"James, brother of Jesus" ossuary a fraud

Exposing the 'Jesus' Brother' Fraud

The discovery of the ossuary was hailed in some quarters as a spectacular archeological find — solidly circumstantial proof, at last, of Christ's existence. For it would have held the remains of the Apostle James, who was killed in 62 A.D. and is described in the Bible as Jesus' brother.

When the James ossuary toured Canada in October 2002, it attracted thousands of the curious and faithful. Some visitors kneeled in quiet prayer. But back in Israel, police detectives, along with a growing posse of Biblical scholars, were growing skeptical of the ossuary's authenticity. After a two-year investigation, police in December 2004 charged the antiquities collector and four others of forgery, alleging that the James ossuary was a clever fake, and that Golan had masterminded an international ring of thieves that over the past 20 years had duped major museums and collectors out of millions. Put on trial, Golan denied the charges and some experts and the pious rallied to his side. Nevertheless, one of the detectives insisted: "Oded Golan played with our beliefs, the beliefs of Jews and Christians. That is why it's the fraud of the century."

Of course, this ossuary was never considered as proof of Jesus' existence by real Christians. According to the Antiquitates Judaicae, concerning the martyrdom of St. James:

But this younger Ananus, who, as we have told you already, took the high priesthood, was a bold man in his temper, and very insolent; he was also of the sect of the Sadducees, (23) who are very rigid in judging offenders, above all the rest of the Jews, as we have already observed; when, therefore, Ananus was of this disposition, he thought he had now a proper opportunity [to exercise his authority]. Festus was now dead, and Albinus was but upon the road; so he assembled the sanhedrim of judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James, and some others, [or, some of his companions]; and when he had formed an accusation against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned.

and Hegesippus:

And, when many were fully convinced by these words, and offered praise for the testimony of James, and said, “Hosanna to the son of David,” then again the said Pharisees and scribes said to one another, “We have not done well in procuring this testimony to Jesus. But let us go up and throw him down, that they may be afraid, and not believe him.” And they cried aloud, and said: “Oh! oh! the just man himself is in error.” Thus they fulfilled the Scripture written in Isaiah: “Let us away with the just man, because he is troublesome to us: therefore shall they eat the fruit of their doings.” So they went up and threw down the just man, and said to one another: “Let us stone James the Just.” And they began to stone him: for he was not killed by the fall; but he turned, and kneeled down, and said: “I beseech Thee, Lord God our Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.”

And, while they were thus stoning him to death, one of the priests, the sons of Rechab, the son of Rechabim, to whom testimony is borne by Jeremiah the prophet, began to cry aloud, saying: “Cease, what do ye? The just man is praying for us.” But one among them, one of the fullers, took the staff with which he was accustomed to wring out the garments he dyed, and hurled it at the head of the just man.
And so he suffered martyrdom; and they buried him on the spot, and the pillar erected to his memory still remains, close by the temple.

St. James the adelphotheos is celebrated on October 23.

mtDNA haplogroup J not associated with Ashkenazi Jewish centenarians

Table 1 has haplogroup frequencies in Ashkenazi centenarians and controls, and Table 2 from Ashkenazi Jews of various origins.

PLoS ONE doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0003425

Ashkenazi Jewish Centenarians Do Not Demonstrate Enrichment in Mitochondrial Haplogroup J

Liran I. Shlush et al.

Abstract

Background

Association of mitochondrial haplogroup J with longevity has been reported in several population subgroups. While studies from northern Italy and Finland, have described a higher frequency of haplogroup J among centenarians in comparison to non-centenarian, several other studies could not replicate these results and suggested various explanations for the discrepancy.

Methodology/Principal Findings

We have evaluated haplogroup frequencies among Ashkenazi Jewish centenarians using two different sets of matched controls. No difference was observed in the haplogroup J frequencies between the centenarians or either matched control group, despite adequate statistical power to detect such a difference. Furthermore, the lack of association was robust to population substructure in the Ashkenazi Jewish population. Given this discrepancy with the previous reported associations in the northern Italian and the Finnish populations, we conducted re-analysis of these previously published data, which supported one of several possible explanations: i) inadequate matching of cases and controls; ii) inadequate adjustment for multiple comparison testing; iii) cryptic population stratification.

