[enkid]

Out of Africa was fought by the majority of Western scientists during the early 20th century because of their pro-European biases. The reason its accepted is because the preponderance of evidence supports it.

[whimsicalism]

there were also a lot of sociocultural changes coming out of the 60s/70s that changed the scientific conclusions we drew.

it used to be that we saw changes in ancient pottery and language and assumed that previous people had been replaced by new people with different techniques. then, in the 60s/70s it became popular that these changes didn’t mark population replacement but were more cultural spread and shift.

then genetics came around in the 90s and obliterated the cultural hypothesis and showed that in most of these cases it was largely population replacement.

there are lots of theories from the mid-20th that haven’t yet had their ‘genetics in the 90s’ moment.

[PittleyDunkin]

> then genetics came around in the 90s and obliterated the cultural hypothesis and showed that in most of these cases it was largely population replacement.

I think the current consensus is a fusion of the two stances, particularly as some of the changes have appeared to be too rapid to reflect population displacement, and genetics clearly indicate genetic admixture with varying distinguishing characteristics relevant to the region and timeperiod as opposed to straight displacement.

Unsatisfying, I know, but basically any firm position on either side has equally firm arguments against it.

[Mountain_Skies]

No doubt those biased Europeans felt their theory had the preponderance of evidence behind it. Funny how often the settled science is like that until the incumbent scientists die off rather than because better evidence was considered and adopted by science.

[anonymousDan]

I don't think it's some sort of conspiracy among scientists. A lot of the genetic sequencing techniques simply weren't possible until recently.