genetics nonsense

[Not rock pile related]

I am going to quote a paragraph here, from
https://phys.org/news/2019-01-long-term-neandertal-dna-europeans.html

Over the past several years, multiple teams of researchers have conducted studies with the goal of learning more about what has happened with the Neandertal DNA that became mixed with human DNA approximately 45,000 years ago. Most have agreed that introduction of DNA from Neandertals underwent negative selection and thus has slowly diminished—at least in modern Europeans. In this new effort, the researchers have found evidence that suggests these earlier results were wrong, and that there is no evidence of negative selection. They further contend that the reason the other researchers got it wrong was because they made incorrect assumptions about gene flow between non-Africans (Europeans) and Africans.


Note that "most" researchers got it wrong because of "incorrect assumptions about gene flow...". You wonder, what kind of journals published this research that was largely confused about basic assumptions? Also how can the "evidence" of the earlier papers become the "no evidence" of the later paper? Suppose, for example, they were papers about the color of a flower; and rewrite the phrases. You have "most have agreed the flower was pink" and now there is "no evidence the flower is pink". Given these contradictions you have to ask: what kind of a standard for "evidence" exists in a subject that can do such a reversal?

The conclusion is that there is no such thing as "evidence" for DNA comparisons. Consequently [I will take this to the extreme], one should assume all genetic evidence related to Native Americans and peopling of the New World is suspect of being just an expression of "incorrect assumptions about gene flow" by researchers.

Don't get me wrong. There is certainly worthwhile science to do with genetic comparisons. The problem is that it is so easy to introduce bias. You would think the journals might have a clue about this.