Conclusions/Significance

There does not exist a universal association of mitochondrial haplogroup J with longevity across all population groups. Reported associations in specialized populations may reflect genetic or other interactions specific to those populations or else cryptic confounding influences, such as inadequate matching attributable to population substructure, which are of general relevance to all studies of the possible association of mitochondrial DNA haplogroups with common complex phenotypes.

Link

Why did Neanderthals have broad noses?

Neanderthals had a generally wide nose opening. In recent humans, such a feature is found mainly in the inhabitants of equatorial regions, while populations away from the tropics have a narrower nose. Neanderthals occupied a relatively cold and dry region of the world, so they ought to have relatively narrow noses, but they didn't. What accounts for this discrepancy?

To explain this phenomenon, it was proposed that Neanderthals were constrained to have wide noses by their wide mouths, especially the distance between their front canine teeth (ICB), which effectively "pulled to the sides" their midfacial region. Neanderthals may have needed to have such broad mouths to aid chewing.

Interestingly, a broad dental arch is associated with facial prognathism, i.e., the degree to which the face juts forward. So, perhaps Neanderthals possessed this trait because they retained the ancestral trait of prognathism. Prognathism can be measured by the basion-prosthion length (BPL), roughly the distance between the hole at the bottom of the skull and the point between the front two teeth.

It turns out that BPL rather than ICB explains more variance in the breadth of the nasal aperture, and hence this tends not to support the theory that Neanderthals had broad noses because they had wide palates.

So, how did Neanderthals manage to have broad noses against ecological expectation? They were "forced" to have such noses because of their substantial prognathism. But, their nasal heights were also great, and hence their nasal index (breadth/height) was fairly low. Thus, they may have dealt with their cold and dry environment by having a broad and long nose, rather than a short and narrow one.

Journal of Human Evolution doi: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2008.07.001

The paradox of a wide nasal aperture in cold-adapted Neandertals: a causal assessment

Nathan E. Holto, Robert G. Franciscus

Abstract

Neandertals have been characterized as possessing features indicative of cold-climate adaptation largely based on ecogeographical morphological patterning found in recent humans. Interestingly, one character that deviates from this pattern is a relatively wide nasal aperture. The ecogeographical patterning of the nasal aperture in recent humans would predict instead that Neandertals should exhibit reduced nasal breadth dimensions. To explain this apparent anomaly it has been argued that a reduction in Neandertal nasal breadth was not possible due to dentognathic constraints on their midfaces via large anterior palatal breadth dimensions, especially large intercanine distances. A complicating factor in understanding the relationship between anterior palate breadth and nasal breadth is that both measurements are also correlated with facial prognathism. It is, therefore, unknown to what degree the relationship between anterior palate breadth and nasal breadth in Neandertals is a function of the pleisiomorphic retention of a prognathic facial skeleton. We used path analysis to test for a causal relationship between intercanine breadth and nasal breadth taking into account the potential effect of facial projection and facial prognathism (i.e., basion-nasion length and basion-prosthion length) using a large sample of geographically diverse recent and fossil Homo. Additionally, we examined the ontogenetic relationship between nasal breadth and intercanine breadth using a longitudinal human growth series to determine whether these variables exhibit similar growth trajectories. The results of these analyses indicate a weaker association between intercanine breadth and nasal breadth than expected, and that more variation in nasal breadth can be explained through basion-prosthion length rather than anterior palatal breadth dimensions. Moreover, the ontogenetic development of anterior palate breadth does not correspond to the growth trajectory of the breadth of the nose. These results explain the apparent paradox of wide piriform apertures in generally cooler climate-adapted Neandertals without resorting to dentognathic constraints, and provide additional insight into both the adaptive and nonadaptive (i.e., neutral) basis for Neandertal facial evolution.

