Talk:Neanderthal extinction/Archive 1

Typo in second sentence
The second sentence uses the phrase, "the Neanderthals place." It should be "the Neanderthals' place." I'd fix it myself but the article is locked.

Sources for "rufosity"?
Some recent genetic research has pointed toward the possibility that the gene responsible for red-hair and freckles in modern Europeans had Neanderthal origins

Sources for this?


 * I, too, would be interested in knowing where this came from. It sounds too much to me like something you would say if you wanted to tease a redhead or a freckly person. --Hazey Jane 22:50, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

this bbc article talks about neandertal's and red hair. It says it's not likely that the gene in humans came from neandertals [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/2975862.stm ]
 * Had they rufosity or not, it's quite unlikely that we inherited anything from Neanderthals, as they weren't our ancestors. --Anshelm &#39;77 03:38, 12 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Don't be so sure! As with almost anything in human evolutionary studies, this idea is always in flux.  For example, see the recent discussion of possible genes "shared" in some way by Neandertals and "our ancestors"  .  GwenW 04:45, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Typo in title?
The title has "Neandertals", but the article has "Neanderthals" (notice the H missing in the title). How does one rename articles? --142.239.254.20 08:49, 16 October 2005 (UTC)

Title is ok, both spellings are accepted (see Neandertals) --193.206.170.151 23:50, 7 February 2006 (UTC)


 * but shouldn't it be spelled the same throughout the article? Mapetite526 20:18, 13 September 2006 (UTC)


 * agreed

Homo heidelbergensis
If Homo heidelbergensis is the ancestor of Homo neanderthalensis, then it's very unlikely that it's the ancestor of modern man too. Homo heidelbergensis was found in Europe. Modern man (Homo sapiens) is now believed to have evolved in Africa and since have come to Europe in a second wave. Wikiklaas 00:06, 11 March 2006 (UTC)


 * We are talking interbreeding, not direct ancestry.NineNineTwoThreeSix (talk) 22:21, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

Homo Heidelbergensis has been found in Africa too. Don't be deluded by the name. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.75.88.231 (talk) 17:14, 8 July 2010 (UTC)


 * As I understand the latest hypotheses, Homo rhodesiensis and H. Heidelbergensis were so morphologically similar as to be the same species. Heidelbergensis is the group that left Africa, migrated to Europe, and populations evolved into Homo antecessor or Homo neandertalensis. Rhodesiensis stayed in Africa, and evolved into H. sapiens. As we now know, some sapiens groups stayed in Africa, others migrated out. By the time sapiens arrived in Europe, they found only neandertals. It's all in whether you want to split rhodesisensis and heidelbergensis into two species, partly for convenience (which would prevent "name delusions") and also based on geography; or you want to lump them into one species (based on morphology). Boneyard90 (talk) 11:57, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

new data from Gibraltar
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20060913.wneanAM0913/BNStory/Science/home

Neandertals have been around up to 24,000 years ago, longer than was thought ebfore.--Sonjaaa 19:14, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

Rapid Extinction
The counter argument to Diamond's genocide/disease hypothesis provides no source and sounds suspiciously like a wikieditors opinion of Diamond argument. This needs to be sourced with a notable commentary who has criticised Diamond in order to avoid being chopped out of the article. Ashmoo 03:40, 31 January 2007 (UTC) - Just removed:

"Furthermore, the nomadic Eurasian populations such as the Mongols did not get wiped out by the diseases of the agriculturalist societies they invaded and took over, like China and eastern Europe."

Didn't the Mongols have their own large animals, horses? More importantly, they were not separated by an ocean from the areas they invaded, so the exposure was not as "sudden." They had more time to build up resistance by gradual titration, or some such idea.

