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Oldest European Human Jawbone Discovered
DrLudicrous writes "A research group working in Romania has dated an ancient human jawbone to 35+/-1 thousand years old. This is a few thousand years older than other jawbones found in Europe. What is unusual about this specimen is that it has rather large molars, something that the lead scientist thinks may be an indication of human-Neanderthal interbreeding. Modern DNA studies have indicated that there is little to no traces of this inbreeding, so this raises some interesting questions."
I keep imagining this super-old Swiss dude waving an indignant fist at the scientists: "You bastards, I was using that!"
I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
Oldest according to the Out of Africa theory. The Multiregional theory claims that Neanderthals are part of the human race. (Check out the second linked pdf for a good paper on the DNA evidence: "Population Bottlenecks and Pleistocene Human Evolution")
The lead scientist is a professer at Washington University in St. Louis. There is more info at the university's web site. It turns out there was more than a jawbone found, but the rest of the bones haven't been analyzed yet.
They found my mother in law.
All these years I thought I had gotten away with it.
maybe it was: a. a really smart neanderthal b. dumber than average human or they got lucky and found a mutant
I think it's great how they find this jawbone that has large molars and all of a sudden that means that there was inter-species reproduction and all the current crackpot theories have to be thrown out the window for a new crackpot theory...
Sometimes scientists infer and speculate way too much based on the data they have. It's kind of getting stretched so far it's starting not to resemble science at all.
A solution to the problem with music today
/me jawbone drops in shock.
I thought that Cro Magnons (sp) were still pre Homo Sapian.
Hollow words will burn and hollow men will burn.
You could call me a nit-picker, but you wouldn't be quite correct :-)
...and lots of evidence of interbreeding has already been, heh, dug up. Neandertals also have larger brains than us on average, so which way did the development arrow point? (-:
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
but i thought the reverend whoziwhatsis said the earth was only 10 thousand years old? doesn't this show that anthropologists are really anti-religion? they're essentially like hitler. they must be stopped. lobby bush to bomb nazi anthropology departments across the country!
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What evidence has been found that Neanderthals bred with humans? None that I know of. The genetic record, and current thinking, suggests that no modern humans have a Neanderthal genetic legacy. If early Homo sapiens sapiens did mate with Neanderthals, offspring were probably infertile. The last common ancestor of Neanderthals and us seems to be ~ 500,000 years ago (4 * the estimated common human ancestor).
Yes, I know there are also articles claiming that sapiens and neandertalis didn't interbreed, people seem to need them every few years to reassure themselves that all of those hybrid skeletons are just phantasms. The last page above references several articles which address this very issue.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
In high school, we learned that different species are considered separate when they can no longer interbreed, with a few exceptions, i.e. horse + donkey = mule (though, mules are sterile). Ergo, if Cro-Magnon men could interbreed with Neanderthals, then Neanderthals and Cro-Magnon men are of the same species. Ergo, there would be evidence that the Multiregional theory is correct. That's what all the "missing link" fuss was about.
-StarMaven
In what way was I lazy? I suggest it is you who is lazy, in being dogmatic and refusing to accept the possibility of the majority scientific view being correct! Even the stories you link to admit the 'theory is controversial' and 'Most anthropologists seem to accept the conclusion of molecular evolutionists that the recently obtained sequences of Neanderthal mitochondrial DNA prove that Neanderthals and Cromagnons did not interbreed'. Also, 'all those hybrid skeletons'? Only a single (possible) example is mentioned in the sources you point to.
In any case, skeletal comparisons are rather subjective, and far inferior to DNA comparisons. In comparing mitochondrial DNA between Neanderthals and modern humans, no overlap has been found (e.g.).
The single 'hybrid' skeleton may have been a distinct species, may have been an infertile cross, may have been genetically deformed, or may have been an early hybrid before the two species fully diverged. Before accepting the possibility that it is a true hybrid I would like to see genetic evidence that shows this is possible.
Is it really possible to extract DNA from something that old?
Hey cool! I had always thought that Europeans had interbred with Neanderthals. I mean... just look at some of them!
The right spelling and pronunciation is Neandertal. I thought everyone knew that by now.
Oh, jawbone, when did you first go wrong?
Oh, jawbone, where is it you belong?
</the Band>
[What good is Karma if you can't burn some of it up once in a while?]
Stupid people screwing stupid beings, no wonder their jaw was so big.
Nope. Cromagnon is pure H. sapiens.
They are us.