293 replies to this topic

[cormac mac airt]

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What I'm saying is basically, today modern redheads that they tested do not inherit red hair from Neanderthals, but at some time in the past some red haired people could have genetically inherited it. They may not be around anymore or were untested people.

Not likely, based on the genetic evidence. This would appear to be a species specific trait, each with its own version.

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Todays African's would have to have some sort of transfer of people back into it, to all be homo sapien sapien again, because when homo left it originally he wasn't one...

Actually, yes he was. We were already HSS by the time of the Out of Africa migration, c.50,000-70,000 BP.

cormac

[Leonardo]

The Puzzler, on 04 May 2011 - 01:47 AM, said:

It says the cerebellum was larger and more powerful - this is not your 'whole brain' and it didn't equal intelligence as such, it equalled a better understanding of dreams.

[i]The 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

That quote about the function of the cerebellum, Puzz, is very inaccurate.

The cerebellum is the centre which controls basic memory and learning, but also control motor skills, such as co-ordination. It is in the cerebral cortex that the 'higher' (abstract) thinking largely takes place and it is the cerebral cortex that grants us imagination.

[Leonardo]

cormac mac airt, on 04 May 2011 - 03:04 AM, said:

Aus, what it boils down to is that all Eurasian descended modern humans share 1% - 4% of the same genes as Neanderthals. While African descended modern humans do not. This, in and of itself, is understandable. What is not so cut-and-dried is that the genes can be shown to be unequivocally Neanderthal in origin. This is ONLY based on genetic results taken from Neanderthals and modern humans (HSS). Due to a complete (thusfar) lack of genetic material, and therefore testing, of ancestral lines such as H. Erectus, H. Ergaster, H. Heidelbergensis, the unclassified species responsible for the Omo 1 and 2 remains, H. Sapiens Idaltu, the unclassified species known only from the Gawis cranium and the Denisovans, there is a wholly incomplete understanding of where this 1% - 4% sharing of genes originates in the big picture.

Is that as clear as mud?  

cormac

cormac,

If I read this correctly, the indication might be that H. neanderthal and H. sapiens may not have acquired the identical genes through interbreeding, but these genes may be identical due to their (H. neanderthal's and H. sap's) common ancestry?

If that is what you are indicating, I am in agreement that much has been made of only one possibility for why we share genes with Neanderthals, and not much said about the other possibilities.

[The Puzzler]

Leonardo, on 04 May 2011 - 07:26 AM, said:

cormac,

If I read this correctly, the indication might be that H. neanderthal and H. sapiens may not have acquired the identical genes through interbreeding, but these genes may be identical due to their (H. neanderthal's and H. sap's) common ancestry?

If that is what you are indicating, I am in agreement that much has been made of only one possibility for why we share genes with Neanderthals, and not much said about the other possibilities.

OTHER possibilities. Isn't that a nice phrase to think about?

Leo, hi, you sound like me in the above and I'm sure you don't really want that - so you should think about which one you are going for - that they tell us the 1 - 4% is from interbreeding or think about whether it might actually come in from some other way. Don't tell me you are doubting the official word.

Molecular phylogenetic analysis[24] suggests Homo rhodesiensis[citation needed] and Homo heidelbergensis continued to intermix until 350,000 years ago, after which they were separate species, and sometime within the last 200,000 years Homo heidelbergensis evolved into Homo neanderthalensis, the classic Neanderthal human. It appears the original Neanderthal population was, in fact, more distantly related to today's human than is Homo heidelbergensis. However, recent evidence of successful interbreeding between Neanderthals and modern humans has made that issue moot, at least insofar as some Neanderthal populations were concerned.

The interbreeding has been pinpointed to Middle east. But of course, feel free to go against what they are telling us...I always welcome that and love when people find a hole in the mesh. I actually thought of exactly what you said. Maybe this came from a common ancestor then - it seems too obvious to have been left out of the equation of when they decided it was an occurance and made it valid news.

But of course, so much guesswork in archaeology and paleontology can only take you so far.

And, in the end, it always makes me wonder what else is said to have happened that might not really have happened that way.

I am teasing Leo but I do hope you get my point. Is it OK to not believe the official word when it goes against a pre-conceived idea one has?

cormac may be right in a way but it is now accepted that Neanderthals and humans interbred and the 1-4% is from this event.

Again, I welcome anything that challenges the accepted view.

