Stone Age Apocalypse - pt3of5

Some 75,000 years ago a super-eruption from the site of Lake Toba in Sumatra blasted out more than two hundred cubic miles of ash over an area of over a million square miles. This program investigates the devastating aftermath of the most powerful volcano of the last twenty-five million years - including the theory that it triggered a human genetic bottleneck leaving a tiny band, as low as a few thousand survivors to preserve the human race - and looks at the threat of super-volcanoes in the 21st century.

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Science & Technology

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[redprince9]

when it showed the volcanic cloud of ash that covered the planet... the cloud went west towards Africa, in the simulation the lower half was covered, meaning that those humans that did survive in Africa during that time would've been the most adaptable, yet not necessarily the "strongest", as all being the biggest, baddest, mofo in the game means that you gotta eat a lot more than the lil' wiry one's to remain active, and 4 smaller couples up the odds of survival more than one buff couple can

[Mikosch2]

@vikified Sounds logic to me. The 2004 earthquake in Sumatra moved the whole island, which possibly caused magma activity.

[vikified]

@mrbignerd ..Seems like this volcano is coming to life too. with 4 moderate earthquake around the lake Toba in past 7 days, i'd try to get all my news aroudn there.

[mrbignerd]

@Axial100: We have no true way of knowing where exactly humanity started and quite frankly I could care less whether it is from Asia, Africa or Europe. What I do know is that this eruption DID happen 75K years ago. You cannot deny the evidence and the impact it had on the planet. How it affected the human race is up for debate though I personally think it was quite catastrophic according to the genetic evidence available. Neanderthals really only lived in Europe and went exinct 25-30K years ago.

[Axial100]

According to this hypothesis, 75ka or so, we humans were nearly wiped out everywhere but east Africa. Conveniently, they leave out the neanderthals who apparently out-survived us every where they lived. Really? They lived until 35ka while we were down to 5,000 breeding pairs 70ka. This is one of several reasons this hypothesis (put forward as near-fact) is wrong.

[Axial100]

A hypothesis that does fit the facts is that modern humans, us, evolved from earlier humans at this time. Not a bottleneck, but a new start. There was no planetary catastrophe, just an evolution of us. I believe this central asian group grew in its point of origin then spread out after some number of generations. Probably by family groups. Each group traveling to different destinations.

[Axial100]

This is an explanation for what we see that does not require a biblical cataclysm to explain us. The family groups that spread out carried only a subset of the gene pool of the original group with them. If the subset was olive skin, slanted eyes, curly hair, red hair, whatever, those characteristics become dominant after a hundred generations within the separate family groups.

[Axial100]

For this hypothesis to be true, there would need to be a group in central asia having a wide range of genetic markers in its gene pool.They are the originals. These folks in central asia are our ancestors.

[Axial100]

Does anyone recall the experiment done about 10 years ago where many female faces from many haplogroups were digitally merged. The woman in the resulting picture was hauntingly beautiful. Check youtube for women who look like this. you will find them in central Asia, not east Africa.