# The 10,000 Year Explosion - a book review **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 22, 2011, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355 "2011-04-22T14:17:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 6:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/161 "2011-04-25T06:12:17Z")
> [@gcochran](#): > > I have no faith in Rushton’s explanations of of the origins of various racial differences, but his account of the actual existing differences is substantially correct. What? That blacks are oversexed morons and Asians are undersexed geniuses? That there are three “races” of humanity? Sorry. That stuff is just silly. Refuting Gould is of no interest to me, since I do not look to Gouild for information on these topics. IQ, (particularly _g_), remains a bugbear for which no advocate has provided persuasive evidence that it is genuine across multiple cultures. Cranial capacity is tied pretty much to body size and differs widely within the various populations that are lumped into purported “races,” so I am not sure what bearing that has on anyone who is not engaged in the silly feuds between the nineteenth century Germans and French. If you are citing it as some sort of support for Rushton, you are probably damning whatever good will you might hope to garner for the claims of The 10,000 Year Explosion. ---
**Author:** ![gcochran](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/7feea3/32.png) [@gcochran](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gcochran)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 6:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/162 "2011-04-25T06:12:49Z")
I talked to Nick Wade and to the science editor of the Economist (Geoffrey Carr) back when the paper came out. Carr’s reaction was rather amusing: he thought that the paper’s thesis (a funny occupational pattern in an endogamous group selected for alleles favoring traits that furthered economic success in those occupations) was perfectly obvious, wasn’t sure that he really needed to interview me (although he later did). The paper was clear enough by itself. And he’s largely right: it’s ag science, not rocket science. But then, Carr had studied zoology at Oxford: he’s not your average science reporter. Not even your average internet poster, I should think. ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 6:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/163 "2011-04-25T06:19:40Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > Cranial capacity is tied pretty much to body size and differs widely within the various populations that are lumped into purported “races,” so I am not sure what bearing that has on anyone who is not engaged in the silly feuds between the nineteenth century Germans and French. If you are citing it as some sort of support for Rushton, you are probably damning whatever good will you might hope to garner for the claims of The 10,000 Year Explosion. Which you’ll know from reading Rushton & Ankney’s 2009 paper on brain size and general mental ability in the International Journal of Neuroscience. Rushton’s account of group differences in terms crania isn’t imaginary. Ask Ralph Holloway at Columbia University. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 6:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/164 "2011-04-25T06:25:35Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > Agriculture did not exist in sub Saharan Africa until 5,000 years ago, if that long ago. It did not begin to spread throughout sub Saharan Africa until about 2,500 years ago. > > Agriculture entered Europe about 8,000 years ago, and existed everywhere by 5,000 years ago. Agriculture existed everywhere by 5,000 years ago, even though you claim it did not “spread throughout sub Saharan Africa until about 2,500 years ago”? You might want to avoid contradicting yourself in your own posts. Your point fails to address my point, in any event. Agriculture may have made it to Europe by 5,000 years ago, but the entirety of Europe (including Northern and Central Europe), was not agriculturist until much later, and you still have avoided addressing the issue of the Steppes where a lot of the people you want to include in the “Caucasian race” were hanging out without agriculture for a long time. I have taken no stand on the merits of The 10,000 Year Explosion. I have simply noted that your effort to wrest it into a defense of your own racialist views is not supported by the historical facts. It may very well have a bearing on various smaller populations of humans, but the mechanics it describes could not have worked a the “racial” level because no purported “race” has undergone a unique history separated from any other purported “race.” All the human groups lumped into “races” in the last 10,000 years have included large populations of hunter/gatherers, pastoralists, agriculturalists, and, eventually, urban dwellers so that while one population, (in this thread’s argument, Ashkenazim), might develop uniquely, there is no reason to extend that guess to larger multi-population groups. ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 6:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/165 "2011-04-25T06:55:57Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > Agriculture existed everywhere by 5,000 years ago, even though you claim it did not “spread throughout sub Saharan Africa until about 2,500 years ago”? You might want to avoid contradicting yourself in your own posts. > > Your point fails to address my point, in any event. Agriculture may have made it to Europe by 5,000 years ago, but the entirety of Europe (including Northern and Central Europe), was not agriculturist until much later, and you still have avoided addressing the issue of the Steppes where a lot of the people you want to include in the “Caucasian race” were hanging out without agriculture for a long time. > I have taken no stand on the merits of The 10,000 Year Explosion. I have simply noted that your effort to wrest it into a defense of your own racialist views is not supported by the historical facts. It may very well have a bearing on various smaller populations of humans, but the mechanics it describes could not have worked a the “racial” level because no purported “race” has undergone a unique history separated from any other purported “race.” All the human groups lumped into “races” in the last 10,000 years have included large populations of hunter/gatherers, pastoralists, agriculturalists, and, eventually, urban dwellers so that while one population, (in this thread’s argument, Ashkenazim), might develop uniquely, there is no reason to extend that guess to larger multi-population groups. What there does seem to have been are [selective sweeps](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1885279/) across different populations in response to [local selection](http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/26/science/26human.html) pressures. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 8:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/166 "2011-04-25T08:49:28Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > Agriculture did not exist in sub Saharan Africa until 5,000 years ago, if that long ago. [Bullshit.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sahel#History) ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 9:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/167 "2011-04-25T09:10:24Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > [Bullshit.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sahel#History) OK. This is also true: The Sahelian kingdoms were a series of monarchies centered in the Sahel, between the **9th and 18th centuries** Their wealth of the states came from controlling the Trans-Saharan trade routes across the desert, especially the slave trade with the Islamic world. Their power came from having large pack animals like camels and horses that were fast enough to keep a large empire under central control and were also useful in battle. All of these empires were also quite decentralized with member cities having a great deal of autonomy. The first large Sahelian kingdoms emerged after 750, and supported several large trading cities in the Niger Bend region, including Timbuktu, Gao, and Djenné. * * * They still did not produce indigenous civilizations until the 9th century. Also, farming does not seem to have moved south until later than it began in the Sahel. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 9:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/168 "2011-04-25T09:13:51Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > Agriculture existed everywhere by 5,000 years ago, even though you claim it did not “spread throughout sub Saharan Africa until about 2,500 years ago”? You might want to avoid contradicting yourself in your own posts. > > Your point fails to address my point, in any event. Agriculture may have made it to Europe by 5,000 years ago, but the entirety of Europe (including Northern and Central Europe), was not agriculturist until much later, and you still have avoided addressing the issue of the Steppes where a lot of the people you want to include in the “Caucasian race” were hanging out without agriculture for a long time. Agriculture entered Europe 8,000 years ago. By 5,000 years it had spread everywhere. Those in the Steppes were nomads who lived off of domestic animals. They were not paleolithic. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 9:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/169 "2011-04-25T09:22:30Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > Agriculture existed everywhere by 5,000 years ago. Agriculture never reached Australia until the whites did. The American Indians of the Great Lakes region did not begin to use agriculture until 1,000 years ago. The Eskimos, the Pygmies of the Congo, and the bushmen of southern Africa never developed it. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 9:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/170 "2011-04-25T09:44:31Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > Agriculture entered Europe 8,000 years ago. By 5,000 years it had spread everywhere. Those in the Steppes were nomads who lived off of domestic animals. They were not paleolithic. I would like to add that a nomadic existence requires the same foresight and self discipline as a settled existence growing crops. On page 114 of The 10,000 Year Explosion, Gregory Cochran and Henry Harpending write, “Foragers had no tradition of self-denial and no inclination to deny themselves. They weren’t very good at self-denial back in the early Neolithic period, and they aren’t very good at it even today: Efforts to teach Bushmen to become herders frequently fail when they eat all of their goats. People can learn new traditions, but genetic differences must make this kind of self-denial easier for some people than it is for others.” ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 12:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/171 "2011-04-25T12:17:56Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > OK. This is also true:[irrelevant content snipped] > > * * * > > They still did not produce indigenous civilizations until the 9th century. None of which\* has any fucking thing to do with your original point\* even if it were true, **which is isn’t** - Koumbi Saleh dates to the 3rd and the Ghana Empire itself to the 7th century. Agriculture existed in Sub-Saharan Africa before “5000 years ago”. You were \*\*wrong \*\*about that, and moving the goalposts isn’t going to change that. You spouted your mouth off when you were \*\*wrong \*\*about the facts. You were ignorant and saw fit to opine anyway. **Wrongly**. > [@](#): > > Also, farming does not seem to have moved south until later than it began in the Sahel. Agriculture didn’t move South _before_ it was invented? Well, thanks for fucking pointing that out, Captain Obvious. And no, Agriculture _only_ moved to the Cape of Good Hope by 2000 years ago. What slackers. You do realise the fact that Bushmen never picked up agriculture is a pretty irrelevant one, right? They lived in close physical _and cultural_ contact with groups\* that did\*, and, in fact, social migration from pastoralist to hunter-gatherer was possible. It was, in fact, only after the related Khoekhoen pastoralists were replaced by White farmers that such social movement ceased. See, that’s the problem with (wrongly) viewing human populations as clades rather than clines. You miss out all the shadings and interplay between groups, and draw these bright lines that don’t reflect reality at all. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/172 "2011-04-25T13:33:25Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > None of which\* has any fucking thing to do with your original point\* even if it were true, **which is isn’t** - Koumbi Saleh dates to the 3rd and the Ghana Empire itself to the 7th century. Agriculturally, the first cases of domestication of plants for agricultural purposes occurred in the Sahel region c. 5000 B.C.E., when sorghum and African rice began to be cultivated. Around this time, and in the same region, the small guinea fowl became domesticated… by 500 B.C.E., metalworking began to become commonplace in West Africa, possibly after being introduced by the Carthaginians. Ironworking was fully established by roughly 500 B.C.E. in areas of East and West Africa… Linguistic evidence suggests the Bantu people (for example, Xhosa and Zulu) had emigrated southwestward from what is now Egypt into former Khoisan ranges and displaced them during the last 4000 years or so, during the transition from the paleolithic to the iron age, which happened very suddenly in Africa south of Egypt. Bantu populations used a distinct suite of crops suited to tropical Africa, including cassava and yams. This farming culture is able to support more persons per unit area than hunter-gatherers. > **[History of Africa - New World Encyclopedia](http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/History_of_Africa)** * * * Agriculture did not begin to spread throughout sub Saharan Africa until the Bantus acquired iron age technology about 500 BC. Iron weapons and tools gave them an advantage over stone age paleolithic hunters and neolithic farmers - who were still heavily dependent on hunting. ---
