I am not sure where I read or heard the information below but believe it may have some merit which adds to the argument in the post.

I believe that certain Western Australian Aborigines have genetic material that was recently traced back to around the 16 and 1700's that have strong Dutch DNA material, this was most strongly correlated to Indigenous Australian's in the Mid West and Pilbara region, if I remember correctly, this was most likely attributed to ship wrecked Dutch survivors inter-breeding and known cases of Dutch sailors being abandoned by their Captain's along the west coast in years of old.

Similar DNA traits have also been noted in Central Australian Aborigine's with Portugese DNA from similar times.

A recent chinese map discovery (the map was said to be from around 1200AD) and based on an even earlier map sources from pre BC times also shows a land mass (Australia) and both Northern and Southern America adds to the mystery.

Reading the attacks on Walsh and accusations of being financed by
graziers etc rang bells for me in the similarity of the attacks on
those scientists that do not agree with AGW.
You have heard it, they are in the pay of oil companies and various odd
organisations.

It seems science is peopled by ordinary failable humans after all !

So, what is the author's point.

Is he trying to say that Indians were amongst the many visitors or migrants to Australia before the British colonised it? Or, is he trying to use small pieces from a scientific journal to claim that Indians were the first peoples in Australia as I have heard some migrants from India claim (not in an open forum and usually in an informal setting)? Opportunistic use of selective bits of debatable science does not make a fact.

Have a look at http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-09-23/aboriginal-dna-dates-australian-arrival/2913010 where they date the arrival of Aboriginal people at 70,000 years ago minimum. The finds of artifacts in Tasmania that are claimed to be 40,000 years old - Mungo man's remains have been agreed to be at least 40,000 years old.

Walsh's funding by the pastoralists and media moguls indicates that whoever pays the piper gets to pick the tune. The tobacco industry was great at using selective and well remunerated scientists report to push their own agenda. The same goes for the asbestos industry.

The intent behind this article is not clear. What is the author trying to say - and whats in it for him?

Hi, Aka, it's great to hear from you again. i miss our 'discussions' ;)

I think the author is trying to say that Australia has been part of international links and interactions for a long time, certainly for four or more thousand years. Austronesians may have brought dingoes to Australia around 4-5,000 years ago. Various Asian sea-faring peoples, as well as people from Papua-New Guinea, may have been making landfall in Ausgtralia for perhaps even longer.

But nobody is suggesting that anybody was 'here' before Aboriginal people, who may have been here sixty, fifty, forty thousand years or more - it doesn't really matter. Maori have been in New Zealand for perhaps less than seven hundred years, yet are of course the Indigenous people of New Zealand, the first people, humans, to arrive there. Just as the Vikings are the Indigenous people of Iceland, having colonised it twelve hunded years ago.

We all have come out of Africa, a high proportion of our ancestors drifting out some fifty or sixty thousand years ago, (some much more recently) and slowly spreading along the southern Asian shores, across the Asian plains towards the east coast, some even into Europe. None of it could have been planned, of course, it just happened that way, imperceptibly, over tens of thousands of years.

What the author may have been alluding to is that, apart from all that, we are all humans, all capable of inter-mixing - our DNAs are all compatible and none of us are so unique or 'different' as to be outside the bounds of what it is to be human.

Let's celebrate our commonalities as well as our differentiations :)

Joe

I have read that genes found in Bangladeshis matched those of Aborigines. When you consider that as late as 1802 Maccassans as seen by Flinders visited the North of Australia then it is not implausible that the very first humans in Australia came via Asia. What puzzles me so much is why there hasn't been any development here as there had everywhere else.
Even the closest neighbours, the people of New Guinea built houses & canoes & artefacts. Was the isolation of Australia so sudden that time literally stood still ? It is indeed highly interesting.

Individual, I recommend you read Bill Gammage's book, 'The biggest estate on earth' if you are genuinely curious. It is a good starting point.

Anna Haebitch's book 'Broken Circles' is also a good start for the social aspects of colonsiation.

History has been heavily edited to fit within the coloniser's political intention but the early European explorers journals show that there was indeed developement, houses, villages, granaries, farming etc. These accounts have just been left out of the popular historical accounts.

Google can also shed some enlightenment.

Happy reading.