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Neanderthals survived on a knife's edge for 350k years

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Re: Neanderthals survived on a knife's edge for 350k years

#151

Post by Schmerika »

Monotoko wrote: post #145
paulnpace wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have wondered if animal husbandry played a larger role than agriculture, alone. The horse, as we know it, altered all of civilization.

It was the cat, those little fluffy bastards walked into a human camp about 10,000 years ago and kicked everything off. That's why the Ancient Egyptians revered cats as Gods /s

Honestly not sure how necessary that /s is.

Like, without cats storing grain becomes so, so much harder; maybe basically impossible/unfeasible. Without storing grain you don't get cities as easily or as long.

Same with transporting food by boat; you gotta have a cat on your trireme or what are you even doing Andronikos.

Countless poets, writers, scientists and artists have been directly inspired by cats. I could easily believe yoga was inspired by them too.

It seems likely that models, royalty, and the concept of grace itself are all directly inspired by cats.

And then there's the profound cultural significance of Toxoplasmosis over the millenia; cats are (usually) calming; introverts can hang with cats all day...

Re: Neanderthals survived on a knife's edge for 350k years

#152

Post by AngryData »

jstanley wrote: post #117
surgical_fire wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Er, Aztecs and Incans definitely had agriculture. They actually had highly complex societies. What they mostly lacked were antibodies against the numerous diseases brought by the Europeans. Measles, Mumps, Cholera, Tuberculosis, and so on.

They had agriculture, yes, but they hadn't had it long enough to bootstrap an advanced civilisation before the Europeans arrived. If they had, perhaps Europe would have been conquered by South Americans instead of the other way around.

What do you mean they didn't have an advanced civilization? They had city densities above the best in Europe and their gold work put European goldsmiths to shame. They had the abacus, pain medications, aqueducts, armor, dams, beer, gold plating along with sintering soldering and lost wax casting, roads, the concept of zero in mathematics, advanced astronomy, plumbing, the suspension bridge, multiple unique writing systems, and tons of food preservation techniques. That is a far cry from some dudes tieing rocks to sticks.

Re: Neanderthals survived on a knife's edge for 350k years

#153

Post by vessenes »

jstanley wrote: post #117
surgical_fire wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Er, Aztecs and Incans definitely had agriculture. They actually had highly complex societies. What they mostly lacked were antibodies against the numerous diseases brought by the Europeans. Measles, Mumps, Cholera, Tuberculosis, and so on.

They had agriculture, yes, but they hadn't had it long enough to bootstrap an advanced civilisation before the Europeans arrived. If they had, perhaps Europe would have been conquered by South Americans instead of the other way around.

Friend, this is just not true. Thousands of years of large sophisticated governments and civilizations in what is now Mexico and farther south. Its reductive to the point of being completely wrong to think of the Americas in this way.

Teotihuacan shows excellent astronomy, civil engineering, and a very large implied economy built so long ago the name of the people group is not recorded.

Did Europe rock the Americas, hard? Yes. Was it because they were more advanced? In wartime tech, and psyops, yes. The rest? I would be cautious.

Re: Neanderthals survived on a knife's edge for 350k years

#154

Post by snovymgodym »

hoppp wrote: post #147
MadDemon wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did they really die out, or did the population just merge with modern humans? Most people on the planet have some Neanderthal DNA, so clearly there was some intermixing. If modern humans were a much larger population, it makes sense that the Neanderthals only contributed a small amount of DNA to the gene pool. I could imagine that they were just slowly absorbed into the much larger Sapiens population.

In Africa most people don't have Neanderthal DNA however in Europe probably everyone has. (I have no idea about Asia, maybe somebody can chip in) I think they probably mixed in and we just became one, sort of

Virtually every population outside of Sub-Saharan Africa has Neanderthal and Denisovan DNA between 1-4%. This includes all of Eurasia, all pre-Columbian American populations, Aboriginal Australians, Papuans, etc.

Re: Neanderthals survived on a knife's edge for 350k years

#155

Post by justonceokay »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #79
justonceokay wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Parasites are my main go-to when I meet someone complaining about the modern world. In the history of multicellular organisms on earth, only (some) humans—and only in the last ~100 years—have had the luxury of not being completely infested with parasites. Even now we have more parasites than we probably know or care to admit.

This was / is likely a factor in the "kernel of truth" with the whole "deworming tablets cure covid-19" thing, the chances of survival of people in certain areas infected with the virus increased if they were administered deworming medication because they also had a parasitic infection.

