Neanderthal and Human Interbreeding Accepted?

[Cognito]

Agreed on the dates as stated Cogs but, as I argued with RS, finding the first or last of a species must be odds of millions to one against. Later HSN appeard to have buried his dead, thus the chances of finding bones must be even less than if he didn't bury his dead. You posted some time ago on the number of HSN in Europe at a given time, as I obserbed earlier, once numbers fall below a certain level the chances of finding evidence of their existance becomes very small.

Skeletal remains are very rare. As far as I know nobody has yet to find the remains of a Solutrean yet their tools are everywhere. At least there is what appears to be the remains of a hybrid HSN/HSS child found in Portugal.

My comment made some time ago was that population estimates of the entire HSN population of Eurasia (up to the Altai region) at 45-47kya when HSS began entering the area, was between 8,000 to 15,000 individuals. Finding anything based on the lack of population density would be a flippin miracle and the only reason why we do is because they chose the best spots to hang out since there was no hominid competition at the time, and some of the sites were left undisturbed after they disappeared.

Your position is similar to Bednarik's in that he really doesn't believe that HSS had much of a presence in Europe prior to the LGM. Bednarik references Aurignacian technology as being found with HSN remains, not HSS as everyone was taught and once thought (see: http://donsmaps.com/neandertalsymbols.html). Charlie Hatchett and I would go round and round on this topic with him believing that HSN dunnit while I explored the possibility of many Solutreans being hybrids and they were the ones whodunnit. Alas, neither of us wrote a paper on the topic, nor would anyone be inclined to read it!

[Digit]

The only way I can see that explains the significant differences between the races Cogs is the Chinese view that Mongoloids are a straight development from HE, then the Slavs would seem to be Cro-Magnon and the rest of us HSN X HSS.
The Club might not like it but I know of no other scenario that can be fitted into the suggested time frame.
The physical likeness of the !Kung of southern Africa and the Mongoloids is also very striking.

Roy.

[Minimalist]

the Chinese view that Mongoloids are a straight development from HE,

I wonder why they weren't obliterated by the Toba Eruption? They were, after all, a lot closer to it.

[Digit]

The logical answer is that the Toba event wasn't as bad as portrayed Min, as you have pointed out in the past, it seemed to have little effect on other species.
This was another of RS's favourites where he kept on about the depth of ash in India. I would suggest that the depth is unimportant on its own, we need a time scale as well.
5ft in 50 yrs the people would walk away. 5ft in 5 mins and your dead!
Short of a planet wide event I can see no reason why HE, HSN or HSS would go extinct, there diet wasn't specialised, their use of fire would permit life in areas much larger than most species, their use of tools would permit living in areas that would be marginal for others.
No Min, if any species could survive Toba I'd put my money on Homo.

Roy.

[Cognito]

The Toba eruption dumped significant amounts of ash on India since the wind was carrying it in that direction at the time. Even though the eruption supposedly created up to six frigid winters nobody knows their severity. HSN and the Denisovans survived in Eurasia as would any HEs in Asia since the primary ash cloud did not dump on China to any extent.

Digit is correct that the genus Homo is adaptable. If the climate turns frigid, move south, stick together, stay near large bodies of water ... and wear more furs!

[Minimalist]

That was my unsubtle way of dismissing the Toba genetic bottleneck, Cogs.

Dig is correct. I have previously pointed out that this eruption seemed highly "species specific" to HSS, if you listen to the geneticists.

I can't help but wonder what else they are mistaken about.

[Digit]

what else they are mistaken about.

They breathe!

Roy.

[Cognito]

That was my unsubtle way of dismissing the Toba genetic bottleneck, Cogs.

Ah yes. I now remember your previous refutations of the bottleneck theory. Scientists who believe in it fail to mention that the Neanderthals and Denisovans survived it as well as the Hobbit (genus Afarensis?) and possibly HEs in Asia.

That's some bottleneck!

[Minimalist]

Scientists who believe in it fail to mention that the Neanderthals and Denisovans survived it as well as the Hobbit (genus Afarensis?) and possibly HEs in Asia.

