What is the currently accepted explanation for the Sicilian/Ashkenazi genetic similarity?

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Originally Posted by Sikeliot

Do you think Ashkenazis and southern Italians look European?

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Yes i think they both look European.
I rarely find Ashkenazis who don't look European

To put it this way, i think Ashkenazis look more Italian than most other ethnicites. E.g. Germans, English, Russians, etc. But they don't look that similar usually. And a lot of the time its completely obvious they aren't italian. Although sometimes it is almost impossible to tell which.

two things:

when you say Ashkenazi culture, what do you mean
also, do you not think that the fact that verbal&mathematical iq is higher is not a coincidence. watch/read these - i believe its pretty decisive in describing why jews have such high verbal and mathematical iqs but an average spatial iq:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7R-hTToDRzs

http://www.aei.org/publication/the-2...ver-jewish-iq/

and for some amazing figures

http://immortallife.info/articles/en...i-jews-so-high

basically, AJs were banned from owning land, so they lent money. those who had high mathematical and verbal IQs prospered, and earned more money, and had more children. the gene pool now has a higher verbal and mathematical iq. over many generations, this effect becomes significant, and has thus resulted in the roughly 125 verbal and mathematical IQ. spatial iq is slightly below average, and this is because a spatial iq is not needed to banking

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Originally Posted by ToBeOrNotToBe

basically, AJs were banned from owning land, so they lent money. those who had high mathematical and verbal IQs prospered, and earned more money, and had more children. the gene pool now has a higher verbal and mathematical iq. over many generations, this effect becomes significant, and has thus resulted in the roughly 125 verbal and mathematical IQ. spatial iq is slightly below average, and this is because a spatial iq is not needed to banking

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I did say this succinctly in my post. Ashkenazi culture is orientated towards white-collar work and/or intensive comprehension (of liturgical works).

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Originally Posted by Dylan

Yes i think they both look European.
I rarely find Ashkenazis who don't look European

To put it this way, i think Ashkenazis look more Italian than most other ethnicites. E.g. Germans, English, Russians, etc. But they don't look that similar usually. And a lot of the time its completely obvious they aren't italian. Although sometimes it is almost impossible to tell which.

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Can you tell Italians and Jews from Greeks?

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Originally Posted by Sikeliot

Can you tell Italians and Jews from Greeks?

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Greeks and Italians are often hard to tell. If my grandmother weren't my grandmother for example, I would have thought she was Greek.
I notice that Greeks a lot of the times have rounder ocular bones with archy eyebrows and this is less common in italians.

I can generally tell if someone is Ashkenazi.

So I guess you could say I can tell Ashkenazis apart from Greeks and Italians, but I often times I can't tell Italians from Greeks and vice versa.
Although there are some Italians who are very clearly Italian and not Greek.


And obviously this is extremely subjective stuff.
I can't tell every time, but I'm pretty good at it. For example when I met the guy who is now my best friend at college, I had one look at him and I could tell he was Ashkenazi before he told me his name or anything.

And obviously theres always those people who just don't have the phenotype even thought they have the genotype.
E.g. You saw the picture of my dad, he doesn't look French. Most people think he's Lebanese, but he's nearly full french.