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The Neanderthal's Necklace
The Neanderthal's Necklace is an engrossing and informative introduction to the Neanderthals, setting them in the context of human evolution and prehistory more generally, and of broader ecological and environmental history. In it Luis Arsuaga touches on anatomy, demographics, systematics, evolutionary psychology, philosophy of mind, and more, but he does so sensibly, not trying to cram in too much and not getting distracted from his basic subject. He does focus on Spain and to a lesser extent on his own digs - he is one of Europe's leading paleoanthropologists - but while his passion for his subject is clear, The Neanderthal's Necklace never becomes autobiographical.
The first two chapters are an account of early human prehistory: the other apes, the various species of Australopithecus and Homo, early toolmaking, and so forth. This includes a brief introduction to systematics. Chapter three continues this with an account of the evolution of the Neanderthals in Europe and our ancestors in Africa, and an overview of their comparative anatomy and morphology.
Two chapters describe the environment in which this happened, presenting a history of the flora, fauna, geology and climate of Spain (and in less detail of Europe) over the last few hundred thousand years. Here Luis Arsuaga brings to life the mountains and forests of Spain, and the cave bears, mammoths, reindeer, and other animals that inhabited them. With bears and hibernation as the link, he goes on to consider the problem of finding enough to eat in this environment, especially in glacial periods. He looks at foraging and hunting (or scavenging) as sources of food, at the development of hunting technology, and at the extinction of many species. A chapter on demographics and life histories then explains how the archaeological record is used to estimate population densities, life expectancies, and so forth for both Neanderthals and Cro-Magnons.
Luis Arsuaga includes just a little bit of abstract philosophy of mind in an overview of debates over consciousness, sentience, language, and their evolutionary origins; he argues that Neanderthals had language and self-awareness, but lacked our more advanced symbolic abilities and vocal anatomy; evidence for "funerals" or other ritual behaviours is not conclusive. And he reconstructs the contact between Neanderthal and Cro-Magnon, with the latter's superior tools and social organisation giving them an edge in the last glaciation, and the last Neanderthals living in southern Spain. A brief final chapter recapitulates the story and glances at what came next, at agriculture and domestication.
Only a few rough sketches, graphs and maps are included in The Neanderthal's Necklace: a decent map of Spain is probably the major omission for non-Spanish readers. The publisher of this translation has, rather annoyingly, converted all the units from metric to Imperial, though the subject is surely scientific enough to warrant having left them. And a digression explaining the "grandmother" theory of menopause seems awkwardly "tacked on". Otherwise, there is not much to fault - this is a superb piece of popular science, one that does justice to its fascinating subject.
If you enjoyed this review, you might like to check out Danny's other paleoanthropology and popular science reviews. You can purchase The Neanderthal's Necklace from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
Researchers were quick to deny rumours that the earliest neanderthal lithographs discovered on cave walls have been translated as "First Post"...
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
What really annoys me about most pre-history books and television shows is not the way that they assume, but the way they put forward their assumptions as facts. The way that in a show about dinosaurs, the narrator will casually throw in a bit about "the brightly coloured skin" or saying that Australopithecus slept in trees and had good colour vision.
I was under the impression that neanderthals were proven to be merely an extinct race of Homo Sapiens, but this book shows them as a different species again? Somebody explain plz
But there is a huge difference between how science approaches explanation than how religion does.
... + Assumption N = Conclusion 1.
[Science]
Assumption 1 + Assumption 2 + Assumption 3 = Conclusion 1.
The scientific method. Take a set of assumptions. Add them together. Come up with a hypothesis. Test that hypothesis with a carefully constructed experiment. Come up with a conclusion based on observing the experiment.
Pretty standard stuff. That's pretty much how human thought works.
But where do the assumptions come from? In science, assumptions are previously-made observations. For instance, "the proton has a positive charge," "hydrogen has an atomic number of 1," "neurons are incapable of regenerating," etc. Experiment after experiment has been run, and these assumptions have been challenged in theory after theory. But they've always held fast.
Thusly, the assumptions or their attendant conclusions become "law." And they remain so until proven otherwise.
[Religion]
Assumption 1 +
Same methodology as with science. Makes sense, considering that's how our minds are built to solve problems.