Not to mention the mammoths, and woolly rhinos, and sabre-toothed cats, and dyer wolves, etc., etc., etc. all of whom merrily pranced about without knowing they'd been obliterated by Toba. It sort of reminds me how the Egyptians kept building pyramids even though they all drowned in Noah's "flood."

[Minimalist]

I'll just stick this in here.....

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... ought.html

Neanderthal man lived on seafood far earlier than previously thought

[Digit]

Well as no one's laughed me out of court I'll move one.
As I said earlier what I proposed explains rather neatly where we are today, but not how we got here.
If we accept that HE was OOA, and the first of us, to be followed later by HSS as represented by Cro-Magnon, we are faced with the problem of the origins of HSN!
If the Chinese view that they are a straght line development from HE is correct is there sufficent time for HSN to develop from HE?
Next we face another problem, there are no black races in Eurasia. If HE was the colour and stature of the !Kung then the Chinese colour and stature is explained, but what then about the black Andaman Islanders and the Aborigines?
There simply isn't sufficient time for all the colours to have originated from one OOA, nor I suspect, two such migrations.
Equally if there were two OOA migrations there would certainly seem to be no reason to limit the view to two such events.
It is, I believe, worth observing that Africa has the yellow !Kung and the black tribes as well, so were they all from HE?
Bearing in mind that the club view seems to be that each of the extinct species in Africa was superceded by an 'improved' model we are forced into accepting one common ancestor, HE. Why?
The efforts by the Club to fit all the extinct species into a straight line is steadily becoming something of a problem. Perhaps the time has come to consider that the common ancestor was not HE, that more than branch of Homo existed alongside HE?

Roy.

[Minimalist]

If we accept that HE was OOA, and the first of us, to be followed later by HSS as represented by Cro-Magnon, we are faced with the problem of the origins of HSN!

2 million years is a long time, Dig. We have HE at Dmanisi in Georgia. There is no reason that I can see why there could not have been successive waves of HE coming OoA...if you want to use the term. All that is necessary is for one group to turn left at Turkey instead of right. Or, take their boats across the strait of Gibraltar and spread out from there. We have already learned that HNS and HSS were not separate "species" in the sense that they could and did interbreed with fertile offspring.

For that matter, what is to stop HE from crossing back to Africa? It isn't as if they knew they were going "back."

[Digit]

The problem there Min is that the 'official' view, the one that is taught, is much simpler.
Homo came OOA as fully formed HSS 70000yrs ago.
Skin colour, hair form, eye colour, all unknown. Within that time period he occupied every land mass bar Antarctica and produced all the various races of the world.
Now we know from excavations that all the races were fully formed in their present forms many thousands of years ago, in the case of the Aborigines may be as long ago as 60000 yrs.
There just isn't sufficient time to have done that Min if HE and the rest were all long dead!
Either HSS diversified faster than any known species or there were/are other variants of Homo involved.
If HE was yellow like the !Kung, and the Aborigine is a straight line development from HE why did he end up one of the blackest races on the planet?
Alternativly if HE was black why, when the solar radiation would have favoured the darker skin, did HE turn from the black of the Abo to the yellow of the !Kung?
There has to be other Homo variants involved to have acheived this amount of variation in such a short period of time as I see it.
I have not seen any direct evidence that Cro-Magnon could have morphed into the Abo or vice-versa. It seems to me that the club is fixed in the belief that HSS is and was the father of us all then they have to try and make everything fit that belief.
The simpler solution is either multi OOAs or longer term regional development or a combination of both. A one shot OOA does not fit.

Roy.

Roy.

[Minimalist]

You know that I don't by the official view.

I'm pretty much a multi-regionalist.

[Digit]

I do indeed Min, in fact it's your fault that I started thinking about this!
There has to be common ancestor somewhere back in time but regional development based on HSS is far too late IMO.
HE? Yes, but not necessarily exclusively I suspect.

Roy.