Modern Humans, Neanderthals Shared Earth for 1,000 Years

joffley writes "ABC News is reporting on new evidence that has emerged suggesting Neanderthals co-existed with anatomically modern humans for at least 1,000 years in central France, before gradually disappearing about 28,000 to 30,000 years ago. But why did they disappear?"

Comments

Where they went...

[mfh]

I think it's fairly easy to know where they went. Because they were "different" than modern humans, with lower technology levels, we simply killed them off for trying to take our resources. It's a no-brainer, because it's what we do as humans. We try to related but we destroy people who are not like us. Look at it as an early form of racism, and it's pretty straight forward. I'm not saying it's good, but at the time, we were equally as primative. We are still as primative, generally.

Re:Where they went...

[Gulthek]

Ahh yes. The "primitive" neanderthal who survived the brunt of the last major ice age and thrived. Who had a larger cranial capacity than we Homo Sapiens. (Note that larger brain size is used as evidence for Homo Sapiens mental superiority in all cases comparing to other genetic lines (Australopithecus, etc) except when comparing to Neanderthals. In that case textbooks commonly claim that our brains operated "more efficiently" than the Neanderthals' when there is little reason to make such a conclusion.

I suggest you read up some more. The issue is more complex than you summarize, there is a reason that there is still a debate.

We have a pretty good idea where they went.

[Pantero Blanco]

A period of a thousand years is long enough for the Cro-Magnon, with their superior abilities and traits, to become more numerous than the Neanderthals. At that point the Neanderthals were either killed off or crossbred with the Cro-Magnon. Over time, most of the Neanderthal genes in the offspring probably faded.

Re:We have a pretty good idea where they went.

[jc42]

Mitochrondrial DNA tests indicate that Neanderthals were an entirely seperate species with no interbreeding.

Actually, this merely says that any Neanderthal ancestors we may have weren't through the pure-maternal line. It says nothing at all about the nuclear DNA, which is over 99% of our DNA.

I've been watching for reports on Neanderthal DNA, and I've been repeatedly disappointed by people making conclusions from mtDNA samples. This basically indicates cluelessness about how inheritance works. Your mtDNA is a rather special case, and it's inherited very differently from your nuclear DNA. It's only useful for tracing your purely-maternal line of ancestors. It carries no information about any male or any of his ancestors.

It's still entirely possible that a tiny part of the ancestry of Europeans is Neanderthal. This could mean a few hundred genes scattered through the nuclear DNA. It could mean just one gene. Until you convincingly show, for every single gene, that it's not of Neanderthal origin, you really haven't shown that there was no interbreeding at all.

This is significant because nobody suggests a significant Neanderthal contribution to the modern European gene pool. Even supporters of the conjecture would be surprised if 1% of our genes are of Neanderthal origin. The question is whether the number is exactly zero or something slightly higher.

My guess is that we'll never have good enough evidence of Neanderthal genes to show that there was no interbreeding at all. That requires study of the entire genome, and the fossil record doesn't have to have preserved it for us. Unless there's some very luck discovery, such as a deep-frozen Neanderthal in the permafrost (that's now rapidly melting, so we'd better hurry), it's unlikely that we'll ever have a complete sample of Neanderthal DNA. And even that wouldn't really be enough; the most it could prove is that that particular individual wasn't one of our ancestors.

In any case, arguments from mtDNA are supremely unconvincing. Interesting, yes, but unconvincing.

But that doesn't stop the media from publishing gee-whiz articles on the topic.

Heard this before...

[AsiNisiMasa]

The Discovery channel ran a special recently about evolution and it offered similar information. Considering how long it takes to produce such a show, one would think this would have already made it's rounds around the internet.

As far as the question of why they are extinct, the show stated it as a matter of fact that homo sapiens simply over-ran their niche, as is prone to happen when two competing species inhabit the same environment.

I dunno if the show was pushing it's speculation as fact or if this source is out of date. It seems to make sense though. Smarter, team-working homo sapiens out-hunt the competition and the others starve.

Birth canal problems

[Baldrson]

One theory is that when neanderthals mated with modern humans the offspring would survive if the father was a modern human and mother was a neanderthal because the neanderthal woman's birth canal was wider. However, if a neanderthal man mated with a modern human the mother and child could die in labor due to the fact that the birth canal was too narrow for the hybrid child. There has been speculation on differing gestation periods as well.

