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[jstripes]

if they were so smart then whey are they all dead?!

check mate

I know you're being sarcastic, but for the sake of the thread, possibilities are disease and climate change.

 

[andythinkpad]

Writing and civilization has nothing to do with intelligence. History is far more complex than that.

Many super complex societies and empires had no writing to speak of, didn't make them any lesser - just different.

In fact, some philosophers thought of writing as something that addled the brains by letting it get lazy.

This video is a good one on civilisation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wyzi9GNZFMU

So yeah, your claim holds no water and is racist.

You don't have to use writing as the only mile stone advance in humanity. You can count the use of fire; domestication of wild plants and farming; domestication of farming animals; use of ceramic; advance in stone tools; use of iron tools; writing; religion etc etc

Now going back to the importance of writing. It's said that human brain can only recognize limit number of faces and names. I think the number is between 100-200. Once your organization exceed that number, you need the help of writing for organization. Writing is also vitally important for tax and palace inventory recording. That was the original purpose of the oldest writing.

 

[wandering]

They were not. There were no artifact excavated from the Neanderthal sites you can qualify as art or religious. Even in the same cave that carried both Neanderthal and modern human artifacts, the human ones were much more "spiritual."

However I have a pet theory that modern human mixing with a little bit of Neanderthal DNA give human a little extra intellectual boost. My reasoning is that Africans (with 0% Neanderthal DNA) had never developed their system of writing, or large scaled cities despite thousands of years of contact with the middle eastern region, which was the cradle of earliest civilization. This kind of view can be labeled as racism. That's why I don't want to talk about it except in actual Neanderthal discussion.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nsibidi

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ge'ez_script

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tifinagh

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timbuktu

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djenné

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walls_of_Benin

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Zimbabwe

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mogadishu

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merca

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lalibela

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/M'banza-Kongo

 

[Monocle]

It's a religious question, there will be no science based answer, merely faith.
Personally, I choose to think of it in a positive manner.

Lol? Messed up mindset.

 

[Woo-Fu]

I read this in the voice of Louis Ck, for some reason, haha.

Generational thing, I heard George Carlin.

The smell must've been horrible. How did people smash back then....

Brain is pretty good at filtering out background stuff. First day on a pig farm is basically dry heaves. Day after that, disgusting, week later you don't even notice it after the first minute.

 

[Aaronology]

However I have a pet theory that modern human mixing with a little bit of Neanderthal DNA give human a little extra intellectual boost. My reasoning is that Africans (with 0% Neanderthal DNA) had never developed their system of writing, or large scaled cities despite thousands of years of contact with the middle eastern region, which was the cradle of earliest civilization.

I am always amused when racists reveal how startling ignorant they are while simultaneously calling into question the innate intelligence of others.

What a hilarious post.

 

[BKK]

Neanderthals had evolved over hundreds of thousands of years many genes beneficial for their environment. When Homo Sapiens first arrived in Neanderthal environments they didn't possess these genes. Interbreeding meant that these genes were quickly passed into the Homo Sapiens gene pool, whilst any that were less beneficial were quickly extinguished (basic Darwinian survival of the fittest in a time when the infant mortality rate was incredibly high). This explains why that percentage of Neanderthal DNA survived (it was beneficial, or at least not a negative).

Denisovans are considered to be offshoots of Neanderthals who colonised Asia and diverged from Neanderthals. As mentioned, Australasian Homo Sapiens have DNA from these due to interbreeding, again, the beneficial genes survived. Maybe the most famous one of these genes is the one for low oxygen, or high altitude, which is still present in Tibetans. It clearly had a massively beneficial factor to surviving there and spread quickly.

As mentioned, some Africans have DNA from an unknown hominin species, it's unknown if this is more closely related to Neanderthal's predecessor Homo Heidelbergensis, the more ancient Homo Erectus, or an unknown lineage. Similarly an unknown homo lineage has recently been discovered in Australasian DNA, which are only known to have inhabited the same location as Homo Erectus (and maybe Homo Floresiensis "The Hobbit", but there's no evidence for Homo Floresiensis beyond Flores yet), so maybe that was possible.

Despite the widespread belief that Neanderthals weren't as intelligent as Homo Sapiens, we don't really know their level of intelligence. What we do know is that intelligence is massively beneficial to survival, so it's likely that genes for intelligence would be more likely to survive than genes which led to less intelligence. The same would be true for all interbreeding of homo species.

