Not true, the “skull shit” is reliable if the proper measurements/variables are taken into account
I base my takes on evidence. If you can read my response thoroughly, I said, "Sometimes the craniofacial metrics are telling." This means there might be consistency in variation, but at other times, it's not easy to parse the insightful nuances within the complexity. Especially when observing "those groups," interrelated or deeply associated people, the outliers might overlap with other regional variations without local genetic distinctiveness.
All this is explained when you read into the methodological literature of said skull shit. I don't even mean this dismissively. This is good evidence if used right, mostly for enhancement, and inter-variational orientation.
The morphometric traits change differentially within groups. So no, you can't just hone in on a set of traits and expect it only to tell you of the consistency of genetic deviation. You're very lucky if that is the case, lol. Some groups with similar genetics might stay conservative about any given dental characteristics, while considerable selection shifts in other sets of cranial dimensions that are not consistently aligned between related groups, the deviation is complex and often non-aligned. Some changes can be rapid, others not. The structural morphometric changes are not automatically a case for mixing.
What the experts do is to account for as much data as possible to get a closer statistical reading on them. The more data you have, the better. Even with the ideal data conditions involved, there are uncertainties despite the somewhat inferred putative genetic relations (broad genetic associations can find ground through these, dealing with regional variation). You can have plastic deviations of a considerable degree based on a myriad of factors that do not entail genetic non-alignments, to iterate. The analytical framework will average out associations that will give broad results. What clusters are most likely genetically similar, but the within-cluster variation does not need to be genetics at all.
There is evidence of variation in skull morphology within the same broader populations. Have you seen the Elementeitan skulls from other Pastoral Neolithic, for example? All are genetically close, yet dissimilarities in skull metrics.
This is a crania from one variation of the Pastoral Neolithic cultural cluster and it looks very robust:
Genetically, that person is not far off from the average Horn of African individual today, existing within the genetically tight PN groups of which you find morphological variation. Here is another one classified as closer to "Mediterranean":
Another one:
All these are Elementeita SNP:
So here you have clear instances of within-clustered macro-cultural subsistence groups with a morphological discrepancy not explained by marked genetic differentiation.
But let's get to the nitty gritty. Post the actual study it is based upon, and we can scrutinize this. If it is in a Neolithic farmer material cultural context, then it is practically a shut case. If your theory is that these people are outsiders, then outside characteristics will have to show in their ways, picked up on by archeologists.
and the samples I’m talking about are clearly atypical of the region, they aren’t typical Anatolians in theres measurements they are strongly North African influenced compared to most other samples from the same region and time period.
It is correct that as far as we know, the mainland farmers had close variation. Potentially from the bottleneck. However, the pre-pottery Neolithic groups had way more heterogeneity. Genetically similar groups, mind you. If we stretch it, we can say that PPN groups had an extremely peripheral existence in the Aegean, but that would warrant evidence that shows material relations to the Levant, right?
Given the variational skeletal phenotype structure showing wide differences among PPN groups as well. There is speculation that some of the Aceramic cultures of the Aegean, such as Cyprus Neolithic material young Stone Age datings, point to Levantine origin. So whatever outliers you see might be a middle-range junction between Asia Minor and Levant, not North Africa proper. Neolithic Egyptians would resemble some variation of Levantine diversity too, all the way from the Epipaleolithic to the early Neolithic.
