Out of Africa? Political Correctness and Science

Regular readers may know that I’m wont to joke that we are all African-Americans, and so should be eligible for minority set-asides, scholarships and/or reparations (should they ever be awarded). My joke is based upon the prevailing hypothesis about the origin of modern Homo sapiens sapiens.  Personally, I’ve never accepted the Out of Africa model (aka single replacement), but it’s been the favored scientific “wisdom” for some time. The proposals of Milford H. Wolpoff, who advances the multiregional hypothesis, have always seemed to make more sense, but even that model envisions Africa as our ultimate homeland.

The Out of Africa model proposes that all modern humans descend from a common ancestral branch that first arose in Africa sometime around a mere 200,000 years ago. From Africa, these thoroughly modern humans spread out to populate the entire world about 60,000 years ago, displacing all previous populations (such as Neanderthals) who then died off.

The multiregional hypothesis differs by proposing that rather than displacing earlier forms of humans, the more recent migrants from Africa simply interbred with and absorbed those populations.

Recently, some Russian geneticists reported on research that suggests that the common ancestor of all modern humans may never have lived in Africa. Their research was published by a company that might be called part of the “alternative” scientific press.

You may not believe in human evolution. This post doesn’t argue for or against evolution but is an attempt to demonstrate how political correctness can corrupt what’s presented as objective science.

Some believe that the reason that the Out of Africa model became so popular is simple political correctness. [emphasis added to quotes]

Scientific evidence refuting the theory of modern humanity’s African genesis is common knowledge among those familiar with the most recent scientific papers on the human Genome, Mitochondrial DNA and Y-chromosomes. Regrettably, within mainstream press and academia circles, there seems to be a conspicuous – and dare we say it – deliberate vacuum when it comes to reporting news of these recent studies and their obvious implications.

 

Australian historian Greg Jefferys explains that, “The whole ‘Out of Africa’ myth has its roots in the mainstream academic campaign in the 1990′s to remove the concept of Race. When I did my degree they all spent a lot of time on the ‘Out of Africa’ thing but it’s been completely disproved by genetics. Mainstream still hold on to it.”

Yes, some are motivated by a desire to “remove the concept of Race,” but others (who prefer to divide us) use the “myth” to help promote Afrocentrism, as illustrated by a book written by Professor Mary Lefkowitz and reviewed by Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.:

“Not Out of Africa” [How Afrocentrism Became an Excuse to Teach Myth as History] has sparked widespread debate over the teaching of revisionist history in schools and colleges. Was Socrates black? Did Aristotle steal his ideas from the library in Alexandria? Do we owe the underlying tenets of our democratic civilization to the Africans? Mary Lefkowitz explains why politically motivated histories of the ancient world are being written and shows how Afrocentrist claims blatantly contradict the historical evidence. “Not Out of Africa” is an important book that protects and argues for the necessity of historical truths and standards in cultural education.

“Not Out of Africa” combines a learned demolition of various politically correct historical fantasies with a thoughtful inquiry into questions of historical method and of academic freedom. Anyone perplexed by multicultural education should read it.

So history as well as anthropology falls victim to political correctness. A particular bias for the Out of Africa model is said to be more prevalent in Europe and the USA, while scientists elsewhere (particularly Russia and China) tend to disagree. Harvard biochemist Christian Schwabe wrote,

The “out of Africa” idea of human evolution is dominant among anthropologists perhaps because most fossils were found there, because of the commitment to a single origin scenario, and finally because of cultural demands that all humans be of equal descent. In the final analysis these are not very forceful reasons.

Perhaps because of “cultural demands”, political correctness and the politicization of “science” are becoming the norm in the United States and Europe. Most obvious is the slanting of the science on “global warming“, which is also called inadvertent climate modification, greenhouse effect, anthropogenic climate change, anthropogenic global warming, global climate change, global heating, climate breakdown, and climate insecurity.

The ever-morphing terminology is one clue that politicization happens frequently in climate science.

Most scientific studies expressing an opinion accept the theory that humans cause global warming, says one much-cited meta-analysis. That amazing 97.1% “consensus” figure is proof, however, only of how cleverly some lie with statistics. Nearly two thirds of the studies examined expressed no opinion. In addition, the meta-analysis included research abstracts from only peer-reviewed scientific literature. Which brings us to another way that political correctness infects science: through the suppression and deliberate non-publication of opposing views.

Peer review is the standard for credibility. Or it used to be.

Now political correctness is used to prevent opposing viewpoints from being published in peer-reviewed journals in the first place, which keeps the world from seeing any research-based evidence that refutes the prevailing “wisdom”, seemingly confirming the imaginary “consensus”.

Thus the need for an alternative scientific press, such as the one that published the findings of those Russian geneticists.

Similar forces of political correctness gave rise to a need for the New Media (aka the alternative media, including the “pajamas media” or bloggers). As mainstream media falls victim to political correctness, the alternative media steps in.

There are obvious parallels between the current suppression of some “inconvenient” scientific facts and the Catholic Church’s suppression of Galileo’s work in defense of the theories of Copernicus.

