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by DamnYuppie
2932 days ago
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Well to be honest I believe you underestimate humanity. There are way too many instances of clans who would fight till nearly both parties were eradicated. Regardless of that I am not convinced that is the root cause. I feel this whole theory misses some key elements of our ancestors. First the idea that each male was able to reproduce at the same rate or had the same opportunity to breed as each other; this is not how nature really works! For most mammals only a few males get to bread each year with ALL the females in a herd. The alpha male will do the overwhelming majority of the breading for X number of years until displaced, i.e. dies of natural causes or is violently displaced. Our ancestors were most likely not very different. This, in my opinion, could be one of the reasons women in a group will synchronize their menstrual cycles, as it would help to ensure the male could bread everyone in a short time period and not worry about competitors sneaking in as much. Also the idea that there were equal number of men and women needs to be looked at. Again, in nature, there is generally way more females then males. A healthy and diverse herd is considered to be around 70% female and 30% male. |
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The article is talking about Y chromosomes, not the rate of successful breeding of each male. In patrilineal clans, all males share the same Y chromosome since they are all related. It doesn't matter which males within the clan breed when you are analyzing Y chromosomes.
As long as a single male within the clan breeds, the Y chromosome will be passed on.
The question is why many Y chromosomes disappeared from the gene pool. Why the diversity in Y chromosomes declined so drastically.
> The alpha male will do the overwhelming majority of the breading for X number of years until displaced, i.e. dies of natural causes or is violently displaced.
Once again, that doesn't matter in Y chromosomal diversity analysis. It doesn't matter whether you or your brother was "alpha". It doesn't matter which one of you fathered most of the descendents since both you and your brother carry the same Y chromosome.
The question is, if you were living thousands of years ago, why you, your brother, your paternal related male cousins, etc didn't breed. IE, why your clan's Y chromosomal legacy didn't make it while your mother, sister, female cousin's, etc mDNA ( mitochondrial DNA ) did make it. Why did your female genetic legacy make it while your male genetic legacy did not?
It's pretty clear that warfare played a role. There is no disease that wipes out only the males and none that wipes out 100% of the male population. Even if disease wiped out 99% of the males in your clan, the 1% remaining can breed with all the females and replenish the clan and your Y chromosome would live on.