AN AMERICAN WELLSPRING AND THE PEOPLING OF THE EASTERN HEMISPHERE

INTERPRETING ARCHAEOLOGICAL SIGNATURES BEFORE CLOVIS:AN AMERICAN WELLSPRING AND THE PEOPLING OF THE EASTERN HEMISPHERE

By Alvah Hicks [email protected]

This Presentation will outline "warranting evidence" through a multidisciplinary approach hypothesizing that: Amerindian populations should be examined as a source for the Homo sapien sapien Peopling ofthe Eastern Hemisphere. An ancient pre-Clovis archeological signature, autochthonous in its nature, can be projected to precede the onset and evolution of the modern Paleolithic detected in the colonization and"Sudden Replacement" of Old World Hominids beginning less than 50,000 years ago. A conservative archaeological assessment of the initial arrival of Late Paleolithic Asians and Australians, European UpperPaleolithic Cultures, and African Later Stone Age People coincides in time with an evolving modern human behavior throughout the Eastern Hemisphere. A multidisciplinary alternative to the “Eve out of Africa” hypothesis follows that supports an archaeologically based chronology.

!Note: “Quotes” are aligned on both sides, my own text is aligned “left”.

Introduction:

“If you want to establish the claim that modern humanscame out of America, and not Africa, then you hadbetter face head on the evidence for an African or OldWorld modern human origin. Because if you cannot showthat there are problems with the African origin model,

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no one will be interested in your claims for anAmerican origin (David Meltzer, personal correspondenceMay 6, 1992).”

“Success in understanding the problem to the initialpeopling of any part of the globe depends on findingthe archaeological, genetic, and skeletal signatures ofindividual migrations and in their singularcontributions to adaptive radiation (Dillehay; PNAS2008, pg. 971)…To do so requires both aninterdisciplinary scientific and theoretical framework(ibid, pg. 976).”

The Modern Human Odyssey as seen from the Americas

When I first started this investigation back in 1984 I was looking for the hard evidence for modern human origins in the Old World. I was also asking: ‘Whythe Western Hemisphere was not included as a source forthe 45ky “sudden replacement” of Home erectus populations who had settled the entire Eastern Hemisphere more than1,500,0000 years before.’ There is an explanation for why an American Wellspring remains an uncharted hypothesis and it goes back to the discovery of “The New World.” After 367 years of Theological (1492-1859) meanderings scientific determinations became the norm (1859-1912). Two main opinions emerged, one that the Native Indian of the Americas originated in Asia and two, they or any other “living race” could not have preceded the Neandertal of Europe. However, there were many early evolutionists who challenged this opinion, (among them; Ameghino, Wallace, Keith, Whitney, Sidis, Loomis, Curtis, Kollman, and Native Americans 2

intellectuals), arguing that the human anatomy had beenrelatively stable over time (e.g. LaPierie’s “Men before Adam”).

From: Frank Spencer, The Neandertals and TheirEvolutionary Significance: A Brief Historical Survey inSmith /Spencer , 1984 pg. 7

“Another problem confronting late 19th centuryhuman evolutionists was the incipient argument for therelative stability of the human form. From accumulatingskeletal evidence it appeared as if the modern humanskeleton extended far back in time, an apparent factwhich led many workers to either abandon or modifytheir views on human evolution. One such apostate wasAlfred Russell Wallace (1823-1913). In 1887, Wallaceexamined the evidence for early man in the New World, andlike the German anatomist Julian Kollman (1834-1918),who three years earlier had made a similar survey,found not only considerable evidence of antiquity forthe available specimens, but also a continuity of typethrough time.” emphasis added

Differing opinions can be found to support "multiregional evolution" and "rapid replacement," the two main camps defining modern human evolutionary research. In the Western Hemisphere origins are definedagainst the backdrop of migrations from Asia cast from the nineteenth century British-school's contention thatHomo s.s. could not pre-date the Neandertal. The fact that ancient American fossil man finds (the vast majority remain undated) were/are anatomically modern

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led Holmes and Hrdlicka to cast career threatening suspicions on researchers contending great antiquity ofman in the Americas. In 1929, twenty one years from itsinitial Folsom discovery by New Mexico’s own George McJunkin in 1908, Clovis theory began to draw its own line in the sand and a terminal Pleistocene presence has reigned ever since. Damage control to the ideas andcareers of professors and students studying American origins has not wavered while archaeologists and geneticists and their theories alike have been forced to adopt limitations drawn from these mistaken startingpoints. Dogma lies at the heart of the problem while I had no idea it would be so difficult to overcome. By example, the 20,000 years separating Monte Verde I and II will remain unaccounted for without a well rounded theory to guide researchers in accepting a contemporarypresence in Europe the 33,000 ybp dates embrace.

