Frequent inbreeding may have caused skeletal abnormalities in early humans
Early humans faced countless challenges as they fanned out of Africa: icy conditions, saber-tooth cats, and, according to a new study of ancient skeletons, an unusually high number of birth defects, both debilitating and relatively inconsequential. It's unclear why such abnormalities seem to be so common, but scientists say one strong possibility is rampant inbreeding among small hunter-gatherer groups.
"This paper represents a valuable compilation," says Vincenzo Formicola, an anthropologist at the University of Pisa in Italy who wasn't involved in the new work. "Many cases reported in the list were unknown to me and, I assume, to many people working in the field."
Many human fossils from the Pleistocene (roughly 2.5 million B.C.E. to 9700 B.C.E.) have unusual features. For example, femur bones with abnormal bowing have been found from China to the Czech Republic. The skull of a toddler found in the Qafzeh cave in Israel had a swollen braincase consistent with hydrocephalus, a condition in which fluid floods the skull. And a fossilized man in Liguria in Italy had a bowed right upper arm bone but a normal left one.
By and large, these were viewed as one-off curiosities. But Erik Trinkaus, a paleoanthropologist at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, noticed a pattern: These skeletal deformations seemed to be suspiciously common in the fossil record.
An abundance of developmental anomalies and abnormalities in Pleistocene people (DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1814989115) (DX)
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 06 2018, @09:27PM (4 children)
"The domestication of the dog probably helped quite a bit too, as the TFA plainly states these were people that had to deal with fucking sabre-toothed tigers."
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Dogs still help today, because today we have to deal with ghetto scum who ride a bus to the suburbs in their attempts to rob, rape, and pillage. Clueless naive idiots
will mod this down, but after you've been mugged or raped your worldview will be more accurate, trust me.
(Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 06 2018, @09:40PM (3 children)
you should be robbed and raped
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 06 2018, @09:46PM (2 children)
Only incels write naïve without a diaeresis.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 06 2018, @09:49PM
You can think whatever you like.
Idiots usually do.
(Score: 5, Touché) by takyon on Tuesday November 06 2018, @09:52PM
It sure is ornery in here. Election rage containment zone in ~2 hours.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]