries to say her great great grandmother was mexican).
2. Assuming macro-evolution is how we came into being (I don't actually believe that by the way) you'd expect our ancestors to look a lot like the animals they came from- apes.
3. Light skin isn't an evolutionary advantage in most places humans are suspected to come from. Studies show that black cats kill a great deal more prey than white ones. The same thing should apply to a white human trying to sneak up on his next meal in any setting other than snow.
3A. This lends itself to a question- maybe the various races emerged faster than we'd expect, and gained their geographic placement not because they evolved to fit their surroundings, but because they traveled to fit their abilities, and eventually stopped in places where they were most successful. (a thin and mostly useless theory to be sure, but why not?)

4. I consider the Irish, to whom I owe 1/4 of my being, to be the finished product of humanity, which means they would have come last. Don't ask me to back that up... it's one of those things that just is, and you've got to take it on faith.

"1. There is a such thing as albinos- you can get lighter traits from darker parents, but to my knowledge, lighter parents can't have much darker offspring (unless somebody's been unfaithful and tries to say her great great grandmother was mexican). "

i think there are studies that contradict that but i'm not sure

i had a friend who had a son with blue eyes and after a couple of years his eyes turned dark brown.



[edit on 20-7-2004 by cornholio]

[edit on 20-7-2004 by cornholio]

Hard to say. The first widespread hominid species was homo erectus:
www.boneclones.com...

Because of the differences in the skullcap and face structures, it's hard to make a clear definition (like this one, that shows some of the African racial characteristics of the Egyptians):
www.geocities.com...

The nasal areas have some of the same proportions as the current Asian races:
phs.psdr3.org...
..but, again, it's not an exact match.

The oldest Homo Sapiens skull is 200,000 years old and is from China... can't comment on the racial features, but I'd suspect that "vaguely Asian" covers it: www.ecotao.com...

Okay, I will use the answer of "middle brown" for the purpose of those that like DNA. I am not saying that this is correct, just the most plausible answer that I could think of using a "scientific basis"

Let's say that "AA" represents dark skin, "aa" represents light skin, and "Aa" would represent middle brown. In this model, there is no significant dominant-recessive.

If the first people were "Aa" then it would suffice to say that as they began to spread their genes to future generations that there would become slight variations. Throughout time, perhaps using something like the Biblical Tower of Babel for instance, could be used to spread the people out on a basis of skin color. If language was used at that point to spread the people of the world, then why not go ahead and spread them apart by skin color as well if the goal were to keep them from coming together like that again. This could explain how different groups gradually became lighter skinned, while others developed darker skin. Also, this could account for the other varying skin colors throughout the world.

I realize that this does not touch base on anything like environmental conditions, but I'm not interested in that so it will not bother me at night...

...Please be kind when correcting my spelling, I'm tired and don't care about my grammar at the moment...

Okay...I decided to add something. If you believe in God, then all of the physical variants can also be accounted for because if God created man, then why wouldn�t He be able to change their physical characteristics as well?

Originally posted by petey_pongo23
If the first people were "Aa" then it would suffice to say that as they began to spread their genes to future generations that there would become slight variations.

You're not giving mutation and evolution much credit, here. The "first" of a kind may not have mixed alleles.

Throughout time, perhaps using something like the Biblical Tower of Babel for instance, could be used to spread the people out on a basis of skin color.

Okay.. your theory runs into huge amounts of trouble, here, because in many areas of the world, skin color doesn't matter. In our more ancient civilizations (Egypt, for example), the skin tone ranges from as pale as mine to a very dark blue-black. There is no social difference due to skin color.

If language was used at that point to spread the people of the world, then why not go ahead and spread them apart by skin color as well

You didn't need that mechanism. We lived in small groups of hunter-gatherer folk. You can only have a limited number of people in one area, and then you run out of food. This creates situations where people move away in order to have better access to resources.

No language, skin, religious differences needed.

if the goal were to keep them from coming together like that again. This could explain how different groups gradually became lighter skinned, while others developed darker skin. Also, this could account for the other varying skin colors throughout the world.

Well, separation did it, but so did climate. Pale skins (like mine) are a very poor survival trait in the tropics. I'd be dead of sunburn or skin cancer. Dark skins do very poorly in north climates, where they don't absorb enough ultraviolet light through the dark pignment and become much less healthy.