“The Clovis theory, over time, acquired the force ofdogma. “We all learned it as undergraduates,” [Michael]Waters recalled. “Any artifacts that scholars said camebefore Clovis, or competing theories that cast doubt onthe Clovis-first idea, were ridiculed by thearchaeological establishment, discredited as badscience or ignored (From: G. Gugliotta, SmithsonianMag. February 2013).”

Consensus Opinion and Theories of Human Origin

From: Howell, F.C., 1984, "Preface" to The Origins ofModern Humans: A World Survey of the Fossil Evidence, Eds. SmithFH, F. Spencer, New York: Alan R. Liss, Inc. 1984

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"There is now a near consensus among students of humanevolutionary biology that the origins of our ownspecies, Homo sapiens, is somehow intimately linked withthe first intercontinental ancient hominid, Homo erectus.However, neither the transformation of erectus to sapiensnor the transformation of ancient (archaic) populationsof Homo sapiens to their anatomically modern successors(H s sapiens) are matters of agreement in this scientificfraternity. Undoubtedly, there are many factors thatmake this the case, and any reader of this volume willdiscern some of those that are most obvious. In fact,there is no consensus among the authors represented inthis volume, although the major issues are generallywell delineated, and the limitations of the diverse andoften disparate lines of evidence are usually apparent(p. xiii.)."

Another example of the scope of the “crisis”:

From: Willamette, C. M., and G. A. Clark. Paradigmcrisis in modern human origins research Journal of HumanEvolution (1995) 29, 487-490.

“Despite the considerable efforts of many well-informed investigators, however, no resolution of thecontroversy is in sight.

How selectively biased are researchers? Anextensive literature review of published multivariatedata invoked in support of "continuity" and"replacement" positions produced some dramatic results

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(Willamette, 1993, 1994). A total of 680 data pointswere collected, representing 61 variables on 55fossils. Of these, only 72 variables on 11 fossils, or11% of the reported database, were common to bothparadigms. This means that in the sample, 89% of thedata collected were used by members of only oneparadigm (p. 488).

Given the construal of the paradigm just outlined,theories (more accurately the hypotheses deduced fromthem), can only be confirmed or disconfirmed accordingto the tenets of the metaphysic (the construal of"reality" defined by the biases and preconceptions ofthe paradigm). Outside a particular paradigm, itsconstituent theories ("hypotheses") might appearnonsensical.

Despite assertions to the contrary (e.g. Klein,1989), the venerable history of the debate suggeststhat simply acquiring more data will not help us choosebetween opposing paradigms. The reason is that datahave no meaning or existence independent of a paradigmthat defines and contextualizes them. In light of theplethora of articles and books that have appeared inthe last 10 years, it is worth asking ourselves whetherwe are any closer to solving the question of ourorigins than we were a century ago. If there is alesson to be learned from the debate, it is thatstudents of human evolution must begin to confront theinferential basis for their knowledge claims. So far,they have not been much concerned to do so. The result

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is an interminable debate, now well into its secondcentury, with no resolution in sight (p. 489-489).”

Examining an American Wellspring“In contrast, multiregional evolution can easily be disproved if itcan be shown that all of the ancestors of living humans at somediscrete time in the Middle or Late Pleistocene lived inonly one area of the world. If this were the case, then weshould be able to trace the ancestry of every humangenetic locus to a single population existing at sometime in the past million years.” (Milford Wolpoff etal. pg.131, Multiregional, Not Multiple Origins, in AJPA112:129-136 (2000) (emphasis added)

Geographic isolation as long been identified as a problem for advocates of “Replacement” by “Multiregional” proponents from Weisenrich and Hrlichkato Wolproff and Thorne and others today. However, the geographic constraints in exiting the Americas are perhaps the most compelling insight as to why Homo sapiens sapiens are so recent to the Eastern Hemisphere.