[The Puzzler]

Leonardo, on 04 May 2011 - 07:14 AM, said:

That quote about the function of the cerebellum, Puzz, is very inaccurate.

The cerebellum is the centre which controls basic memory and learning, but also control motor skills, such as co-ordination. It is in the cerebral cortex that the 'higher' (abstract) thinking largely takes place and it is the cerebral cortex that grants us imagination.

Yes.

OK Leo, I checked this out a bit earlier but wasn't overly sure about it so maybe it would be good to discuss it. Wiki indeed gives no mention of it's ability to be a dream 'connector' to our brain but maybe it's ability to do what it does is the actual action that it means...

This is what I found that seemed to explain it quite well, it is a spiritual website if that makes any diff.

Dreams are experiences of the Beyond. During sleep, some of us leave the physical body and go to other planes. The results of such experiences are what we remember as dreams when we wake up. Genuine dreams are experienced as pictures and these impressions stay on in the cerebellum, see "Brain" and are then passed on to the frontal brain hence coming to day consciousness. That way, the experiences of other realms reach our consciousness.

The important fact here is to understand the role the cerebellum plays in all this as the mediator for the spirit, receiving pictures or images and then passing these on to the frontal brain. Dreams are very important, as they can also be a source of warning. These pictures are shown to the spirit which are then passed on to the cerebellum and then on to the frontal brain. The ability of the cerebellum to retain these pictures and to pass them on depends on how strong and active it is.

The strength of the cerebellum varies greatly among human beings. The cerebellums of many people are not active at all, thereby making it impossible for such people to receive anything from the spirit. There is more often than not a loosened connection between the cerebellum and the frontal brain leaving a gap, which is very difficult to bridge. Dreams in such cases then are not truly dreams as there are so many other influences.

In some cases, the activity of the frontal brain is so great that it suppresses the cerebellum and it is in such cases that words tend to appear in dreams. Words are only to be found in the World of Gross Matter and in the true experiences of the Beyond, which dreams should be, there should no words just pictures. Where words appear, then the frontal brain has had an influence and the reception is no longer pure.
http://www.spiritual...cles/dreams.htm

It appears the cerebellum helps to maybe 'digest' the dream so as to then become a conscious thought of the dream - which was my point to Harte before - sure animals dream but do they wake up with a consciousness of the dream that became imprinted into their brain because of the cerebellum's function..? To reatin the pictures and pass them on.

My cerebellum seems to be an inactive one in this dept. lol - I am not spirtual at all and never remember my dreams. Maybe occasionally, if they were scary.  

[The Puzzler]

Here it is:

More commonly, admixture with much later archaic Homo sapiens, especially with Neanderthals is proposed. A draft sequence publication by the Neanderthal Genome Project in May 2010 indicates some form of hybridization between archaic humans and modern humans have taken place after modern humans emerged from Africa. An estimated 1 to 4 percent of the DNA in Europeans and Asians (i.e. French, Chinese and Papua probands) is non-modern, and shared with ancient Neanderthal DNA and not with Sub-Saharan Africans (i.e. Yoruba and San probands).[3] No evidence supporting this has been found in mitochondrial DNA analyses of modern Europeans, suggesting that no direct maternal line originating with Neanderthals has survived into modern times.[4][5][6]


NOT with Sub-Saharan Africans.

That is why the Omo etc do not count.

The interbreeding is shown to be between Neanderthals and humans because the dna genome is not sub-Saharan.

http://en.wikipedia....y_modern_humans

So, I'd have to disagree with cormac on that one and say it is known that the genome is from Neanderthal and not any other because it's shown to be a NON-sub-Saharan gene.

[The Puzzler]

cormac mac airt, on 04 May 2011 - 06:06 AM, said:

Actually, yes he was. We were already HSS by the time of the Out of Africa migration, c.50,000-70,000 BP.

cormac

Yes, OK, I mixed that one up. I was reading about Neanderthal line and rushed my post before dinner, my apologies.

The 20 year gap there can make alot of difference too.

If it was 70,000 they left, modern humans really don't come into proper until 50,000BC, yes, I know in Africa they do have early ones but not actually until 50,000BC is true modern humans really around, so that gap is quite deceiving really.

As Aus pointed out, that Neanderthal is a sub-species makes this scenario work much better.