I did not give evolution much credit in my post, because I do not give "evolution" much credit at all. There are two main types of evolution" that people recognize. One deals with the evolution from monkeys-to-man. That evolution I do not believe.

However, there is an evolution that deals with people using their intelligence to better adapt to their world, and that I do believe in. I would really dislike giving someone the idea that I was talking about the wrong kind of "evolution" on this board.

As far as the first of a kind having mixed alleles, I believe that I said "in this model". I never claimed to be a genetic scientist, or a human relations specialist. However, in ancient Egyptian history, slaves were brought in from different regions to serve the native Egyptians. Perhaps this might account for the varying skin colors in that specific area. As far as time is concerned, skin color could have been an issue over 2500 years ago. We do not know if it was or was not at that point in time. I feel that skin color should not matter, but to some it does and it appears to have mattered for some time before my generation.

And now back to the evolution idea. I believe that any evolution that has occured has been at the hands of God. My statements are merely my ideas, or in some points just my suggestions to consider. Anyways, skin color really doesn't matter that much anymore, because Michael Jackson has proven that that can change. And for those in the wonderful world of Hollywood, if you don't like what nature has given you...go to a surgeon and they will give you someone else's...

Originally posted by cornholio
what color were the first human species to walk the earth? just wanted to know i'm tired of hearing bs. please provide proof.

I dont know if any one can give you proof. I can say this, if people closer to the equator are darker, then I would have to say that the first people were darker, because all the plates shifted north over time, all starting from the bottom.

I would imagine they would have been roygbiv in color. Thats a guess of course but as good as anyone elses.

It is generally believed by most anthropologists that the first human beings to appear on earth were dark skinned due to the region and that region's associated climate.

If you're talking Homo Sapiens, who seemed to first evolve in Africa, then one would assume they would be just as dark as Africans are now. However, there is much proof that homonids like Homo Erectus were already all over Europe, Asia, and Africa simultaneously, and all eventually evolved into Homo Sapiens. We're talking looooong, loooong years here, hundreds of thousands. It was long enough for people to assume the shades they have today thanks to their climate.

In ancient times, Vitamin-D deficiency would cause a malady known as rickets. Vitamin-D is created when a person comes in contact and absorbs ultraviolet light. So, yes, it makes sense that people in northern latitudes would eventually become lighter and lighter. People in brighter latitudes would become darker and darker to offset the negative affects of the sun. People in various climates adjust to the environment and you have pale skin, blue eyes, and fair hair, olive skin, brown skin, and black skin.

Since most archeological evidence shows that the earliest humans evolved in Africa, it makes sense that people spread out from that part of the world and changed color. So the first Homo Sapiens were probably dark skinned.

What's far less controversial and more obvious than man's original skin color, though, is the fact that agriculture and writing evolved in Sumeria. And we all know what Sumerians look like - generally olive-skinned, some light eyes, most dark. Odd that modern-day Iraq, the Cradle of Civilization, is now a gigantic war zone, no?

The problem with answering that question is that new evidence seems to be uncovered each year. A few years ago, Sir H.H. Johnston in his book on British Central Africa, wrote, "the earliest known race of man inhabited what is now British Central Africa and was akin to the Bushman-Hottentot type of negro. " If that's true (and it isn't accepted across the board by anthropologists), the earliest race would be black and about four and half feet tall.

But the problem is that archaeologists, anthropologists and other scientists keep discovering civilizations and bones that create controversy concerning once accepted "truths."

During the 1990's, diggers found the remains of a white man in the northwest whose skeletal remains approximate the features of TV and movie actor Patrick Stewart. What is astounding about this ice age find is that the skeleton predated any known Native American tribe.

Because so much of early history is most likely obliterated or paved over in some cases, I doubt that the question of the nature of the earliest race will ever be answered.

Race and color are not permanent and are prone to changes in environment, civilization advances, and population migrations. Interestingly, in a study, mean wore T-shirts, sweated a bit in them, then the T-shirts were given to women. The women had to smell the T-shirts and choose which one they liked the most by smell. The women always chose the T-shirt that belonged to the male most genetically different from themselves.