The barriers in exiting an old New World into a newOld World would have been extremely encumbering. Getting to the backdoor, out of the Americas, and into northeastern Asia, would be feasible only after de-glaciations and this timing would coincide with the existence of a Bering Sea not a Bering Land Bridge. This issue has been heralded by a number of discussantsI have held conversations and correspondences with, including Lewis Binford…

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“‘Should modern humans have evolved in the Americas inthe first place, as you suggest, they would have neverfound the Old World, this isolation would have beenimpossible to overcome (Lewis Binford, personalconversation, 1994).’” Lew had summoned the ever soBinfordinan ‘got you’. My reply, it seemed, had beenforthcoming, “‘Lew, you may have answered one of thistheory’s most challenging problem, why was it just 45thousand years ago and not much earlier, that ourspecies crossed into the Eastern hemisphere(?).’”1

In contrast, are there real geographic barriers tocolonization when looking out of Africa for a recent

modern exodus? Survey Says…From: In Search of the Neanderthals: Solving the Puzzle of Human Origins.Cambridge Archaeological Journal, 4, pp 95-119.doi:10.1017/S0959774300000986.

“A Levantine PerspectiveAnthony E. Marks“Having postulated that there was a movement out of

Africa at about 100,000 BP, the obvious first step toconfirm this archaeologically would be to document aspread of African materials into the Levant at thattime. yet the authors are amazingly silent about whatmaterial culture the early 'Moderns' had when theymoved into the Levant. They do note that Qafzeh andKebara both 'have Middle Palaeolithic tools' (p. 153).1 I can still recall the silence before we continued on from there. Weremained friends in dialog through 2011 and his passing. Lew showed me hisDallas Residential ‘desk drawer file’ on me and papers I had sent him toreview. 8

They fail to mention, however, that the LevantineMousterian cannot be traced back into Africa; that thestrong African tendency for bifacilally retouchedpoints and foliates is not seen in the Levant until theNeolithic (pg. 105)!”

“The 'Aurignacian' aspect of this level is limitedto some carinated tools. There are no personalornaments, no figurines, no engravings, and no evidenceof any 'well-organized' campsite. Pierced bone andshell, as well as numbers of bone and antler tools, doappear in the Levant at c. 30,000 BP, some 10,000 yearslater than their appearance in Europe (pg. 105)!”

“The reality of Near Eastern prehistory raises someserious questions about the authors' scenario. How canthe 'modern' Aurignacian, as they define it, beassociated with the spread of anatomically modernpeople into Europe from the Levant before 40,000 BP, whenthe 'early' Levantine Aurignacian does not includethose elements which they consider evidence for'modern' behavior (pg. 105)?”

“Where, how, and why did this 'modern' behaviourdevelop? It is merely stated to be part of theAurignacian in Europe by 40,000 BP. Why, ifanatomically modern people were around from 100,000 BP,did their potential 'modernity' not manifest itself for60,000 years (pg. 105)?”

“The vast majority of those traits consideredindicative of 'modern' behaviour are shown to beginonly at 40,000 BP. The examples given for such

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'modern' behavior as regional art, structures, well-planned campsites, storage pits, etc., however, datecloser to 30,000 BP (even to 20,000 bp) than they do to40,000 BP. Even these examples are mainly exceptionsand in no way universally typical, even of Europe (pg.106).”

“The European EvidencePaul Mellars“What none of us has yet managed to do, of course,

is to provide a clear and coherent explanation of howthis dramatic transformation in behavioural patternscame about – evidently long after the initial emergenceof distinctively anatomically modern humans in eitherAfrica or Asia. Clive Gamble talks happily about 'bigsurprises' or 'flicking a switch' in human culturaldevelopment. These may be catchy and convenient labels,but they hardly help us to unravel the actualmechanisms by which these dramatic behavioral changesoriginated. This remains, in my view, by far thegreatest challenge facing students of the 'humanrevolution' over the next decade (Current Anthropology,1994 pg. 104).”

“In their… Reply: Christopher Stringer & Clive GambleInstead we agree with Bar-Yosef who reiterates a

point he has made before (1987, 34) that 'it is not inthe lithics, but in features such as hearths, thespatial distribution of debris, etc., that theemergence of modern humans is reflected' (pg. 114).”

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What preceded this sudden behavioral and anatomicallife-way? We know it evolved itself, but from where didthis seed find its way to Europe?