With that in mind, the removed sentence does not really add to the article, IMO, 67.187.127.174 (talk) 16:28, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

User:Weirdoinventor edits
Can someone check User:Weirdoinventor's contributions to this article? Most of it (if not all of it) are not encyclopedic, and needs to be removed, or, if it is salvageable, needs to be wikified. --Carioca 04:59, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Hybridization hypothesis
it appears that this is claimed purely on fossil evidence, essentially by Erik Trinkaus and a handful of others. Genetic evidence makes this very, very unlikely, although it can of course never rule it out entirely (it may be that Neanderthals were hybridized into H. sapiens, and the hybridized line then died out, leaving no modern descendants. This would sort of defeat the point of the hypothesis as explaining the disappearance of H. neanderthalensis, because it would be even more difficult to explain the extinction of the successfully hybridized line. Nevertheless, there remains some chance of yet discovering genetic traces (this is a hypothesis that can be proven, but never disproven):
 * Although most evidence argues against Neandertals interbreeding with early humans, the sample size is still too low to be definitive, says molecular archaeologist Carney Matheson of Lakehead University in Ontario, Canada. "It's important to remember that mtDNA, passed on from mother to child, represents only half the story of parental lineage," he notes. The contribution of male Neandertals breeding with humans would not be detected in mtDNA. "Until our technology advances to the point to where we can recover nuclear DNA for analysis, the issue of interbreeding will remain open," says Matheson.

i.e., it is possible that there remain trances of Neanderthal genome in modern population, but neither a pure male nor a pure female line survives. This will be extremely difficult to prove or disprove. dab (𒁳) 14:37, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Response from Bert: What I've understood, this "Genetic evidence" was based on a statistical analysis of mitochondrial DNA (here referenced as mtDNA, of which a lot is around in cells. Thus a minor portion could easily be from Neanderthals, without sticking out in the "evidence". This type of DNA has a somewhat dilutable character. This is partly due to the early phase DNA analysis and knowledge is at (at this time), and the limited quantity of varid (available) material. Further study will improve the first, more finds will increase the second which was already noted. An explanation for the lesser female lineage could be lesser agility in the Neanderthal line, increasing chances of death during labour.

Recent finds, and reexamination of earlier finds, appear to support the notion of interbreeding. So why does DNA seem to disagree?

Looking at traits from Neanderthals, and differences between African and European originated people today, a few differences stick out: - Caucasian people have light skin, African dark, - Caucasian people have flat hair, African have afro hair, - Caucasian people are quite stiff, African people more often are agile, - Caucasian people have rough bodily characterics, African people are more delicately sculped.

Although we know little about the first two traits, the other two tend towards characterisctics we expect in Neanderthals. Why would these usefull characteristics be reintroduced overwhelmingly predominantly in a few hunderd generations, when the DNA was available, also in the same locus, but according to most theories the lack of agility is a disadvantage. The rough body looks of Caucasians appear to be linked to lack of agility. Noticeable differences between Northern and Southern Asians exists, more easily a result of (other) interbreeding, than of parallel evolution.

And what do we know about the Cro Magnon, their appearance, traits, evolution, etc. How many DNA coparisons have been done to verify their DNA?

Are we Cro Magnon, or an advanced developed result of interbreeding, with an additional 30000 years of seazoning? Interbreeding has happened since, Pygmees might be closer to Cro Magnon than we are. Only the yield of more, and more accurate material can bring us closer to the truth. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.95.169.11 (talk) 22:36, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Delete this article?
This article WP:FORKs information already dealt with in the Neanderthal article and basically represents just one point of view. While the Neandertal article is up to date with recent articles and summarizes the actual state of the debate, this article needs a complete overhaul to cope with recent developments. Here, the extinction of Neanderthal is taken for granted, while it is still hotly debated. This is not conform WP:NPOV policy. If the intention is to describe Cro-Magnon and Neanderthal interaction, than please do so - and find out even the advent of Cro Magnon in Europe before 30000 kya is contested. For all of this the article should be reorganised and rewritten completely, or nominated for deletion. What will it be? Rokus01 (talk) 16:21, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
 * If it's completely dealt with in the Neanderthal article, why not just redirect there? WLU (talk) 01:02, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
 * it isn't. this is a valid sub-article. WP:POINT suggestion (see user's contributions). dab (𒁳) 15:47, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

