Paging professor Milford Wolpoff.
Editorial Reviews
There are two widely held scientific theories concerning the origin of the human species. One posits a single cradle, generally thought to be in Africa, in which Homo sapiens originated.
This dominant theory is assisted by its charismatic spokesmodel Eve, a fictitious personification of a DNA strain that some scientists argue indicates a unique source for the Earth's human population. The other, decidedly less popular theory is known as multiregionalism.
Multiregionalists argue that populations may have originated in Africa, but these populations migrated to distant regions where the human species developed and took on different characteristics, known to scientists as biological diversity but more conventionally referred to as different races.
This divide is obviously controversial, and it is not always the steady eye of science that influences which model is deemed correct (or at least politically correct).
After all, one model promises a scientific verification of our common humanity, the other, interpreted too loosely, could result in a scientific rationale that hardens concepts of racial difference.
You knoooow what I like.
It is interesting that people that lived 25,000 years ago in a rock shelter near my home in Thailand had somewhat different tools than the first inhabitants of Australia. The Negritos, Andaman Islanders and Australians are all quite different than the people that have lived for considerable time right next door both in South Asia (Dravidian) and Southeast Asia. It is too bad that abuses of science of the beginning of the last century and before have poisoned the well of speculation.