From: Knecht, Heidi: Anne Pike-Tay; and RandallWhite; editors. Before Lascaux: The complex Record of the EarlyUpper Paleolithic,CRC Press, Boca Raton, 1993 pg. 1.

"One of the most hotly debated topics of researchin the past decade has been that surrounding the firstappearance in Western Eurasia of hominids that can beconsidered anatomically and culturally modern. Between 50,000and 30,000 years ago, the Neanderthals and Mousterian[Middle Paleolithic] industries were replaced, from theNear East to the Atlantic seaboard, by physicallymodern humans whose culture showed significantinnovations, many of them never seen before on earth.These included graphic representations, true bladetechnology, personal ornaments, complex weapon andpropulsion systems, long distance procurement of avariety of durable raw materials, subsistence systemsbased on strategically organized use of the landscapeover the course of the year, rapid and continualtechnological change through time, and cultural systemsthat very greatly from region to region.

Although the Middle to Upper Paleolithic transition isviewed for purposes of this book as a Western Eurasianphenomenon, it is hard to deny its evolutionary import,especially when we see evidence for the above cultural

changes as far afield as Australia." emphasis added

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Missing is the inclusion of the Americas, why?

German Dziebel and I liken the American mid-Pleistoceneto a basal archaeological state, just as Amerindians contain only basal genetic lineages and few, if any, derived lineages generated by their progeny after exiting the Americas. Most significantly, the primary dilemma(s) archaeologists have with early early Man sites dating before Clovis is that they require:

1: an alternative to the “Clovis First” model

2: a validation of lesser Paleolithic signatures?

3. new implications encompassing the Old World ancestry/odyssey of Modern Humans

There are two holy grails; one encompassing the Origins of Modern Humans, the other; the Peopling of the Americas. Perhaps the two are related! It is in migrating outside of the Americas that we find compelling archeological compliance, specifically, a carry-over of bone, ivory, and antler tools and an assimilation of stone tools, the later drawn from encounters with Hominids during the initial modern Peopling of the Eastern Hemisphere. It is in bringing the two worlds into the same equation that we might find solutions. Empirical archaeological evidence transcends the field of anthropology. A continued archaeologically based denial of a human occupation of the Americas before the onset of the last Pleistocene epoch because we cannot define a theory to guide undeniable attestation is not good science. Archaeology12

is anthropology not a battle field where generals call in the reserves when they know it - the Clovis First paradigm - is a lost cause.

“I prefer archeological dates, when available, butarcheology of the Americas seems more like abattlefield than a research topic. Given thecircumstances, I suppose it is reasonable to becautious. Only if I were forced to bet I would probablyprefer older dates (Luca Cavalli-Sforza, M.D. Professorof Genetics, Stanford University, PersonalCorrespondence 11/25/1991).”

Unprofessional schemes to further a lost cause does nothing to change the facts (like; S. Fiedel blast at the “Beyond Clovis” in Santa Fe 1999). Moreover, scientists looking for real answers CAN NOT SIMPLY DISMISS Monte Verde I with its 26 stone tools -10% modified- , one or more with mastodon blood on the cutting surface and three identically modified heaths with a matrix that is identical to the accepted more recent occupation, because they are unwilling to tacklethe significance of dating it to 33,000 ybp. It and other like dated archaeological sites have similar diagnostic signatures, even though they are not laid ina layer of peat. Contemporary Amerindian Pleistocene sites offer evidence of human behavior similar to MV I and II, while it is in the preserved peat layer that weshould be defining common ground. This is symptomatic of a basal state where “learned economies” suggest an ancient perhaps autochthonous condition ancestral to later Bone Industries that in the Old World

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incorporated a more advanced lithic repertoire. The significance of Pleistocene New World sites

will remain insignificant unless we contemplate their significance. For the Record, I have no idea why the SAA and AJPA meet during the same week every year. Archaeology and Anthropology offer more than just casual links.

"Although it is true that we frequently acknowledgethat we would like to know what life was like in thepast, it should have been clear that we sought tounderstand processes, particularly the processes thatbrought into being the facts of the archaeologicalrecord. In our view these processes were much morecomplicated than previously thought (or imagined)"(Binford 1983b, Working at Archaeology p. 6).

