Francesco Cavalli-Sforza

What a mess. But maybe in a good way. There's a lot of science and philosophy and science and politics and science here. It's a labor of love, almost a magnum opus, a summary of a lifetime's worth of cross-disciplinary research and analysis and thought.

But dude, I don't know whether your son or your translator or your editor is to blame, but the writing does not do your ideas justice. Even though I do already know what mitochondria and morphemes are, and the difference between Lucy and show more African Eve, I still was confused much of the time and had to struggle with this. It was elliptical; most discussions seemed truncated or condensed. Ironically, it would have been better if it were longer, including more examples from research, a bit more narration, and more exploration of counter-arguments.

But there were lots of valuable ideas in here, including demolition of the idea that 'race' and 'IQ' can be defined and actually matter. And I did insert 1/2 dz bookdarts.

One is just a reference to Rudolf Virchow. I seem to remember that his suggestion, that the Neanderthal specimen that looks most primitive was actually diseases (I'm paraphrasing and may not be doing so accurately), is being reconsidered again. I want to see if I can find more about that - meanwhile, do you know anything?)

I liked that the book talks a lot about science as theory, and includes much discussion of the kinds of research that was being done and would reveal more information about LLCS's work. He even made sure we were alert to potential biases and failures of method, pointing out for example that archaeologists like digging in caves because there is a better chance of finding well-preserved... relics."

I feel a revelation to read that Motoo Kimura, who studies evolution, enriches Darwin's adage of 'survival of the fittest' by pointing out that chance also plays a role and so we need also consider 'survival of the luckiest.' So true. A successful mutation may show up but never get expressed if the bearer unluckily gets eaten in infancy!

I also want to find more recent work by Joseph Greenberg. At the time of this book his claim was that Amerind languages can be divided into only three families. This was hotly contested, two decades ago, and may well be resolved by now. (Do you know?)

I love this provocative line that was almost a throwaway. "[P]robably knowledge and culture will be described as a collection of states and levels of excitement in nerve cells and their connections." What?! Comparing brain stuff to electrons? Theorizing an entirely new foundation for research into consciousness and neuro-psychology? What would [a:António R. Damásio|60033|António R. Damásio|http://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1235095020p2/60033.jpg], [a:Susan Blackmore|5348426|Susan Blackmore|http://www.goodreads.com/assets/nophoto/nophoto-U-50x66-251a730d696018971ef4a443cdeaae05.jpg], [a:Daniel Dennett|4584868|Daniel Dennett|http://www.goodreads.com/assets/nophoto/nophoto-U-50x66-251a730d696018971ef4a443cdeaae05.jpg] say??

I also want to look up Raven's progressive matrices, a kind of IQ test.

In sum, fascinating, believable, but a bit dated, and sometimes difficult." show less

This is a shorter version of their previous book "The History and Geography of Human Genes". Here is my review of that.

Absolutely stunning. The result of over 30 years' work by hundreds of scientists. A must for any historian, anthropologist, linguist or paleontologist. Should be of great interest to any scientist.

The authors have applied sophisticated statistical analysis to the evidence from samples of blood taken from thousands of people around the world. It is amazing how much show more information is teased out. Huge amounts of computing time were required.

They look at dozens of alleles (minor mutations) which can be traced in populations over space and time. The primary mathematical method is identification of principal components by multivariate analysis. Most interesting is the resulting geographical mappings of gene flow. There are very many of great interest. For example, they show the three major migrations into North America from Beringia. They confirm that the dispersion of farming out of Anatolia 8,000 years ago was from migrations of farmers rather than merely the spread of a farming culture.

The authors freely draw from the fields of anthropoly, paleontology and linguistics (and occasionally written history) to supplement and complement the genetic data.

(The work shows clearly that race is not of genetic significance, never mind what you may possibly read elsewhere due to misunderstanding.) show less

Very interesting read, but runs off into unnecessary political digression at the end.

Amazon.com
The title The Great Human Diasporas implies that this book is a history of human migration, but it is much more. It is a readable, accessible summary of the lifework of Luca Cavalli-Sforza, who has done more than anyone else to reveal the genetic makeup of human populations. Originally written in Italian with Cavalli-Sforza's filmmaker son Francesco, it maintains some qualities of an interview: The Great Human Diasporas is full of anecdotes about the Pygmies with whom show more Cavalli-Sforza works, the text is frequently personal yet not self-serving, and it clearly shows how he helped tie together population genetics, linguistics, and anthropology to offer a new, non-racist view of human diversity. show less