Neandertals as Advanced as Early Modern Humans?

This is something that I have thought for years. In contrast to the preceding story that I posted, it has been advanced that Neandertals were every bit as capable as modern humans. In Science Daily, the author quotes anthropologist Julien Riel-Salvatore and writes:

Riel-Salvatore identified projectile points, ochre, bone tools, ornaments and possible evidence of fishing and small game hunting at Uluzzian archeological sites throughout southern Italy. Such innovations are not traditionally associated with Neanderthals, strongly suggesting that they evolved independently, possibly due to dramatic changes in climate. More importantly, they emerged in an area geographically separated from modern humans.

"My conclusion is that if the Uluzzian is a Neanderthal culture it suggests that contacts with modern humans are not necessary to explain the origin of this new behavior. This stands in contrast to the ideas of the past 50 years that Neanderthals had to be acculturated to humans to come up with this technology," he said. "When we show Neanderthals could innovate on their own it casts them in a new light. It `humanizes' them if you will."

There are three "adaptive" technologies found in Europe at the Neandertal/early modern nexus: the Uluzzian, in Italy, the Szeletian in Hungary and the Chatelperronian in France. These have traditionally been interpreted as attempts by Neandertals to acculturate the technologies of the incoming moderns. Recent evidence has suggested, however, that, at least in the case of the Chatelperronian (also Castelperronean), the Neandertals and modern humans either coexisted at the site or occupied the same site at different times. The technology is sort of a modern/Neandertal hybrid. Interestingly, the same problem occurs in the Near East, where it is clear that the Neandertals and early moderns in the area were using the same tool types—the Levantine Mousterian. The only difference between the sites is that the early moderns appear to have used a higher percentage of knives.

As more information continues to come to light, including the recent revelation that Neandertals contributed to the modern human genome, it becomes harder to relegate them to the class of intellectually inferior species. It also becomes clear that the reasons for their disappearance (volcanoes aside) are complex.

----------------
Now playing: Todd Rundgren - Where Does The Time Go?
via FoxyTunes

Neandertal Population Size: The Cause for Extinction?

The Max Planck institute has released findings that suggest that Neandertals became extinct because they were below effective population size. Live Science reports that:

Neanderthals are of course extinct. But there never were very many of them, new research concludes.

In fact, new genetic evidence from the remains of six Neanderthals (Homo neanderthalensis) suggests the population hovered at an average of 1,500 females of reproductive age in Europe between 38,000 and 70,000 years ago, with the maximum estimate of 3,500 such female Neanderthals.

"It seems they never really took off in Eurasia in the way modern humans did later," said study researcher Adrian Briggs of the Max-Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Germany.

The research, which will be published in the July 17 issue of the journal Science, suggests the small population size of our ancestral cousins may have been a factor in their demise.

It wasn't for lack of intelligence. As the story notes, Neandertals were far from stupid:

Rather than the dumb cavemen characters starring in Geico car insurance ads, accumulating archaeological and genetic evidence shows Neanderthals were pretty sophisticated. They apparently hunted with blades and spear tips rivaling those of modern humans, ate marine mammals like seals and dolphins and sported brains that grew like ours. Their bodies likely looked similar to ours, and some Neanderthals showed off red locks on their heads.

I am still of the mind that Neandertals did interbreed with the arriving moderns, based on evidence at Arcy Sur-Cure where you have Aurignacian and Chatelperronian tool industries interdigitated, suggesting a somewhat fluid landscape for these hominids. The evidence at Lagar Velho, in Portugal, also suggests interbreeding. But if that didn't happen all over, or if there were conflicts regarding land or food resources, it is easy to see that there may have been a time of admixing and replacement, subsequent to which the Neandertal genome disappeared in the wake of selective pressures for that of modern humans.


----------------
Now playing: Alan Parsons - Blue Blue Sky
via FoxyTunes