Theoretical Applications

From: Lightman and Gingerich Smithsonian Magazine 1992 “Science is a conservative activity, and scientists

are reluctant to change their explanatory frameworks.Scientists may also be reluctant to change paradigmsfor the purely psychological reasons that the familiaris often more comfortable than the unfamiliar and thatinconsistencies in belief are uncomfortable. Whendissonance is present, in addition to reducing it, theperson will actively avoid situations and informationwhich would likely increase the dissonance. Ifunexplained facts can be glossed over or reduced inimportance or simply accepted as givens, the possible

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inadequacy of the current theory does not have to beconfronted. Then, when a new theory gives a compellingexplanation of the previously unexplained facts, it is"safe" to recognize them for what they are (Lightmanand Gingerich 1992 pp. 694).”

From: Ousley, Stephen 1995. Relationships betweenEskimos, Amerindians, and Aleuts: Old Data, NewPerspectives. Human Biology, v. 67, no. 3, pp. 428, 431,433, 434, 447, 451.

“Based on data from the JNPE, Boas concluded that"comparisons of type, language and culture make it atonce evident that the Northeast Siberian people aremuch more closely akin to the Americans than to otherAsiatics (Boas 1905, p. 99)." Based on the greaterbiological diversity in the New World, Boas reasonedthat Amerindians were in the New World earlier.Because the northeast Siberians represented a smallpart of the variation present in the New World, theycould not have been there as long (Boas 1910). Thispattern was confirmed recently by Torroni, Schurr etal. (1993), who found greater diversity in the mtDNA ofAmerindian tribes than in native Siberian groups.”

Yet, mid-Pleistocene Paleoarchaic or pre-Clovis sites are seen as "Archaeo-Logiacally" unfounded (see D. F. Dincauze 1986). Should the dating of human activities in the Americas in mid-Pleistocene times be accurate (or greater then 33,000; or 47,000 yr. B.P., or more, 1.3 mky) then new theories should be designed that would challenge many earlier convictions defining

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today's "conventional wisdom." A contemporary Amerindian Pleistocene presence warrants alternatives that would delineate a resolution to the unresolved terms assigned to the Old World origin(s) of man. A new"warranted" perspective must follow the prospect of determining what should or shouldn't be found, lithically, in the earliest New World archaeological record. Simply, broad-minded paradigms need to follow in the wake of accepting early mid-Pleistocene Amerindian habitations including the global behavioral and anatomical implication(s).

Let’s get back to what we call “the Old World”

From: Klein, Richard G. 1995. Anatomy, Behavior,and Modern Human Origins. Journal of World Prehistory, Vol 9,No. 2 pp. 167-198.

“Were Neanderthals fundamentally incapable of fullymodern behavior? As I have outlined it, Out-of-Africa 2postulates that the Neanderthals were replaced becausethey could not compete culturally with their modernhuman successors. The argument is bolstered over mostof Europe by the relatively abrupt nature of thereplacement. At many sites, Cro-Magnon/UpperPaleolithic occupations overlie Neanderthal/MiddlePaleolithic layers with no evidence for a major breakin time or for any transition between the two,suggesting the replacement took only decades, or atmost, centuries (p. 183).”

Klein continues: “For proponents of Out-of-Africa2 the problem, then, is not that 60,000-year-old

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Australian dates imply an especially early, non-Africanemergence of art, but that they raise two otherfundamental questions: (a) Is it possible that modernhumans left Africa as much as 60,000 years ago? and (b)Assuming that they did, how is it that they reached theFar East (Australasia) 20,000 years before they reachedthe Far West (France and Spain)? In this context, itis important to note that the Middle Paleolithic/UpperPaleolithic interface in France and Spain cannot bemuch older than 40,000 years. This estimate is basednot on radiocarbon dates, which provide only minimalages in the 40,000 year range, but onthermoluminescence dates from Le Moustier (France)(Valladas et al., 1986) and uranium-series dates fromAbric Romani (Spain) (Bischoff et al., 1988, 1994)which show that the Middle Paleolithic survived inwestern Europe until roughly 40,000 years ago (pg.198).”