Link

Altruism and sexual attractiveness

Altruism towards non-relatives is often explained within the framework of Robert Trivers' reciprocal altruism. What this paper demonstrates is that people (and especially women) find altruists more attractive. Thus, altruism can be seen as a sexually selected trait, and advertisement of one's propensity to be giving, and hence, presumably be a good parent and provider.

British Journal of Psychology doi: 10.1348/000712608X298467

Do humans prefer altruistic mates? Testing a link between sexual selection and altruism towards non-relatives

Tim Phillips et al.

Abstract

Humans are often seen as unusual in displaying altruistic behaviour towards non-relatives. Here we outline and test a hypothesis that human altruistic traits evolved as a result of sexual selection. We develop a psychometric scale to measure mate preference towards altruistic traits (the MPAT scale). We then seek evidence of whether mate choice on the basis of altruistic traits is present and find it in one study (N=170 couples). We also predict that a stronger female MPAT, as measured by responses to the MPAT scale, will be expressed - a result found in all three studies (Ns=380, 340, and 398). Both sets of results are consistent with the hypothesized link between human altruism towards non-relatives and sexual selection.

Link

Out of Africa via Libya and not the Nile?

Which way 'out of Africa'?
New evidence provides an alternative route 'out of Africa' for early humans

The widely held belief that the Nile valley was the most likely route out of sub-Saharan Africa for early modern humans 120,000 year ago is challenged in a paper published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

A team led by the University of Bristol shows that wetter conditions reached a lot further north than previously thought, providing a wet 'corridor' through Libya for early human migrations. The results also help explain inconsistencies between archaeological finds.

...

Anne Osborne, lead author on the paper said: "Space-born radar images showed fossil river channels crossing the Sahara in Libya, flowing north from the central Saharan watershed all the way to the Mediterranean. Using geochemical analyses, we demonstrate that these channels were active during the last interglacial period. This provides an important water course across this otherwise arid region." The critical 'central Saharan watershed' is a range of volcanic mountains formerly considered to be the limit of this wetter region.

...

Dr Derek Vance, senior author on the paper, added: "The study shows, for the first time, that monsoon rains fed rivers that extended from the Saharan watershed, across the northern Sahara, to the Mediterranean Sea. These corridors rivalled the Nile Valley as potential routes for early modern human migrations to the Mediterranean shores."

Y chromosomes of Neolithic cattle do not suggest hybridization with European aurochsen

A previous study (pdf) had proposed that there was Y-chromosome evidence for introgression of native European Y-chromosomes into Neolithic cattle. Some previous posts on the mtDNA evidence.

From the paper:

In conclusion, the ancient distribution of the Y1 and Y2 haplotypes suggests that they do not discriminate European and Near Eastern Y-chromosomal lineages. As a consequence, there is still no patrilinear marker for investigating possible male introgression between imported cattle and European aurochs. So far, the importation of taurine cattle from its Near Eastern centre of domestication into Europe without subsequent hybridisation with local wild cattle populations remains the preferred model for the origin of European cattle.

From this paper, Figure 1 has the "Assumed distribution of aurochs mt-haplogroups in Western Eurasia", Figure 2 has the ancient Y data.

PLoS ONE 3(10): e3418. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0003418

Y-SNPs Do Not Indicate Hybridisation between European Aurochs and Domestic Cattle

Ruth Bollongino et al.

Abstract

Background

Previous genetic studies of modern and ancient mitochondrial DNA have confirmed the Near Eastern origin of early European domestic cattle. However, these studies were not able to test whether hybridisation with male aurochs occurred post-domestication. To address this issue, Götherström and colleagues (2005) investigated the frequencies of two Y-chromosomal haplotypes in extant bulls. They found a significant influence of wild aurochs males on domestic populations thus challenging the common view on early domestication and Neolithic stock-rearing. To test their hypothesis, we applied these Y-markers on Neolithic bone specimens from various European archaeological sites.

