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Sitaram · Site Admin Joined: 14 Sep 2005 Posts: 1079

http://www.sulekha.com/chpost.asp...ilosophy&show=0&cid=90341

Sitaram writes:

When I was in 7th grade, we were assigned by our science teacher with
the delightful task of reading Rachael Carson's "The Sea Around Us."

Several years ago, moved by feelings of nostalgea, I purchased a
paperback edition of her book (Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-
506997- Cool

.

What I read in Part I, Chapter 5, "Hidden Lands" sparked my
imagination concerning the possiblility of some primordial ancestral
memory producing something such as the account of the Lost City of
Atlantis or even the expulsion of Adam and Eve from the Garden of
Eden!

I was immediately reminded of the documentary "The Journey of Man" by
geneticist Spencer Wells (see below).

The Journey of Man is replete with astonishing information. Wells
tells us that we can trace our origins back to a single Adam and Eve,
but that Eve came first by some 80,000 years. We hear how the male Y-
chromosome has been used to trace the spread of humanity from Africa
into Eurasia, why differing racial types emerged when mountain ranges
split population groups, and that the San Bushmen of the Kalahari
have some of the oldest genetic markers in the world. We learn,
finally with absolute certainty, that Neanderthals are not our
ancestors and that the entire genetic diversity of Native Americans
can be accounted for by just ten individuals.

Why did humans leave Africa? Were they driven out - or just curious
about what lay beyond? Paleoclimatologists believe an Ice Age began
about 72,000 years ago, causing a drought in Africa. Humans - and
their prey - had to move to survive.

We may easily see the Biblical Garden of Eden story in Genesis as an
expression of the primordial memory of the easy life of the food
gatherer in a tropical paradise. Perhaps climatic changes bring cold
or draught. The food gathers are cast out of this paradise and
forced to migrate unimaginable distances, and work much harder to eek
out their sustinance and survival.

Rachael Carson wrote in Part I, Chapter 5, "Hidden Lands": Like
other legends deeply rooted in fokelore, the Atlantis story may have
in it an element of truth. in the shadowy beginnings of human life
on earth, primitive men here and there must have had knowledge of the
sinking of an island or a peninsula, perhaps not with the dramatic
suddenness attributed to Atlantis, but well within the time one man
could observe. The witnesses of such a happening would have
described it to their neighbors and children, and so the legend of a
sinking continent might have been born.

Such a lost land lies today beneath the waters of the North Sea.
Only a few scores of thousands of years ago, the Dogger Bank was dry
land, but now the fishermen drag their nets over this famed fishing
ground, catching cod and hake and flounders among the drowned tree
trunks.

During the Pleistocene, when immense quantities of water were
withdrawn from the ocean and locked up in the glaciers, the floor of
the North Sea emerged and for a time became land. It was a low, wet
land, covered with peat bogs; then little by little the forests from
the neighboring high lands must have moved in, for there were willows
and birches growing among the mosses and ferns. Animals moved down
from the mainland and became established on this land recently won
from the sea. There were bears and wolves and hyenas, the wild o,
the bison, the woolly mammouth. Primitive men moved through the
forests, carrying crude stone instruments; they stalked deer and
other game and with their flints grubbed up the roots of the damp
forest.

Then as the glaciers began to retreat and floods from the melting ice
poured into the sea and raised its level, this land became an
island. Probably the men escaped to the mainland before the
intervening channel had beome too wide, leaving their stone
implements behind. But most of the animals remained, perforce, and
little by little their island shrank, and food became more scarce,
but there was no escape. Finally the sea covered the island,
claiming the land and all its life.

As for the men who escaped, perhaps in their primitive way they
communicated this story to other men, who passed it down to others
through the ages, until it became fixed in the memory of the race.

None of these facts were part of recorded history until, a generation
ago, European fishermen moved out into the middle of the North Sea
and began to trawl on the Dogger. They soon made out the contours of
an irregular plateau nearly as large as Denmark, lying about 60 feet
under the water, but sloping off abruptly at its edges into much
deeper water. Their trawls immediately began to bring up a great
many things not found on any ordinary fishing bank. There were loose
masses of peat, which the fishermen christened "moorlog."