 

[Aaronology]

<knowledge>

The problem here is that Andy has no sincere interest in any of that. He obviously formed his cute pet theory without ever actually delving into the history of Africa, its peoples and various cultures.

 

[BKK]

They were not. There were no artifact excavated from the Neanderthal sites you can qualify as art or religious. Even in the same cave that carried both Neanderthal and modern human artifacts, the human ones were much more "spiritual."

However I have a pet theory that modern human mixing with a little bit of Neanderthal DNA give human a little extra intellectual boost. My reasoning is that Africans (with 0% Neanderthal DNA) had never developed their system of writing, or large scaled cities despite thousands of years of contact with the middle eastern region, which was the cradle of earliest civilization. This kind of view can be labeled as racism. That's why I don't want to talk about it except in actual Neanderthal discussion.

If there was an "intelligence gene" that was so beneficial that it quickly spread from Neanderthals to Homo Sapiens, then it would have also quickly spread from Middle Eastern Homo Sapiens to the African Homo Sapiens that they were in contact with.

Your theory only works with a population that was in total isolation.

 

[sphagnum]

well this took a weird turn

 

[OpinionatedCyborg]

They were not. There were no artifact excavated from the Neanderthal sites you can qualify as art or religious. Even in the same cave that carried both Neanderthal and modern human artifacts, the human ones were much more "spiritual."

However I have a pet theory that modern human mixing with a little bit of Neanderthal DNA give human a little extra intellectual boost. My reasoning is that Africans (with 0% Neanderthal DNA) had never developed their system of writing, or large scaled cities despite thousands of years of contact with the middle eastern region, which was the cradle of earliest civilization. This kind of view can be labeled as racism. That's why I don't want to talk about it except in actual Neanderthal discussion.

Is that a fact? I would do some research to determine if that's actually the case. Even assuming it's true (and I am pretty sure it's not), it doesn't mean much because in the evolutionary time scale, one population of humans developing a new technology a few thousand years before another is a blink of the eye.

 

[orochi91]

We was clapping neanderthal cheeks

Poetic~~~

 

[JordanN]

Is that a fact? I would do some research to determine if that's actually the case. Even assuming it's true (and I am pretty sure it's not), it doesn't mean much because in the evolutionary time scale, one population of humans developing a new technology a few thousand years before another is a blink of the eye.

I'm not even sure what his idea of large scale cities mean. Was there a Neanderthal New York City hidden in some cave I'm unaware of?

As well as Africa had plenty of their own city states.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_empires

 

[ZBR]

Hmm... is this 4% based on similarities in our genome? If that's the case that means we share those similarities, not that we were making babies with neanderthals. We would have a common ancestor that we branched off of, causing the similarities in our genome. Just like how we have similarities in our genome that can compare to chimpanzee, orangutan, and gorilla. Shit, I believe some of our genome is comparable to plants.

 

[Xe4]

I'm not even sure what his idea of large scale cities mean. Was there a Neanderthal New York City hidden in some cave I'm unaware of?

As well as Africa had plenty of their own city states.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_empires

Or the fact that historically the vast majority of vast empires have been from the Middle East (including North African), Mediterranean, or East Asian. Europe was underdeveloped for thousands of years before the renaissance.

And that's ignoring the fact that those from Africa have Neanderthal DNA anyhow, sooo...

Hmm... is this 4% based on similarities in our genome? If that's the case that means we share those similarities, not that we were making babies with neanderthals. We would have a common ancestor that we branched off of, causing the similarities in our genome. Just like how we have similarities in our genome that can compare to chimpanzee, orangutan, and gorilla. Shit, I believe some of our genome is comparable to plants.

I'm not a geneticist, but I'm fairly certain there's ways to tell the difference between similarity from being closely related, and that from interbreeding. Probably the way DNA is copied or some such.

 

[WhiteRabbitEXE]

Hmm... is this 4% based on similarities in our genome? If that's the case that means we share those similarities, not that we were making babies with neanderthals. We would have a common ancestor that we branched off of, causing the similarities in our genome. Just like how we have similarities in our genome that can compare to chimpanzee, orangutan, and gorilla. Shit, I believe some of our genome is comparable to plants.

4% actually sourced from Neanderthal.

 

[Stinkles]

Rishathra

That Rings a bell

 

[HStallion]

After humanity wiped out the Children of the Night in a single day and then erased all evidence and knowledge of them from our the world and our minds respectively, we probably weren't as concerned about banging the last remaining hominids.

