293 replies to this topic

[The Puzzler]

cormac mac airt, on 03 May 2011 - 12:34 PM, said:

Except that recent research would suggest that it's much more recent than the 50,000 BP - 70,000 BP timeframe for the OOA migrations.



European Skin Turned Pale Only Recently, Gene Suggests




Neanderthal's red hair color has nothing to do with the red hair of modern humans.



Neanderthals 'were flame-haired'

cormac

OK, but I will just add this to clarify it's not that modern human doesn't have the gene, we do, it's just not the same, yes.

All humans carry the MC1R gene, but modern redheads possess an altered, or mutated, version of it.
This rare variant does not work as effectively as more common forms of the gene. This loss of function alters the chemistry of the cell, producing red hair and pale skin.

In the latest study, the authors retrieved fragments of the MC1R sequence from Neanderthal bones found at Monte Lessini in Italy and from remains unearthed at El Sidron cave in northern Spain. DNA is notoriously difficult to obtain from very old specimens such as these.

"This was a bit like finding a needle in a genomic haystack. I couldn't believe we found it the first time. I asked my friends to repeat the results. Eventually the variant was found in two separate Neanderthals in three different labs," said Dr Lalueza-Fox.
Same article you linked.

[The Puzzler]

Harte, on 03 May 2011 - 12:55 PM, said:

Don't tell me what to do or post.  You waste your own time right here in this thread with your ridiculous speculation based on, apparently, a "feeling" or something.

Note what I said:

Where, in the above, do you see me implying that you said Erectus didn't dream?

Now, please state why it is that you cut Erectus out of your considerations for species that can remember a dream?

There is no evidence for either species dreaming or remembering dreams.


Harte

The speculation is in the article, it's not necessarily mine. I bought it up for discussion.

But as usual, you and I cannot seem to understand each other so what I won't waste my time on, is answering your posts.

[cormac mac airt]

Quote

OK, but I will just add this to clarify it's not that modern human doesn't have the gene, we do, it's just not the same, yes.

No, it's not the same. And shouldn't have been presented as if there was a 1-1 correlation between the two, which is what you appeared to be presenting. If that wasn't your intent then it was poorly worded, IMO.

cormac

[The Puzzler]

cormac mac airt, on 03 May 2011 - 01:27 PM, said:

No, it's not the same. And shouldn't have been presented as if there was a 1-1 correlation between the two, which is what you appeared to be presenting. If that wasn't your intent then it was poorly worded, IMO.

cormac

Yes, at first I put it forward, then you showed me it wasn't possible because modern humans didn't have the gene, OK, then I see we do, it's just a mutated version of a kind the article also says so I then showed that just so it was clear that we did have it but it wasn't the same. I have no agenda, no matter, we don't have the same genetic on the redhead, doesn't affect the spiritual side, which is what this is  really about I guess. I'm not overly defending the article but it is certainly something that is being researched as a possibilty and one I think could be probable so just researching the aspects some more.

It says it pretty clearly here: All humans carry the MC1R gene, but modern redheads possess an altered, or mutated, version of it.

We have it but it's altered - or is this article badly worded..?

Edited by The Puzzler, 03 May 2011 - 01:45 PM.

[The Puzzler]

The Cerebrum and Cerebellum
The vertebrate brain includes the cerebrum and the cerebellum. In modern humans the cerebrum consists of the cerebral hemispheres that fill most of the skull. In humans the cerebellum is smaller than the cerebrum and situated at the back of the head tucked behind and under the cerebrum. Gooch points out that essentially the cerebrum and the cerebellum are two different brains (“we are each of us ‘in two minds’”27) that correspond to two different ways of approaching the world (“Two Brains – and Two Universes”28). The cerebrum is associated with “logical” and “rational” thinking, versus the cerebellum is associated with “dreaming” and “magic.”