Methods and Findings

Here, we have analysed the ancient DNA of 59 Neolithic skeletal samples. After initial molecular sexing, two segregating Y-SNPs were identified in 13 bulls. Strikingly, our results do not support the hypothesis that these markers distinguish European aurochs from domesticated cattle.

Conclusions

The model of a rapid introduction of domestic cattle into Central Europe without significant crossbreeding with local wild cattle remains unchallenged.

Link

Oldest human (Homo heidelbergensis) footprints

Earth and Planetary Science Letters doi:10.1016/j.epsl.2008.08.026

Oldest human footprints dated by Ar/Ar

Stéphane Scaillet et al.

Abstract

Fossilized human trackways are extremely rare in the geologic record. These bear indirect but invaluable testimony of human/hominid locomotion in open air settings and can provide critical information on biomechanical changes relating to bipedalism evolution throughout the primitive human lineage. Among these, the “Devil's footsteps” represent one of the best preserved human footprints suite recovered so far in a Pleistocene volcanic ash of the Roccamonfina volcano (southern Italy). Until recently, the age of these footprints remained speculative and indirectly correlated with a loosely dated caldera-forming eruption that produced the Brown Leucitic Tuff. Despite extensive hydrothermal alteration of the pyroclastic deposit and variable contamination with excess ⁴⁰Ar, detailed and selective ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar laser probe analysis of single leucite crystals recovered from the ash deposit shows that the pyroclastic layer and the footprints are 345 ± 6 kyr old (1σ), confirming for the first time that these are the oldest human trackways ever dated, and that they were presumably left by the modern human predecessor, Homo heidelbergensis, close to Climatic Termination IV.

Link

Estimating TMRCA for a pair of Y-STR haplotypes using Average Squared Distance (ASD) cont'd

This is a continuation of On the use of average squared distance (ASD) to estimate the time to most recent common ancestor (TMRCA) of a pair of Y-STR haplotypes inspired by James Heald's interesting comments. I suggest that you read that post first if you want to make sense of this one.

Summary of first post

In the first post I studied via simulation, the distribution P(gest | g) where g is the real TMRCA, and gest = ASD(hta, htb)/2μest is its estimate via average squared distance of two haplotypes hta and htb.

It was shown that the expected value E[gest | g] = g, and also that gest varies by quite a lot around g.

E[g | gest]

What can we say about E(g | gest), i.e. the expected value of the TMRCA if we have an estimate of its age? In other words, the expected real age, given its apparent age.

To study this, I sample g from a prior distribution P(g) and determine for each sample (via simulation) the corresponding gest. Thus, for each gest I have a set {g1, g2, ..., gn} (real ages), whose apparent age is gest.

Then:

E[g | gest] = mean{g1, g2, ..., gn}

Figuring out the prior distribution P(g) is of course the real trick. Bruce Walsh suggests (Genetics 158: 897–912) using p(t) = λexp(-λt) with λ=1/Ne, where t is the TMRCA and Νe is the effective population size. He cites an estimate for this Ne=5000 for humans, and discovers that the posterior distribution of t is not very sensitive to the prior.

Various kinds of belief or evidence can be incorporated in the prior. For example, we can set P(g)=0 if g>2,500 since two Y-chromosomes cannot have an MRCA older than "Y-chromosome Adam" -- if we are convinced that 2,500 generations is an upper limit on the age of Y-chromosome Adam.

But, if we are comparing Y-chromosomes of patrilineal descendants of a known founder (e.g., Genghis Khan), then we can set P(g) = 0 if g>40. Conversely, if we are comparing an R1a and R1b haplotype then we can set P(g) = 0 for g less than e.g., 160 generations, since the MRCA of R1a and R1b must be older than the time in which R1a1 has been detected in ancient DNA.

The point is that different real ages can lead to the same observed apparent age. To go from the apparent age to the real one, we can use prior information about it, i.e., the P(g) distribution.