The perspective’s outlined here-in offer a conservative assessment for dating the replacement of H. erectus populations. The idea that the replacement emanates from Asia is suggested by the early Australiandates and those from central Siberia. At any rate our sudden appearance throughout the Old World has a relative hypothetical New World comparison in the rapidcolonization scenarios that have been put forth by Clovis First proponents. The Clovis’ second alternative foretells a diffusion of hunting technologies into pre-existing Amerindian populations. Why are earlier mid-Pleistocene American archaeological signature(s) so

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difficult to digest? We have long assumed we should be finding an Old World relationship entailing sophisticated lithic Industries. What we happen to be finding is a rudimentary Paleolithic stage that challenges us to draw conclusions concerning its evolutionary implication. Since the earliest archaeological, or proposed genetic lineages, were not carried out of Africa doubt about Africa being the homeland for modern human lies in defining an alternative. Archaeological and genetic links conform with an Asian source for the spread of modern humans into the rest of the Old World.

From: Ted Goebel, Anatoli P. Derevianko, and Valerii T. Petrin - DATING THE MIDDLE-TO-UPPER-PALEOLITHIC TRANSITION AT KARA-BOM pg. 452 - CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY.

"In Africa transitional Middle-Late Stone Ageindustries are now thought to lie beyond the range ofconventional 14C dating and likely date to between50,000 and 40,000 years before the present (B.P)(Brooks et al. 1990 Grun and Stringer 1991). Likewise,transitional early Upper Paleolithic materials inIsrael have been recently AMS 14C-dated to as early as42,000 years B.P. (Bar-Yosef et al. 1992:517; Hedges etal. 1990:103), and in Europe AMS Willendorf II,Austria, and L'Arbreda and El Castillo Caves, Spain,now suggest that the Upper Paleolithic was well underway by 40,000 years B.P. (Allsworth-Jones1990:231,;Bischoff et al. 1989,; Kozlowski 1988: 219,;Valdes and Bischoff 1989)… In Siberia, new AMS 14Cdates from Kara-Bom demonstrate that initial Upper18

Paleolithic industries appeared as early as 43,000years B.P. or earlier." (emphasis added)

The conservative age (< 43,000-45,000 years) suggested for the earliest modern human archaeological contexts compliments the genetic evidence suggesting a Rapid Replacement of Old World Middle Paleolithic Industries and their makers. This lies at the heart of “the Mousterian Problem.”

From: Binford, Lewis 1983b.Working at Archaeology“Explanation begins for the archaeologist when

observations made on the archaeological record arelinked through laws of cultural or behavior functioningto past conditions on events [Binford 1968c:270]. Ifwe.... appeal to unstated perceptual propositions inexplaining observations we can have little confidencein the historical reconstructions offered.... If thepropositions appealed to in explaining our observationsof the archaeological record are correct, then we willhave gained knowledge of the past [L.R. Binford1968b:1](Binford, 1983, p. 9).”

There are several papers suggesting a northern Asian dispersal for modern human settlement of southeast eastand beyond. As for a settlement of the Americas the only linkage to Amerindians are in the more recently formed populations of northeast Asia. It is here that the two worlds coalesced after the Holocene, as Boas’ conclusions from the Jessup Expedition confirmed.

Radiation of Human Mitochondria DNA Types Analyzed

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by Restriction Endonuclease Cleavage Patterns (Johnsonet al. J. Mol. Evol. (1983) 19:255-271)

“In conclusion, using five restriction enzymes anda sample of 200 individuals, we find that there is ahigh correlation between mtDNA types and the ethnicorigin of an individual. This is particularly strikingin our two African populations, where a distinctlineage separates these populations from both Caucasianand Oriental mtDNA types (pg. 268).”

Emoke J.E. Szathmary 1993. Invited Editorial: mtDNAand the Peopling of the Americas Am. J. Hum. Genet.53:793-799

“It is clear that uncritical use of hypothesesunder dispute can be unwise (pg. 795).”

“Another way to demonstrate that ancient foundereffects remain detectable in modern populations is todocument that the pattern of mtDNA variation deviatesfrom the steady-state balance characteristic ofmutation-drift equilibrium. The only publishedinformation that exists on the Americas was provided byChakraborty and Weiss (1991), who demonstratedprecisely the reverse situation: they found that mtDNAswere in mutation-drift equilibrium in three Amerindianpopulations (pg. 796).” “If Chakraborty and Weiss's (1991) findings apply ingeneral to the Americas, it means that not only isthere no evidence for the presence of major bottlenecksin the evolutionary history of mtDNA in the New World

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but also that is not possible to establish theevolutionary source of mtDNA varieties. They are aslikely to be the product of new mutations as of ancientfounder effects (ibid pg. 796).”