It would be a valid sub-article, if: Now to come forward with some WP:POINT policy in order to dodge the issue I raise, is a bit like a silly WP:GAME isn't it? To keep in line with WP:TALK you should explain why this is a valid sub-article the way it is. Rokus01 (talk) 22:24, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
 * 1) it would establish proven Neanderthal-Cro Magnon interaction on the first place
 * 2) it would not be a WP:FORK from Neanderthal that basically tend to forward the single point of view against interbreeding
 * 3) it would be confirm WP:NPOV policy to represent multiple points of view
 * 4) it would give valuable information on the subject other than basically stating there was no interaction, only extinction.

I never said it should remain "the way it is". It obviously should be improved. If you have any valid points to raise, do it. I know you are here because of Neanderthal H. sapiens interbreeding (you want there to have been interbreeding. Presumably to account for your superior Nordwestblock/Dutch race that gave rise to civilization etc.). This is indeed the right place for the interbreeding debate. That is, following actual research, not racialist speculation. As it happens, there is no evidence indicating that there was any interbreeding. If there was any evidence, this would be the place to report it. dab (𒁳) 19:04, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Apart from your denigrating way of communicating and extrapolating against WP:NPA and WP:AGF that obviously does not fit an administrator; why do you think again it is of any interest what you think about the interbreeding question or evidence? The valid point I raised and keep raising is the article should reflect the current debate on this issue, and not just what happens to be the POV of an administrator on the loose. You being such a great self-proclaimed merger; what keeps you from merging this very article that severely lags behind and does not give any additional information to what we already know from Neanderthal? I am very interested to such "actual research" on evidence of interaction, still all I can see here is mere speculation and obsolete concepts. You still did not comply to WP:TALK to answer my inquiry how this article could be saved, or otherwise why it should be saved. I would save it myself if I knew of any sourced evidence of interaction. So far there is not any evidence or indication whatsoever to who or what belongs the Aurignacian, and all we know is anatomically modern humans were present since Gravette, on locations very separate from late Neanderthal. Hardly a sound base for an article, or rather some opinions on interaction. Rokus01 (talk) 21:11, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

I propose a combination of: Rokus01 (talk) 21:56, 5 January 2008 (UTC)\
 * a redirect to Neanderthal of Neandertal interaction with Cro-Magnons, since this article does not seem to intend adding any valuable information on the interaction-subject about if, when, where and how the two human branches interacted
 * a full move of the content to a new subject called Neanderthal extinction hypotheses, since this is where the article is really all about
 * an overhaul of the content in order to reduce the redundancy with the main article.


 * I like Rokus01's idea. --Blue Tie (talk) 00:43, 6 January 2008 (UTC)


 * I like Neanderthal extinction hypotheses as well. Such an article should address most of the concerns above.  GwenW (talk) 09:29, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
 * I don't have a problem with that. This article is in fact about Neanderthal extinction, so we can and should move it to an appropriate title. dab (𒁳) 07:52, 7 January 2008 (UTC)


 * I've implemented this, someone more knowledgeable may need to give it a look over though. Jack (talk) 13:55, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

A little confusion here. No such merge could have been suggested in the discussion above since by then (January 2008) only one article existed. The discussion was about the article (Neanderthal extinction hypotheses that by then was named Neanderthal interaction with Cro-Magnons while in fact it focused on Neanderthal extinction. To perform the suggested change, erroneously, I did not create a new subject called Neanderthal extinction hypotheses, instead I renamed the article and created the separate redirect called Neanderthal interaction with Cro-Magnons. This redirect, created after the discussion, evolved into the current Neanderthal interaction with Cro-Magnons article: an article that intends to compile information on interaction rather than extinction.

