Why do Caucasian people have different color eyes and hair, but black & Asian people don't generally.?

Question

My question is a serious one, as I have an interest in the origin of tribes, races and the differences between the races.

I have wondered for a long time as to why caucasians have so many different varieties of look and shapes etc.

Is it due to the more insular nature of black and Asian culture?

I know Asian and Black people intermix with other races today, but in times gone by, there wasnt as much mixing?

Tribes in Europe I assume had a lot of raping and pillaging and mixing, therefore creating all the variety?

I am not interested in any wise-cracks, only serious answers

Answer 1

Read "Gun, Germs and Steel"
or
"Approximately 10% of the variance in skin color occurs within groups, and ~90% occurs between groups (Relethford 2002). This distribution of skin color and its geographic patterning—with people whose ancestors lived predominantly near the equator having darker skin than those with ancestors who lived predominantly in higher latitudes—indicate that this attribute has been under strong selective pressure. Darker skin appears to be strongly selected for in equatorial regions to prevent sunburn, skin cancer, the photolysis of folate, and damage to sweat glands (Sturm et al. 2001; Rees 2003). A leading hypothesis for the selection of lighter skin in higher latitudes is that it enables the body to form greater amounts of vitamin D, which helps prevent rickets (Jablonski 2004). Evidence for this includes the finding that a substantial portion of the differences of skin color between Europeans and Africans resides in a single gene, SLC24A5 the threonine-111 allele of which was found in 98.7 to 100% among several European samples, while the alanine-111 form was found in 93 to 100% of samples of Africans, East Asians and Indigenous Americans (Lamason et al. 2005). However, the vitamin D hypothesis is not universally accepted (Aoki 2002), and lighter skin in high latitudes may correspond simply to an absence of selection for dark skin (Harding et al. 2000). Melanin which serves as the pigment, is located in the epidermis of the skin, and is based on hereditary gene expression.

Because skin color has been under strong selective pressure, similar skin colors can result from convergent adaptation rather than from genetic relatedness. Sub-Saharan Africans, tribal populations from southern India, and Indigenous Australians have similar skin pigmentation, but genetically they are no more similar than are other widely separated groups. Furthermore, in some parts of the world in which people from different regions have mixed extensively, the connection between skin color and ancestry has been substantially weakened (Parra et al. 2004). In Brazil, for example, skin color is not closely associated with the percentage of recent African ancestors a person has, as estimated from an analysis of genetic variants differing in frequency among continent groups (Parra et al. 2003).

Considerable speculation has surrounded the possible adaptive value of other physical features characteristic of groups, such as the constellation of facial features observed in many eastern and northeastern Asians (Guthrie 1996). However, any given physical characteristic generally is found in multiple groups (Lahr 1996), and demonstrating that environmental selective pressures shaped specific physical features will be difficult, since such features may have resulted from sexual selection for individuals with certain appearances or from genetic drift (Roseman 2004).
"
from wikipedia =D
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race#Physical_variation_in_humans

nothing good ol' evolution can't explain, you know from a scientific + anthropological perspective

anyway, depends where you live dude[-ette?], i've seen plenty of black people w/ light colored eyes and all kinds of skin colors that could be even be mistaken for "white". anyway, as far as I remember curly hair and dark hair are more dominant than straight and lighter colored hair, so that could explain why you see more homogenicity [dominance] of certain types & colors

eh... i think i went off track... heheh sorry
hope it kinda helps

Answer 2

You are on the right track. It's mostly due to what a society deems attractive. For example, (this is a generalization) if Asians like the darkest black hair, and dark brown eyes with the double fold, then it's most likely that those traits will be passed on because those are going to be the desireable mates.

Also, keep in mind that just because your skin is white doesn't mean you are the same as other white people. Scandinavians are different from say Italians, or the French. What I'm getting at is that there are different races of white folks too, IMO.

Answer 3

Generally speaking the people of northern latitudes don't need as much pigment in their skin or eyes as the winters are long and the summers cool and short. Over millions of years this can have a dramatic effect. Whites also have the fullest beards and are generally more hairy. I think if you really look you will see variation in all races of the globe. Not all Africans look the same, or east Indians, or Asians. And all races have done their share of raping and pillaging. Look at how Japan has treated China over the last thousand years!

Answer 4

The travelers of the Bering Land Bridge were not caucasoids but mongoloids. There is some legitimate speculation that caucasoid people with lite eye colour migrated in smaller numbers via northern europe around the ice into north america...1000's of years ago. Eye colour is a fairly recent change. One might likewise ask why haven't Europeans developed more brown eyes since the ice age has ended... One could simply regard the lite hair and lite eye colour as a caucasoid trait... along with big noses... Europeans didn't develop lite eyes as they moved north, but after they had moved north and in areas isolated from contact with other groups...long enough to develop certain traits but not long enough to become a distinct species.

Answer 5

I think it is do to evolution. Blacks needed more protection from sun burn thus darker skin and possibly eyes too. I'm sure there is something to the Asian skin color in the areas of Asian inhabitants thousands of years ago. Then everyone was land locked for awhile and genetics took over. I'm guessing in a few more thousand years providing we don't destroy ourselves we will look very different

Answer 6

well Europans are weird people with no shame mostly so in the past they had no problem interacting with other ''tribes'' in and outside europe. It had nothing to do with raping. for example when alexander the great took over the known world he encouraged the macedonians and greeks to marry people from the middle east, like persia. Other powerful nobles had wifes, and Concubinage. Concubinage were young women that belonged to the rich men and were used for sex, they came from different lands. So when one got pregnant, the child was of mixed race. And so on, thats how Caucasian/white people have so many verious shapes and colors.

Answer 7

white have a quarter of a million years on earth in cold climate and the others have had the same amount of time in a hot climate and have this adaptions as traits

Answer 8

It's because people from all over the world have came to America.
Thus making babies mixed with different places.

You could have an Asian person have a baby with an irish person and it would have totally different traits.

Answer 9

I wonder that too. It's not fair!