It is important to note that P(g) can be seen as our prior belief about the distribution of g, that is: given two Y-chromosomes, what is our guess about their TMRCA before we see their haplotypes?

But, it can also be seen as the actual distribution of g in the collection of haplotypes from which we have sampled a pair. This will be different e.g., in a rapidly expanding population vs. a static one, or in a population expanding early or late in its history, etc.

Simulation

In the following I use a prior P(g) that is Uniform(1, 2500). I take a million samples from P(g). The number of markers is 50, and the mutation rate is .0025. In the present, I ignore uncertainty about the mutation rate that was the topic of the previous post.

Note that my primary concern isn't to motive this prior as realistic, since P(g) is dependent on prior knowledge (ancient DNA/population history) as mentioned in the previous section. Rather, my goal is to show (i) that E[g | gest] is not generally equal to gest, and (ii) that the choice of prior affects this quantity.

In the following I plot E[g | gest]/gest as a function of gest. For better visualization, and since a particular gest value may not be observed in the simulation, I group gest's into 100-generation long bins, i.e., I show the expected value of g, given that gest is between 1 and 100 generations, 101 and 200, and so on.
It is fairly obvious that E[g | gest] is not equal to gest. For small g it is greater than gest, while for large g it is smaller than gest.

It is easy to see why: consider for example ASD=0 and hence gest=0. It is clearly the case that ASD=0 is compatible with many real ages, all of them are greater or equal to 1. Hence gest=0 is clearly an underestimate of the real age. On the other hand an apparent age of 2,500 generations corresponds to real ages less or equal to 2,500 generations, and hence the expected real age is greater than the apparent age.

Now, consider a different prior: Uniform(1, 1000).
Or Uniform(200, 2500):
It is clear that E[g | gest] is not generally equal to gest and moreover depends on P(g).

Conclusion

To put the conclusions succinctly:

• If the age g of the common ancestor is known, then ASD is expected to be 2μg.
• If ASD is known, then the expected age of the common ancestor is not in general expected to be ASD/2μ.
• The expected age (given an ASD value) varies with ASD, and the way in which it varies depends on the prior estimate of the TMRCA.
  

In short, expected ASD grows linearly with age; expected age does not grow linearly with ASD.

This adds an extra level of uncertainty about the TMRCA, namely population history. It does not seem to be the case that an unbiased estimate of TMRCA can be estimated from ASD.

Of course, the way forward is, once again, to increase nm and pin down the mutation rate more accurately. This will increase the effect of the "evidence" in a Bayesian analysis, making it less susceptible to the background knowledge or belief represented by the prior.

Data-Driven Enhancement of Facial Attractiveness

A new beautification software that transforms a face to make it more attractive while maintaining its "individuality" and recognizability. Link to paper and supporting information. Below is a technical video explaining the method. On the left are examples of original and beautified test images. The NY Times has an article on the subject.




ACM SIGGRAPH 2008

Data-Driven Enhancement of Facial Attractiveness

Tommer Leyvand, Daniel Cohen-Or, Gideon Dror and Dani Lischinski

When human raters are presented with a collection of shapes and asked to rank them according to their aesthetic appeal, the results
often indicate that there is a statistical consensus among the raters. Yet it might be difficult to define a succinct set of rules that capture the aesthetic preferences of the raters. In this work, we explore a data-driven approach to aesthetic enhancement of such shapes. Specifically, we focus on the challenging problem of enhancing the aesthetic appeal (or the attractiveness) of human faces in frontal photographs (portraits), while maintaining close similarity with the original.

The key component in our approach is an automatic facial attractiveness engine trained on datasets of faces with accompanying facial attractiveness ratings collected from groups of human raters. Given a new face, we extract a set of distances between a variety of facial feature locations, which define a point in a high-dimensional “face space”. We then search the face space for a nearby point with a higher predicted attractiveness rating. Once such a point is found, the corresponding facial distances are embedded in the plane and serve as a target to define a 2D warp field which maps the original facial features to their adjusted locations. The effectiveness of our technique was experimentally validated by independent rating experiments, which indicate that it is indeed capable of increasing the facial attractiveness of most portraits that we have experimented with.