Some scholars argue that humans achieved anatomical modernity first, around 200tya, and only later did they adopt modern behaviors around 50tya. This hypothesis is based on the limited record of fossils from periods before 50tya and the abundance of human artifacts found after 50tya. Proponents of this view distinguish "anatomically modern humans" from "behaviorally modern humans".

http://en.wikipedia....y_modern_humans

Anatomical modern humans if being diferentiated from behaviourally modern humans here and that's what I mean in the time frame - sure we have 100,000 year old ANATOMICALLY modern humans but what about behaviour within that body and how it changed over time.

Edited by The Puzzler, 04 May 2011 - 11:41 AM.

[Leonardo]

The Puzzler, on 04 May 2011 - 10:58 AM, said:

OTHER possibilities. Isn't that a nice phrase to think about?

Leo, hi, you sound like me in the above and I'm sure you don't really want that - so you should think about which one you are going for - that they tell us the 1 - 4% is from interbreeding or think about whether it might actually come in from some other way. Don't tell me you are doubting the official word.

Molecular phylogenetic analysis[24] suggests Homo rhodesiensis[citation needed] and Homo heidelbergensis continued to intermix until 350,000 years ago, after which they were separate species, and sometime within the last 200,000 years Homo heidelbergensis evolved into Homo neanderthalensis, the classic Neanderthal human. It appears the original Neanderthal population was, in fact, more distantly related to today's human than is Homo heidelbergensis. However, recent evidence of successful interbreeding between Neanderthals and modern humans has made that issue moot, at least insofar as some Neanderthal populations were concerned.

The interbreeding has been pinpointed to Middle east. But of course, feel free to go against what they are telling us...I always welcome that and love when people find a hole in the mesh. I actually thought of exactly what you said. Maybe this came from a common ancestor then - it seems too obvious to have been left out of the equation of when they decided it was an occurance and made it valid news.

I am not suggesting the interbreeding hypothesis is incorrect, Puzz, just that there are other mechanisms which might explain a commonality of genetic material - such as shared ancestry. I am aware of the different timescales given to the different genes, and one of the reasons the researchers suggested an interbreeding scenario is that the appearance of the genes in H. sap seems to be around the time of encountering H. neanderthal, which is quite strong evidence.

I was only asking cormac if he was expressing the view that the interbreeding scenario, while strong, is not conclusive in the hope he may have additional information, rather than making a statement of intent for myself.

The Puzzler, on 04 May 2011 - 11:13 AM, said:

Yes.

OK Leo, I checked this out a bit earlier but wasn't overly sure about it so maybe it would be good to discuss it. Wiki indeed gives no mention of it's ability to be a dream 'connector' to our brain but maybe it's ability to do what it does is the actual action that it means...

This is what I found that seemed to explain it quite well, it is a spiritual website if that makes any diff.

Dreams are experiences of the Beyond. During sleep, some of us leave the physical body and go to other planes. The results of such experiences are what we remember as dreams when we wake up. Genuine dreams are experienced as pictures and these impressions stay on in the cerebellum, see "Brain" and are then passed on to the frontal brain hence coming to day consciousness. That way, the experiences of other realms reach our consciousness.

What this spiritual website seems to be missing (or, perhaps, what you are misinterpreting from what they suggest?), is the role of the cerebellum in memory, and it is the retention of the dream images in memory that are pertinent to that particular site of the brain - not that the cerebellum has any role in the imagining of, or interpretation of, dream imagery.

As for the cerebellum being active when undertaking such activities as dream interpretation, it pays to realise that recall of dream imagery is a function of memory, so it is natural the area of the brain associated with memory function would be active. Thus, the linking of the cerebellum to 'spirituality' is likely to be incidental, and mistaken.

Edited by Leonardo, 04 May 2011 - 11:58 AM.

[BFB]

Last Neanderthals Were Smart, Sophisticated
http://dsc.discovery...thal-tools.html

[Harte]

The Puzzler, on 04 May 2011 - 01:39 AM, said:

I didn't mention Erectus until you, I didn't even post that much about them so I'm unsure what 'crap' I said about them. I don't know much about Erectus and Erectus as far as I know is not part of this equation and that is why I really am not interested in talking about Erectus, although I know it's the only thing men want to talk about...

No?

The Puzzler, on 03 May 2011 - 11:46 AM, said:

It may be a case of they (EDIT - "They" are Neandertals) were the first real dreamers in a sense of recalling the dream.

