Skull suggests human-Neanderthal link

SuzannePjam

Skull suggests human-Neanderthal link
Interbreeding may have occurred thousands of years ago
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16639881/

WASHINGTON - A skull found in a cave in Romania includes features of both modern humans and Neanderthals, possibly suggesting that the two may have interbred thousands of years ago.
Neanderthals were replaced by early modern humans. Researchers have long debated whether the two groups mixed together, though most doubt it. The last evidence for Neanderthals dates from at least 24,000 years ago.
The skull bearing both older and modern characteristics is discussed in a paper by Erik Trinkaus of Washington University in St. Louis. The report appears in Tuesday's issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The skull was found in Pestera cu Oase — the Cave with Bones — in southwestern Romania, along with other human remains. Radiocarbon dating indicates it is at least 35,000 years old and may be more than 40,000 years old.
The researchers said the skull had the same proportions as a modern human head and lacked the large brow ridge commonly associated with Neanderthals. However, there were also features that are unusual in modern humans, such as frontal flattening, a fairly large bone behind the ear and exceptionally large upper molars, which are seen among Neanderthals and other early hominids.
"Such differences raise important questions about the evolutionary history of modern humans," said co-author Joao Zilhao of the University of Bristol, England.
It could reflect a case in which ancient traits reappear in a modern human, or it could indicate a mixture of populations, Zilhao said. Or it simply may be that science hasn't been able to study enough early modern people to understand their diversity.
Dr. Richard Potts of the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History noted that the skull represents the earliest modern human ever found in Europe.
It's a big deal in that sense, he said, but the combination of characteristics don't necessarily indicate interbreeding between populations.
Overall there is no strong evidence for mixing of Neanderthal and modern human populations and "this doesn't add any," said Potts, who wasn't part of the research team.
None of the features cited as unusual in modern humans is exclusively Neanderthal, Potts said. Rather, they could be features passed down from earlier populations in Africa.
The field work that uncovered the skull was conducted in 2004 and 2005.
Meanwhile, a research team led by Svante Paabo of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, is trying to map the Neanderthal genome in hopes of better understanding any possible relationship to modern people.
The research was funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation, the Wenner-Green Foundation, Washington University, the Leakey Foundation, the Portuguese Institute of Archaeology, the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Science, the Romanian National Council for Academic Research and the Foundation Fyssen.

chopitdown

sorry but this is a pet peeve of mine. An inanimate object, such as a skull, cannot suggest anything. People can form hypothesis about the object, but the object can't suggest anything.

Cool find...it'll be interesting to read the report when it comes out.

Pearl Jam and toast

chopitdown wrote:

sorry but this is a pet peeve of mine. An inanimate object, such as a skull, cannot suggest anything. People can form hypothesis about the object, but the object can't suggest anything.

Cool find...it'll be interesting to read the report when it comes out.

That is the most scientifically devoid statement I've read here in a long time.

Comparing physical traits (and carbon dating the fossil to stick it roughly on a timeline) could (and has it would seem) suggest all sorts of conclusions. Mixed physical traits and accurate age based on our expectations suggests that creature was the result of interbreeding between neanderthal and modern humans.

What a hell of a thing to try and pick apart.

Forming a hypothesis is pretty much saying "this is what the evidence suggests".

chopitdown

Pearl Jam and toast wrote:

That is the most scientifically devoid statement I've read here in a long time.

Comparing physical traits (and carbon dating the fossil to stick it roughly on a timeline) could (and has it would seem) suggest all sorts of conclusions. Mixed physical traits and accurate age based on our expectations suggests that creature was the result of interbreeding between neanderthal and modern humans.

What a hell of a thing to try and pick apart.

Forming a hypothesis is pretty much saying "this is what the evidence suggests".

i didn't try to pick anything apart, so quit reading into. i merely said that an inanimate object cannot suggest. People can suggest things about it, but a skull cannot suggest. Good grief, you can't even look past that to the last comment of it's a good find and will be interesting to read the study.

if i wanted to try to pick something apart i would have used this quote from the article
"Overall there is no strong evidence for mixing of Neanderthal and modern human populations and "this doesn't add any," said Potts, who wasn't part of the research team." But i want to read the journal article myself and see what the co-authors said. The little snippet from the article also said that, It could reflect a case in which ancient traits reappear in a modern human, or it could indicate a mixture of populations, Zilhao said. Or it simply may be that science hasn't been able to study enough early modern people to understand their diversity." Which is a fancy way of saying, "we're not quite sure, but we found something and we need to do more work to figure it out"

gue_barium

I think there was a report a few months ago that DNA testing showed there was no genetic link between homo sapiens and neanderthals. The headline is misleading, or dated.

gue_barium

chopitdown wrote:

sorry but this is a pet peeve of mine. An inanimate object, such as a skull, cannot suggest anything. People can form hypothesis about the object, but the object can't suggest anything.

Cool find...it'll be interesting to read the report when it comes out.

Maybe Skull was a reference to Rumsfeld.

chopitdown

gue_barium wrote:

Maybe Skull was a reference to Rumsfeld.

don't insult the skull

Rushlimbo

This cannot possibly be true. The world is only 5000 years old. Fossils were put here by the devil to trick us away from God and his teachings.

mca47

Rushlimbo wrote:

This cannot possibly be true. The world is only 5000 years old. Fossils were put here by the devil to trick us away from God and his teachings.

