Well I tried to ask my anthropology professor about how our red hair is related to Neanderthal red hair. Have you ever tried to ask an old school prof a question? Let me clue you in . . .
this is how he anwered.
Being able to perceive red is of evolutionary interest. Monkeys that eat fruit seem to have developed the ability in order to tell them when fruit was ripe and edible. Then there are the prosimans, some of which began developing red coats---so sexual selection comes into play. For instance a baboon in estres---the red color indicating her health and ability to reproduce. Many orangutans developed red coats, further supporting some type of sexual selection at play. they have mapped the Neanderthal genome, and the red hair in some is interesting----the third color if you will. And some modern humans have 2.5 percent of their genome in our gentic makeup. But hair color is complicated, and many factors are responsible for hair color, not all of which are fully understood. It cannot be hinged on one specific gene. You see?
think Chappy. he expects and acknowledgement. he wants to know you understood. get that deer in the headlights look off your face!
"Uhm, so would you say that saying Neandethal genes cause red hair in modern humans would be an oversimplification?"
"Exactly".
Hope that helped you as much as it helped me.
Teasing aside, he is an excellent professor who gives fantastic lectures. He is old school, and worked as an archeologist and curator of our natural history museum for many years. He was a professor at Baldin Wallace before coming to my school, and says things like "various and sundry' and "all things being equal" throughout all of the lectures. His mustache curls up at the edges. He looks and speaks exactly how you'd expect and Archeology prof to do so.
NC