There were many bones, and, although the fishermen could not identify
them, they seemed to belong to large land mammals. All of these
objects damaged the nets and hindered fishing. They brought back
some of the bones, some of the moorlog and fragments of trees, and
the crude stone implements. These specimens were turned over to
scientists to identify.

http://www.morien-institute.org/timaeus.html

"I will tell an old-world story which I heard from an aged man; for
Critias, at the time of telling it, was as he said, nearly ninety
years of age, and I was about ten. Now the day was that day of the
Apaturia which is called the Registration of Youth, at which,
according to custom, our parents gave prizes for recitations, and the
poems of several poets were recited by us boys, and many of us sang
the poems of Solon, which at that time had not gone out of fashion.

One of our tribe, either because he thought so or to please Critias,
said that in his judgment Solon was not only the wisest of men, but
also the noblest of poets. The old man, as I very well remember,
brightened up at hearing this and said, smiling:

Yes, Amynander, if Solon had only, like other poets, made poetry the
business of his life, and had completed the tale which he brought
with him from Egypt, and had not been compelled, by reason of the
factions and troubles which he found stirring in his own country when
he came home, to attend to other matters, in my opinion he would have
been as famous as Homer or Hesiod, or any poet.

And what was the tale about, Critias? said Amynander. About the
greatest action which the Athenians ever did, and which ought to have
been the most famous, but, through the lapse of time and the
destruction of the actors, it has not come down to us. Tell us, said
the other, the whole story, and how and from whom Solon heard this
veritable tradition. He replied:

In the Egyptian Delta, at the head of which the river Nile divides,
there is a certain district which is called the district of Sais, and
the great city of the district is also called Sais, and is the city
from which King Amasis came. The citizens have a deity for their
foundress; she is called in the Egyptian tongue Neith, and is
asserted by them to be the same whom the Hellenes call Athene; they
are great lovers of the Athenians, and say that they are in some way
related to them.

To this city came Solon, and was received there with great honour; he
asked the priests who were most skilful in such matters, about
antiquity, and made the discovery that neither he nor any other
Hellene knew anything worth mentioning about the times of old. On one
occasion, wishing to draw them on to speak of antiquity, he began to
tell about the most ancient things in our part of the world-about
Phoroneus, who is called "the first man," and about Niobe; and after
the Deluge, of the survival of Deucalion and Pyrrha; and he traced
the genealogy of their descendants, and reckoning up the dates, tried
to compute how many years ago the events of which he was speaking
happened.

Thereupon one of the priests, who was of a very great age, said: O
Solon, Solon, you Hellenes are never anything but children, and there
is not an old man among you. Solon in return asked him what he meant.
I mean to say, he replied, that in mind you are all young; there is
no old opinion handed down among you by ancient tradition, nor any
science which is hoary with age. And I will tell you why.

There have been, and will be again, many destructions of mankind
arising out of many causes; the greatest have been brought about by
the agencies of fire and water, and other lesser ones by innumerable
other causes. There is a story, which even you have preserved, that
once upon a time Paethon, the son of Helios, having yoked the steeds
in his father's chariot, because he was not able to drive them in the
path of his father, burnt up all that was upon the earth, and was
himself destroyed by a thunderbolt.

Now this has the form of a myth, but really signifies a declination
of the bodies moving in the heavens around the earth, and a great
conflagration of things upon the earth, which recurs after long
intervals; at such times those who live upon the mountains and in dry
and lofty places are more liable to destruction than those who dwell
by rivers or on the seashore. And from this calamity the Nile, who is
our never-failing saviour, delivers and preserves us.

When, on the other hand, the gods purge the earth with a deluge of
water, the survivors in your country are herdsmen and shepherds who
dwell on the mountains, but those who, like you, live in cities are
carried by the rivers into the sea. Whereas in this land, neither
then nor at any other time, does the water come down from above on
the fields, having always a tendency to come up from below; for which
reason the traditions preserved here are the most ancient. The fact
is, that wherever the extremity of winter frost or of summer does not
prevent, mankind exist, sometimes in greater, sometimes in lesser
numbers. And whatever happened either in your country or in ours, or
in any other region of which we are informed-if there were any
actions noble or great or in any other way remarkable, they have all
been written down by us of old, and are preserved in our temples.

Whereas just when you and other nations are beginning to be provided
with letters and the other requisites of civilized life, after the
usual interval, the stream from heaven, like a pestilence, comes
pouring down, and leaves only those of you who are destitute of
letters and education; and so you have to begin all over again like
children, and know nothing of what happened in ancient times, either
among us or among yourselves. As for those genealogies of yours which
you just now recounted to us, Solon, they are no better than the
tales of children.