**Author:** ![Chuck11](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/96bed5/32.png) [@Chuck11](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chuck11)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/173 "2011-04-25T17:11:03Z")
> [@gcochran](#): > > What you really want to do is measure brain volume in healthy subjects, rather than skull capacity. And we can do that now: we use MRI. The results are much the same as before: there is a black-white difference in overall cerebral volume of just under 1 standard deviation. Here’s a nice free reference: Variability in Frontotemporal Brain Structure, PLOS One, Oct 26 2010. gcochran, The paper you cited isn’t too informative. Large differences in regional cortical thickness can exist in spite of presumably small differences in IQ. Take for example: Chee et al., 2011. Brain Structure in Young and Old East Asians and Westerners: Comparisons of Structural Volume and Cortical Thickness. What’s needed are representative studies that measure g and analyze its association with cortical thickness. For example: Karama et al., 2011. Cortical thickness correlates of specific cognitive performance accounted for by the general factor of intelligence in healthy children aged 6 to 18. Studies such as these establish the neurological basis of the IQ (g) gap. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/174 "2011-04-25T18:54:00Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > In The 10,000 Year Explosion Gregory Cochran and Henry Harpending claim that the differences between Negroes on one hand, and whites and Orientals on the other can be explained by the number of generations each race has practiced agriculture and urban living. And, with the number of counterexamples posted just on this thread, we can write it off as junk science and move on. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/175 "2011-04-25T18:58:33Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > I doubt very seriously that dog breeds are more dissimilar genetically than human races. You can “doubt” facts that invalidate your theories all you like, but they remain facts. ---
**Author:** ![Hank\_Beecher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hank_beecher/32/7275_2.png) [@Hank\_Beecher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hank_Beecher)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/176 "2011-04-25T19:12:33Z")
Before and during the historical period some human groups displaced others. In many cases such groups surely had some characteristic differences from each other which combined with local circumstances leading one group to expand at the expense of the other. Surely many of these were cultural, linguistic, and technological factors. However, those are not the only traits that could have differed between the groups, some of the differences may have been heritable. Is there no reason to expect that in some cases these heritable traits also contributed to the displacement of one group by another? ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/177 "2011-04-25T21:47:13Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > by 500 B.C.E., metalworking began to become commonplace in West Africa, **possibly after being introduced by the Carthaginians** Do you have any support for this bullshit assertion? > [@](#): > > Linguistic evidence suggests the Bantu people (for example, Xhosa and Zulu) had emigrated southwestward **from what is now Egypt** Or this bullshit assertion? _Egypt_, are you fucking kidding me? > [@](#): > > Bantu populations used a distinct suite of crops suited to tropical Africa, including cassava and yams. Which they brought from tropical _Egypt_, no doubt?:rolleyes: > [@](#): > > **Agriculture** did not begin to spread[…]an advantage over […] neolithic **farmers** Do you even \*read \*your own bullshit? Anyway, agriculture was already established at the southern tip of Africa around the first century CE. So no, it didn’t need Bantus to bring it, they never even made it that far. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/178 "2011-04-25T22:28:33Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Do you have any support for this bullshit assertion?Or this bullshit assertion? _Egypt_, are you fucking kidding me?Which they brought from tropical _Egypt_, no doubt?:rolleyes:Do you even \*read \*your own bullshit? The New World Encyclopedia. > **[History of Africa - New World Encyclopedia](http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/History_of_Africa)** ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/179 "2011-04-25T23:11:04Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > The New World Encyclopedia. > > [History of Africa - New World Encyclopedia](http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/History_of_Africa) > [@](#): > > The Bantu first originated around the Benue-Cross rivers area in southeastern Nigeria and spread over Africa to the Zambia area. Not that part of your link? ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2011, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355/180 "2011-04-25T23:22:47Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > The New World Encyclopedia. > > [History of Africa - New World Encyclopedia](http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/History_of_Africa) No, I meant \*actual \*scientific support, not an uncited encyclopaedia article that can’t seem to make up its own mind and can’t tell the difference between an Afroasiatic language and a Niger-Congo one. [Here](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bantu_expansion), learn from a better online encyclopaedia. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-10-000-year-explosion-a-book-review/579355.md?page=10)