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Decoding Neanderthals


jmccr8

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Hi Frank,

I don't really agree that they are a different species or even a sub-species as there doesn't seem to be enough differences between them and with what we are seeing with respect to Neandertal,Denisovians ,Homo sapien sapien and even some of the older homo groups.They have more in common that they have in differences in my view,to me,my neighbours are all from different culture,speak different languages and are physically different in some aspects,my daughter is half Jamaican I'm a black hearted Irishman we share some physical similarities and some differences but we are all Hss. :yes: .

jmccr8

Happy New Year to all and Best wishes

jmccr8

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Hi jmccr8,

I am part Scottish, Cherokee, and German with a South African black girlfriend so yea the genetics can get a bit complicated but mean little in terms of personal interactions as far as I am concerned. I have come to view all hominids since Homo Erectus as morphological species rather than biological species. Populations that were somewhere in the process of speciation but with never quite enough time to get there. A murky and ill-defined area where there are clearly substantial genetic and morphological differences but not enough to prevent sexual reproduction between them save through cultural taboo, mate attraction preferences, or habitat separation. With one possible known exception, Homo Floresiensis, which may have been separate long enough to evolve into a biological species. I like the Lord of the Rings analogy as describing most of hominid history. Enjoy the bottle!

Happy New Year To ALL!

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Hi,

Back again,I am posting the links that I said I would a couple of days ago.I will post those that are relevant as a group so there will be a couple of posts made.These first ones are about artifacts from the Doggerland area.

Doggerland - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

BBC News - Hidden Doggerland underworld uncovered in North Sea

BBC NEWS | Science & Environment | Sea gives up Neanderthal fossil

jmccr8

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These following links are about back migrations of Neandertals or Neandertal admixture populations from Asia and Europe.There are several theories as to how this admixture appears in Sub-African populations so I am posting links that propose different positions.

Neandertal Admixture in Africans: A Back-Migration to Sub-Saharan Africa Confirmed

Dienekes’ Anthropology Blog: Haplotype that looks Neandertal-introgressed may reflect African population structure (Gokcumen et al. 2013)

The genetic complexity of recent migration into southern Africa – john hawks weblog

back migrations of Neanderthals into Africa - Google Search

Were ancient human migrations two-way streets?

jmccr8

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I forgot to add this link earlier and it has to do with hominid occupation in Arabia,the study shows that both Hss and Neandertals were in this region.

PLOS ONE: Hominin Dispersal into the Nefud Desert and Middle Palaeolithic Settlement along the Jubbah Palaeolake, Northern Arabia

It's a lenghty read but well worth the time spent.

jmccr8

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  • 3 weeks later...

These following three links deal with the Y chromosome,the first link is about the time line being moved further back form 200kbp to 209kbp

http://phys.org/news/2014-01-adam-rightful-evolutionary-history.html

http://phys.org/news/2013-08-chromosomes-clues-human-ancestry.html#inlRlv

http://phys.org/news/2013-03-human-chromosome-older-previously-thought.html#inlRlv

jmccr8

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This is my last post for today :whistle: the following article is suggesting that the disappearance of the elephant caused the rise of modern man 400kbp.

http://phys.org/news/2011-12-elephant-modern-years.html#nRlv

To be honest I was somewhat confused by how this article was written as it is describing a site in Isreal,and I am not sure I understand to what they are referring to when they talk about a transition from Homo erectus to modern man.My understanding is that H.s.s arose in Africa 200kbp,so is there another hominid line between Herectus and H.s.s or are they referring to Neandertal?

jmccr8

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(FROM post #106), "In 1947, the Norwegian adventurer Thor Hyerdahl’s Kon Tiki Expedition sailed a large balsa raft of Andean or South American design westward across the Pacific for 101 days. The raft was designed and built by indigenous ship builders whose people still live around Lake Titicaca, high in the Andes. Thor Hyderdahl’s theory about ancient South American journeys to Polynesia was initially controversial, but the book about the expedition was an immediate best seller and the documentary film won an Academy Award."

Interesting read too....didn't TH and crew also build a ship using Egyptian....using Papayrus,,,???

Didn't know about the Aus-New Guinea bridge....I'm assuming lower sea levels in that era.

P.S. A polar bear can swim 100 mi.....but hunting more on land now due to less pack ice.

Edited by scorpiosonic
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This is my last post for today :whistle: the following article is suggesting that the disappearance of the elephant caused the rise of modern man 400kbp.

http://phys.org/news...years.html#nRlv

To be honest I was somewhat confused by how this article was written as it is describing a site in Isreal,and I am not sure I understand to what they are referring to when they talk about a transition from Homo erectus to modern man.My understanding is that H.s.s arose in Africa 200kbp,so is there another hominid line between H. erectus and H.s.s or are they referring to Neandertal?

jmccr8

That line would be Homo heidelbergensis.

cormac

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Hi Cormac,

Thanks for clearing that up for me. Xynoplas added a link about the H.h and Denisovan link whoever these timelines overlap and are in a different location and there is evidence of Neandertal in the same areas does this mean that there were populations of all of these groups co-existing?

jmccr8

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WASHINGTON – Next time you call someone a Neanderthal, better look in a mirror.

Many of the genes that help determine most people's skin and hair are more Neanderthal than not, according to two new studies that look at the DNA fossils hidden in the modern human genome.

About 50,000 years ago, modern day humans migrated out of Africa north to Europe and East Asia and met up with furrow-browed Neanderthals that had been in the colder climates for more than 100,000 years. Some of the two species mated. And then the Neanderthals died off as a species — except for what's left inside of us.