In the first place you remember a single deluge only, but there were
many previous ones; in the next place, you do not know that there
formerly dwelt in your land the fairest and noblest race of men which
ever lived, and that you and your whole city are descended from a
small seed or remnant of them which survived. And this was unknown to
you, because, for many generations, the survivors of that destruction
died, leaving no written word. For there was a time, Solon, before
the great deluge of all, when the city which now is Athens was first
in war and in every way the best governed of all cities, is said to
have performed the noblest deeds and to have had the fairest
constitution of any of which tradition tells, under the face of
heaven.

Solon marvelled at his words, and earnestly requested the priests to
inform him exactly and in order about these former citizens. You are
welcome to hear about them, Solon, said the priest, both for your own
sake and for that of your city, and above all, for the sake of the
goddess who is the common patron and parent and educator of both our
cities. She founded your city a thousand years before ours, receiving
from the Earth and Hephaestus the seed of your race, and afterwards
she founded ours, of which the constitution is recorded in our sacred
registers to be eight thousand years old.

As touching your citizens of nine thousand years ago, I will briefly
inform you of their laws and of their most famous action; the exact
particulars of the whole we will hereafter go through at our leisure
in the sacred registers themselves. If you compare these very laws
with ours you will find that many of ours are the counterpart of
yours as they were in the olden time.

In the first place, there is the caste of priests, which is separated
from all the others; next, there are the artificers, who ply their
several crafts by themselves and do not intermix; and also there is
the class of shepherds and of hunters, as well as that of husbandmen;
and you will observe, too, that the warriors in Egypt are distinct
from all the other classes, and are commanded by the law to devote
themselves solely to military pursuits; moreover, the weapons which
they carry are shields and spears, a style of equipment which the
goddess taught of Asiatics first to us, as in your part of the world
first to you.

Then as to wisdom, do you observe how our law from the very first
made a study of the whole order of things, extending even to prophecy
and medicine which gives health, out of these divine elements
deriving what was needful for human life, and adding every sort of
knowledge which was akin to them.

All this order and arrangement the goddess first imparted to you when
establishing your city; and she chose the spot of earth in which you
were born, because she saw that the happy temperament of the seasons
in that land would produce the wisest of men. Wherefore the goddess,
who was a lover both of war and of wisdom, selected and first of all
settled that spot which was the most likely to produce men likest
herself. And there you dwelt, having such laws as these and still
better ones, and excelled all mankind in all virtue, as became the
children and disciples of the gods.

Many great and wonderful deeds are recorded of your state in our
histories. But one of them exceeds all the rest in greatness and
valour. For these histories tell of a mighty power which unprovoked
made an expedition against the whole of Europe and Asia, and to which
your city put an end. This power came forth out of the Atlantic
Ocean, for in those days the Atlantic was navigable; and there was an
island situated in front of the straits which are by you called the
Pillars of Heracles; the island was larger than Libya and Asia put
together, and was the way to other islands, and from these you might
pass to the whole of the opposite continent which surrounded the true
ocean; for this sea which is within the Straits of Heracles is only a
harbour, having a narrow entrance, but that other is a real sea, and
the surrounding land may be most truly called a boundless continent.

Now in this island of Atlantis there was a great and wonderful empire
which had rule over the whole island and several others, and over
parts of the continent, and, furthermore, the men of Atlantis had
subjected the parts of Libya within the columns of Heracles as far as
Egypt, and of Europe as far as Tyrrhenia. This vast power, gathered
into one, endeavoured to subdue at a blow our country and yours and
the whole of the region within the straits; and then, Solon, your
country shone forth, in the excellence of her virtue and strength,
among all mankind.

She was pre-eminent in courage and military skill, and was the leader
of the Hellenes. And when the rest fell off from her, being compelled
to stand alone, after having undergone the very extremity of danger,
she defeated and triumphed over the invaders, and preserved from
slavery those who were not yet subjugated, and generously liberated
all the rest of us who dwell within the pillars.

But afterwards there occurred violent earthquakes and floods; and in
a single day and night of misfortune all your warlike men in a body
sank into the earth, and the island of Atlantis in like manner
disappeared in the depths of the sea. For which reason the sea in
those parts is impassable and impenetrable, because there is a shoal
of mud in the way; and this was caused by the subsidence of the
island.