Damn right!!!

Evolution and science is for suckers!

reversedarwinism

Rushlimbo wrote:

This cannot possibly be true. The world is only 5000 years old. Fossils were put here by the devil to trick us away from God and his teachings.

i know you're joking, right? right?

Pearl Jam and toast

chopitdown wrote:

i didn't try to pick anything apart, so quit reading into. i merely said that an inanimate object cannot suggest. People can suggest things about it, but a skull cannot suggest. Good grief, you can't even look past that to the last comment of it's a good find and will be interesting to read the study.

I know what you meant, it was just the kind of OCD bullshit that triggers my OCD bullshit

Rushlimbo

reversedarwinism wrote:

i know you're joking, right? right?

Yes I was. I read an article recently about a creationist museum that believes dinosaurs and man were living together when the world was created 5000 years ago. Seriously.

Pearl Jam and toast

Rushlimbo wrote:

Yes I was. I read an article recently about a creationist museum that believes dinosaurs and man were living together when the world was created 5000 years ago. Seriously.

I know that group of people!

They say that all dinosaurs (for instance the T-rex with it's gigantic fangs designed for ripping apart flesh) were vegetarians, which is why humans could co-exist with them.

reversedarwinism

Rushlimbo wrote:

Yes I was. I read an article recently about a creationist museum that believes dinosaurs and man were living together when the world was created 5000 years ago. Seriously.

thank you. now i know you're going to hell, hell, hell to get burned by the devil, sinner.

Collin

Pearl Jam and toast wrote:

I know that group of people!

They say that all dinosaurs (for instance the T-rex with it's gigantic fangs designed for ripping apart flesh) were vegetarians, which is why humans could co-exist with them.

Yes and do you know why tigers have such sharp claws? Not to shred animals into pieces but to climb trees! Of course that was when Adam and Eve didn't fuck Paradise up yet.

chopitdown

Pearl Jam and toast wrote:

I know what you meant, it was just the kind of OCD bullshit that triggers my OCD bullshit

fair enough. *Cheers* to OCD BS

ClimberInOz

Rushlimbo wrote:

Yes I was. I read an article recently about a creationist museum that believes dinosaurs and man were living together when the world was created 5000 years ago. Seriously.

A few months I was placed in a school as part of my grad diploma of education, to become a science teacher.

It was a christian school that still taught creationism as part of the science curriculum. My favorite bits of creation science that were actually taught to the students by other science teachers included:

* The dinosaurs went extinct in Noah's flood- which is why we don't have to worry about them anymore.
* All fossil fuels were created during the great flood.

And my personal favorite:

* David Attenborough is a deceiver and a prophet of evil for abandoning the church and 'preaching' evolution.

Belief in god is not for me, but if it is your thing- go for it. But lets not bring up our kids in a culture of complete ignorance. (And I know that this school does not represent the majority of the christian faith- at least not here in Australia). Creationism goes beyond faith in the absence of evidence... It is faith despite the evidence.

miller8966

ClimberInOz wrote:

A few months I was placed in a school as part of my grad diploma of education, to become a science teacher.

It was a christian school that still taught creationism as part of the science curriculum. My favorite bits of creation science that were actually taught to the students by other science teachers included:

* The dinosaurs went extinct in Noah's flood- which is why we don't have to worry about them anymore.
* All fossil fuels were created during the great flood.

And my personal favorite:

* David Attenborough is a deceiver and a prophet of evil for abandoning the church and 'preaching' evolution.

Belief in god is not for me, but if it is your thing- go for it. But lets not bring up our kids in a culture of complete ignorance. (And I know that this school does not represent the majority of the christian faith- at least not here in Australia). Creationism goes beyond faith in the absence of evidence... It is faith despite the evidence.

I remember science once told me that pluto was a planet...now its not?!

Collin

miller8966 wrote:

I remember science once told me that pluto was a planet...now its not?!

A team discovered an object (Eris) in 2005, Eris is larger than Pluto and the question came up whether to call Eris a planet or not, since it's bigger than Pluto. The IAU pick a group of astronomers to come up with a new definition of the term 'planet'. According to this new definition Pluto is no longer a planet but a dwarf planet.

I don't know how you can compare redefining an object because of a new scientific discovery with just making up random stuff.

SuzannePjam

gue_barium wrote:

I think there was a report a few months ago that DNA testing showed there was no genetic link between homo sapiens and neanderthals. The headline is misleading, or dated.

there was an article posted about a year ago discussing the possibilities of a link between Neanderthals and homo sapiens based on the artifacts and bones they had at that time. This skull was found after that. Here's the link to the article you may be referring to.

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/discoveries/2005-02-08-skeletons_x.htm

gue_barium

SuzannePjam wrote:

there was an article posted about a year ago discussing the possibilities of a link between Neanderthals and homo sapiens based on the artifacts and bones they had at that time. This skull was found after that. Here's the link to the article you may be referring to.

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/discoveries/2005-02-08-skeletons_x.htm

No, that's not the article.

The idea that homo sapiens and neanderthals interbred has been around nearly as long as its been that neanderthal fossils were identified as a unique species. The DNA test, apparently, put the idea to rest.