Now, the merge that dab suggested was dated May 2008. Nobody gave its opinion on this issue so far. I am afraid the merging action was based on a little misunderstanding and deserves another discussion. Rokus01 (talk) 23:45, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Merge proposal of May 2008
Personally, I don't think interaction should be covered by an article on extinction. However, feel free to incorporate information on the possibility of interbreeding, since it seems such a chapter already existed here.Rokus01 (talk) 23:45, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

What killed neanderthals . Paleolithic 'HIV' from eva ?
Adam lived in eden hapily. He hunted big game and had a lot of food.

One day looking south he spoted mitohondrial efe.... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.16.176.177 (talk) 10:14, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

complete falesy
Why whithe have to be covered in big title blau only ?

Exactly - survival in section about loosers ? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.16.176.177 (talk) 08:55, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Neanderthal extermination
I am aware that my contribution here is quite uncommon: - because it is related in some way to ALL extinction hypotheses - because all my statements are unsourced But I will appreciate anybody who can help with the references and if necessary, with corrections of places and dates.

I see the Neanderthal extermination within the frame of socio-biological behaviour of primates, the species Homo being only their latest branch.

The conquest of new habitat is a socio-biologic trait in all primates, including man. If the new habitat is already inhabited by other primates or men, a scenario of invaders and defenders inevitably evolves. Here I want to examine the parameters which determine the fate of the invaders and the defenders. Then we can see how these parameters apply to the interaction between the Cro-Magnons and the Neanderthals.

As main Variables determining the outcome of the confrontation can be listed:

- climate - vegetation of the contested habitat - topography of the contested habitat - physical shape of the contenders - quality and technology of armament - quality and number of possible allies - number of invaders and of defenders - nutrition habits - social structure - intellectual level

150.000 TO 50.000 YEARS AGO

For more than 100.000 years Neanderthals and Cro-Magnons coexisted, without one subspecies being able to overtake the territory of the other. This was probably due to a clear climatic "barrier": Europe of the ice age was too cold for the Cro-Magnon, and Africa was too hot for the Neanderthal.

Nonetheless, clashes between the two groups occurred throughout this period in the border zone. Findings from this period in Southern Spain indicate that in these fights the Neanderthals regularly maintained the upper hand. Other places like some caves in Israel were alternately inhabited by Cro-Magnons and by Neanderthals.

Already in this early clashes a number of parameters can be observed:

- vegetation of Southern Spain: in these days the parts of Spain bordering the Mediterranian were densely forrested.

- topography of the caves in Israel: the terrain was hilly and broken

- physical shape: Cro-Magnons could run faster than Neanderthals and they could throw their spears unerringly. Neanderthals were superior in     hand to hand fighting and their hearing capacity was much greater than that of the Cro-Magnons.

- quality and technology of armament Both subspecies used spears, but of different quality. Neanderthals had strong muscles, but no waist and no torsion- capacity in their spine. So they did not throw their spears. Spears served them as heavy stabbing weapons. Cro-Magnons had lighter spears, which they could use either as projectiles or    as light stabbing weapons.

On densely forrested terrain the projectiles of the Cro-Magnons did not find easy targets. The Neanderthals could hear them coming from afar, hide and prepare ambushes.

On hilly and broken terrain the capabilities of both subspecies balanced each other. One time one group was victorious, another time the other.

50.000 TO 40.000 YEARS AGO

During this period climate shifted to warmer gradually and the Cro-Magnons succeeded to break out of Africa and the Arab Peninsula. They pushed forward into todays Irak, Iran and Turkey. Whereever they found wide plain areas without dense forests, they defeated the Neanderthals.

40.000 TO 30.000 YEARS AGO

While the Cro-Magnons were roaming the arid steppe-regions of Southern Eurasia, they tamed the prairie wolf. One can only guess how this was done. Probably both species found out that they complemented one another quite well during long houndings: first the distance weapons of the spearthrowers and then the wolfes to close in on the game.

In the wooded regions of Northeastern Europe and Russia wolfes could not be tamed in the same way by Neanderthals. Here the two species had similar, competing hunting patterns.

Thus Cro-Magnon tribes were eventually accompanied by packs of tamed wolfes - their mighty allies. The "wolfmen" now had the decisive edge on the Neanderthals. With overwhelming power their tribes pushed northward and westward, into the mountenous and densely wooded regions of Central Asia, Russia and Central Europe.