I have told you briefly, Socrates, what the aged Critias heard from
Solon and related to us. And when you were speaking yesterday about
your city and citizens, the tale which I have just been repeating to
you came into my mind, and I remarked with astonishment how, by some
mysterious coincidence, you agreed in almost every particular with
the narrative of Solon; but I did not like to speak at the moment.
For a long time had elapsed, and I had forgotten too much; I thought
that I must first of all run over the narrative in my own mind, and
then I would speak.

And so I readily assented to your request yesterday, considering that
in all such cases the chief difficulty is to find a tale suitable to
our purpose, and that with such a tale we should be fairly well
provided. And therefore, as Hermocrates has told you, on my way home
yesterday I at once communicated the tale to my companions as I
remembered it; and after I left them, during the night by thinking I
recovered nearly the whole it. Truly, as is often said, the lessons
of our childhood make wonderful impression on our memories; for I am
not sure that I could remember all the discourse of yesterday, but I
should be much surprised if I forgot any of these things which I have
heard very long ago. I listened at the time with childlike interest
to the old man's narrative; he was very ready to teach me, and I
asked him again and again to repeat his words, so that like an
indelible picture they were branded into my mind.

As soon as the day broke, I rehearsed them as he spoke them to my
companions, that they, as well as myself, might have something to
say. And now, Socrates, to make an end my preface, I am ready to tell
you the whole tale. I will give you not only the general heads, but
the particulars, as they were told to me.

The city and citizens, which you yesterday described to us in
fiction, we will now transfer to the world of reality. It shall be
the ancient city of Athens, and we will suppose that the citizens
whom you imagined, were our veritable ancestors, of whom the priest
spoke; they will perfectly harmonise, and there will be no
inconsistency in saying that the citizens of your republic are these
ancient Athenians. Let us divide the subject among us, and all
endeavour according to our ability gracefully to execute the task
which you have imposed upon us. Consider then, Socrates, if this
narrative is suited to the purpose, or whether we should seek for
some other instead."

http://ancienthistory.about.com/library/bl/bl_text_plato_critias_intro
.htm

The Critias is a fragment which breaks off in the middle of a
sentence. It was designed to be the second part of a trilogy, which,
like the other great Platonic trilogy of the Sophist, Statesman,
Philosopher, was never completed. Timaeus had brought down the origin
of the world to the creation of man, and the dawn of history was now
to succeed the philosophy of nature. The Critias is also connected
with the Republic. Plato, as he has already told us (Tim.), intended
to represent the ideal state engaged in a patriotic conflict. This
mythical conflict is prophetic or symbolical of the struggle of
Athens and Persia, perhaps in some degree also of the wars of the
Greeks and Carthaginians, in the same way that the Persian is
prefigured by the Trojan war to the mind of Herodotus, or as the
narrative of the first part of the Aeneid is intended by Virgil to
foreshadow the wars of Carthage and Rome. The small number of the
primitive Athenian citizens (20,000), 'which is about their present
number' (Crit.), is evidently designed to contrast with the myriads
and barbaric array of the Atlantic hosts. The passing remark in the
Timaeus that Athens was left alone in the struggle, in which she
conquered and became the liberator of Greece, is also an allusion to
the later history. Hence we may safely conclude that the entire
narrative is due to the imagination of Plato, who has used the name
of Solon and introduced the Egyptian priests to give verisimilitude
to his story. To the Greek such a tale, like that of the earth-born
men, would have seemed perfectly accordant with the character of his
mythology, and not more marvellous than the wonders of the East
narrated by Herodotus and others: he might have been deceived into
believing it. But it appears strange that later ages should have been
imposed upon by the fiction. As many attempts have been made to find
the great island of Atlantis, as to discover the country of the lost
tribes. Without regard to the description of Plato, and without a
suspicion that the whole narrative is a fabrication, interpreters
have looked for the spot in every part of the globe, America, Arabia
Felix, Ceylon, Palestine, Sardinia, Sweden.

