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Analytical thinking does not decrease religious belief

It seems to me that psychology would benefit from taking a break from publishing new findings and clean house of all the junk that has accumulated over the years. Junk breeds junk, and if left unchecked can generate entire unwholesome disciplines (as the sad state of the social sciences proves to us daily).

Related:

• Excess Success for Psychology Articles in the Journal Science

PLoS ONE 12(2): e0172636. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0172636

Direct replication of Gervais & Norenzayan (2012): No evidence that analytic thinking decreases religious belief

Clinton Sanchez, Brian Sundermeier, Kenneth Gray, Robert J. Calin-Jageman

Gervais & Norenzayan (2012) reported in Science a series of 4 experiments in which manipulations intended to foster analytic thinking decreased religious belief. We conducted a precise, large, multi-site pre-registered replication of one of these experiments. We observed little to no effect of the experimental manipulation on religious belief (d = 0.07 in the wrong direction, 95% CI[-0.12, 0.25], N = 941). The original finding does not seem to provide reliable or valid evidence that analytic thinking causes a decrease in religious belief.

Link

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Jewish and Indian ancestry in the Bene Israel

PLoS ONE 11(3): e0152056. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0152056

The Genetics of Bene Israel from India Reveals Both Substantial Jewish and Indian Ancestry
Yedael Y. Waldman , Arjun Biddanda , Natalie R. Davidson, Paul Billing-Ross, Maya Dubrovsky, Christopher L. Campbell, Carole Oddoux, Eitan Friedman, Gil Atzmon, Eran Halperin, Harry Ostrer, Alon Keinan

The Bene Israel Jewish community from West India is a unique population whose history before the 18th century remains largely unknown. Bene Israel members consider themselves as descendants of Jews, yet the identity of Jewish ancestors and their arrival time to India are unknown, with speculations on arrival time varying between the 8th century BCE and the 6th century CE. Here, we characterize the genetic history of Bene Israel by collecting and genotyping 18 Bene Israel individuals. Combining with 486 individuals from 41 other Jewish, Indian and Pakistani populations, and additional individuals from worldwide populations, we conducted comprehensive genome-wide analyses based on FST, principal component analysis, ADMIXTURE, identity-by-descent sharing, admixture linkage disequilibrium decay, haplotype sharing and allele sharing autocorrelation decay, as well as contrasted patterns between the X chromosome and the autosomes. The genetics of Bene Israel individuals resemble local Indian populations, while at the same time constituting a clearly separated and unique population in India. They are unique among Indian and Pakistani populations we analyzed in sharing considerable genetic ancestry with other Jewish populations. Putting together the results from all analyses point to Bene Israel being an admixed population with both Jewish and Indian ancestry, with the genetic contribution of each of these ancestral populations being substantial. The admixture took place in the last millennium, about 19–33 generations ago. It involved Middle-Eastern Jews and was sex-biased, with more male Jewish and local female contribution. It was followed by a population bottleneck and high endogamy, which can lead to increased prevalence of recessive diseases in this population. This study provides an example of how genetic analysis advances our knowledge of human history in cases where other disciplines lack the relevant data to do so.

Link

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The plight of the Assyrians

ISIS Onslaught Engulfs Assyrian Christians as Militants Destroy Ancient Art

ISTANBUL — The reports are like something out of a distant era of ancient conquests: entire villages emptied, with hundreds taken prisoner, others kept as slaves; the destruction of irreplaceable works of art; a tax on religious minorities, payable in gold.

A rampage reminiscent of Tamerlane or Genghis Khan, perhaps, but in reality, according to reports by residents, activist groups and the assailants themselves, a description of the modus operandi of the Islamic State’s self-declared caliphate this week. The militants have prosecuted a relentless campaign in Iraq and Syria against what have historically been religiously and ethnically diverse areas with traces of civilizations dating to ancient Mesopotamia.

The latest to face the militants’ onslaught are the Assyrian Christians of northeastern Syria, one of the world’s oldest Christian communities, some speaking a modern version of Aramaic, the language of Jesus.

The New York Times reporter need not have gone to so distant a past to find parallels to the plight of the Assyrians, as this is merely a repeat of what happened only a hundred years ago.

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A Persian in China (Y chromosome of Sayyid Ajjal)

Quite remarkable that a Persian (Sayyid Ajjal) would leave many descendants in faraway China, and one of this descendants (Zheng He) would one day set out to explore the West (from the perspective of China). A nice reminder of how far a Y-chromosome lineage might travel, even in the span of a couple of centuries.

arXiv:1310.5466 [q-bio.PE]

Present Y chromosomes support the Persian ancestry of Sayyid Ajjal Shams al-Din Omar and Eminent Navigator Zheng He

Chuan-Chao Wang et al.