Link (pdf)

Female voice pitch and ovulation

Biol Lett. 2008 Oct 8;

Vocal cues of ovulation in human females.

Bryant GA, Haselton MG

Recent research has documented a variety of ovulatory cues in humans, and in many nonhuman species, the vocal channel provides cues of reproductive state. We collected two sets of vocal samples from 69 normally ovulating women: one set during the follicular (high-fertility) phase of the cycle and one set during the luteal (low-fertility) phase, with ovulation confirmed by luteinizing hormone tests. In these samples we measured fundamental frequency (pitch), formant dispersion, jitter, shimmer, harmonics-to-noise ratio and speech rate. When speaking a simple introductory sentence, women's pitch increased during high- as compared with low-fertility, and this difference was the greatest for women whose voices were recorded on the two highest fertility days within the fertile window (the 2 days just before ovulation). This pattern did not occur when the same women produced vowels. The high- versus low-fertility difference in pitch was associated with the approach of ovulation and not menstrual onset, thus representing, to our knowledge, the first research to show a specific cyclic fertility cue in the human voice. We interpret this finding as evidence of a fertility-related enhancement of femininity consistent with other research documenting attractiveness-related changes associated with ovulation.

Link

Intelligence predicted by brain structure and function

J Neurosci. 2008 Oct 8;28(41):10323-9.

Multiple bases of human intelligence revealed by cortical thickness and neural activation.

Choi YY, Shamosh NA, Cho SH, DeYoung CG, Lee MJ, Lee JM, Kim SI, Cho ZH, Kim K, Gray JR, Lee KH.

We hypothesized that individual differences in intelligence (Spearman's g) are supported by multiple brain regions, and in particular that fluid (gF) and crystallized (gC) components of intelligence are related to brain function and structure with a distinct profile of association across brain regions. In 225 healthy young adults scanned with structural and functional magnetic resonance imaging sequences, regions of interest (ROIs) were defined on the basis of a correlation between g and either brain structure or brain function. In these ROIs, gC was more strongly related to structure (cortical thickness) than function, whereas gF was more strongly related to function (blood oxygenation level-dependent signal during reasoning) than structure. We further validated this finding by generating a neurometric prediction model of intelligence quotient (IQ) that explained 50% of variance in IQ in an independent sample. The data compel a nuanced view of the neurobiology of intelligence, providing the most persuasive evidence to date for theories emphasizing multiple distributed brain regions differing in function.

Link

Stonehenge controversy continued

Mark Pitts was involved in the Stonehenge Decoded documentary. See the previous entry on Stonehenge was built in 2,300BC and may have been a healing center for the "Stonehenge as healing center theory".

Stonehenge 'was a cremation cemetry, not healing centre'

Stonehenge was used as a cremation cemetry throughout its history, according to new evidence that divides archaeologists over whether England's most famous ancient monument was about celebrating life or death.

...

Recently a BBC documentary suggested that the standing stones were not erected until 2,300BC, when the site became a centre of healing.

Now a team behind the latest dig suggest the standing stones were erected much earlier than previously thought, in 3,000 BC, and used for cremation burial throughout their history and not for healing.

...

The report said: "We propose that very early in Stonehenge's history, 56 Welsh bluestones stood in a ring 285 feet 6 inches across. This has sweeping implications for our understanding of Stonehenge."

The second significant finding was from radiocarbon dating of human remains found on the site from between 2,300 and 3,000 BC. Researchers concluded that this meant cremation burial was going on long after the standing stones had been erected.

The report said: "Contrary to claims made in the recent BBC Timewatch film, which promoted a theory of Stonehenge as a healing centre built after the practice of cremation burial had ceased, standing stones and burial may have been prominent aspects of Stonehenge's meaning and purpose for a millenium."

...