The reason this results in extinction of one of the races is due to the fact that when there is consistent gender bias in inter-racial mating, if there is any degree of polygyny or serial monogamy (de facto polygyny) then the gene flow tends to be from the race whose males are successfully mating to the population whose males are not as successfully mating. If there is any substantial inter-racial mating under such circumstances it could easily be that a millenium or so is all it would take to destroy the existence of the race whose males are experiencing lower fertility.

The question is what was the trigger that resulted in the presence of modern humans midst neanderthals?

This is only marginally new

[Arker]

Lewis Binford, many years back, investigated another site (in Israel) where h. sapiens and h. neanderthalis existed in close proximity for MUCH longer, around 90,000 years IIRC. The same results otherwise, despite an incredibly long time period very close to each other, no genetic drift towards each other to be seen. Pretty much has to mean that they were not sexually compatible with each other.

Everyone assumes that OUR ancestors had the 'superior abilities and traits' but, other than the fact that we're here instead of them, there's no reason to think that. They were definately stronger, more muscular and with a more efficient musculature as well - if they were still alive today they would take all the top spots in just about any sport you can think of. The 'hunchback' stereotype is incorrect - one of the early neanderthal skeletons had those features and that was taken as typical, but it turns out it was just that that particular individual had massive crippling arthritic problems - it wasn't genetic. And despite the stereotype that they were dumb, there's really no evidence of that either - their brains were even larger than ours, and their artifacts are not inferior.

One difference is that there is a bone in the throat, (hyoid bone iirc) critical to the production of human speech, which was shaped differently in the neanderthal. They would not have been capable of making many of the sounds we use in speech as a result. However, that doesn't mean they couldn't have spoken their own languages, with different sounds - only that they would not have been able to make many of the sounds we use.

Still a great mystery. Maybe one day we'll know what happened.

Saw A Program About This On German TV 2 Years Ago

[aquatone282]

My german is pretty poor, but it was simple to pick up the basic story line:

The show followed a family of Neandrathals as they attempted to cross the Alps.

A young female wandered off from the family. Nearby, three "modern" human males had a camp and were cooking meat over a fire. The female picked up the scent of the meat and followed it to the camp.

The males lured her into the camp with the offer of food. She warily accepted and while she was eating, one of the males knocked her down to her hands and knees and took her from behind (much to her distress). The other males then took their turns.

The last shot was of the female wandering up into the snow-covered mountains, obviously pregnant.

Again, my german is not very good, but the impression I got was the show was attempting to explain how a neandrathal female corpse, preserved by altitude and cold, was found in the Alps with an unborn child that contained "modern" human DNA. . .

Got to love those European documentaries - they leave little to the imagination.

Re:Voice box - no communication

[EtherealStrife]

Slashdot has once again made a big deal out of nothing. In one of my archaeology classes a few years ago we discussed these very caves, and covered the EVIDENCE (that's right, evidence) that damn near proves the existence of Homo sapiens and neanderthals in fairly close quarters.

The fact of the matter is that Homo sapiens have been around for 200 THOUSAND YEARS!! Neanderthals were the dominant species for most of that time, until they died off approximated 30-35k ago ... it's not such a big leap to suggest that coexistence goes back to far earlier times, but the big deal about these caves is that the neanderthals were competing for the same resources as Homo sapiens, and were outhunted (the BIG mystery the article claims is unknown...you gotta love media) to extinction. Neanderthals used flake technology, while Homo sapiens used blade tech. Without going too heavily into it, Homo sapiens were killing up a storm with thrown spears and using prismatic cores and all that high tech jazz. Neanderthals still had to close in for the kill, and as such could not compete at all.

The important thing to understand is that there were two variants of hominids during the middle and upper paleolithic periods (assuming we disregard the Homo erectus groups off in Asia that were still hanging in there), rather than one being descended from the other. Neanderthals were adapted for the Ice Age, and were limited to Europe because of this. The highly adaptable (yet peabrained) little Homo sapiens spread like wildfire across the continents, killing as we went. Neanderthals are believed to have been very gentle and possibly even possessors of culture (although this is in constant debate), even taking care of the sick and wounded around them. One skull was even found with a hole beveled into it, suggesting some attempt at early surgical treatment (it was done premortem, and the individual lived for several years after the hole was made).
Whereas we were honed to kill.

Disclaimer: It's highly improbable that Homo neanderthalensis and homo sapiens mingled, or that the Homo sapiens killed off the neanderthals. But until we can send a time machine back to record all this shit, nobody can be 100% certain.

Oh and A.C., I'm not making any corrections to what you've said, just trying to expand on it a bit. Seemed like as good a place as any. :) I agree about the communication, and how large Neanderthal brains were.