And, in response to:

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

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

You said:

The Puzzler, on 03 May 2011 - 12:30 PM, said:

I said they (EDIT- "They" here refers to Homo Erectus) can't recall a dream, as far as I know. I never said they didn't dream. Don't waste my time and annoy me stright off the bat Harte.

There is absolutely no reason at all to even consider that Neandertals were the first species of Homo to be able to remember dreams.

Also, before you even begin to think that a larger cerebellum would result in more psychic ability, as in:

Quote

The 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.29s

you should look into determining whether or not psychic abilities, etc. even exist.  I would think that you would have at the very least considered that there is, in fact, no evidence for the existence of such abilities.

Lastly, as was pointed out, there appears to be no correlation between brain size (cerebrum or cerebellum) and the capabilities of the brain in question.


Harte

[The Puzzler]

Maybe we don't have those psychic capabilities NOW.

I was just thinking in the shower, cause it's a good place to think, quiet, no kids - of Australia and the Aboriginals.

I have this book too, too bad no pic is up on Amazon but here's a review:

This is book is an exploration of the prehistory of the Aboriginal peoples of Australia - and peoples they are, not just one homogeneous race that the name Aborigines seems to suggest. There is even a suggestion that there may be mixtures of robust and gracile forms of early humankind in their makeup - perhaps uniquely of all races.
The whole issue of human development, of arising consciousness, is one that fascinates me. I keep thinking of the strange hypnogogic and hypnopompic experiences I sometimes encounter and I wonder if in the dreamtime - in humankind's early beginnings - these shadowy forms of consciousness were all that early people experienced.

Josephine Flood explores the mysteries of Aboriginal peoples - such as how they could have so early in human history have reached so far south (such as at Lake Mungo). Compared to the colonisation of the American continent, the colonistaion of Australia is so much earlier and yet the continent is certainly not an immediately appealing destination. And then there is the mystery of why the isolated Tasmanian Aboriginals quite suddenly stopped eating fish and seafood.

Not all these explorations are encouraged by the modern Aboriginal people and yet I am sure that a true understanding of their uniqueness will return some respect to Aboriginals for being just that - Aboriginals - rather than trying to massage them into some creditable position in what is largely an alien society.

This is a wonderful story of discovery, of posing mysteries and suggesting possibilities.
http://www.amazon.co...d/dp/0824808975

This one I've had for around 16 years and have read it all.

Here's a pic, found one:



They have the original DREAMTIME.

What is the Dreamtime?

It's a time before time itself - when everything came into being. It's thought they didn't make this up when they got here but had this thought all along, the Dreamtime is an ancient age of dreaming. They adapted their ideas to their new land but it was always there.

This book tells that it must have been 70,000 years ago they first came in, the sea level that allowed them entry was lowest at that time and the distances etc are very intricately measured in the book with detailed explanation, it's not a haphazard guess. Lake Mungo holds old clues, graciles BEFORE ancients can be found there.

The Dreaming. What is it, that aboriginals have that makes them have the knowledge they do yet don't write a word, existed here without outside interferance for over 50,000 years, signs of entry come around 12,000BC with an intrusion from the North with dingoes but this is not usually associated with the more ancient people..? Arising consciousness?
These people are some of the closest you will get to ancient African types of the period we speak. I live within them because I live in the Far Nth and I can tell you now these people are like no other for being, I'm not using the term derogatively but in a positive term, animal like, meaning they can track a scent or act and sound like an animal incredibly well when they mimic them. They don't need anything and Australia has a problem with this, it's extremely hard to take a person like that and within a short space make them conform to a lifestyle 50,000 years ahead of your own. Again, problem is not used negatively but what I mean is they have an ability to reject everything around them and walk away which doesn't fit into the way our structured society should work. High paid Aboriginal footballers go 'walkabout' sometimes, they just get up and leave, stuff everything else.

Point being, they are people of the spirit and land, they reject and do not need what we have, they get by quite fine thank you on nothing. We had to laugh my old friend and I the other day when another friend gave another friend a pack of Aboriginal Tarot cards - like give me a break. It's a need to use the ancient cultures knowledge in a modern way we understand. I find this common and this is just one example and I compare it to the overall taking of the Neanderthal culture too and spirituality and maybe if look really hard, or listen, around the billabongs at the Corroborees you might hear the sounds of what men were like when they lived with Neanderthal and learnt about the Dreamtime.