[T]he cerebellum… is responsible for trance states, for dreams, for telepathy, for psychic healing, for spontaneous wounds, for poltergeist phenomena, and all other such matters. It is also the source of and the impetus for religious belief.29

Here we have the anatomical/physiological explanation for the duality of human personality. The Cro-Magnon and Neanderthal brains both consisted of larger cerebrums and smaller cerebellums, but the Neanderthal brain had a much larger and more powerful cerebellum than that found in Cro-Magnons. The more developed Neanderthal cerebellum gave rise to their “high civilisation of dreams.”30

Neanderthals developed a deep understanding of the natural world, but they did not necessarily do so in the rational, logical, “scientific” manner that modern humans have come to expect and accept. “I think that they [the ancients, Neanderthals]” Gooch stated, “obtained their knowledge not logically and scientifically but intuitively.”31
Stan Gooch original linked article.

[The Puzzler]

Hybridisation Between Neanderthals & Cro-Magnons
The taxonomic status of Neanderthals has long been debated. Were they a species distinct from modern humans? Even if they were a distinct species, could they have interbred with our species, at least to a limited extent?32 Or were Neanderthals simply a subspecies or variety of our own species? Is the grouping of fossil forms currently labelled “Neanderthals” actually a collection of different types of humans, perhaps different species or varieties or races? Gooch believed there were several different varieties of Neanderthals, separated geographically and temporally, in Europe, Africa,33 the Middle East, and Asia. Furthermore, a key point of his thesis is that Neanderthals, at least some Neanderthals, could and did interbreed with our direct ancestors, the Cro-Magnons.

In recent decades it has become apparent that human diversity tens of thousands of years ago was much more complex than previously believed. Some 50,000 to 30,000 years ago, for instance, there may have been half a dozen or more distinct species of humans inhabiting Earth. Besides Cro-Magnons (archaic Homo sapiens) and Neanderthals (Homo neanderthalensis) in Eurasia, in what is now modern Indonesia there was the diminutive “hobbit” form Homo floresiensis34 as well as apparently the last remnant populations of Homo erectus.35 In southern Africa were found the Boskop people, Homo capensis, reputedly with brains 25 to 35 percent larger than those of modern humans.36 In Siberia about the same time there was another population of humans, who may have been a species distinct from those listed above (though perhaps most closely related to Neanderthals), at present simply referred to as the “Denisovans.”37 To add to the list, the indigenous aboriginal Homo sapiens populations of Australia and New Guinea may have been relatively isolated for the last 50,000 years or more.38

Leaving aside at this time the issue of the numerous other human species (how they interacted with one another, and what contributions they made to the modern human lineage, remain open questions), Gooch believed that aggressive and battle-skilled Cro-Magnons both massively exterminated some populations of Neanderthals and also interbred with them. He wrote,

The genetic crossing of Cro-Magnon and Neanderthal produced not just (a) highly gifted individuals (‘the mighty men of old, the men of renown’) but ( an entirely new species of human – ourselves…. [T]his new product was… either entirely or very largely due to Cro-Magnon men fertilising Neanderthal women – not the other way around. These offspring would have been accepted into Cro-Magnon groups…. And so Neanderthal genes were introduced into the Cro-Magnon gene pool…39

This was a radical, unconventional view – to believe that Cro-Magnons and Neanderthals interbred and therefore Neanderthal genes should still be found among us. However, recent studies of the Neanderthal genome reveal that today an estimated 1% to 4% of the modern Eurasian genome appears to come from Neanderthals.40 That is, Neanderthals and Cro-Magnons must have interbred. Gooch’s ideas appear to be corroborated! (As an aside, we can also point out Gooch suggested that at least some Neanderthals may have been redheaded, another prediction since corroborated by modern science.

[The_Spartan]

what makes you think  that the bigger the size of your brain, the more intelligent you are?

[third_eye]

Harte, on 03 May 2011 - 12:13 PM, said:

I doubt this very much.

It is known that animals dream.  Why do you cut Homo Erectus out of this idea of remembering a dream?

Harte

Excellent article OP,
To Mr Harte, excellent one. Evidently humour had ideas too

[lightly]

The Puzzler, on 03 May 2011 - 01:58 PM, said:

The Cerebrum and Cerebellum
The vertebrate brain includes the cerebrum and the cerebellum. In modern humans the cerebrum consists of the cerebral hemispheres that fill most of the skull. In humans the cerebellum is smaller than the cerebrum and situated at the back of the head tucked behind and under the cerebrum. Gooch points out that essentially the cerebrum and the cerebellum are two different brains (“we are each of us ‘in two minds’”27) that correspond to two different ways of approaching the world (“Two Brains – and Two Universes”28). The cerebrum is associated with “logical” and “rational” thinking, versus the cerebellum is associated with “dreaming” and “magic.”