The difference here is in the nature of the assumptions. In science, as mentioned above, the assumption is merely an observation. However, religion's assumptions are canonical. They are arbitrary, unobserved "observations" that must be taken as fact. If you want to know for sure that "a proton has a positive charge", you can look up hundreds of independent studies that prove it, and how to reproduce that proof. If you want to know that "God created the Earth in 7 days", there's only one place to look. And even that source contradicts itself. (For instance the Yahwist v. Priestly sources in Genesis 1 & 2).
These assumptions remain true, and cannot be proven otherwise, under penalty of toppling the entire system itself. Science has changed continously over its entire existence; its assumptions and conclusions constantly refitted to match the current set of data. Religion has not. The same immutable assumptions have always existed.
So just because Religion and Science follow the same patterns of explanation does not make them so similar. The common thread is of course, they are both used by humans.
But while we're speaking of religion...
If the majority of people were capable of and had the mental fortitude necessary to conducting an honest and critical analysis of their belief systems then the world we live in would be a starkly different place. I think it would be a better place, but maybe not.
Our belief systems serve to shield us from possible realizations that could hinder day to day living or even cause irreparable damage to our mental stability. There are some people that don't need religion, nationalism or any philosophy to buffer them from an understanding of the possible irrelevance of their existence. Then there are those people that fly into a rage at the mere suggestion that some examination of their beliefs may be in order. In between are people who have constructed a very fortified logic loop that they enter when confronted with the fragility of their base assumptions. When asked pointed and illuminating questions they frown or make odd faces realizing that there may be a chink in their armor. Often they just lapse in quoting scripture or other text they see as supporting their justifications.
Now please don't misconstrue what I'm saying into "all indoctrination renders people into sheep." That may or may not be the case. The issue is that by subscribing to a system of belief without serious, SERIOUS questioning of that belief and why we feel the need to cloak our perceptions within it we automatically draw potentially harmful barriers between "Us" and "Them."
Yes, this is a clinical view of the situation. Science itself can be construed as a belief system that serves the purposes I've stated above. But I would argue that the core doctrine of any particular scientific discipline is to look at an aspect of our existence and attempt to discover and explain the true workings behind it. Most religions on the other hand present "The Truth" as "seen" or "understood" by prophets, soothsayers, gods and messiahs. While often comforting, these doctrines often go out of their way to discourage the questioning of "The Truths" they present. To be fair though, the basic doctrine of many religions is a moral code outlining decent and appropriate behavior that is often followed only loosely, if at all, by many of the religion's supposed followers.
There are people who have asked themselves the right questions, have done the deep analysis, and remain strong in their faith and belief. These people are often excellent examples of the better aspects of their belief system. I say more power to them. The problem is that they are the minority. Most people use religion as that crutch, that warm comfy cave that keeps them from having to think too hard about "what it all means." Not everybody is prone to such analysis and that's fine, but when you start using that crutch to beat others over the head you've just made yourself a big part of "the problem."
To paraphrase Martin Luther King, "I can't be who I need to be until you are who you need to be. You can't be who you need to be until I am who I need to be. Let's help each other get there together." The main issue I have with religion is that unless we are very careful we let it tell us what other people need to be. That is a sure recipe for strife and prejudice.
I'm sure that a great number of slashdotters have studied anthropology or related topics previously, but for those not "in the know", the word "Neanderthal" is pronounced with a hard "T" (as in "tall"), not a "th" sound as in "thought".
Take a look at Merriam-Webster's pronunciation .wav file -- they've got it right.
Pronouncing it correctly will show others you're a bit more educated -- saying it incorrectly, and the anthro-geeks will roll their eyes. ;)
I only post comments when someone on the internet is wrong.
Just to clear this up a bit, and yes I was an anthro major...
There's still a LOT of debate in the anthropological/archaeological community about the evolution tree of modern humans. Originally it was thought that it was a simple straight line of evolution from ape like 'missing links' to modern humans.
These days there's a lot more in the middle there.
Neanderthals may or may not be related to modern humans, as the time period when they existed has a very jumbled fossil record. There are at least 3 distinct human-like species (or sub species) from this era, and as one poster already refered to, they may have been able to interbreed.