 

[Unicorn]

Mitochondria are normally inherited exclusively from the mother and genome sequencing has revealed there is no Neanderthal mitochondrial DNA in humans.

This likely means that either Neanderthal females and Human males produced infertile offspring or no offspring at all.

In an alternate universe this is the erotic alien porn of my dreams. All the fukken with no fear of baby bumps

 

[Chuck Norris]

Couldn't homosapiens thriving over Neanderthals simply come down to the better climate, food sources and larger geography allowing for superior population growth? Neanderthals probably died en masses every harsh winter

By the time homosapiens extended up to Europe, they had huge populations while Neanderthals never experienced that

 

[Acorn]

-reads first page

"Interesting discussion"

-clicks last page

"Oh god"

 

[akira28]

They were not. There were no artifact excavated from the Neanderthal sites you can qualify as art or religious. Even in the same cave that carried both Neanderthal and modern human artifacts, the human ones were much more "spiritual."

However I have a pet theory that modern human mixing with a little bit of Neanderthal DNA give human a little extra intellectual boost. My reasoning is that Africans (with 0% Neanderthal DNA) had never developed their system of writing, or large scaled cities despite thousands of years of contact with the middle eastern region, which was the cradle of earliest civilization. This kind of view can be labeled as racism. That's why I don't want to talk about it except in actual Neanderthal discussion.

I'd like to nominate this post for a tag.

so i can remember andy thinks these things.

 

[DrFunk]

well this took a weird turn

GAF!

Was interesting till the racism stepped in. I /liked/ your avatar btw, Andy. Sheesh

 

[Chiaroscuro]

This. Pretty much though was spread through war and killing rather than love. Homo Sapiens are smarter and had greater weaponry. Would probably slaughter a Neanderthal camp, rape the women and keep them as slaves who bore children that had homo sapiens and neanderthal DNA.

Not saying that did not happen, but that cannot be the cause of the Neanderthal DNA in the Sapiens genoma, since no Neanderthal mitocondrial DNA is found in modern humans it means that we got our Neanderthal genes from male neanderthals mating with Sapiens females.

 

[PiFace]

They were not. There were no artifact excavated from the Neanderthal sites you can qualify as art or religious. Even in the same cave that carried both Neanderthal and modern human artifacts, the human ones were much more "spiritual."

However I have a pet theory that modern human mixing with a little bit of Neanderthal DNA give human a little extra intellectual boost. My reasoning is that Africans (with 0% Neanderthal DNA) had never developed their system of writing, or large scaled cities despite thousands of years of contact with the middle eastern region, which was the cradle of earliest civilization. This kind of view can be labeled as racism. That's why I don't want to talk about it except in actual Neanderthal discussion.

Maybe it is viewed as racist because it is. You have no evidence to make such a claim.

 

[Choabac]

I highly recommend the book Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari. In the first section of the book, he details the cognitive revolution that Sapiens went through to become the dominant species on the planet and out-compete other rivals such as Neanderthals.

Apparently, Homo sapiens appeared about 200,000 years ago and were no more dominant than other Homo species at the time. The first time we left Africa we were driven back by Neanderthals. Those Sapiens seemed physically identical to us now, but they had different cognitive functions. About 70,000 years ago something changed in our cognitive function, and we likely developed imagination. This was important because it allowed for shared beliefs - myths, religions, and much later, the idea of justice and corporations. Because of the change in the way we thought about the world, we could work together as thousands or millions towards a common goal. Until this revolution occurred, the most a group that can coordinate with each other is something around 150 or so individuals. Harari highlights chimps as modern examples of this limitation. They can co-exist in small groups, but they're unable to form societies in any higher numbers. Their cognitive function is limited - at most they can share only basic information with each other, and they can only keep track of 150 or so individuals on a personal level to trust. With the spark of imagination, Sapiens can work with perfect strangers towards common goals. They don't need to know everyone at a deeply personal level to co-exist. So Sapiens were able to coordinate and join tribes to out-compete our rivals. Neanderthals apparently never got this mutation, so they were outnumbered and out-coordinated in every encounter.

 

[ginger ninja]

Whole lot of rape. Almost two bill cosby stand-ups worth.