Sayyid Ajjal is the ancestor of many Muslims in areas all across China. And one of his descendants is the famous Navigator of Ming Dynasty, Zheng He, who led the largest armada in the world of 15th century. The origin of Sayyid Ajjal's family remains unclear although many studies have been done on this topic of Muslim history. In this paper, we studied the Y chromosomes of his present descendants, and found they all have haplogroup L1a-M76, proving a southern Persian origin.

Link

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Y chromosomes and mtDNA from the Maldives

Of interest from the paper:

The haplogroup J(M304) Y chromosomes are all in subgroup J2(M172). 

... 

However, Eaaswarkhanth et al. (2010) report that Muslims and non-Muslims in India largely have the same Y-haplogroup frequency distribution, except that in Muslims low frequencies of Y-E1b1b1a(M78), Y-J(M304)(xJ2(M172)), and Y-G(M201) are found that are absent in non-Muslims (Eaaswarkhanth et al., 2010). In our Maldivian sample, none of those Y-haplogroups were found.

AJPA DOI: 10.1002/ajpa.22256

Indian ocean crossroads: Human genetic origin and population structure in the maldives

Jeroen Pijpe et al.

The Maldives are an 850 km-long string of atolls located centrally in the northern Indian Ocean basin. Because of this geographic situation, the present-day Maldivian population has potential for uncovering genetic signatures of historic migration events in the region. We therefore studied autosomal DNA-, mitochondrial DNA-, and Y-chromosomal DNA markers in a representative sample of 141 unrelated Maldivians, with 119 from six major settlements. We found a total of 63 different mtDNA haplotypes that could be allocated to 29 mtDNA haplogroups, mostly within the M, R, and U clades. We found 66 different Y-STR haplotypes in 10 Y-chromosome haplogroups, predominantly H1, J2, L, R1a1a, and R2. Parental admixture analysis for mtDNA- and Y-haplogroup data indicates a strong genetic link between the Maldive Islands and mainland South Asia, and excludes significant gene flow from Southeast Asia. Paternal admixture from West Asia is detected, but cannot be distinguished from admixture from South Asia. Maternal admixture from West Asia is excluded. Within the Maldives, we find a subtle genetic substructure in all marker systems that is not directly related to geographic distance or linguistic dialect. We found reduced Y-STR diversity and reduced male-mediated gene flow between atolls, suggesting independent male founder effects for each atoll. Detected reduced female-mediated gene flow between atolls confirms a Maldives-specific history of matrilocality. In conclusion, our new genetic data agree with the commonly reported Maldivian ancestry in South Asia, but furthermore suggest multiple, independent immigration events and asymmetrical migration of females and males across the archipelago. Am J Phys Anthropol 000:000–000, 2013. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Link

Genomewide diversity in the Levant (Haber et al. 2013)

Razib points me to a new paper (and its associated data, consisting of Christian, Druze, and Muslim Lebanese).


Genome-Wide Diversity in the Levant Reveals Recent Structuring by Culture

Marc Haber et al.

The Levant is a region in the Near East with an impressive record of continuous human existence and major cultural developments since the Paleolithic period. Genetic and archeological studies present solid evidence placing the Middle East and the Arabian Peninsula as the first stepping-stone outside Africa. There is, however, little understanding of demographic changes in the Middle East, particularly the Levant, after the first Out-of-Africa expansion and how the Levantine peoples relate genetically to each other and to their neighbors. In this study we analyze more than 500,000 genome-wide SNPs in 1,341 new samples from the Levant and compare them to samples from 48 populations worldwide. Our results show recent genetic stratifications in the Levant are driven by the religious affiliations of the populations within the region. Cultural changes within the last two millennia appear to have facilitated/maintained admixture between culturally similar populations from the Levant, Arabian Peninsula, and Africa. The same cultural changes seem to have resulted in genetic isolation of other groups by limiting admixture with culturally different neighboring populations. Consequently, Levant populations today fall into two main groups: one sharing more genetic characteristics with modern-day Europeans and Central Asians, and the other with closer genetic affinities to other Middle Easterners and Africans. Finally, we identify a putative Levantine ancestral component that diverged from other Middle Easterners ~23,700–15,500 years ago during the last glacial period, and diverged from Europeans ~15,900–9,100 years ago between the last glacial warming and the start of the Neolithic.

Link

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