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Climate Shaped the Human Nose, Researchers Say (theguardian.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Human noses have been shaped by climate, according to research probing variation in the human snout. Researchers say their findings back up the theory that wider nostrils developed in populations living in warm, humid conditions, while populations living in high latitudes, such as northern Europe, developed narrower nostrils as an adaptation to the chilly, dry conditions. Writing in the journal Plos Genetics, researchers from the U.S., Ireland and Belgium describe how they began to unpick variations in nose shape by using 3D facial imaging to take a host of measurements from 476 volunteers of south Asian, east Asian, west African and northern European ancestry. The results revealed that only two out of seven nose-related traits were found to differ more between the populations than would be expected from the impact of random, chance changes in genetic makeup over time. The authors say that suggests variations in those traits have been influenced by natural selection. With further analysis, based on data from participants of west African and European ancestry, confirming that nose shape is highly heritable, the team looked to see if there was a link between nose shape and climate. The results showed that nostril width is linked to temperature and absolute humidity, with participants whose ancestors lived in warm-humid climates on average having wider nostrils than those whose ancestors lived in cool-dry climates. That, says Arslan Zaidi, co-author of the study from Pennsylvania State University, could be because narrower nasal passages help to increase the moisture content of air and warm it -- a bonus for those in higher latitudes.
You can pick your friends, you can pick your nose, but you can't unpick variations in nose shape by using 3D facial imaging to take a host of measurements from 476 volunteers of south Asian, east Asian, west African and northern European ancestry.
Sounds like an H1-B! Go back to your country!!!!
We like to think that this means that humans decided to have trait X, but it really means that those who didn't have trait X were less likely to reproduce and pass on that trait, right?
So does this mean that people with the wrong kind of nose are less likely to thrive in those areas?
Or does it just mean that people of the opposite sex that lived in those areas found that type of nostril more attractive?
Or some combination of both?
Or something else? (e.g. pure dumb luck after some major catastrophe)
You got to wonder what the motive for the U.S. and U.K researchers were, considering both countries have collectively cut off their nose to spite their face. ;)
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
I live in a northern latitude, have narrow nostrils, and breathe through my mouth. Is that bad, then?
We should devote more of our Student's tuition and my tax money to subsidize studies about stuff I don't give a shit about. Hawk nose, no-nose, skinny nose, broad nose...they all smell the same from my altitude.
Climate might have started shaping human nose, but the project was actually completed by plastic surgeons in Los Angeles.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
When I get a flu, almost always it's my right nostril that gets clogged. Left nostril rarely clogs. What could be the cause? I tend to sleep on my right side.
Oh well, I can live with that. As long as my nose doesn't start whistling.
how was climate when elephants appeared on the Earth ?
What? No comments yet about the "Sweet Sixteen Nose-Job."
if air is cheap, then noses curl to the mouth like a backhow or a pick or shovel.
There was recently an article about holocaust denial in Google, of tge holocaust happened then shouldnt there be some noses born straight not hooked? You cant pick your nose, but your lifestyle picks your children's nose.
most noses pulled down by gravity like a hook because the skeleton and skin by either parent genome didnt match right. comparing a Great Dane to a Sharpee is like a Chijuajua was born with all the skin of a Dane.
The hooknose was because of middle-eastern dna. Likely of how most African slave trade was pushed to middle-east and they sired to slave dna resulting to the unethical genome branches exhibitting such characteristics.
Did anyone else misread?
As far as evolutionary theory goes, this is about as "Captain Obvious" you can get, imho.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
It's not just the snout that's changed.
Even with a massive margins of error, the trend in that graphic is concerning enough to at least be cautious. Jews are around 10 IQ points higher than whites and 60 IQ points higher than Australian aborigines for example. 30 of that max can be explained by nutrition, education and poverty, but making up the other 30 by environmental factors alone is near impossible.
Australian aborigines have scientifically proven, better vision than Europeans and probably any other demographic in the world. If the eye can differ in quality between groups of people who have evolved in separate continents for millennia, then why can't the brain - itself merely another physical organ?
As another example, the difference in intelligence between a border collie and bulldog is vast, and pit bulls are obviously much more aggressive than labrador retrievers. Human races are somewhat comparable to different breeds. We are okay speaking about these differences in dogs, but when it comes to humans, then we have to be all PC.
Having spent several months on the polar plateau, I say it's humbug. There's not enough room in the nose to warm up air appreciably, and the extra surface area exposed to cold air is more likely to expose it to frostbite (and chunks falling off) than do anything useful. What good will that air-warmer do once it has fallen off?
Also, how could any study of the suitability of nose type to climate fail to include at least one polar people, such as the Inuit, Sami, or Chukchi?
Is for finding truffles.
Like they say, you can pick your friends, but you can't pick your nose.
https://app.box.com/WitthoftResume Code: https://github.com/cellocgw
Terrible!
...omphaloskepsis often...
If we don't tax everything, restrict energy usage and return to the 1700s, Climate change will make all of our noses look funny and we will become the laughing stock of the Galaxy.
Though why do those living in high altitude South American countries have bigger nasal passages? Or is that just a hold over from migration within the last 40k years?
Hey Im beau,, :)
I dont know what im doing here,, Isn't it obvious by the stuff ive been posting..
my mouth is so full of DICE, it seems to impact my brain to the point that I must spit out this crap (along with other fluids) in order to avoid choking..
I seek to be important and significant, only to further marginalize my self when opening my mouth.
Maybe others may catch on to the fact that I got this job through acts of Lewd and indecent fornication with your fellow DICE overlords? Naw, I'll blind them with facets of fantastic fornication..
animals adapt to their environment.
One could argue it's all wrong from the expected results: whitey ought to have big fat ape nostrils evolved for easier picking with gloves on. Blacky ought to have skinny nostrils because he doesn't need the gloves.
Nice try evolutionists, you clearly lost this time.
Under the current PC rules, this is Racist. Evolution is Racist! (Just drawing a conclusion for what I have been told.)
As the old saying goes "everyone knows that and scientifically measured and quantified are not the same thing".
Is that why Bill Cosby, others, and I have huge noses? :P
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
I guess this means all our noses are about to change shape.
Serioulsly? What's next? Climate shaped the eyes? Climate influenced skin color?
I thought this was already a matter of fact.