 

[Moosichu]

You don't have to use writing as the only mile stone advance in humanity. You can count the use of fire; domestication of wild plants and farming; domestication of farming animals; use of ceramic; advance in stone tools; use of iron tools; writing; religion etc etc

Now going back to the importance of writing. It's said that human brain can only recognize limit number of faces and names. I think the number is between 100-200. Once your organization exceed that number, you need the help of writing for organization. Writing is also vitally important for tax and palace inventory recording. That was the original purpose of the oldest writing.

So your admitting your pet theory is a tale from your ass and has absolutely no evidence to support it? Africa did have all the other things your described.

Also, it is worth pointing out, that Neanderthal genes are turned off in the brain anyway.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xX2iv4SyNHg

 

[televator]

The percantage varies depending on your genealogy (obviously). I think people descended from certain parts of Europe have the highest percentage on average.

 

[NEO0MJ]

We'll never know. But survival of the fittest doesn't always mean survival of the smartest.

I think I read somewhere that there was a relative of humans that had larger skulls and potentially larger brains than us. They died out for some reason, though.

 

[LookAtMeGo]

They were not. There were no artifact excavated from the Neanderthal sites you can qualify as art or religious. Even in the same cave that carried both Neanderthal and modern human artifacts, the human ones were much more "spiritual."

However I have a pet theory that modern human mixing with a little bit of Neanderthal DNA give human a little extra intellectual boost. My reasoning is that Africans (with 0% Neanderthal DNA) had never developed their system of writing, or large scaled cities despite thousands of years of contact with the middle eastern region, which was the cradle of earliest civilization. This kind of view can be labeled as racism. That's why I don't want to talk about it except in actual Neanderthal discussion.

In this moment I am euphoric, not because of any phony gods blessing, but because I am enlightened by my neanderthal DNA.

 

[Angry Grimace]

what does any of that have to do with the fact that both species are animals and raped eachother? how else do you get one species dna in another species? by cross breeding.



yeah. in the pants.

There's no reason to assume the answer is "rape" as opposed to voluntary reproduction. The evidence suggests they were similar enough in intelligence and appearance.

 

[Roufianos]

They were not. There were no artifact excavated from the Neanderthal sites you can qualify as art or religious. Even in the same cave that carried both Neanderthal and modern human artifacts, the human ones were much more "spiritual."

However I have a pet theory that modern human mixing with a little bit of Neanderthal DNA give human a little extra intellectual boost. My reasoning is that Africans (with 0% Neanderthal DNA) had never developed their system of writing, or large scaled cities despite thousands of years of contact with the middle eastern region, which was the cradle of earliest civilization. This kind of view can be labeled as racism. That's why I don't want to talk about it except in actual Neanderthal discussion.

The hieroglyphs aren't a system of writing?

 

[Chuckie]

The hieroglyphs aren't a system of writing?

No those are just stupid little drawings.

Spoiler

/s

 

[StayDead]

Neanderthals had evolved over hundreds of thousands of years many genes beneficial for their environment. When Homo Sapiens first arrived in Neanderthal environments they didn't possess these genes. Interbreeding meant that these genes were quickly passed into the Homo Sapiens gene pool, whilst any that were less beneficial were quickly extinguished (basic Darwinian survival of the fittest in a time when the infant mortality rate was incredibly high). This explains why that percentage of Neanderthal DNA survived (it was beneficial, or at least not a negative).

Denisovans are considered to be offshoots of Neanderthals who colonised Asia and diverged from Neanderthals. As mentioned, Australasian Homo Sapiens have DNA from these due to interbreeding, again, the beneficial genes survived. Maybe the most famous one of these genes is the one for low oxygen, or high altitude, which is still present in Tibetans. It clearly had a massively beneficial factor to surviving there and spread quickly.

As mentioned, some Africans have DNA from an unknown hominin species, it's unknown if this is more closely related to Neanderthal's predecessor Homo Heidelbergensis, the more ancient Homo Erectus, or an unknown lineage. Similarly an unknown homo lineage has recently been discovered in Australasian DNA, which are only known to have inhabited the same location as Homo Erectus (and maybe Homo Floresiensis "The Hobbit", but there's no evidence for Homo Floresiensis beyond Flores yet), so maybe that was possible.

Despite the widespread belief that Neanderthals weren't as intelligent as Homo Sapiens, we don't really know their level of intelligence. What we do know is that intelligence is massively beneficial to survival, so it's likely that genes for intelligence would be more likely to survive than genes which led to less intelligence. The same would be true for all interbreeding of homo species.

