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40,000-year-old bracelet made by extinct human species found (2015)

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Re: 40,000-year-old bracelet made by extinct human species found (2015)

#31

Post by madaxe_again »

TezlaKoil wrote: post #2

This article about the bracelet is from 2015. No updates since then, and it does not link to anything peer-reviewed. All in all I would take this with a huge grain of salt.

Indeed, it's poorly written (no morphological similarities to modern humans?? They were alive before they were extinct? Daily mail as source), and this scans more like the mystical bullshit you read in Russian media all the time (Jesus was Russian, all peoples are descended from the pure Slavic archetype, dinosaur spotted in Yekaterinburg, putin wrestles ten bears saving orphanage).

Re: 40,000-year-old bracelet made by extinct human species found (2015)

#32

Post by madaxe_again »

contingencies wrote: post #13

200km is not necessarily 'imported'. People can walk 5km/hr easily. You are talking about 4 days' comfortable walk. Many nomadic groups would have had ranges exceeding 200km at least on occasion. For example I believe there is evidence that some Australian aboriginal societies regularly communicated over vaster distances, at least sporadically - eg. annually in certain seasons.

200km is also well within the range of river transport washing erratics downstream.

Re: 40,000-year-old bracelet made by extinct human species found (2015)

#33

Post by dghf »

> the recent discovery of a female Denisovan finger bone and various teeth shows that they had no morphological similarities to either Neanderthals or modern humans.

Does "morphological similarities" have a particular definition in palaeoanthropology beyond the apparently plain meaning of the words? Even if "they" refers to the finger bone and teeth rather than the Denisovans as a whole, I would have thought they would have had some morphological similarities to modern humans, otherwise they wouldn't be recognisable as a finger bone and teeth.

Re: 40,000-year-old bracelet made by extinct human species found (2015)

#34

Post by willvarfar »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #29
thoughtsimple wrote: post #15

I always love quotes like this: "All jewellery had a magical meaning for ancient people. Bracelets and neck adornments were to protect people from evil spirits, for instance." And we know this how? Maybe it was just made to be pretty. A rich person giving their partner a gift etc. No one could possibly be able to make any further inferences from a species of human we know almost nothing about.

My mother studied archaeology and she told me once what she heard during her classes - that "religious significance" is the default label that is put on things they found when they have no clue what those things were for.

Yeap, in Time Team (warning: you can lose days binging on those videos on youtube!) they use the term "ritual". Everything is ritualistic, every pathway is for "processions" and so on, until they find evidence of something that makes said object or pathway or location mundane :)

Re: 40,000-year-old bracelet made by extinct human species found (2015)

#35

Post by AndrewOMartin »

INTPenis wrote: post #30
thoughtsimple wrote: post #15

I always love quotes like this: "All jewellery had a magical meaning for ancient people. Bracelets and neck adornments were to protect people from evil spirits, for instance." And we know this how? Maybe it was just made to be pretty. A rich person giving their partner a gift etc. No one could possibly be able to make any further inferences from a species of human we know almost nothing about.

Yes but look back only 60-70 years in Europe and a lot of jewelry had a double purpose. It was pretty but it was also for example St. Anthony, a cross or some other spiritual tribute.

...or to Livestrong.

Re: 40,000-year-old bracelet made by extinct human species found (2015)

#36

Post by pranavsinghca »

ythn wrote: post #6

How do we know that 5000 year old humans didn't make jewelry out of 35000 year old materials?

This is interesting. Could modern scientists today create a piece of jewellery using ancient material? Surely they can.

I'd be interested in knowing what techniques modern scientists would use to 'fool' other scientists, and then knowing when these techniques generally became available.

Re: 40,000-year-old bracelet made by extinct human species found (2015)

#37

Post by Mithaldu »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #29
thoughtsimple wrote: post #15

I always love quotes like this: "All jewellery had a magical meaning for ancient people. Bracelets and neck adornments were to protect people from evil spirits, for instance." And we know this how? Maybe it was just made to be pretty. A rich person giving their partner a gift etc. No one could possibly be able to make any further inferences from a species of human we know almost nothing about.

My mother studied archaeology and she told me once what she heard during her classes - that "religious significance" is the default label that is put on things they found when they have no clue what those things were for.

I may be jumping to conclusions here, but this feels to me like a consequence of the american thing of "never admit when you don't know something".

Re: 40,000-year-old bracelet made by extinct human species found (2015)

#38

Post by TeMPOraL »

Mithaldu wrote: post #37
TeMPOraL wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My mother studied archaeology and she told me once what she heard during her classes - that "religious significance" is the default label that is put on things they found when they have no clue what those things were for.

I may be jumping to conclusions here, but this feels to me like a consequence of the american thing of "never admit when you don't know something".

I don't think this is just an American thing. Also, my mother studied in Poland.

Re: 40,000-year-old bracelet made by extinct human species found (2015)

#39

Post by icebraining »

dghf wrote: post #33

> the recent discovery of a female Denisovan finger bone and various teeth shows that they had no morphological similarities to either Neanderthals or modern humans. Does "morphological similarities" have a particular definition in palaeoanthropology beyond the apparently plain meaning of the words? Even if "they" refers to the finger bone and teeth rather than the Denisovans as a whole, I would have thought they wou…

Also, how could they have mated, let alone have hybrid children?

Re: 40,000-year-old bracelet made by extinct human species found (2015)

#40

Post by Mithaldu »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #38
Mithaldu wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I may be jumping to conclusions here, but this feels to me like a consequence of the american thing of "never admit when you don't know something".

I don't think this is just an American thing. Also, my mother studied in Poland.

Even if she's not american, it could be an attribute of the line of study. Mathematics weren't started in Germany, but many text books, even in the USA are strongly influenced by german aspects.

Also, if it's not that, where does that aspect come from then? How long have archeologists been doing this?

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