An Interesting Look at Japanese Culture via Blood Type
posted by al fin at 9:29 pm
“During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act” _George Orwell
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- Name: al fin
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7 Comments:
I have read that Chimps only have type A blood, Gorillas have type B blood, and Baboons have types A & B. Type O blood is apparently a relatively new and exclusively human trait. Does anyone else out there know more? I also know that I am O-, ee_ga is A+ and our daughter is A-.
Funny, just the other day I bought the book giving diets based on blood type. They said that O was the hunter type, they agreed on A, and they said that AB was quite rare.
I didn't pick up the book because I thought it was likely to be correct, it's just that I read huge numbers of books.
For those of you that are interested I did some research.
"Antigens are found in the invading substance and elicit the production of antibodies." type A blood produces type A antigen type B produces type B antigen type AB produces both and type O doesn't produce any. "The blood group antigens, on the other hand, are produced during the development of the circulatory system of the fetus." "There are several reasons scientists are interested in studying the evolution of human blood types -- the predominant reason being it helps them to understand the place humans occupy in evolution's branching tree. In other words, by studying the similarities and differences between human and non-human primate blood groups scientists can determine who our closest common ancestors are and the degree of our relationship." But how do the different blood types develop?
"n order to be blood type A, cytosine at nucleotide site 793 translates to leucine 265 and guanine at nucleotide site 800 transloates to glycine 267.
In order to be blood type B, the cytosine at 793 translates to methionone 265 and the guanine at 800 to alanine 267 (Martinko et al., 1993).
Blood type AB occurs when both changes occur.
Blood type O is caused when an inactive or nonfunctional protein is coded for." In other words if you are type O, blond or blue eyed you have some of the most recent functional mutations. Chimps "have predominantly blood type A and in rare cases blood type O, but NEVER blood type B (Socha et al., 1984). " Because of this it is thought that the primate before cro-magnon man is our last common ancestor capable of mating with modern chimp ancestors, or the node where we branch off. "In contrast to chimpanzees, gorillas have been found to possess ONLY blood type B. Some evolutionary scientists believe the gorilla to be the ancestor of Neanderthal man." Moving some scientists to hypothesize that Gorillas may have a closer common ancestor with Neanderthal, if we did cross bread with Neanderthal man that would explain our acquisition of type B. There is also speculation that "selection is at work today in the interacions between mother and fetus. Some studies have concluded that in mothers with type A blood who are carrying a fetus of type O (and vice versa), there is incompatibility which will result in miscarriage of the fetus." Luckily for me there is a shot called Rogam, which is capable of squelching the antigen reaction that could occur were the placenta to be damaged during deliveray. It is also important to note that it is the second child that will be effected not the first, suggesting that humans evolved with women giving birth to children sired by different men. Whether this was due to promiscuity or high death rates among cave men.... It has also suggested that Henry VIII was AB+ resulting in the birth of one healthy child from each wife and a miscarriage in all subsequent pregnancies.
For those of you who are interested there is a great article on the evolution of human blood types, and how what it implies about our closest primate relatives at http://facstaff.uwa.edu/jmccall/evolution_of_the_human.htm.
Britney Spears is "conservative, clam, responsible, introverted, reserved, punctual, perfectionist", eh?
OJ Simpson is a farmer?
Not very well-known but interesting nonetheless is the early-20th-century application of this blood-type/character schema to studies of racial temperament.
As Richard Siddle writes in Race, resistance and the Ainu of Japan (p. 86): Identifying two broad character types, an active type (blood groups O and B) and a passive type (A and AB), [Furukawa Takeji] then turned to an analysis of the 'violent and cruel' Taiwanese aborigines (the Musha Rebellion in which 134 Japanese had died had occurred only a few months before). Their 'stubborn' and energetic natures were due to a high proportion of O blood type, which meant that 'it will be necessary to exert an enormous amount of energy to civilise them.' The Ainu, on the other hand, 'not far from extinction', were predominantly B type, happy to live in the present 'with little care for the past or future'. In his conclusion, he suggested that a concrete proposal for pacification of the Taiwanese aborigines would be to let them intermarry with Japanese and so reduce the prevalence of O type, something that education alone could not accomplish.
Note that "Taiwanese aborigine" refers not to the majority Han inhabitants of the island (whose presence there in fact largely postdates European settlement) but to the Austronesian tribes they swamped. I've addressed the question of their "aboriginality" here.
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“During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act” _George Orwell
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