Recent Ancestry-Deep Ancestry

When asked, "What is your ancestry?" most people think back to their great grandparents and the countries of their origin(for me personally it is Swedish, Croatian(Dalmatia), Norwegian, and Scottish). But when considering life on an evolutionary timescale what I can hold in my own memory or gather from relatives is functionally similar to the memory of a baby.

A baby has difficulty learning complex things because it has many organs and brain functions that have yet to be developed and if it had to remember what happened 10 days ago in order to make a decision today it wouldn't do very well. Our ancestral memory though has recently undergone exponential growth. Due to advances in the field of genetics we can now trace our own personal history back thousands of years. How can we use this knowledge?

The second area I'd like to delve into is a way of testing for adaptability to various foods and begin to develop adaptability ratings based on these regions

N. Europe
S. Europe
N. Africa
S. Africa
N. America
S. America
C. Asia
E. Asia
S. Asia
Australia

Specifically you would place yourself in one of these categories not by appearance of ancestry, but by DNA markers of ancestry as outlined in human Genographic project. The genographic project is a privately-funded, not-for-profit collaboration between the National Geographic Society, IBM and the Waitt Family Foundation dedicated to mapping humanity's route out of Africa, starting with the initial suspected population in southern Africa 60,000-40,000 years ago all the way up to the present day. Here's a map of a few of the critical population points.




Each of the points refers to a gene marker, taken from section of each participants. There are, parts of the human genome that pass unshuffled from parent to child. These segments of DNA are only changed by occasional mutations. When these mutations are passed down to succeeding generations, they become markers of descent DNA that doesn't change as much.

A recent example from the National Geographic program The Human Family Tree highlights why the DNA marker is more important than your appearance. One of the shows participants, Dave, considered his heritage to be African-American(because visually this is what he saw) whereas upon testing his marker indicated that his marker came out of C. Asia and eventually Europe, which was the same marker of another participant George who considered his ancestry Greek. Essentially at the genetic level appearance based labels like African American and Greek break down, and for food adaptability ratings I predict they will also lose some of their usefulness(depending on if the adaptation is internal(gut adaptation/organs) or external(skin adaptation for Vitamin D production/absorbtion)).

The genetic/dietary connection can be seen when you compare the map above to the one below of the inability to digest lactose beyond 4 years of age .



In the future I'll post on other areas that may have a genetic connection like wheat and alcohol tolerance.

Next post I'll talk about how I think presumed random sampling leads to underlying bias in nutritional studies and examine how a tweak in experimental design could improve the reliability of research and the replication of results.

Evolutionary Tinkerer-T.V. Munson "The Grape Man of Texas"

The past few years I began to look around for books concerning evolution in practice. I had read a lot of Dawkins, Mayr, and Jared Diamonds books about evolution. However I wanted to switch from that type of learning to learning from people who were doing things where they used evolution in their everyday life. As far as I know Dawkins does not use evolution to think about the things he should and shouldn't eat, nor is he any type of doctor, geneticist, or grower that is using evoultionary ideas in his everyday life. His evolutionary life seems confined to academia. What I found in my search was a book about a man who was the quintessential evolutionary doer: T.V. Munson. His most famous work was Foundations of American Grape Culture originally published in the early 1900's and still in use today.

I know for a fact Elmer Swenson, the pioneer of the Minnesota wine industry, used what he learned from Munson's book to begin adapting cold hardy grapes to the Minnesota climate. I have been to a few of the wineries/vineyards here in Minnesota like the Cannon Valley winery, and they are making some really excellent wines and growing great tasting grapes. I learned a rather good evolutionary principle by reading Foundations of American Grape Culture where he talks about how breeders will often take their "star" vines and hybridize them together, which Munson argues leads them towards greater and greater fragility. He argues that the best method of hybridizing is to match the vines that are strong at certain characteristics, with vines that compensate for areas in which the star vine is weak.

