Millions of years have passed since our ancestors stood upright on two legs, and we’ve learned much about them from archaeological and anthropological discoveries. The scientific revolution has given us a new way to ask questions and the answers we have found are truly fascinating. Here are some surprising insights into the lives of early humans.
Early Humans Had Surprisingly Low Genetic Diversity
Despite having found a large variety of different human species, the discoveries don’t differ too much in terms of their genetic make-up. The scientific reasoning lies in the fact that we (and all of our ancestors) come from the same location in East Africa.
In order to determine genetic diversity, scientists need to know the effective population size of a specific group. This size helps to understand how many organisms you need to create the genetic diversity of the full population. For our species, this number is 15,000 individuals to recreate a society of over 7 billion people.
