Neanderthals … Bro, Or No Bro?
Neanderthals were separate species, says new human family tree …
A new, simplified family tree of humanity has dealt a blow to those who contend that the enigmatic hominids known as Neanderthals intermingled with our forebears.
Neanderthals were a separate species to Homo sapiens, as anatomically modern humans are known, rather than offshoots of the same species, the new organigram published Sunday by the journal Nature declares.
The method, invented by evolutionary analysts in Argentina, marks a break with the conventional technique by which anthropologists chart the twists and turns of the human odyssey.
That technique typically divides the genus Homo into various classifications according to the shape of key facial features — “flat-faced,” “protruding-faced” and so on.
Reconciling these diverse classifications from a tiny number of specimens spanning millions of years has led to lots of claims and counter-claims, as well as much confusion in the general public, about how we came to be here.
Various species of Homo have been put up for the crown of being our direct ancestor, only to find themselves dismissed by critics as failed branches of the Homo tree.
The authors of the new study, led by Rolando Gonzalez-Jose at the Patagonian National Centre at Puerto Madryn, Argentina, say the problem with the conventional method is that, under evolution, facial traits do not appear out of the blue but result from continuous change.
So the arrival of a specimen that has some relatively minor change of feature as compared to others should not be automatically held up as representing a new species, they argue.
The team goes back over the same well-known set of specimens, but uses a different approach to analyse it, focussing in particular on a set of fundamental yet long-term changes in skull shape.
They took digital 3D images of the casts of 17 hominid specimens as well as from a gorilla, chimpanzee and H. sapiens.
The images were then crunched through a computer model to compare four fundamental variables — the skull’s roundness and base, the protrusion of the jaw, and facial retraction, which is the position of the face relative to the cranial base.
When other phylotogenic techniques are used, the outcome is a family tree whose main lines closely mirror existing ones but offers a clearer view as to how the evolutionary path unfolded.
The paper suggests that, after evolving from the hominid Australopithecus afarensis, the first member of Homo, H. habilis, arose between 1.5 and 2.1 million years ago.
We are direct linear descendants of H. habilis. H. sapiens started to show up around 200,000 years ago.
None of the species currently assigned to Homo are discarded, though.
On the other hand, the Neanderthals are declared “chronological variants inside a single biological heritage,” in other words, evolutionary cousins but still a separate species from us.
The squat, low-browed Neanderthals lived in parts of Europe, Central Asia and the Middle East for around 170,000 but traces of them disappear some 28,000 years ago, their last known refuge being Gibraltar.
Why they died out is a matter of furious debate, because they co-existed alongside anatomically modern man.
Some opinions aver that the Neanderthals were slowly wiped out by the smarter H. sapiens in the competition for resources.
Other contend that we and the Neanderthals were more than just kissing cousins. Interbreeding took place, which explains why the Neanderthal line died out, but implies that we could have Neanderthal inheritage in our genome today, goes this theory.
(AFP)
They maybe … right …
Be respectful of others and their opinions. Inflammatory remarks and inane leftist drivel will be deleted. It ain’t about free speech, remember you’re in a private domain. My website, my prerogative.
If you can't handle using your real email address, don't bother posting a comment.
Disease may have wiped them out also. When Europeans came to the new world, many of the indigenous people had no resistance to their diseases. Entire civilizations were decimated. Why could this not have been the case with Neanderthals?
May 4th, 2008 at 7:30 pmThey obviously haven’t seen me after a few weeks without shaving….
May 4th, 2008 at 8:47 pmIt’s a no brainer. Unless my mother forgot to mention that she performed unspeakable acts with a Klingon….
The term “species” is taking a beating. The old rule was ‘ If they can interbreed, they’re the same species. If not, not. ‘ But it’s actually a sliding scale of increasing difficulty, hybrids, mules, and finally infertility.
E.g.: some have suggested humans and chimps could interbreed. No known attempts have occurred — or at least, there are no known survivors.
May 4th, 2008 at 9:14 pmThis is beyond stupid. You can find “Neanderthals” walking around today, and I don’t mean on TV. There is an incredible variety of features in the human body available for anyone to see. Just for size, try going down to the nearest circus to see a few. These “scientists” were educated in the Big Lie, and can’t bring themselves to admit that they are sinners in need of the Savior; THAT is the major problem here, not science.
May 5th, 2008 at 12:23 amMitochondrial DNA showed Neanderthals being our forebearers several years ago as totally bogus. Next time you hear that chimps have 98% of a common chromosome structure as man, remind yourself that with all the diversity you see in the human genome and the way it is visibly manifested (phenotype for all you scientists), all of man has a 99.9% common gene structure.
When all of this is said and done, biochemists and geneticists are going to show man has not been on the earth much more than say a 100,000 years, probably much less. And all those brilliant folks thinking there’s an obvious scientific reason will be left scratching their heads wondering just how that happened.
May 5th, 2008 at 2:47 am“their last known refuge being Gibraltar.”
alongside with the magdalenians’ caverns there are also neanderthals known sites from archeologists in south west of France
Apparently they have been sharing the same aeras for a while before disappearing ; might be out of disease as Rudermeister suggested
May 5th, 2008 at 3:45 amJust regular stinkin muslims.
Fuck Islam
May 5th, 2008 at 3:49 amhave a good day
They’re still here. For hundreds of thousands of years they can been seen at tail gate parties and soccer games in Europe. Some of my best friends. We’ve all been here for millions of years and have about four billion years to go. Remember, for every day before there’s a day before that.
May 5th, 2008 at 4:01 am83delta, can’t be these, because of their very comportment, they are not as brave as :
http://cogweb.ucla.edu/ep/NeanderthalParadigm.html
I wonder if the “people coming from the sea”, in ancient greek “Illiade and Odysseus” legends, were not remains of neandethals ? or that legend of the Atlantes, what kind of people had removed the stones in Carnac and Stonehendge ?
May 5th, 2008 at 4:35 am
Franchie
May 5th, 2008 at 4:54 amI stand corrected, Muzzies must be a sub/sub species-