Yes my friend took ivermectin recently because he grew up in he Virgin Islands and realized he had likely been harboring parasites his whole adult life. I don’t know if it is placebo but his eating habits changed significantly after his dose

Re: Neanderthals survived on a knife's edge for 350k years

#156

Post by Saline9515 »

jarjoura wrote: post #82
hax0ron3 wrote: post #7

It's wild to think how long very human-like beings and modern humans existed before the technological revolution really took off. Hundreds of thousands of years of existing on the technological level of stone tools, spears, cloth made out of hides, and fire. Then at some unknown point probably in the last 100,000 years, the bow and arrow. Then about 12,000 years ago, the agricultural revolution, which probably unlock…

Can't imagine having to live with anxiety of just staying alive. Constant diseases, infestations, starvation, animal attacks. You would never feel like you have time to just, be. Instead you're focused on getting your next meal, and finding a place to sleep. It only took a few ice-ages to force us to get smart about how we organize and then here we are.

On the upside they weren't stressed about the new "Grunt Hunt" models by Neanderthalic, which are likely take away all of the entry-level hunting jobs in the tribe.

Re: Neanderthals survived on a knife's edge for 350k years

#157

Post by ralferoo »

snovymgodym wrote: post #154
hoppp wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Africa most people don't have Neanderthal DNA however in Europe probably everyone has. (I have no idea about Asia, maybe somebody can chip in) I think they probably mixed in and we just became one, sort of

Virtually every population outside of Sub-Saharan Africa has Neanderthal and Denisovan DNA between 1-4%. This includes all of Eurasia, all pre-Columbian American populations, Aboriginal Australians, Papuans, etc.

Is there any research about why Sub-Saharan Africa doesn't have Neanderthal DNA?

Is the argument that the tribe of humans from Africa was good at repelling outside invaders, but themselves expanded outwards and assimilated (and then outnumbered) the other populations, or something else?

It just seems a bit bizarre given that all humans elsewhere have relatively similar amounts (but quite a low amount) of Neanderthal DNA, which seems to suggest a reasonable amount of migration, interaction and interbreeding between populations everywhere except Africa.

Re: Neanderthals survived on a knife's edge for 350k years

#158

Post by ralferoo »

Schmerika wrote: post #106
jarjoura wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't imagine having to live with anxiety of just staying alive. Constant diseases, infestations, starvation, animal attacks. You would never feel like you have time to just, be. Instead you're focused on getting your next meal, and finding a place to sleep. It only took a few ice-ages to force us to get smart about how we organize and then here we are.

> Can't imagine having to live with anxiety of just staying alive. Spoken like someone who easily affords both rent and food. > Constant diseases, infestations, starvation, animal attacks. Not really, no. Sometimes, sure. Not all the time. A lot of food was more abundant, and a lot of modern diseases weren't an issue. Animal attacks were probably a 'constant threat' - but not likely a daily, monthly, or even yearly o…

> A lot of food was more abundant

That's a good point. Good quality food like meat might be much harder to obtain, you'd need weapons and maybe organised into a group to catch anything large, but the flip side is that subsisting on fruit and berries is much easier when there's literally nothing to stop you gathering and eating what you want.

In a sense, simple existence is easier when you don't have to worry about money, or who owns what land, assuming of course that you're fit enough and able to spend a lot of time gathering food.

Re: Neanderthals survived on a knife's edge for 350k years

#159

Post by bit-anarchist »

Betelbuddy wrote: post #150
MadDemon wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did they really die out, or did the population just merge with modern humans? Most people on the planet have some Neanderthal DNA, so clearly there was some intermixing. If modern humans were a much larger population, it makes sense that the Neanderthals only contributed a small amount of DNA to the gene pool. I could imagine that they were just slowly absorbed into the much larger Sapiens population.

>> Did they really die out There are a few still. One made it to President of the USA.

Do not speak ill of the Neanderthals.

Re: Neanderthals survived on a knife's edge for 350k years

#160

Post by tbirdny »

jarjoura wrote: post #82
hax0ron3 wrote: post #7

It's wild to think how long very human-like beings and modern humans existed before the technological revolution really took off. Hundreds of thousands of years of existing on the technological level of stone tools, spears, cloth made out of hides, and fire. Then at some unknown point probably in the last 100,000 years, the bow and arrow. Then about 12,000 years ago, the agricultural revolution, which probably unlock…

Can't imagine having to live with anxiety of just staying alive. Constant diseases, infestations, starvation, animal attacks. You would never feel like you have time to just, be. Instead you're focused on getting your next meal, and finding a place to sleep. It only took a few ice-ages to force us to get smart about how we organize and then here we are.

Can you imagine how many grass grazing animals would have been just standing around waiting to be eaten? During the Pleistocene, some regions supported huge, stable herds of grazing megafauna that could provide reliable food. You just needed some friends to help you hunt. In areas with relatively mild climates and predictable seasons, people likely experienced long stretches, even generations, of comparatively low stress and easy resources. Granted, life could quickly become difficult when climate, animal populations, or competition shifted.
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