I would like to start growing my own vines in the next couple years. I started a garden for the first time last year with good success and my wife and I made our own wine this year(with purchased grape must) as we are just wetting our feet.

I want to learn about natural systems by doing. Louis Pasteur when he discovered germs and came up with his germ theory of disease wasn't a doctor, he was working for the French wine and poultry industries.

For any interested in learning about Munson, his only biography was written by Sherrie. S McLeRoy and Roy E. Renfro, titled The Grape Man of Texas.

There is really interesting passage from Foundation of American Grape Culture that I wanted to share that I think tells me a lot about T.V. Munson the person. He entitled it "Personal Qualifications Necessary in the Originator." Which he meant to mean those who would take up the practice of hybridizing and breeding grape vines. He said :

"This work requires not only theoretical knowledge, but also direct personal knowledge, experience, skill, and much of the intentive faculty, with great patience and perserverence, without the stimulus of money-making in it, for there is little to the originator. There is no law providing protection to the inventions(varieties) of an originator, as there is to the less meritorious mechanical inventor. The originator must have a great fund of enthusiasm, and an ambition to add something to the general fund of human development for the benefit of the world at large, and, that he may reap some some personal compensation, or enjoyment, he must have an intense love of close communion with nature, causing him to admire the infinite correlated life movement; to study the loves and hates prevailing in all organic life and growth, discovering the great fundamental turth in ethics, as well as in the development of organic bbeings, that love breeds life, hate breeds death."(pages 129-130 of Foundations of American grape Culture.

Russell's dogs' table

I drew this image recently after reading a wonderful book called How Dogs Think by Stanley Coren. The outer eye represents the human color spectrum and the inner the dog, or that is what we think dogs see based on experiments.

It is a translation of my view of the world to hopefully some semblance of what my
Jack Russel, Kirby sees. Dogs see the world mostly in yellow and blue, with some degrees of black, brown, and grey. I understand now why he often used to lose the orange and yellow tennis balls in the grass if he couldn't smell them. Basically they both looked like the same color. Dogs eyes turn red into black, green into a brown-yellow, purple into blue.




Unlike my vision which has been selected to see multiple colors(probably based on the dietary fruit gathering) my dogs vision has been selected to see better at night and while moving. Both of these abilities would allow him to better catch prey at night. While that is not how he currently puts food in his dish, it is worth understanding for a couple of reasons.

The fact that a dog can not see in color means that he/she has no evolutionary relationship with fruits and vegetables(they do have the taste receptors for them but their % of a canine diet would have been low. They would also not have participated primarily in the selection/rejection process). Canis loopus have always been carnivores and many of the current dog and people foods are on a long time scale, quite recent additions. Like many in our population dogs may also have difficulty with cereal grains, sugar, and processed starches. Yet these can be some of the main ingredients in commercial dog foods. I try my best to steer clear of those. Kirby eats mostly raw beef, chicken, pork and bones or organ meat. I occasionally give him some yogurt(the no sugar or corn syrup variety). His treats are cuts of chicken or duck jerky that you can get at target/cub foods. I occasionally give him fruits and vegetables. He likes purple cabbage andI now know he can see it as the color blue. He has never needed to go to the vet yet and is in good health. My wife often complains that our apartment looks like a graveyard. Well...maybe.

Russell's Table

Note: These two tables are of the same dimension

In the The problems of philosophy written by Bertrand Russell he asks "is there any knowledge in the world that is so certain that no reasonable man could doubt it? To make our difficulties plain, let us concentrate our attention on the table...if several people are looking at the same moment, no two of them will see exactly the same two distribution of colours, because no two can see from exactly the same point of view."

Yes consider the table. Seriously? Russell's concern over differences in seeing tables strikes me as eerily similar to mathematicians who worry about normal distribution deviations when there are more pressing concerns staring them in the face.

I remember the problem of whether we could trust that the table was "really" there being presented to me first when I was studying European history at high school. I remember thinking at the the time that it was a ridiculous notion, and I still think the the problem as defined by Russell is ridiculous, however his notion and methodology of doubting his senses is not. I appreciate the work Bertrand and intend to expand on the problem and re-frame it.