"This means there were earlier connections with Wales, where the standing stones came from, than previously thought and that Stonehenge was always about death and ancestors and burial and not healing," he said.

Geoffrey Wainwright, one of the archaelogists behind the BBC film, maintained that healing was one of the uses of the site.

"We do not claim Stonehenge was a single use monument," he said. "We think it was a multifunctional monument and part of its purpose was for healing."

I said as much in my previous post:

Such a prominent edifice need not have a single function. Healing cults tend to form around important religious sites irrespective of their original purpose.

Intelligence in childhood and adult voting preferences

There was another recent post on political orientation and IQ. I don't know much about British politics, but both Liberal Democrats and Greens seem to be small minority parties with specific agendas, and this would agree with the finding of the previous study of higher intelligence in political extremists (*)

Related: another study on childhood IQ from the 1970 British Cohort study.

(*) If we define extremism as taking an unpopular or "niche" political position; I have no opinion on the merits of these two parties.

Intelligence doi: 10.1016/j.intell.2008.09.001

Childhood intelligence predicts voter turnout, voting preferences, and political involvement in adulthood: The 1970 British Cohort Study

Ian J. Deary et al.

Abstract

Little is known about the association between measured intelligence and how people participate in democratic processes. In the 1970 British Cohort Study, we examined the association between childhood intelligence and, at age 34: whether and how people voted in the 2001 UK general election; how they intended to vote; and whether they had taken part in other political activities. People with higher childhood intelligence were more likely to vote in the 2001 election (38% increased prevalence per SD increase in intelligence), and were more likely to vote for the Green Party and the Liberal Democrats (49% and 47% increased prevalence per SD increase in intelligence, respectively). The intelligence-Green party voting association was largely accounted for by occupational social class, the intelligence-Liberal Democrat voting association was not. Similar associations between intelligence and preference for the Green Party or Liberal Democrats were found as regards voting intentions, but neither of these associations was accounted for by occupational social class. People with higher childhood intelligence were more likely to take part in rallies and demonstrations, and to sign petitions, and expressed a greater interest in politics (40%, 65%, 33%, and 58% increased prevalence per SD increase in intelligence, respectively).

Link

A large secondary structure of human mtDNA

Geneticists often use an abstraction of DNA as a linear sequence of nucleotides, but in fact it is a three-dimensional structure with interesting patterns of its own. In this paper, an interesting structure in human mtDNA is described, and the authors claim that it is important for the fact that different sites in human mtDNA mutate at a different rate

Molecular Biology and Evolution doi: 10.1093/molbev/msn225

Evidence for variable selective pressures at a large secondary structure of the human mitochondrial DNA control region

Filipe Pereira et al.

Abstract

A combined effect of functional constraints and random mutational events is responsible for the sequence evolution of the human mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) control region. Most studies targeting this noncoding segment usually focus on its primary sequence information disregarding other informative levels such as secondary or tertiary DNA conformations. In this work, we combined the most recent developments in DNA folding calculations with a phylogenetic comparative approach in order to investigate the formation of intra-strand secondary structures in the human mtDNA control region. Our most striking results are those regarding a new cloverleaf-like secondary structure predicted for a 93 bp stretch of the control-region 5’ peripheral domain. Randomized sequences indicated that this structure has a more negative folding energy than the average of random sequences with the same nucleotide composition. In addition, a sliding window scan across the complete mitochondrial genome revealed that it stands out as having one of the highest folding potential. Moreover, we detected several lines of evidence of both negative and positive selection on this structure with high levels of conservation at the structure-relevant stem regions and the occurrence of compensatory base changes in the primate lineage. In the light of previous data we discuss the possible involvement of this structure in mtDNA replication and/or transcription. We conclude that maintenance of this structure is responsible for the observed heterogeneity in the rate of substitution among sites in part of the human hypervariable region I, and that it is a hotspot for the 3’end of human mtDNA deletions.

