Human races - climate adaptation?

[Exeter]

Does anyone have good information on which climate zones, such as the Köppen classification, different races are adapted to.

I'm mostly curious of Europids. I already know enough about the major geographical races. Nowadays many Europids in the New World live outside their natural environment. Agrippa who takes an interest in the subject may know.

[Susi]

Some of the New World has the same Köppen classification (in terms of zone) as the Old World.

Remeber the Köppen classification has to do with both temperature and precipitation..

Many maps will give you different data but it seems that more than one correlates to my theory. I live in Southern Ontario in Toronto, right now. (I hope you all know where it is. Basically follow the St. Lawrence (river from the Atlantic to the interior of the country) to Lake Ontario (first lake) and go to the end (that's where I used to live) and move 75km NE along the shore. :p



Another map, this time, it is like parts of Scandinavia and Russia. However, I think the Subarctic zone comes down way too far on this one.



This map has more accurate classifications by zone and subtype but I find it somewhat innaccurate as well. It says my zone has "cool summers" when the summers here are quite hot (20-30 celsius average temperature). Here it is the most accurate in terms of classifications to the Köppen-Geiger system. (And still correlates to Scandinavia/Russia/East Europe)



Here the zone is the same as the northern parts of Scandinavia



Here it's the same as nearly all of Scandinavia.



One more map, just for fun. Quite accurate as well.

edit: I should know this stuff. It's one one of my exams :p

[Menydh]

Good maps! The three pockets in Iberia that are classified as semi-arid, correspond to Almería (S. pocket), Los Monegros (NE. pocket), and the third one I'm not sure but it must be Tierra de Campos (NW pocket), the old Campos Gothicos which was the main settlement of the Visigoths (most likely an area of a very low demographic density at the time of their settlement). It's a steppe area.

[Agrippa]

This thread should help to begin with:
Basic Climatic Rules

also interesting:
Somatopsychical Structures in Human Races

Most Europeans in America live in areas which suit them well.

This map was made by me to show for which areas the different racial forms are primarily made for and live in today:


See also this thread about racial specialisation and climatic zones:
Racial Specialisations and Climatic Zones

Regions of origin or primary distribution:


More:
Presentation of my Racial Typology

What does a basic racial typology describe in Europe?

India is an interesting case study:
Racial Types of South Asia

Even ethnicity is there often secondary to habitats and living conditions in the racially mixed ethnic groups. So in some areas which provide a similar habitat Indo-Aryans and Dravidians are closer to each other than to related ethnolinguistic groups.

[Susi]

Oh, Agrippa, I like your map. I wanted to do something like that but I don't have the knowledge of races/subraces really that well.

What climatic system of classification is that? It looks like Köppen-Geiger to me.. or modified Köppen-Geiger.

I found a newer, updated version of the map (to 2006):

World Map of the Köppen-Geiger climate classification updated

[Menydh]

Suspiciously similar.. and modified

[Carnyx]

Originally Posted by Susi

Is it Humid Subtropical shown in South East Europe?

[Agrippa]

The map is from an Atlas I own and the only information about it I can give you is, that it was edited in the 1980's and made after the system of C. Troll and KH. Paffen.

Site about their classification system in German:
Klimadiagramme, Die Klimaklassifikation nach Troll / Paffen

Klima und limaklassifikation

Wikipedia:
Klimazone - Wikipedia
Carl Troll - Wikipedia

[Susi]

Originally Posted by Mynydd

Suspiciously similar.. and modified

Well it is updated to 2006 climate data. I don't know why it's bad..?

[Arthur Gordon Pym]

The question is, if climate influences race, how long does it take to manifest itself?

[Agrippa]

Originally Posted by Marulus

The question is, if climate influences race, how long does it take to manifest itself?

There is no general rule for that for a variety of reasons. To begin with, humans are not the same when they enter a habitat usually and they are able to use culture for their protection from environmental pressures.

Both means that the higher developed a group of people is, the slower and less influence the climate will have on them. The more primitive they are, both by general biological and cultural development, the faster they will have to adapt, often in a quite drastic manner, especially if having a limited habitat (being encircled by more developed groups) with limited ressources.

So f.e. a certain form of cold adaptation (Borealisation, Baltisation) might have been in many parts of North Eastern Europe much weaker if the nutrition and health conditions would have been better and it would have been even weaker if other selective pressures (like positive-high level group and individual selection) would have worked against it too.

F.e. in parts of East Africa rather progressive, elongated Negroid variants (Tutsis) live side by side to more primitive and reduced Kafrid (Hutu) farmers and the even more primitive and infantile-reduced Bambutids (Twa), which are probably the best adapted for the tropical area physically, but the lowest developed of the three the same time.

But one has to consider that the Hutu had agriculture and a higher culture (comparatively) and the Tutsi had a dominant social position and were highly specialised herder(-warriors). So if the ancestors of the Tutsi had to live on a primitive cultural level in the worst areas of the tropical forests, they would have become more infantile-reduced either, but because of their level of development and position, they became the exact opposite!

So climate explains a lot, but not all, you have always to consider other factors - one of the simplest being that lighter skinned Europid Berber and Arab people protected their skin from UV-rays. They wouldnt do as good as the dark Nilotids and Sudanids in certain parts of North Africa, but that way they did pretty good actually, even though their limited potential (they just had more problems if working naked in the sun to put it that way) limits their adaptive potential in some areas...