If there is a sense I am not going to doubt it is one that is very old taking in data and representing something that is inanimate and unadaptive. Variations in viewing tables between members of the human population are going to be small, so small as to not matter(barring those who lost their sight or are color blind). However if you take the the notion of doubting sight and put it the right environment, suddenly Russell's concerns become quite useful.

Dylan(a twenty something northwesterner) walks into his local supermarket. He is on the hunt for his weekly supply of food. The American supermarket is the perfect example of an environment that has catered to the over selection of sight. As Dylan walks down the aisles all the food looks quite delicious and much of it also probably tastes good. However much of what he sees is indeed in need of being doubted. The entire middle of the grocery store showcases not the actual food he is going to eat were he to purchase something from this section, but pictures on boxes of the food. Want to know what's in it? Well then read the label. Yes language will tell us everything! Except for the fact that language until recently has never been used as a tool of food selection. The words we use like calorie, fat, carbohydrate, etc. all say something about a food, but we seem to think that we can capture everything about something in a word. No sooner has the word been villified as it later seems to come through a redemption. Fat is bad, carbs are bad, calories are bad. Later it's Good Calories Bad Calories, some fats are good for you, or natural sugars(like those found in fruit) are good.


The whole thing seems an elaborate opportunity for deception. Have we ever thought that we should stop thinking in language about our food choices? Alas we need to to uncover the damage that has already been done.

As a paleo dieter/EF'er Dylan buys virtually nothing from the center of the grocery store. He has wisened up and learned to buy from the outsides. Less deception there but there is still the opportunity for some.

Consider this nugget of information from the pages of Bernd Heinrich's book Winter World "Fruit's nutritional content depends on the season for which their dispersal is tailored. Thus although the highest-quality(highest energy content) fruits contain fat and sugar, that food(especially fat) causes rapid fruit spoilage due to microbes. Low fat and sugar contents, as well as high acidity and low water content all help to prolong branch life.....The tomatoes we get at the super market may be a close analogy. They are selected for long-distance travel from California and long shelf life, unlike the garden variety we grow for taste. As with wild fruit the nutrients that make them taste good also cause their rapid spoilage, and our commercial varieties of fruits are selected, like many winter fruits, for longevity."

High acidity taxes the kidney to produce a countering balancing "base" substance from reserves. Dylan has learned that eating is a dynamic process of expending energy to gain energy. Winter fruit bears a short term cost(whatever energy Dylan's body has to direct to the kidneys that doesn't get directed elsewhere.)

So Dylan can not even use his rule "shop around the outside of the store" exclusively an be entirely confident in his senses. Some might add the rule "buy local", but even if a fruit is local you may not live in an area that can produce high fat fruit. So your local fruit will be selected for the ability to survive winter giving it the same sort of characteristics as those shipped from far away. What is the solution?

Dylan must learn to understand the dynamics of evolution, signaling systems and the ways in which people are consciously and unconsciously fooled by reality.

When selecting food Dylan needs to see bright colors and use his sense of taste to sense an acceptable fat/sugar ratio. Some parts of his mind may get the feeling that something is "too sweet" or "too tart". He also needs language to document, experiment, and remember the good and bad choices he has made.

He needs the knowledge that in evolution what works in some instances may not work as well in others. Perhaps shipping is fast enough in some instances so that the fruit he finds is of the good high fat variety. Perhaps some canned tomatoes, may be better at certain points of the year than those he could buy that are fresh. Perhaps during some periods he will have to intermittently fast.

As humans we have created an environment with the supermarket, where the dimension of selection is primarily sight and language. When you understand what some things have to go through in order to look good in that environment(versus similar fruit found in more natural settings), Bertrand Russell's Table suddenly becomes an interesting problem that you confront quite often. I have simply added some fruit on top of it.