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Manga Girls Beware: Extra Large Eyes Caused Neanderthal's Demise
An anonymous reader writes "The BBC reports on a new study of prehistoric skulls which suggests that Neanderthals became extinct because they had larger eyes than our species. As a consequence of having extra sized eyes, an average 6 millimeters larger in radius, more of their backside brain volume was devoted to seeing, at the expense of frontal lobe high-level processing of information and emotions. This difference affected their ability to innovate and socialize the way we, modern people (Homo Sapiens Sapiens) do. When the last Ice Age set on 28,000 years ago, Neanderthals had no sewn clothes and no large organized groups to rely on each other, hastening their fall. Yet, they were not stupid, brutish creatures as portrayed in Hollywood films, they were very, very smart, but not quite in the same league as the Homo Sapiens of Cromagnon."
And from the departement of wild speculations we have the following gem...
Personally, I'm more partial to the theory that we *are* Neanderthals (hybrids) and that they didn't 'die out', but were simply bred away.
There has been little hard evidence that Neanderthals were any less intelligent than Sapiens, just less evidence found for their intelligence, likely because there were far fewer of them. Studies of their flint knapping abilities show they were at least as skilled at toolmaking as Sapiens.
Anyhow, the article reads ore like a daydream than a piece on science, as evidence for the most important part (percent usage of the brain for eyesight, and the retardation effects of this difference)are omitted.
while(1) attack(People.Sandy);
We all know those big-eyed anime little neanderthal girls were killed of by tentacle monster rapists, thus preventing procreation!
Silence is a state of mime.
Can you please stop the tabloid headlines. "Extra Large Eyes Caused Neanderthal's Demise" would have been just fine, thanks. No need to try and sex it up with some manga girls. BTW, manga boys have big eyes too.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
my mom always warned me about that
It amazes me that comments like this, with so little data to make such a conjecture, can be taken seriously by people who scoff at religion. We know slightly more about these other branches of humanity (their biology aside) than we do about the historicity and culture of Atlantis. Yet we are supposed to take for granted that we can just know, with virtually nothing known about neanderthal society, what caused them to go extinct.
Unbelievable.
I say BS! Neanderthals died out because the females preferred the larger penis of the Homo Sapiens.
They were bred out - this has been shown by DNA analysis. Early homo sapiens bred with them, and the homo sapiens traits were more effective.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
The last time I checked Neanderthals/Denisovans did not suffer a demise. It seems that at least some of them were absorbed by modern human populations so in a way Neanderthals/Denisovans are still around. Now if you'll excuse me I'm off to eat a dinosaur.
I first read that as "they were not stupid, british creatures".
My first program:
Hell Segmentation fault
I thought it was already proven that Europeans are the ancestors of Neanderthals through DNA sequencing? And it's this very DNA responsible for a strong immune system in people with large amounts of Neanderthal DNA.
Yeah, back then they used to wrap them around their waist, unfortunately all the interbreeding with small peni'ed Neanderthal has left us with the 10 inches we have today. (Doesn't everyone else have 10 inches?)
Cheap storage VM.
Equating intelligence with brain size has always been both stupid and puzzling to me, particularly since there's no good evidence to support it that can't be countered by contra-evidence that at least as good or better.
Yep. From the article:
Ms Pearce found that Neanderthals had significantly larger eye sockets - by an average of 6mm from top to bottom.
From the summary:
As a consequence of having extra sized eyes, an average 6 millimeters larger in radius,
Submitter must be a science reporter...
Required reading for internet skeptics
While size does matter, larger eye sockets does not automatically mean more of their brain was used for processing visual stimuli. For that to be valid, one would need to know what the size of the pupil and retina was, not the eye socket. It is quite possible that Neanderthals has more muscular eyes, just like they had more muscular bodies, but the actual visual portion of their eyes, the part that actually sees, was not significantly different than homo sapiens. Another explanation could also be that when Neanderthal developed, during the ice age, light levels were lower in the climates that they inhabited and the larger eyes were an adaptation, which again would not indicate more of their brain was used to process visual stimuli, but instead the larger eye was simply to enable more light gathering capability than their ancestors near the equator.
Without having an actual Neanderthal brains and eyes to examine, one cannot simply make this determination simply based on the size of the eye socket.
Baby, no hurt Grug.
That the human brain generally works a particular way is no indication of how the neanderthal brain worked.
We know, for example (thanks to a slashdot story) that a man with like 1/4th of a brain's normal volume (http://news.softpedia.com/news/A-Quarter-Brained-Man-60542.shtml) can lead a pretty normal life. We also know that brains route around damage and adapt. So what is it with this obsessive belief that brain size is equated with X, Y and Z of intelligence and behavior?
While the article presents an interesting hypothesis which fits in with why humans would have dominated neanderthals (better group behavior/communications), it can't really be said for sure based on the size of the eyes. There's a WHOLE lot of assumption and speculation going on there.
I find it interesting that the notion of being "really smart" (based on brain size) but without good communication skills. This would imply they were effectively advanced apes... unable to learn from one another, but able to learn on their own and through mimmickry. (No stored knowledge means no building or accumulation of knowledge.)