Scientists isolated the parts of the non-African modern human genetic blueprint that still contain Neanderthal remnants. Overall, it's barely more than 1 percent, said two studies released Wednesday in the journals Nature and Science.

However, in some places, such as the DNA related to the skin, the genetic instructions are as much as 70 percent Neanderthal and in other places there's virtually nothing from the species that's often portrayed as brutish cavemen.

'We're more Neanderthal than not in [some] genes.'

- University of Washington genome scientist Joshua Akey

The difference between where Neanderthal DNA is plentiful and where it's absent may help scientists understand what in our genome "makes humans human," said University of Washington genome scientist Joshua Akey, lead author of the paper in Science.

Harvard researcher Sriram Sankararaman, the lead author of the Nature study, said the place where Neanderthal DNA seemed to have the most influence in the modern human genome has to do with skin and hair. Akey said those instructions are as much as 70 percent Neanderthal.

"We're more Neanderthal than not in those genes," Akey said.

However, Sankararaman cautions that scientists don't yet know just what the Neanderthal DNA dictates in our skin and hair.

Sarah Tishkoff, a professor of genetics and biology at the University of Pennsylvania who was not part of either study, theorized that the Neanderthal DNA probably helped the darker humans out of Africa cope with the cooler less bright north. Living in the cooler Europe means less ultraviolet light and less vitamin D from the sun. Darker skin blocks more of those needed rays, so lighter skin is more advantageous in the north and it seems that humans adopted that Neanderthal adaptation, she said.

Another area where we have more Neanderthal DNA is parts of genetic codes that have to do with certain immune system functions, Sankararaman said. Again, scientists can't say more than that these Neanderthal genes seem connected to certain diseases, such as type 2 diabetes and Crohn's disease and lupus, but they are there.

Tiskhoff and Akey said one of the most interesting parts in comparing human and Neanderthal genomes is where we don't see any caveman influence. That, Tiskhoff said, is "what makes us uniquely human" and those regions of genetic code "you just can't mess with."

One of those areas has been heavily connected to genes that determine speech and communication and there's nothing Neanderthal there, Akey said. This fits with theories that lack of communication skills hurt Neanderthal and speech ability was a distinctly human advantage, he said.

And the study in Nature found something that may help explain why the brutish and virile cavemen haven't influenced humans much: They may have made babies, but the male hybrids of Neanderthals and humans weren't very fertile. Scientists figured that out because the genes associated with the testicles in humans and the X chromosome were unusually empty of Neanderthal influence.

While Neanderthal males themselves were likely good at breeding, their half-human sons weren't and "they must have been disappointed in their sons," said Nature co-author Svante Paabo of the Max Planck Institute in Germany.

The Nature paper found that people of more East Asian descent had slightly more Neanderthal than Europeans, indicating that there may have been a second wave of interbreeding in Asia, researchers said.

Three outside scientists praised the two studies, which used different techniques to reach similar conclusions. And those conclusions were so close to each other and standard evolution theory that it all fits together in a scary way for scientists used to findings that surprise, said New York University anthropology professor Todd Disotell.

Disotell recently had his genome tested by a private company and found he's got more Neanderthal DNA than most people, about 2.9 percent: "I'm quite proud of that."

___

Online:

Nature: http://www.nature.com/nature

Science: http://www.sciencemag.org

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  • 3 weeks later...

I came across this and am adding it,the article is about H.erectus constructing the first settlements in north and east Africa.The remains of stone huts and tools for fishing and butchering have been found at sites like Budrinna on the shore of the extinct Lake Fezzan in S.W.Lybia and at Melka Konture,along the River Awash in Ethiopia.The sites show small communities of 40-50 people.As well the article discusses other sites in Europe and did include the site in Japan which has been shown to be a hoax and agknowledged by the author in the comments below the article.

jmccr8

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The following link discusses the use of medicinal plants by Neandertals.What I like about this links is that it states that these medicinal plants could have been intentionally used or explains that is could have been due to eating the stomachs of the animals that had been butchered as a possibility.From there the other aspects,such as climate and diet are factored in to give a better picture of the conditions at that time and how it relates to how the information may be interpreted.

http://johnhawks.net/weblog/reviews/neandertals/diet/neandertal-self-medication-hardy-2013.html

jmccr8

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Eee, I don't buy that animal stomach line. You can't tell which plant it is once you pull it out of the stomach.

Humans have been eating plants since before they were humans. Even some animals know about medicinal plants.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/10/101011090010.htm

Neanderthals were eating plants for uncounted generations; surely they'd keep track of which plants were poisonous and which ones (yarrow and chamomile) had soothing effects. They weren't dumb.

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I had debated with myself as to whether or not to add this study to the thread as it is not relative to Neandertals in any direct form,as it is about an archaic H.s.s found in India.I decided that I would add it primarily because of the work that was done in order to study this artifact.The descriptions of the work involved help me understand how science works for us.

http://www.ancient-asia-journal.com/article/view/aa.06102/3

jmccr8

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Hi Xynoplas,

What was being put forward is that during specific conditions like drought or seasonal changes when plants aren't growing fresh that archaic hominids could still get the value from plant matter by cooking and eating the full stomach of their game.Kinda like and archaic dinner pack without the micro-wave. :w00t: They likely didn't take what was in the stomach out,they would cook the stomach with the contents in it.

jmccr8

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