There's way too much going on still in trying to sort this all out, so for now just be happy thinking that these may or may not be humanity's ancestors.
Because we don't know the truth yet.
"You worthless post!"
-Shakespeare, 2 Gentlemen of Verona, 1. 1. 147
Just watch enough RealTV and you will come across a few. Last night I saw two neandertals trying to sky dive to a wedding... one crashed into a parking lot, the other crashed into a tree, you could tell they weren't homosapiens because modern man is smart, right?
"Smokey, this isn't Nam, there are rules." -Walter
A while back, an article in the journal Nature indicated that labs in Germany and the US isolated small fragments of DNA from Neanderthal bones. These indicated that the differences between Neanderthal sequences and the equivalent sequence in modern humans is greater than the difference among various populations of modern humans. They interpreted this to indicate that Neanderthals had branched off the the population of homo-like species well in advance of the development of modern humans, and thus that they compromised a separate species, with no indication of interbreeding with modern humans.
I'm sure those who disagree could give a cogent counter argument, but i don't work on evolution, so i can't.
Cheers,
Jay
______ This mind intentionally left blank.
I actually live in a town in Germany to which the "Neanderthal" (it's a valley) belongs. So, technically, I'm a Neanderthal.
Fleur de Sel
How do the Christian fundies explain away the Neanderthals? Last time I checked, according to these fanatics, anything that wasn't written in the King James Bible, either never happened or never existed.
That has been debated! Scientists tend to be pigheaded about their pet theories and thus the subject of Homo Sapient/Neandertalis hybrids has become the cause of full blown trench warfare among scientists.
But enaugh about the bonfies of (scientific) vanity. Geneticists claim they have extracted Homo Sapiens Neandertalis DNA from fossils. Now..... some of the people who evaluated these results claim that interbreeding was impossible or at best extremely unlikely. Critics of this assertion point out that if Camels and Guanacos (30-40 million years of genetic isolation) can produce viable hybrid offspring the same should be the case with Homo Sapiens Sapiens and and Homo Sapiens Neandertalis where the Genetic isolation was much, much, smaller. This seems to be born out by evidence from Israel (debated) and especially new discoveries in Portugal . Some of the aversion to the possibility of Neandertal/Cromagnong hybrids seems to be almost Eugenic with some people which is probably due to the Neandertals undeserved reputation of being a primitive hominid when, at least in my humble opinion, they fully deserve the title "Sapiens". Personally I would not be at all disappointed to find I had some Neandertal DNA. There is a legion of worse possibilities when it comes to embarrasing ancestors than Neandertals. Feel free to make fun of me for saying that, I'm sure some of you can will not be able to resist it.
Ps. I am not an anthropologist and I may be misusing the term Homo Sapiens Sapiens, these hominids are also sometimes referred to as Homo Sapiens Cromagnon.
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
- Neandertals no longer exist, and their distinguishing physical characteristics (projecting midface, occipital bun, small mastoid processes) no longer appear at appreciable frequencies in recent people. However, some Neandertal characteristics (horizontal-oval mandibular foramen, suprainiac fossa, lambdoidal flattening) do occur in the Europeans who directly follow Neandertals, indicating to many scientists that their genes were swamped by immigration from outside Europe, rather than being replaced by it.
- Neandertal mtDNA sequences from ancient bones lie as an outgroup to those of recent people. To many scientists this is evidence of their distinctiveness. However, their mtDNA does not differ from that of living people to the extent that chimpanzee subspecies differ from each other, and the evolutionary pattern of mtDNA in living people may reflect recent selection on the molecule rather than the spread of a distinct non-Neandertal people.
- Neandertals are different from their contemporaries and distinguishable by many anatomical criteria, interpreted by some scientists as evidence they did not interbreed with their contemporaries. However, the level of differences has not been shown to indicate a great genetic difference (for example greater than that among living human geographic groups), and it is clear that these differences could have arisen even without any isolation of Pleistocene Europe.
So for these reasons, the debate about Neandertal relationships continues.Is this a suggestion that Arsuaga could have written about the neanderthals in the 1st person?