Let me get straight into the point.
I have an idea about “body proportions”,on how in fact they are related to specific phenotypes(like the ones used by Carleton Coon),on how they are inherited and how that is related to anthropology etc Throughout time and close observation, I’ve been able to recognise some patterns about proportions,more specifically there was a time that I had an interest in body shapes,inheritance&anatomy while trying to understand mine on a deeper level as there were changes during puberty and I was playing sports,now there came an “eureka” moment where I was able to “detect” other people who had the same exact proportions(and not just similar,I mean if one was to put these people under a 3d scanner some proportions would be identical),the interesting part for me is that using some old anthropologist sources like Carleton Coon as I said,if one was to classify these people and me included we’d fall under the Upper Paleolithic phenotypes spectrum.
Which suggests to me two things,1) certain body proportions remain fixed and haven’t changed in a matter of tens of thousand years which tells me that looking at these certain proportions,classifications of modern humans and human remains could be made 2)Looking at how “body proportions”is something inherited and could go back as far as Upper Paleolithic also tells me that it is something as similar as any other phenotypic trait,I’ve seen people of different ethnicities share these exact proportions suggesting a common ancestor/ancestral population they inherited it from.
I could prove my point by finding a sample and apply measurements but I’ve no ability or qualification to do this,I don’t know if that is or isn’t important but I found it interesting and I’ve never been able to find some kind of text or research mentioning this.
I find interesting the idea of finding a sample in order to do a comparison to the body proportions who are the same meaning they are “fixed” and those who are not(which is probably due to the epigenetics and environment,which are fixed and which change and why?),it would explain a lot I think,one proportion that I’m sure of being a “fixed trait”is all that has to do with arms length both upper ,forearm and circumference ,and my guess would be also the clavicle shape and torso length while femur bone is said to be one the reasons for us humans getting taller the last centuries(meaning femur bone could be one of those proportions influenced by environment and epigenetics),such a research would help seperate which proportions have remained unchanged in a matter of thousand years and which has not,further than that it would create a classification system of skeleton types(based on the fixed proportions while ignoring the ones changed for the above reasons).I’ve found out for example that people as short as 1,58 and as tall as 1,85 have the same arms proportions while some of them are fat,other thin,muscular but in terms of arms length and physical phenotype they are identical underneath in some skeletal proportions.
I’ve a hard time trying to promote this idea so I don’t know really if it’s important but I’m sure 100% percent that there is validity in it.
The final result is I have a photographic archive of hundreds of such individuals and besides their
identical proportions,in terms of physical anthropology they’d all fall under the spectrum of Upper
Paleolithic Cromagnid influenced phenotypes(more later) I see a possibility that something an important
percentage of them might not fit the “type”that I’m talking about(20%maximum)as it’s not easy to
understand real measurements just by observing images but most are into it and that’s what matters I
think.
+++++++What I’m trying to explain and prove is that besides the phenomenal variety that exists in our body shapes,due to different skin texture(maybe),fat deposits and muscles which are influenced by environment,epigenetics,different genes ,our skeleton is a different story,I’d call it skeleton “phenotypes” where if we think of skeletons as a way of applied mathematics of nature(like the golden ratio for those who know)humans could be taxinomized based on SOME fixed measurements.
Adding more to this post and to make it more understandable,there are researches that prove there are identical measurements of body proportions between relatives which of course makes you think it’s not weird as we are speaking about the same family&genetics and it’s not coincidence,now think of this : what happens if you find other and other families with the same exact proportions?Someone might think that we are talking about a coincidence,but personally I’m more than 100% sure that we are talking about a “skeletal phenotype”.
In this post for example(I also have real life examples like me,my mother and friends completely unrelated to me besides these images)if you take the majority of them and me included and you did a 3D scan of body proportions,I’m 100%sure that SOME of them(that I don’t know which exactly due to the fact that I have no authority or qualification to do such research) they would have the same EXACT radius&humerus bone in such a 100% proximity that you’d think “these people can exchange their radius bone for example and have the same exact bone” I hope you get my idea.
Unfortunately I don’t have the ability to do some kind of research with 3D scans,but believe me If I was able to do it,I’m sure I’d find thousands of people.
Despite being reduced only to the act of observance,I’m 100% sure there is validity in this theory,so much that I wouldn’t call it a theory but a fact(at least for me it is but I’m not able to share it with others).
Although I shouldn’t write here again everything that I said to this post on wordpress, you could pay attention to the “Carleton Coon”reference(I know he’s outdated but I see a real connection there)and let me add a last thing, as I said and it’s my humble opinion,there are “skeletal phenotypes”that we do not see yet,in this post you’ll see only one,the one that I share with some people and it’s easy for me to detect it,after you read this reference about Carleton Coon&Upper Paleolithic Europeans,you can think that this one specific “skeletal phenotype”that I’m talking about goes as far back as that time!which for me at least is great to know,theoretically again If I had a large number of human remains from that time,I’d be able to find the ones with this phenotype!
The conclusion for me is that theoritically skeletons should be treated as phenotypes just like the variety of blue-green eyes etc but in this case we are talking about an unknown number of phenotypes.
It’s also interesting that we’re talking about IDENTICAL measurements,something that you can’t do when classifying skulls which from the dawn of history have been changing(you’ll read to the above post about the fact that SOME proportions are the identical ones that create the phenotype and others are changing due to unknown reasons to me which makes it even more interesting)so , in my mind,there are skeletal phenotypes where some bones consist of a phenotype and have remained unaltered in thousands of years through generations and some others susceptible to change(which change and which don’t is another problem I can’t solve without the ability to make a research based on a large sample).
++++For every person that exists,there is a number of thousands other people who share the same exact proportions,thing which proves that skeletons come in phenotypes.
Here is the photographic archive:
anatomicanthropologytheory 