This was a really informative post. I'm going to take it at face value without checking the facts (as I can't at work), but if this is all true that's really cool.

 

[Greddleok]

I can promise you there was no romance. Have you seen what neanderthals look like? No one wants to get romantic with one of those.

 

[Big Chungus]

Watch The Croods and you'll find out.

 

[moggio]

I can promise you there was no romance. Have you seen what neanderthals look like? No one wants to get romantic with one of those.

Well, some people aren't that shallow and there are homosapiens who look much worse who have no problem forming relationships.

Also, as I said, they were probably hung. That's good enough an incentive for me.

 

[Moosichu]

Neanderthals had evolved over hundreds of thousands of years many genes beneficial for their environment. When Homo Sapiens first arrived in Neanderthal environments they didn't possess these genes. Interbreeding meant that these genes were quickly passed into the Homo Sapiens gene pool, whilst any that were less beneficial were quickly extinguished (basic Darwinian survival of the fittest in a time when the infant mortality rate was incredibly high). This explains why that percentage of Neanderthal DNA survived (it was beneficial, or at least not a negative).

Denisovans are considered to be offshoots of Neanderthals who colonised Asia and diverged from Neanderthals. As mentioned, Australasian Homo Sapiens have DNA from these due to interbreeding, again, the beneficial genes survived. Maybe the most famous one of these genes is the one for low oxygen, or high altitude, which is still present in Tibetans. It clearly had a massively beneficial factor to surviving there and spread quickly.

As mentioned, some Africans have DNA from an unknown hominin species, it's unknown if this is more closely related to Neanderthal's predecessor Homo Heidelbergensis, the more ancient Homo Erectus, or an unknown lineage. Similarly an unknown homo lineage has recently been discovered in Australasian DNA, which are only known to have inhabited the same location as Homo Erectus (and maybe Homo Floresiensis "The Hobbit", but there's no evidence for Homo Floresiensis beyond Flores yet), so maybe that was possible.

Despite the widespread belief that Neanderthals weren't as intelligent as Homo Sapiens, we don't really know their level of intelligence. What we do know is that intelligence is massively beneficial to survival, so it's likely that genes for intelligence would be more likely to survive than genes which led to less intelligence. The same would be true for all interbreeding of homo species.

As mentioned earlier in the thread, recent epigenetics studies of Neanderthal DNA in humans seem to indicate that Neanderthal genes are turned off in our reproductive organs and brains - which seems to indicate that their intelligence was less advantageous than ours.

Being turned off in the reproductive organs makes sense as well, as reproductive organs are the parts of species that need to be the most specific to a species in order to successfully work.

 

[BKK]

As mentioned earlier in the thread, recent epigenetics studies of Neanderthal DNA in humans seem to indicate that Neanderthal genes are turned off in our reproductive organs and brains - which seems to indicate that their intelligence was less advantageous than ours.

Being turned off in the reproductive organs makes sense as well, as reproductive organs are the parts of species that need to be the most specific to a species in order to successfully work.

Right, absolutely ... you would expect if homo sapiens were more intelligent then their genes would survive. But if Neanderthals also had those genes, then why didn't they survive? Maybe their brains weren't designed to comprehend as well as homo sapiens? I think that's the most logical explanation. What I don't get is how 50k+ years ago modern day humans switched from being dumb for over 100k+ years, to suddenly being intelligent... where did that come from? Arthur C Clarke?

 

[Prinz Eugn]

That Rings a bell

How many heads does this go over?

Too many, I fear.

 

[mckmas8808]

They were not. There were no artifact excavated from the Neanderthal sites you can qualify as art or religious. Even in the same cave that carried both Neanderthal and modern human artifacts, the human ones were much more "spiritual."

However I have a pet theory that modern human mixing with a little bit of Neanderthal DNA give human a little extra intellectual boost. My reasoning is that Africans (with 0% Neanderthal DNA) had never developed their system of writing, or large scaled cities despite thousands of years of contact with the middle eastern region, which was the cradle of earliest civilization. This kind of view can be labeled as racism. That's why I don't want to talk about it except in actual Neanderthal discussion.

So Egyptians aren't Africans now?

 

[Cindi Mayweather]

African's don't have Neanderthal DNA.

But not all black people are 100% African.

And not all African's are black.

