The face of migration

Both human genome studies and archeological evidence point to Australian aborigines as a population that has taken exceptional risk in wading through miles of deep sea into the far continent. This required exceptional skills and tremendous amounts of risk taking. What is not clear, however, is the reason why they did it. Was it the thrill of risk taking or were they pushed into a situation with no alternatives.

It is important to unearth what happened, It is also interesting to speculate why. As the 7 billion current occupants of a bland planet, with little differentiation among themselves, kill and mutilate each other for meaningless material possessions such as oil, gold and land, such thoughts may help us to recalibrate. Why did humans travel from Africa to the middle east to India, Indonesia and to Australia? What drove them to take such risks nearly 50,000 years ago? Was it really risk taking or were they actions with no options?

Modern day humans are remarkably the same as those who decided to walk on two legs, 2 million years ago in that they are driven by the same goals. Thus, today's humans should provide sufficient hints as to what drove our ancestors. Humans are clearly territorial and materialistic and those who got to India first would have claimed the land pushing the later arrivals to Indonesia. The story will repeat itself as the later waves are forced ashore, with over 25 miles of deep sea between the land owners and virgin lands across in the continent of Australia.

Migration is not a story of adventure and risk taking – it is simply a story of greed and violence – fundamental properties of humans.