Toadfish Monastery

Oh, I thought you were talking about Supraorbital ridges

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Quote from: Swatopluk on November 07, 2012, 04:41:25 PM
Not sure. Experiments have shown that a well-dressed Neanderthal (modern human with lots of prostethic makeup) can walk among us without getting noticed as unusual.

Might notice the muscles when up close and personal.

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even well-dressed people can be bodybuilding

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This conversation is building.

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What does it matter while it lasts?

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Which lived longer, sapiens or derthals?

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As a species? By now I think we. Btw, thals were also sapiens but only as middle name. As individuals? No idea. And given the high infant mortality one had to be careful about the definition. I'd think (without looking for data, pure gut) that under similar circumstances thal babies would have slightly better chances of surviving the critical first phase but it would even out later.

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Edit: I looked it up. Current estimates (on an admittedly slim data base) say that both early hss and hsn had similiar life expectancy. In both species the probability to survive beyond 40 was about 14%.

I read an article that claimed that the advantage of Cro-magnon's was that more individuals were able to surpass the 40yo barrier, and speculated that the riskier way of life of the Neanderthals was the leading cause of them dying sooner. As you have more 'survivors' the knowledge of your culture survives longer giving an advantage.

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This seems to have been a popular theory until recently. But as said bone statistics seem to belie that.
And one thing is clear, the youngest (and thus latest in the species) finds of Neanderthals were in areas where our ancestors had not yet reached and where the settling had taken place long before (i.e. not refugees).
I think still in the race are the theories that 'We' very slowly outbred them over millennia* and 'they' in the end fell victim to the natural fluctuation in population without any aggression on 'our' side and the related one that repeated climate change drove up the fluctuations which gave our slightly superior ancestors the edge.
Something interesting I heard just recently. Although hsn buried his dead, the custom to add grave goods seems only to occur where he was in contact with hss, so it can be assumed that he took that idea up from hss.

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*Let's say 101 hss were born for every 100 hsn. Then after 500 generations the hss:hsn would be 145:1. On a much shorter timescale we can see it in red squirrels losing to gray squirrels in the UK (I am not aware of any gray extermination campaigns against their red cousins).

I read that article in a recent (this past year) scientific american, they didn't claim an overwhelming survival rate after forty for HSS but they explained that one or two individuals per clan surpassing the age of 40 would've made a drastic difference.

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In any case, the census data in those times was less precise than we have today and the margin that would have an effect over millenia would be within the error margin (see my 101:100 example).

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The Chinese think themselves a different species to us?

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Some Chinese professors seem to do (I think the one in the BBC series about the human migration out of Africa was genuine).

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No Denisovan DNA on the classic Han IIRC.

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One would of course have to discuss, whether party functionaries have different DNA (or maybe only RNA)

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