 

[wumster3000]

We was clapping neanderthal cheeks

LMAO...I guess one and done? All other posts are irrelevant.

 

[Toxi]

However I have a pet theory that modern human mixing with a little bit of Neanderthal DNA give human a little extra intellectual boost. My reasoning is that Africans (with 0% Neanderthal DNA) had never developed their system of writing, or large scaled cities despite thousands of years of contact with the middle eastern region, which was the cradle of earliest civilization. This kind of view can be labeled as racism. That's why I don't want to talk about it except in actual Neanderthal discussion.

Your "pet theory" is based on

• Your personal ignorance about African history and archaeology
• No actual genetic or neurological evidence, so assuming causation based on a supposed correlation
• The assumption that adoption of a writing system or construction of large cities is based on intelligence
• Ignoring the populations with Neanderthal ancestry that didn't do those things
• Ignoring the evidence that Neanderthal genes are generally less expressed in the brain

In conclusion, yes, it's fucking racist. I never expected to see this 19th century garbage on NeoGAF.

 

[Vital Tundra]

Wait I thought Neanderthals were intelligent just like us? In fact having better tools and such. I would assume integration with more sapien to sapien/sapien to Neanderthal happened more than Neanderthal to Neanderthal sex.

 

[mckmas8808]

African's don't have Neanderthal DNA.

But not all black people are 100% African.

And not all African's are black.

All Africans? Or just a particular tribe or region of Africa?

 

[The Artisan]

I bet Neanderthals had big ol' schlongs.

I'd fuck one.

I'd definitely hook up with a Neanderthal chick if I could go back in time unfortunately though it sounds like our babies would not be that healthy.

This is the old depiction. New evidence suggests they had feathers.

Are you joking?

Before worldwide travel, there were probably different kinds of human ancestors living in all kinds of places.. Then they started moving about and having sex, heyooo!

not only having sex, but conceiving fertile children, that's the awesome part.

Cool OP, never considered some of those perspectives.

it's very interesting to think about ain't it?

Actually an interesting topic despite the "fuckin'" one liner jokes, the interactions between the two (and three) species would have been interesting to see.

Neanderthals had symbolic thought, so they were also capable of forms of written language like us, it's pretty...I don't know, mind boggling, staggering, saddening, to think, what if they had survived till now as well, what would they have been today?

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/neandertal-symbolism/

We also copied their technology early on -

http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/modern-humans-may-have-copied-neanderthal-technology-1.1396420

What technology would they have had in 2017?

even if we copied their early tools, we probably mastered and did better than them at their own sport. I think their biggest problem is that instead of integrating with sapiens and maybe even other tribes of their own, they did things more isolated and that's what may have led to their downfall.

but i agree, it is among the most interesting things to think about about our planet, evolution, mankind.

this is incredible.

i'd love to see more stuff like this.

same! i take it that setting of reconstruction is probably in a museum of natural history. visit any one, you're bound to probably see more of the same awesome stuff.

100% pure Homo sapiens sapiens here....going off the standards in the OP anyway.

yep. genetically, sub-Saharan Africans are the purest homo sapiens alive today.

if your ancestry is 100% African, then you have the most homo sapien DNA of all living people these days. Other human species lived in Africa I think, but not Neanderthals.

As to the question of how we've managed to retain that approximate 4%, instead of reducing it to basically nothing, the most probable cause is that neanderthal DNA became widespread enough in the population that it could be inherited from both parents. So instead of one parent having say, 12.5%, and the other 0%, reducing your percentage to 6.25%, one has 6% and another 4%, averaging out to around 5%. Some may have more and others may have less, but so long as the general population has a minimum amount of Neanderthal DNA, it will never go below a certain threshold.

What would this threshold be? If the human population continues to rise, then logically the neanderthal percentage in everyone's DNA would become lower, yeah?

When God removed Adam's rib to create Eve, he actually replaced it with a Neanderthal rib. Over the ages this part of the official historic text has sadly been lost. :'(

I have a theory that Adam and Eve could've been Homo erectus. Growing up in a Muslim background I don't think many would appreciate this scientific, evolutionist approach, but I've never talked to another Muslim about it but I can imagine they wouldn't appreciate it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xX2iv4SyNHg

This is a good video on Neanderthal DNA and the effects it may have on the human body.




