Neanderthals were good parents. No, really?

Adam Khor

http://www.sci-news.com/archaeology/science-neanderthals-good-parents-01844.html

All primates are good parents, don´t see why this is any surprise. But whatever, I didn´t read the whole thing :pac:

Wibbs

Hmmmm, lots of supposition in that article. Deliberate burial, or at least deliberate symbolic burial in the way we might think of it is seriously up in the air as far as evidence goes. In nearly every example it could be argued other processes or intent were at play.

“Neanderthal children played a particularly significant role in their society, particularly in symbolic expression.”Eh wut? I'd love to know what they were smoking when they came up with that and I'd love to see the evidence for their supposition. Symbolic expression for Neandertals as a people is very scant. Yes there is some, but it's rare and often in the eye of the beholder researcher.

“There is evidence that Neanderthals cared for their sick and injured children for months and often years.”There is evidence that they cared for their sick and injured adults alright, so it would make sense to extrapolate that to their kids, but again it's extrapolation without definable evidence.

Galvasean

Hmm, I assumed they simply ATE THEIR CHILDREN immediately upon birthing them!

Kess73

Wibbs wrote: »

Hmmmm, lots of supposition in that article. Deliberate burial, or at least deliberate symbolic burial in the way we might think of it is seriously up in the air as far as evidence goes. In nearly every example it could be argued other processes or intent were at play.

“Neanderthal children played a particularly significant role in their society, particularly in symbolic expression.”Eh wut? I'd love to know what they were smoking when they came up with that and I'd love to see the evidence for their supposition. Symbolic expression for Neandertals as a people is very scant. Yes there is some, but it's rare and often in the eye of the beholder researcher.

“There is evidence that Neanderthals cared for their sick and injured children for months and often years.”There is evidence that they cared for their sick and injured adults alright, so it would make sense to extrapolate that to their kids, but again it's extrapolation without definable evidence.

You are just the man I am looking for. Added a few books to my wishlist on Amazon and wondered if you had read them. Basically am just wondering if they are worth getting



The Neanderthals Rediscovered: How Modern Science is Rewriting Their Story by Dimitra Papagianni, and Michael A. Morse



and


Britain: One Million Years of the Human Story by Rob Dinnis and Chris Stringer.

Wibbs

Both are good titles K and you'll not go far wrong reading them. The first naturally focuses on the Neandertals, the second gives a great overview of humans in the UK.

Kess73

Wibbs wrote: »

Both are good titles K and you'll not go far wrong reading them. The first naturally focuses on the Neandertals, the second gives a great overview of humans in the UK.

Thanks for that. A thumbs up from you on anything related to early humans is gold imo.


Both books are now ordered.

Capt'n Midnight

Galvasean wrote: »

Hmm, I assumed they simply ATE THEIR CHILDREN immediately upon birthing them!

Which just goes to show that Greek Mythology about Chronos & Co. was based on fact.

Australians have older stories about extinct volcanoes erupting so plausible.

Wibbs

Personally I'd find it a convincing enough case that the original legends and tales of trolls were, or might have been based on Neandertals and that "race memory" comes down to us. "Woodmen" and "Greenmen" of the forest similarly. Even the deep dark woods as the place where the boogeyman lives in lots of European tales another holdover. African folks who live near or in deep forests don't have such tales or misgivings to nearly the same degree. Indeed the forest is often an ally.

Then again 20,000 years ago in Europe if you had another people who you rarely encountered in open ground, that were much stronger than you and much more adapted to thick cover and low light you might make their living areas places of dread, where the wild things live. Well even going on physiology, they had the biggest eyes of any human ever and the largest optical processing area in the brain. Allied to the strength of 3 world class cage fighters and a constant need for protein, they would be the last thing you'd want to meet in a dark forest. It might be easily imagined how such a people in their last days isolated and contained in the last great forests could become legend.

cant touchthis

qz.com/204161/one-of-sciences-greatest-mysteries-deepens-did-humans-kill-off-neanderthals/

Adam Khor

Wibbs wrote: »

Personally I'd find it a convincing enough case that the original legends and tales of trolls were, or might have been based on Neandertals and that "race memory" comes down to us.

There's seemingly plenty of such cases with other extinct creatures. Thunderbirds in North America may be a memory of teratorns and/or the giant Woodward's eagle which apparently was as big as a Haast's eagle (except it had a greater wingspan, being an open-habitat bird and all that); unicorns may have ties to Elasmotherium, the South American Mapinguari could be a giant ground sloth, and don´t even get me started on Australian aborigin legends...

Wibbs wrote: »

Well even going on physiology, they had the biggest eyes of any human ever and the largest optical processing area in the brain.

I find it highly frustrating that we get no pictures of Neanderthals with their big eyes. Do you know of any, maybe? As in, one that actually resembles what they looked like for real?

Wibbs

I don't AK, but because the sheer size of their faces and skulls doesn't come across in photos, their big eyes aren't so obvious. They're in proportion to the rest of their faces. They have huge noses and jaws and heads so... I'd say you'd really notice the diff if you put modern human eyes into a reconstruction. They'd look like peeholes in the snow.

Adam Khor

I see :eek:

Speaking of hominins, I was reading this the other day- about how Homo erectus seems to be "armored" in a way. It is not really new, but it was for me, at least, so I'm linking anyways, in case anyone wants to read it:

http://www.naturalhistorymag.com/htmlsite/master.html?http://www.naturalhistorymag.com/htmlsite/0204/0204_feature.html

cant touchthis

smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/bringing-human-evolution-life-180951155/?no-ist


Paleoartist Brings Human Evolution to Life

Adam Khor

cant touchthis wrote: »

/QUOTE]

Fraud!! I'm pretty sure I saw this guy in the original Planet of the Apes.