A New Inquisition?

While that might sound extreme, consider that one professor has actually proposed holding “climate deniers” criminally negligent:

What are we to make of those behind the well documented corporate funding of global warming denial? Those who purposefully strive to make sure “inexact, incomplete and contradictory information” is given to the public? I believe we understand them correctly when we know them to be not only corrupt and deceitful, but criminally negligent in their willful disregard for human life. It is time for modern societies to interpret and update their legal systems accordingly.

The professor sounds far from “modern” in his analysis. His argument also sounds like a classic case of projection: Who is suppressing “contradictory information?”

Yet more evidence:

The journal Environmental Research Letters refused to publish an article by Lennart Bengtsson and other academics which flagged up inconsistencies in temperature projections. …

Prof [Richard] Tol, who refused to sign a recent Intergovernmental Pancel on Climate Change (IPCC) report because it was too alarmist said: “Environmental Research Letters is known for making politically inspired decisions. They are very green, and not the scientific journal that they claim to be.

“There are few people with as much credibility as Lennart Bengtsson. His integrity is beyond doubt.”

The paper by Prof Bengtsson, of Reading University, challenged findings by the IPCC that the global average temperature would rise by up to 4.5C if greenhouse gases in the atmosphere were allowed to double.

It suggested that the climate might be much less sensitive to greenhouse gases than has previously been claimed.

Unfortunately, common sense wins some and loses some. Here’s more evidence of politically correct suppression combined with economic bullying:

Some of the world’s top PR companies have for the first time publicly ruled out working with climate change deniers, marking a fundamental shift in the multi-billion dollar industry that has grown up around the issue of global warming.

Public relations firms have played a critical role over the years in framing the debate on climate change and its solutions – as well as the extensive disinformation campaigns launched to block those initiatives.

Now a number of the top 25 global PR firms have told the Guardian they will not represent clients who deny man-made climate change, or take campaigns seeking to block regulations limiting carbon pollution. Companies include WPP, Waggener Edstrom (WE) Worldwide, Weber Shandwick, Text100, and Finn Partners. …

Not surprisingly, all things considered, that news comes on the heels of this:

U.S. President Barack Obama and EU leaders meeting in Brussels this month [March 2014] will throw their combined weight behind tackling climate change, a document seen by Reuters says, in a show of developed world solidarity on the need for a new global deal. …

Both the European Union and the United States are preparing new pledges on cutting emissions for the first quarter of 2015, ahead of a U.N. summit in Paris that is meant to agree a new worldwide deal.

Its aim must be to limit any global average temperature increase to less than 2 degrees Celsius compared with pre-industrial levels “and should therefore include ambitious mitigation contributions, notably from the world’s major economies and other significant emitters,” the document said.

Why doesn’t Obama just stretch out his all-powerful hand and command the oceans to stop rising?

Political correctness also impedes science with regard to determining how the Americas were first populated. For political reasons, activists persuaded the U.S. Congress to pass a law that requires ancient human remains found within the USA to be controlled by “Native Americans”, who are assumed to be the descendants of the deceased. Remains are turned over to tribes living in the same geographical area for reburial, as if humans haven’t migrated over the intervening tens of thousands of years. In some cases, no scientific study of the remains is conducted, as that would be disrespectful towards “the ancestors” and would desecrate their remains.

Everything from mineral rights to land rights to separate nationhood status depends upon maintaining the “common wisdom” (or imaginary consensus) that the ancestors of today’s “Native Americans” were the only first inhabitants of this hemisphere and were basically homogenous. In addition, some Native American mythologies teach that “the ancestors” were indigenous to the Americas, so they never could have been Out of Africa, or even Siberia. To say otherwise is politically incorrect and disrespectful to their culture. After all, this is a now a nation where cultural relativism is almost a religion.

Cultural relativism is the view that no culture is superior to any other culture when comparing systems of morality, law, politics, etc. It’s the philosophical notion that all cultural beliefs are equally valid and that truth itself is relative, depending on the cultural environment.

In truth, we are all immigrants to this hemisphere, the only variable being time. Who came first is yet to be determined, if it will even be allowed to be determined. The way things are looking, we may never know the truth, because politics is far too involved in the study of Ancient America.

So the Solutreans may never get their due. The Solutrean hypothesis proposes that migrants from western Europe arrived on the east coast of America somewhere between 21,000 and 13,500 years ago. That hypothesis, as you might imagine, has “not been well received.”

The field of psychology is similarly infected by politics. For example, research is published purporting to prove that conservatives are mentally ill or that whites are particularly, if not uniquely, prone to subconscious racial microaggressions, the latter hypothesis leading to some very ridiculous, divisive, and rather unfortunate incidents.

Anthropology, history, paleontology, archaeology, psychology–these are not the only fields of study subject to corruption by political correctness, but they seem to be the most susceptible, especially the social sciences.

Everything is political and everything is tainted with politics.

Politically corrupted science bodes ill for this Republic, which is the topic of an upcoming post. Stay tuned.

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