Evolutionist: What colour was the skin of the first human?

Question

What colour was the first human?

Answer 1

Black. Every race came from Africa.

Answer 2

White. Same color as a modern day chimpanzee. The first human had a lot of black hair then.

Answer 3

No one knows, but it was most likely dark to protect them from the sun. As humans migrated north the sun was less intense and melanin was not necessary to protect skin from damage so humans became lighter.

Answer 4

The first humans very likely had dark skin because they evolved in Africa where having a lot of melanin would be helpful for protection against UV radiation.  

The reason people developed less melanin in their skin (i.e. became "whiter") was because as humans migrated north to areas where sun intensity was less, we needed to let more UV penetrate because it is essential for things like Vitamin D production.  This is why people we associate with northern areas (like scandinavians, russians) are very often some of the lightest pigmented people.

Answer 5

There is an additional detail worth mentioning.  It was not just the northward movement of people that caused selection pressure to decrease the amount of melanin in the skin.  The migration of people to the southern tip of Africa also caused them to lose some of their melanin.  The long term natives of South Africa have skin pigmentation that is lighter than that of more recent immigrants from equatorial regions of Africa.  

Movement in both directions causes loss of melanin in order to increase the amount of ultraviolet light reaching the dermis where it is needed to form the precursor to vitamin D.

Answer 6

dark brown

no one has black or white skin. it is impossible. but the first sapiens had brown skin.

now, other sub species of homo may have had lite skin because they were covered by fur or hair.

for example the :GRACILE AUSTRALOPITHECUS  may had tan skin or lite brown skin. because they were covered with hair. the hair acts as a radiation deflector against solar radiation. making it harder for the skin tone to be affected.

but in science we know that lite comes from dark. and not the other way around.

very interesting question.

Answer 7

black...everyone knows that.

Answer 8

Sophia J has your answer.

>"Evolutionist: What colour was the skin of the first human?"

Since the evidence is that the first humans evolved in the savannahs of Africa (what is now Ethiopia), it is probable that that they had dark skin like people today from equatorial regions.

>"Black? really! So why are some races made different varieties of colours? Is there a reason for this?"

Yes.  Dark skin (more melanin in the skin) provides better protection against the equatorial sun.   But as humans migrated further north across Europe and Northern Asia, lighter skin has a slight advantage in the production of Vitamin D.   But as further migrations took humans back south through the Pacific islands and South into Australia and New Zealand, and a second migration worked across North America down into South America, those who again found themselves in equatorial regions again found an advantage to darker skin.

This is why the term "races" doesn't have much meaning in biology.  Skin color is just a property of where your recent ancestors (within the last thousand generations) came from ... the aboriginal people of Australia are not the same "race" as people from Africa just because they have dark skin.  That is just not borne out by DNA.   Instead, they both have dark skin for the simple reason that their ancestors came from equatorial regions.

Answer 9

Well its started from the time when they build the tower of Babel to heaven and the.... Maker upstairs decided  to split the people by changing their languages and coloured skin so that there was no communication among themselves ....work stop obviously..skin colour was white then