Ranajit Chakraborty and Kenneth M. Weiss GeneticVariation of the Mitochondrial DNA Genome in AmericanIndians is at Mutation-Drift Equilibrium. in AmericanJournal of Physical Anthropology 86:497-506 (1991)

“The present work suggests that in three Amerindianpopulations (Pima, Maya, and Ticuna) a steady state hasapparently been reached, and hence the initial foundeffect has probably dissipated during the evolution ofAmerindians in the New World (pg. 497).”

“We should also note that a consequence of founder-effect (or equivalently, population bottleneck) isreduced gene diversity. . . . These strengthen ourconclusion that probably the past bottleneck effect inAmerindians has dissipated and the contemporarypopulations of Amerindians are now at a mutation-driftequilibrium state (pg. 504).”

Mutation-drift equilibrium is not detected in Old World people and is a primary determination in suggesting a recent bottleneck for Asians, Africans, and Europeans. Clearly, mutation-drift equilibrium was not expected in Amerindian Population that are/were proposed to have been recently derived. Nor are they the product of just four or five or 33 or more unfounded mtDNA lineages.

“As you can see, some of our conclusions (such as the21

antiquity of Amerindian mitochondrial lineages)resonate with your ideas. However, I do not believethat our data can be used to determine the dates ofentry of humans into the Americas. We have tried tomake this distinction clear. R. H. Ryk Ward in aletter to Alvah Hicks (personal correspondence,September 16, 1991; emphasis not added).”

In Conclusion: We liken the differences in “peopling events” to measuring the diversity of an entire glass of water with one that has recently been derived from the pouring of only a subset of the substance and then tracing its disperse into a new sphere. Over time adaptation to a new area will be detected in the accumulation of novel traits that are distinguished from the original basal condition. Archaeology and genetics mirror’s the past if we can find common groundand start anew in reflection of an American Wellspring.

Epilog:

In an email from geneticist Theodore G. Schurr, April

24, 2000

“You have your work cut out for you. I don’t considerthis a hopeless effort, but you have to understand thatthese are the circumstances under which you areworking. Remember, that if it has taken over fiftyyears to finally force many Clovis-first archaeologiststo admit that there really is a pre-Clovis substratum22

in the Americas (except Fidel of course), then thinkhow long it will take to sway their opinion towards an“Out of the Americas” interpretation of modern humanorigins (Personal Correspondence, 2000).

My colleague Dr. German Dziebel was a student ofProfessor Tom Dillehay, I just a civilian advocate; “Of the researchers working sites that seemed toprecede Clovis people, Dillehay was singled out forspecial criticism. He was all but ostracized by Clovisadvocates for years. When he was invited to meetings,speakers stood up to denounce Monte Verde. “It’s notfun when people write to your dean and try to get youfired,” he recalled. “And then your grad students tryto get jobs and they can’t get jobs.”(G. Gugliotta,Smithsonian Magazine, January 2013)”

An evolutionary afterthought:

EVOLUTIONARY ANTHROPOLOGY: ISSUES, NEWS, AND REVIEWSVolume 17, Issue 1, January/February 2008, Pages: 49–54, Ian Tattersall and Jeffrey H. SchwartzArticle first published online: 22 FEB 2008, DOI: 10.1002/evan.20153

“Conclusion”

“For a variety of historical reasons explored above,our species has contrived to elude satisfactorymorphological definition. Through a sort of self-reinforcing process, whereby each reasonable large-

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brained extinct form that was shoehorned into the taxonhas appeared to enlarge its permissible morphologicallimits, a huge variety of morphologies has beenadmitted into H. sapiens, albeit sometimes into archaicvarieties of the species. Acceptance of this muddledvariety has been facilitated by a view of evolutionthat emphasizes gradual transformation in lineages, inwhich species are basically units of convenience ratherthan of biology, and that are expected in principle tobe undefinable in morphological terms. To systematistsstudying other groups of mammals, this situation wouldbe untenable; it would indeed, effectively prevent themfrom plying their trade using currently fashionableapproaches, but paleoanthropologists have remainedfairly unperturbed because, after all, as human beingwe “know who we are,” and do not really need to betold, which absolves us, of course, from having to findout (Tattersall and Schwartz 2008, pg. 52).”

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