[T]he cerebellum… is responsible for trance states, for dreams, for telepathy, for psychic healing, for spontaneous wounds, for poltergeist phenomena, and all other such matters. It is also the source of and the impetus for religious belief.29

Here we have the anatomical/physiological explanation for the duality of human personality. The Cro-Magnon and Neanderthal brains both consisted of larger cerebrums and smaller cerebellums, but the Neanderthal brain had a much larger and more powerful cerebellum than that found in Cro-Magnons. The more developed Neanderthal cerebellum gave rise to their “high civilisation of dreams.”30

Neanderthals developed a deep understanding of the natural world, but they did not necessarily do so in the rational, logical, “scientific” manner that modern humans have come to expect and accept. “I think that they [the ancients, Neanderthals]” Gooch stated, “obtained their knowledge not logically and scientifically but intuitively.”31
Stan Gooch original linked article.

Thanks for the interesting thread puzzler...  i'm on the edge of my seat      
It sounds like neanderthal was more intuitive... like other animals.  WE are the oddballs imo.

[Abramelin]

From Puzz's quote:

"In southern Africa were found the Boskop people, Homo capensis, reputedly with brains 25 to 35 percent larger than those of modern humans"

Here a site about antropology, and a page about those Boskop men:


http://johnhawks.net...skops-2008.html
http://johnhawks.net/taxonomy/term/645
http://johnhawks.net...anger-2009.html



JOHN HAWKS is Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Wisconsin—Madison.

I was trained as a paleoanthropologist, studying human evolution from an integrative perspective. My research focuses on the processes affecting human genetic evolution across the last 6 million years

[cormac mac airt]

Quote

Yes, at first I put it forward, then you showed me it wasn't possible because modern humans didn't have the gene

Which quite obviously shows that you didn't understand what I actually said, as I never stated that modern humans didn't have the gene. We have a variant, as in different version, of the gene which the Neanderthals do not have and therefore there is no 1-1 relationship between the two. All of which makes your mention of Neanderthals having red hair as well as modern humans (Scottish, Irish, etc.) rather meaningless.

Quote

We have it but it's altered - or is this article badly worded..?

No. But your understanding of genetics, once again, is less than adequate and ought not be utilized to make a non-existant point.

cormac

[Harte]

third_eye, on 03 May 2011 - 02:17 PM, said:

Evidently humour had ideas too

Yes.  Big ones.

For one example, I have some pretty wild ideas about H. Erectus. I obviously resent anyone pretending they "know" some bull like Puzzler posted about Erectus.

I'm just tired of repeating them. Probably that's a result of my having been here since 2006. I already posted here that I'm semi-retired from argument/discussion at this site.


Harte

[Abramelin]

Harte, on 03 May 2011 - 05:15 PM, said:

I have some pretty wild ideas about H. Erectus.

Harte

[SlimJim22]

The Spartan, on 03 May 2011 - 02:06 PM, said:

what makes you think  that the bigger the size of your brain, the more intelligent you are?

I don't think that was the assertion. Puzz is talking about the Neanderthal brain as being more receptive or designed for altered states of consciousness and the potential this has for shamanic magick. It is a really interesting idea and one I'd never given serious thought to but it may explain a lot. Imagine how far a thinking species could have got in 100,000 years if they took an entirely different direction. They may have had the intuition to commune with nature and benefit from the symbiotic relationship.

Is it then as Gooch claims that Cro Magnon spied on them and took the secrets, or did some enlightened neanderthals forsee humanity becoming the dominant species, as there world may have started to crumble for whatever reason?

Have archaeologists ever found a frozen specimen with a brain capable of analysis?

[cormac mac airt]

Quote

Have archaeologists ever found a frozen specimen with a brain capable of analysis?

No, and it's rather meaningless IMO to speculate "about the Neanderthal brain as being more receptive or designed for altered states of consciousness" as we have no actual knowledge about the Neanderthal brain and its NORMAL state of consciousness. Talk about putting the cart before the horse.

cormac