[The Puzzler]

Harte, on 04 May 2011 - 12:28 PM, said:

There is absolutely no reason at all to even consider that Neandertals were the first species of Homo to be able to remember dreams.



Harte

They may have been the first to utilise them in a constructive way to the spiritual self.

Psychic abilities, well, I don't know if they exist or not, sorta like God and UFO's, I haven't seen one and don't think they are out there but I really don't know...many people swear they are real. I feel unable to judge that like psychic abilities in people or any other paranormal abilities claimed. People apparently can get hypnotised, you just may not understand how to manipulate the brain to get people (or things) to do something at will, like others can and probably could do much better than us today.

[The Puzzler]

What is a psychic ability anyway, maybe it's just reasoning - the phone rings, I go, it's your Mum, and it is...is that psychic, it seems like I've known, but I just estimate that this would be the timeframe she would ring and hasn't for a while and so it will be her.

Is it an ability that is instinctively in us? Like a dog knows when a storm will be coming or birds read the weather to make movement - maybe we actually had to re-adjust from instinct to keeping the knowledge, not just having it anymore. Psychic abilities seem to be more of an ancient thing coming from instinct. Developing language to do this or drawings or even signals would have been the precursor to the mythic stories that tell us stories of star movements in elaborately conceived stories of heroes being placed into the sky.

[cormac mac airt]

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cormac,

If I read this correctly, the indication might be that H. neanderthal and H. sapiens may not have acquired the identical genes through interbreeding, but these genes may be identical due to their (H. neanderthal's and H. sap's) common ancestry?

If that is what you are indicating, I am in agreement that much has been made of only one possibility for why we share genes with Neanderthals, and not much said about the other possibilities.

Hello Leonardo,

Yes, that would be it in a nutshell. That we may share genes with any of our ancestral or sister lines of the genus Homo is quite understandable. But to assume that specific genes can be seen as originating from any one, with no other substantiating evidence coming in from any of the others is putting the cart well ahead of the horse, IMO.

//////////

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NOT with Sub-Saharan Africans.

That is why the Omo etc do not count.

The interbreeding is shown to be between Neanderthals and humans because the dna genome is not sub-Saharan.

http://en.wikipedia....y_modern_humans

So, I'd have to disagree with cormac on that one and say it is known that the genome is from Neanderthal and not any other because it's shown to be a NON-sub-Saharan gene.

Timelines, Puzzler, timelines. The Sub-Saharan Africans that are being talked about here are modern day Sub-Saharan Africans. It has nothing to do with ancient Sub-Saharans, in this case the peoples of Omo Kibish, for example. So yes, the Omo 1 and 2 peoples still can not be ruled out from the overall question of genes and their origin.

//////////

Quote

Anatomical modern humans if being diferentiated from behaviourally modern humans here and that's what I mean in the time frame - sure we have 100,000 year old ANATOMICALLY modern humans but what about behaviour within that body and how it changed over time.

Being ‘behaviourly modern’ does not change the genetics. We know from mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) studies that genetics agrees quite well with the oldest anatomically modern humans. Omo 1 and 2 dating to c.196,000 BP and the oldest modern human female line mtDNA Haplography “L” dating to c.192,400 BP.

cormac

[The Puzzler]

cormac mac airt, on 04 May 2011 - 03:44 PM, said:

Hello Leonardo,

Yes, that would be it in a nutshell. That we may share genes with any of our ancestral or sister lines of the genus Homo is quite understandable. But to assume that specific genes can be seen as originating from any one, with no other substantiating evidence coming in from any of the others is putting the cart well ahead of the horse, IMO.

//////////



Timelines, Puzzler, timelines. The Sub-Saharan Africans that are being talked about here are modern day Sub-Saharan Africans. It has nothing to do with ancient Sub-Saharans, in this case the peoples of Omo Kibish, for example. So yes, the Omo 1 and 2 peoples still can not be ruled out from the overall question of genes and their origin.

//////////



Being ‘behaviourly modern’ does not change the genetics. We know from mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) studies that genetics agrees quite well with the oldest anatomically modern humans. Omo 1 and 2 dating to c.196,000 BP and the oldest modern human female line mtDNA Haplography “L” dating to c.192,400 BP.

cormac

What was this about anyway?

Are YOU challenging the now accepted view that Neanderthals and modern humans interbred?  You seem to be pushing a point that the 1-4% in modern humans is not from Neanderthal interbreeding when it is quite clearly saying it has and is acknowledged as happening.