For many generations, as tradition tells, the people of Atlantis were
obedient to the laws and to the gods, and practised gentleness and
wisdom in their intercourse with one another. They knew that they
could only have the true use of riches by not caring about them. But
gradually the divine portion of their souls became diluted with too
much of the mortal admixture, and they began to degenerate, though to
the outward eye they appeared glorious as ever at the very time when
they were filled with all iniquity. The all-seeing Zeus, wanting to
punish them, held a council of the gods, and when he had called them
together, he spoke as follows:--

No one knew better than Plato how to invent 'a noble lie.' Observe
(1) the innocent declaration of Socrates, that the truth of the story
is a great advantage: (2) the manner in which traditional names and
indications of geography are intermingled ('Why, here be truths!'):
(3) the extreme minuteness with which the numbers are given, as in
the Old Epic poetry: (4) the ingenious reason assigned for the Greek
names occurring in the Egyptian tale: (5) the remark that the armed
statue of Athena indicated the common warrior life of men and women:
(6) the particularity with which the third deluge before that of
Deucalion is affirmed to have been the great destruction: (7) the
happy guess that great geological changes have been effected by
water: ( Cool

the indulgence of the prejudice against sailing beyond the
Columns, and the popular belief of the shallowness of the ocean in
that part: (9) the confession that the depth of the ditch in the
Island of Atlantis was not to be believed, and 'yet he could only
repeat what he had heard', compared with the statement made in an
earlier passage that Poseidon, being a God, found no difficulty in
contriving the water-supply of the centre island: (10) the mention of
the old rivalry of Poseidon and Athene, and the creation of the first
inhabitants out of the soil. Plato here, as elsewhere, ingeniously
gives the impression that he is telling the truth which mythology had
corrupted.

http://zinken.typepad.com/palaeo/2003/11/the_doggerland_.html

The Doggerland Project
Prof. Bryony Coles has been examining the archaeology
of "Doggerland", which now lies under the North Sea. Its highest
point is the submerged Dogger Bank wherm prehistoric artefacts are
occasionally found by fishermen and geologists. At the height of the
last Ice Age, Doggerland was dry and stretched from the present east
coast of Britain and the present coasts of The Netherlands, Denmark
and North Germany. Thus, the so-called land-bridge, was a place where
people settled as the ice-sheets wasted and northwestern Europe
became habitable once more. But, as the ice-sheets retreated further
and sea levels rose, the North Sea encroached on the land, eventually
separating the British Peninsula from the mainland

http://www.nescb.org/epublications/winter2004/bookreview1.html

Dogger Bank, now covered by the North Sea, and which may be the
origin of the mysterious tale of Atlantis. Before rising seas drowned
the island about 12,000 years ago, humans hunted the wooly
rhinoceros, wild oxen, bear, and the mammoth.

http://www.ex-premie3.org/archives/archive.cgi?arch=f3a52b

When the last Ice Age was winding down about 10,000 years ago, the
sea level was much lower. In 8500 BC what is now the North Sea was
all land, and you could walk in a straight line from Mablethorpe to
Copenhagen.

Apparently lots of prehistoric remains have been dredged up from the
seabed, which is still shallow all the way over, known as the Dogger
Bank. So it would appear lots of people lived there.

Over the next 2 or 3 thousand years the sea level continued to rise
as the ice caps melted, and the area was flooded.

This may explain the legends in our culture of 'lost civilisations'
and 'great floods'.

http://abob.libs.uga.edu/bobk/ccc/cc101600.html

LETHAL FLOODS RAVAGED STONE AGE BRITAIN

From The Independent on Sunday, 15 October 2000
<http://www.independent.co.uk/news/UK/Science/2000-
10/stoneage151000.shtml>

By David Keys, Archaeology Correspondent

15 October 2000

Scientists are unearthing the long-lost secrets of Britain's own
Atlantis -
a vast area of former dry land under what is now the North Sea.

The investigations are revealing how ancient Stone Age communities
were
wiped out by a series of apocalyptic floods which, scientists
believe, are a
stern warning of the devastation that global warming and rising sea
levels
can cause.

After the last Ice Age, melting ice caused the southern half of the
North
Sea to rise by some 65ft in 2,000 years, submerging an area in the
North Sea
the size of modern Britain.

But researchers at Durham University have now established that
Britain also
suffered a series of shorter term but catastrophic floods with
terrible
effects on human communities, killing 2,000-3,000 people at a time.

Whereas populations were able to adapt to long-term sea level rise,
they
would have been unable to escape from the periodic super-floods which
resulted from it.

There were periods in which very large flat areas became vulnerable
to tidal
surge inundation for several hundred years before becoming permanently
submerged.

Between 7600 BC and 5900 BC around 1,000 square miles of North Sea
region
dry land would have been overwhelmed by 15ft-high tidal and storm
surges on
average four times a century - once a generation.

Due to the concentration of human hunter-gatherer activity in food-
rich
coastal and estuarine areas, such surges would probably have drowned
up to
2,000 people each time.

