"The old story goes we won, beating out Neandertals because we were smarter, better hunters and innovators."
From an article in the latest Scientific American.
The gist of that is it was none of the above.
Neandertals were stronger, had bigger brains and could probably crush a modern human in ten seconds.
The new view is our superpower as a species was 'self domestication' where serotonin was responsible for the growth of affibility, the effect being able to work together and communicate findings of technology and social discourse and having not much at all to do with our supposed superior intelligence.
So we beat out Neandertals and all the rest by learning to work together and make sure the next generation did not have to redo the effort of the last generation. Our hidden superpower.
@sonhousesaid "The old story goes we won, beating out Neandertals because we were smarter, better hunters and innovators."
From an article in the latest Scientific American.
The gist of that is it was none of the above.
Neandertals were stronger, had bigger brains and could probably crush a modern human in ten seconds.
The new view is our superpower as a species was 'self dom ...[text shortened]... the next generation did not have to redo the effort of the last generation. Our hidden superpower.
It's just a shame we cannot live and work together in all things.
The human race is still no better than the animal kingdom , fighting for territory and posessions.
As for passing on our wisdom to the next generation, we fight the same wars century after century learning nothing along the way.
What lessons were learned from the American civil war -none -the great war "the war to end wars" was tactically a carbon copy.
In the 21st century we still fight each other on a nation v nation basis.
Only the landscape has changed
@vendasaid It's just a shame we cannot live and work together in all things.
The human race is still no better than the animal kingdom , fighting for territory and posessions.
As for passing on our wisdom to the next generation, we fight the same wars century after century learning nothing along the way.
What lessons were learned from the American civil war -none -the great war "the wa ...[text shortened]... e 21st century we still fight each other on a nation v nation basis.
Only the landscape has changed
or simply put "greed"..which I basically don't have any issue with.
@ogb That affable index seems to me is more meaningful in relatively small groups.
When you get to the scale of millions of people or billions of people the affable index can fall to zero or minus zero, meaning dead set on destroying an enemy.
@sonhousesaid "The old story goes we won, beating out Neandertals because we were smarter, better hunters and innovators."
From an article in the latest Scientific American.
The gist of that is it was none of the above.
Neandertals were stronger, had bigger brains and could probably crush a modern human in ten seconds.
The new view is our superpower as a species was 'self dom ...[text shortened]... the next generation did not have to redo the effort of the last generation. Our hidden superpower.
@AThousandYoung But they would have been better at running with a spear and shoving it in to a prey species. I say that because they are reputed to have been much stronger than H Sap.
@sonhouse Not researching it now but my understanding was that there were two reasons for H.Sapiens displacing H. Neanderthal and they were
1. Climate change.
2. Group size. Neanderthals lived in small family units, Sapiens lived as small tribes.
@wolfgang59 I think he was referring to their barrel chest not able to twist as well and fast as H Sap. which would reduce the effectiveness of a spear throw.
@wolfgang59said Really?
Did their physiology prevent that?
I think it is known that they were advanced tool users (axes & knives).
The Neandertal bone structure which enabled their great strength also meant their shoulder joint was too tight and restricted in its movements to throw spears as well as we can with our loose shoulder joints. At least that's what I read once.
(PhysOrg.com) -- A new study of the skeletal fossils of Neanderthal and Early modern man suggest the lack of a "throwing arm" may have made the difference in human evolution. Researchers Jill A. Rhodes and Steven Churchill, evolutionary anthropologists published their findings in the January 2009 edition of the Journal of Human Evolution. The paper entitled, "Throwing in the Middle and Upper Paleolithic: inferences from an analysis of humeral retroversion," provides some clues to the extinction of Neanderthal.
@athousandyoungsaid The Neandertal bone structure which enabled their great strength also meant their shoulder joint was too tight and restricted in its movements to throw spears as well as we can with our loose shoulder joints. At least that's what I read once.
(PhysOrg.com) -- A new study of ...[text shortened]... an analysis of humeral retroversion," provides some clues to the extinction of Neanderthal.
That is interesting.
It certainly would restrict hunting ... but they managed for millenia.
Must have been the scarcity of food or changing prey animals maybe?
@vendasaid I read recently that there's evidence that Neandertals and Homo sapiens interbred and also that we are all decended from just 10,000 breeding pairs
That's old news.
What is new is that recent DNA investigations have shown amounts of
Neanderthal DNA (up to 2% I think) in Africans. Hitherto it was thought
only Europeans and Asians had ancestors who had interbred. Using some
fancy techniques the latest opinion is that Africans interbred with returning
Europeans (some 100,000 years ago) who had bred with Neanderthals.
New ideas as to H Sapians winning out:
14 Aug '20 03:56
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