The evidence appears to show that this wasn't the case - interbreeding was really rare. Neanderthals did die out through other means - although we aren't entirely sure what caused them to do so. Humans probably played a big a part by killing them.

we don't know that interbreeding was really rare - it could be that a looooot of the hybrid people died very young, before they could have children themselves.

OP's question is far more interesting, if you'd read the OP. They acknowledge that fuckin' went on, but what kinda fuckin?

Are we talking about the different cultures mixing in a non-violent way? Where Neanderthal and Homospadien people would freely intermix in trade and relations and family? Or are we talking violent fuckin?

Thank you. Yes, this was the discussion I originally wanted to have in this thread.

Sorry OP. Look how humans act now with an abundance of resources. Now imagine back then the fight for resources? Neanderthals were probably killed and raped into nonexistence.

Yes, mankind can be despicable but I think the best of humanity far outweighs the worst. One thing also have to remember if you really think rape was the cause of this, is that the hybrid children born of rape or not, would have to have been taken care of all the way into adulthood. This would mean the neanderthal parent would be integrated into sapien culture - definitely not a likely scenario if this was rape.

Current evidence suggests that human-Neanderthal hybrids were often sterile, and that the male fetuses may have been non-viable, so it's unlikely.

The current evidence is that the children born from male sapiens and female Neanderthals were unhealthy and sterile, and probably died.

The only viable children were those that had a Neanderthal father, and a sapien mother. And of those children, only the females seemed to be fertile. Considering how harsh the climate was back then, for all we know there could have been tons of more fertile hybrids that lived, but died before they could have children of their own.

ur mother

What?

That's not the question the OP is asking.

Thank you.

actually around 20% of neanderthal genome is present in humans as a whole.

Can you explain this? I have read about this before but it often confuses me with the 4% number. Like, 20% of Neanderthals technically live today through humans? Where does the 4% fit in in this context?

If it was by force, then Neanderthal women were probably kidnapped and integrated into human tribes. Their DNA wouldn't be in ours if they and their hybrid offspring were not integrated with us.

Your half right - I'm not saying kidnapping didn't happen, but most people who have Neanderthal DNA these days have an ancestor that was a Neanderthal man. So if it were by force...then the Neanderthal who kidnapped raped the human sapien would had to have taken care of her in the Neanderthal clan, since she would be the mother of his child. And that child would grow up to have either hooked up with another Neanderthal, or came across a sapien clan that integrated with her own.

There's no such thing as a "pure" African. All humans have Neanderthal DNA to some extent, and all humans share a direct ancestor in the very recent past, as recently as a 2/3 thousand years ago.

Also, nothing in that picture, or recreations of Neanderthals comes off as racist to me. Most have pretty light skin, actually. And they look hairy because they were hairy. They needed that hair to keep warm in Europe.

You're wrong on both counts. There is such thing as a "pure" African in the context of genetics. Neanderthals did not live in Africa, so Africans never met them.

As for the picture, their skin tone may have been light, but they weren't hairier than what we would consider the hairiest today.

There is absolutely no reason to believe that Neanderthals were any hairier than modern man. Computer models have shown that excess hair on neanderthals would have caused over-production of sweat which would have frozen on the neanderthals potentially leading to death.

http://listverse.com/2009/06/16/top-10-misconceptions-about-neanderthals/

Yea, I'm out of this thread.

come on, don't let one unsettling post stop you from discussion in this thread...

well this took a weird turn

let's turn it back!

-reads first page

"Interesting discussion"

-clicks last page

"Oh god"

Please don't go...

GAF!

Was interesting till the racism stepped in. I /liked/ your avatar btw, Andy. Sheesh

fuck the racism, that's not why I made the OP. there's still a potential interesting discussion to have here.

The percantage varies depending on your genealogy (obviously). I think people descended from certain parts of Europe have the highest percentage on average.

Probably those descended from the Middle East, too.

I can promise you there was no romance. Have you seen what neanderthals look like? No one wants to get romantic with one of those.

There are pictures of what they used to look like in this thread. Whatever your picturing is probably an earlier and more inaccurate misconception.

All Africans? Or just a particular tribe or region of Africa?

All sub-Saharan Africans, I should have pointed that out in the OP. Africans that lived in the Saharan desert probably came into close contact with those living in the Middle East, who did come across Neanderthals.

Who is We? I am only .6% Neanderthal Thank you very much.

How did you find that out?! I REALLY would like to know if I have Neanderthal ancestry. My dad looks just like a Neanderthal with dark brown skin