Link

(Lack of) intelligence in childhood and psychological distress in adulthood

Intelligence doi: 10.1016/j.intell.2008.09.002

Intelligence in childhood and risk of psychological distress in adulthood: The 1958 National Child Development Survey and the 1970 British Cohort Study

Catharine R. Gale et al.

Abstract

Lower cognitive ability is a risk factor for some forms of severe psychiatric disorder, but it is unclear whether it influences risk of psychological distress due to anxiety or the milder forms of depression. The participants in the present study were members of two British birth national birth cohorts, the 1958 National Child Development Survey (n = 6369) and the 1970 British Cohort Study (n = 6074). We examined the association between general cognitive ability (intelligence) measured at age 10 (1970 cohort) and 11 years (1958 cohort) and high levels of psychological distress at age 30 (1970 cohort) or 33 years (1958 cohort), defined as a score of 7 or more on the Malaise Inventory. In both cohorts, participants with higher intelligence in childhood had a reduced risk of psychological distress. In sex-adjusted analyses, a standard deviation (15 points) increase in IQ score was associated with a 39% reduction in psychological distress in the 1958 cohort and a 23% reduction in the 1970 cohort [odds ratios (95% confidence intervals) were 0.61 (0.56, 0.68) and 0.77 (0.72, 0.83), respectively]. These associations were only slightly attenuated by further adjustment for potential confounding factors in childhood, including birth weight, parental social class, material circumstances, parental death, separation or divorce, and behaviour problems, and for potential mediating factors in adulthood, educational attainment and current social class. Intelligence in childhood is a risk factor for psychological distress due to anxiety and the milder forms of depression in young adults. Understanding the mechanisms underlying this association may help inform methods of prevention.

Link

Some comments on Steve Jones and human evolution

Leading geneticist Steve Jones says human evolution is over

Human evolution is grinding to a halt because of a shortage of older fathers in the West, according to a leading genetics expert.

Fathers over the age of 35 are more likely to pass on mutations, according to Professor Steve Jones, of University College London.

It is certainly true that older fathers pass more mutations to their offspring. One would, of course, have to account for the fact that many of these mutations are deleterious, and hence are no-starts in terms of evolution. One would also need to consider that the human population today is much larger than any time in human history, and hence a smaller percentage of old fathers is perfectly consistent with a lot more alleles entering the gene pool, an effect recently discussed.

More from the Times article:

Another factor is the weakening of natural selection. “In ancient times half our children would have died by the age of 20. Now, in the Western world, 98 per cent of them are surviving to 21.”

It is true that as human technology progresses, old selection pressures are relaxed. A lot of things that would have killed or otherwise incapacitated our ancestors can be treated effectively today.

But, technological progress brings with it its own selection pressures. Consider, for example, that a few centuries ago, being illiterate did not seriously affect a person's reproductive potential. Or, very few people had to work at night, because there just wasn't enough light for much human activity to occur.

So, while technology frees us from some environmental influences, it also puts us into novel environments for which we are not well-adapted.

More:

Decreasing randomness is another contributing factor. “Humans are 10,000 times more common than we should be, according to the rules of the animal kingdom, and we have agriculture to thank for that. Without farming, the world population would probably have reached half a million by now – about the size of the population of Glasgow.

“Small populations which are isolated can evolve at random as genes are accidentally lost. World-wide, all populations are becoming connected and the opportunity for random change is dwindling. History is made in bed, but nowadays the beds are getting closer together. We are mixing into a glo-bal mass, and the future is brown.”

Genetic drift is one of the factors affecting evolution, and this has certainly been relaxed in large modern populations. But, what does this mean?

In a small population, an allele becomes fixed sooner than in a large one. If we think in terms of genetic drift alone, allele frequencies will shift faster in a small population.

However, drift isn't the only factor at play. As stated above, more novel alleles are created in a larger population. Moreover, there is room for more genetic variability in a large population (compare a small village with a large city), and, correspondingly, a broader range of phenotypes. This is exactly what selection needs to proceed, variability in genotypes and phenotypes. The more variability in the population, the faster selection will proceed.