The geographical spread of these flood disasters has been calculated
by a
team of paleogeographers from Durham University who have just
completed a
survey of the drowning of the North Sea region.

Most of this 100,000 square mile British Atlantis was there in 8000
BC and
gone by 6500 BC. By then only a 140 mile long, 5,000 square mile
island,
where the Dogger Bank is now, survived.

This flooding was a pivotal event in British prehistory and Britain's
status
as an island dates from this time. The initial consequences were
technological, cultural and perhaps even genetic. The introduction of
new
continental weapons technology - new forms of arrow heads - was
delayed for
2,000 years. And subsequently the introduction of agriculture and
monumental
architecture was delayed for 1,000 years.

By ensuring that Britain lagged behind the continent, the drowning of
the
land-link was the cause of a pre-historic "two-speed" Europe.

Scientists involved in the research believe that, as well as helping
us to
understand the past, their work also acts as a warning for the
future.

Dr Ben Horton, a leading member of the University of Durham's Sea
Level
Research Unit, said: "Our investigations have revealed for the first
time
that large areas of land can be flooded very rapidly.

http://videoindex.pbs.org/program/all_chapters.jsp?item_id=36923

How did the human race populate the world? A group of geneticists
have worked on the question for a decade, arriving at a startling
conclusion: the "global family tree" can be traced to one African man
who lived 60,000 years ago. Dr. Spencer Wells hosts this innovative
series, featuring commentary by expert scientists, historians,
archaeologists, and anthropologists.

Dr. Spencer Wells' trek begins in the Kalahari Desert in Namibia,
where he visits the San Bushmen tribe and explains how DNA analysis
places them at the base of the family tree of humanity. He searches
for inherited mutation markers in the DNA chain, which are passed
down from father to sons. The San Bushmen marker is unique. Their
language, characterized by clicking, and their method of weapon
making, using bones to form the sharp tips, are indicative of the
first skills that separated men from apes. The ability to hunt
following tracks represented cognitive thinking skills not found in
animals.

Why did humans leave Africa? Were they driven out - or just curious
about what lay beyond? Paleoclimatologists believe an Ice Age began
about 72,000 years ago, causing a drought in Africa. Humans - and
their prey - had to move to survive.

After the first group arrived in Australia, a second group of humans
left Africa for parts unknown. This is the branch from which ninety
percent of humanity derives. We know this group headed toward China.
It took humans 10,000 years to get from the Middle East to Europe.
Why? Ancient art drawn by Cro-Magnon people reflect journeys through
ice. But the direct path from the Middle East wasn't frozen. During
the trek, the skin pigment of the ancient people lightened in order
to absorb more vitamin D from the sun. The question remains: why did
it take humanity so long to get to Europe?

http://bboard.scifi.com/bboard/browse.cgi/1/5/984/4871

Around 60,000 years ago, a man--identical to us in all important
respects--lived in Africa. Every person alive today is descended from
him. How did this real-life Adam wind up father of us all? What
happened to the descendants of other men who lived at the same time?
And why, if modern humans share a single prehistoric ancestor, do we
come in so many sizes, shapes, and races?

Showing how the secrets about our ancestors are hidden in our genetic
code, Spencer Wells reveals how developments in the cutting-edge
science of population genetics have made it possible to create a
family tree for the whole of humanity. We now know not only where our
ancestors lived but who they fought, loved, and influenced.

Informed by this new science, The Journey of Man is replete with
astonishing information. Wells tells us that we can trace our origins
back to a single Adam and Eve, but that Eve came first by some 80,000
years. We hear how the male Y-chromosome has been used to trace the
spread of humanity from Africa into Eurasia, why differing racial
types emerged when mountain ranges split population groups, and that
the San Bushmen of the Kalahari have some of the oldest genetic
markers in the world. We learn, finally with absolute certainty, that
Neanderthals are not our ancestors and that the entire genetic
diversity of Native Americans can be accounted for by just ten
individuals.

It is an enthralling, epic tour through the history and development
of early humankind--as well as an accessible look at the analysis of
human genetics that is giving us definitive answers to questions we
have asked for centuries, questions now more compelling than ever.

Spencer Wells was formerly head of the population genetics research
group at Oxford University's Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics
and is currently a consultant to the biotechnology industry. The
writer and presenter of the science film The Journey of Man, he has
been a consulting scientist for several other film productions.

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