from the oog-drag-girl-to-cave-by-hair dept.
What happened to the Neanderthals? They left their African homes and migrated into Europe 350,000 to 600,000 years ago, well ahead of modern humans, who showed up only about 45,000 years ago. But within about 5,000 years of our arrival, the indigenous Neanderthals had disappeared.
Anthropologists have proposed that they may have been done in by terrible epidemics or an inability to adapt to climate changes of the era, but a new study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences [open, DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1524861113], now suggest culture wars of a sort might have spelled the end.
The researchers came to their conclusion after creating mathematical models that demonstrated that it wasn't necessary for the humans to outnumber the locals in order to prevail. A smaller band of humans with a more highly developed level of culture could eventually push out the Neanderthals, the models showed.
The edge wasn't just raw intelligence. Archeological findings have shown that brain size was essentially the same for humans and Neanderthals, and recent paleo-anthropological studies suggest that Neanderthals were capable of a range of advanced intellectual behaviors typically associated with early modern humans.
Original study. The role of culture in competitiveness has been debated by many, including Max Weber. The question is far from settled. Also, there have been other recent studies that suggest Neanderthals were better tool makers and had more culture than had previously been supposed.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 06 2016, @05:45PM
Brain size doesnt equal intellegence, unless you want to claim men are smarter than women. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain_size#/media/File%3ABrain_weight_age.gif [wikipedia.org]
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 06 2016, @06:45PM
Brain size doesnt equal intellegence, unless you want to claim men are smarter than women.
Wait, do we not want to claim that?
*ducks*
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 06 2016, @07:09PM
Quack, quack.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 06 2016, @07:12PM
(Score: 2) by q.kontinuum on Saturday February 06 2016, @11:20PM
Intelligence is like marmalade. The less you have the more you smear it around.
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 3, Insightful) by frojack on Saturday February 06 2016, @09:59PM
An culture is defined, much like history is written, by the prevailing civilization.
So I give far less credence to this study, which has nothing but guesswork and supposition behind it, than I do to studies showing genetic traces of interbreeding or fossil evidence of climate change.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 06 2016, @10:08PM
Yeah, but women eat a lot more yogurt, so they are more cultured.
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 06 2016, @08:15PM
The Neanderthals had a longer history and more sophisticated culture, but we liberated them from all that and brought them Freedom (c) and Democracy (c).
(Score: 2) by GungnirSniper on Saturday February 06 2016, @09:12PM
Most likely the Neanderthals welcomed in the newcomers, and adjusted themselves to their ways, thus destroying their own.
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(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday February 06 2016, @09:33PM
Is this a thinly disguised social commentary?!!!
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Saturday February 06 2016, @09:50PM
I see no disguise.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 06 2016, @11:30PM
A Neanderthal who lost a battle for leadership warned the others not to let in the H. Sapiens criminals and rapists.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by M. Baranczak on Sunday February 07 2016, @12:58AM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 07 2016, @08:04AM
You had to imagine one? I just saw exactly what you describe on tv not long ago.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by inertnet on Saturday February 06 2016, @09:49PM
If you're interested in this kind of stuff you should go and see "Quest for fire" http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0082484/ [imdb.com]
Personally I believe that humans most likely got them extinct, as is probably the case with many animal species they encountered in Europe and Asia. I bet that the rise of humans coincides with a major extinction event.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 07 2016, @07:42AM
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Joe Desertrat on Monday February 08 2016, @02:49AM
It is speculated by some (fossil evidence is too scarce to make it a full theory or end the speculation) that humans were not able to colonize North America in any great numbers until some of the megafauna became extinct (or at least scarce), particularly the short-faced bear (think something like a one ton wolverine) and the North American lion.
(Score: 1) by dexcheque on Saturday February 06 2016, @10:23PM
Culture could very easily be (largely) responsible for the "win". Culture serves (among other things) as an excellent way of taking the patterns identified by individuals (even ones long-dead) and transposing that to a group, thus providing the benefit of others' experience. Especially, if modern humans had developed better carrier systems -- higher resolution -- for that culture than the neanderthals (such as music, story-telling, or even religion).
(Score: 4, Interesting) by q.kontinuum on Saturday February 06 2016, @11:29PM
I think religion could be responsible. Religion bonds societies together and motivates the fighters to fight stronger and more selfless because they expect their reward in the afterlife / accept a higher authority. Also it might help to counter compassion (those evil mirror-neurons) by declaring other tribes less human/insignificant.
If the competition of the Neanderthals was more receptive to religion I think this could explain the extinction of the Neanderthals.
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 06 2016, @11:36PM
I think the study mistake culture and greed, if that one think where homo sapiens is superior to any other animal is greed, just look at mighty buzzard and j.morris
(Score: 2) by kbahey on Monday February 08 2016, @11:23PM
I saw a documentary where they visited the caves at Gibraltar. Archeological digs there showed that it was the last known area inhabited by Neanderthals in Europe.
They compared what they found with human finds from the same time line.
The conclusion was that humans were more social and had wider networks. For example, they were trading across long distances for goods such as flint. On the contrary, the Neanderthals did not have such networks and had to make do with what their environment has.
It could well be that this network had other benefits, such as knowledge sharing, learning, ...etc.
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(Score: 1) by nb on Wednesday February 10 2016, @11:57PM
about the Netherlands, but it was not making sense...
then I read it properly , the article was less nice than i thought.