There, in the heartland of the Neanderthals, a ruthless extermination campaign raged for more than 1000 years. No cave was remote enough, no hideout in trees or bushes remained secret - the wolfes would hunt them down everywhere.

Was this a "gradual extinction"?

When about 50 to 40 thousand years ago the climate around the Middle East and neighboring regions got warmer and the dense vegetation withdrew to the north, the Neanderthals gradually were pushed northwards by the Cro-Magnons.

When less than 40 thousand years ago the Cro-Magnons acquired domesticated wolfes, their push turned into a swift and violent sweep ("rapid extinction").

Were the Neanderthals absorbed into the Cro-Magnon population (was there interbreeding)?

To answer that question let us look at the remaining parameters:

- number of invaders and of defenders: Since the Neanderthals withdrew from 50 thousand years ago on     only gradually, we can assume that their initial numbers in the border regions were about equal. With advancing climate change more CroMagnons would come over from Africa and the Arab Peninsula, and together with the local Cro-Magnons they would multiply faster than the Neanderthals

- nutrition habits and social structure: Coprolites of the Neanderthals show that for more than 80% of    their food they relied on meat. That's why their numbers were limited mainly by the game potential of the territory they lived in. The menu of the Cro-Magnons was more versatile: meat, fish, vegetables and fruits, which grew better in the warmer regions. Therefore their territories could sustain settlements with larger numbers of individuals.

- intellectual level: There is no sign whatsoever that the Neanderthal was intel- lectually inferior to the Cro-Magnon. But the Neanderthal's    everyday life was harder: without distance weapons he had to     risk more, which ment he could multiply less efficient than the Cro-Magnon. Besides, the Cro-Magnon had more leisure time to    develop non-existential skills like painting and sculpturing.

When due to climate change the forests became more open, the Neanderthals found it harder to stalk on their prey with stabbing weapons. But still the same territory could sustain Neanderthals as well as Cro-Magnons.

Things changed dramatically when the tame wolf-packs entered the scene, since they were direct food-competitors to the Neanderthals. Whereever they appeared, they diminished Neanderthal's chances of survival rapidly.

Before the wolf-age some interbreeding may have occurred between the subspecies in the border regions. But the wolfes put the Neanderthals at the mercy of the Cro-Magnons in a way they had never experienced before.

''Did interbreeding stop completely during the wolf-age? Is that consistant with recent genetic findings showing that about 5% of the genome of modern man in Europe stems from Neanderthal origin? ''

Interbreeding did non cease altogether, but its NATURE changed completely. Cro-Magnons developed a new self-conception, now regarding themselves as the master race, while the "others" were degraded to subhuman creatures.

A cave drawing from that time found in Southern France shows the speared body of a Neanderthal. The Cro-Magnon artist had mounted a bisonhead on his neck. His message: "It may look almost human, but it really is nothing but an animal of prey."

Still, basic instincts remained intact during the wolf-age and so Neanderthal women were frequently raped by Cro-Magnons, after they had killed all the males of the tribe.

If that was so, why is our genetic heritage from the Neanderthals only about 5% and why did the Neanderthal phenotype disappear almost completely?

As I stated before, the nature of interbreeding had changed completely. The Cro-Magnon of the wolf-age was master over life and death of every Neanderthal he found. He probably used Neanderthal women as slaves, but regarding the offsprings of their matings, he observed strict guidelines:

If an interbred child developed APPARENT distinctive marks of the Neanderthals, it was killed immediately. In this way extermination of the Neanderthal phenotype (but not of his gene pool) was garanteed. 87.123.67.106 (talk)ramiko —Preceding undated comment was added at 12:33, 12 September 2008 (UTC).

Your discussion of "wolfmen" and a "wolf-age" sound like WP:OR. However, if you can trace a discussion of Neanderthal extinction linked with the domestication of the dog to quotable literature, feel free to present this here, including references. --dab (𒁳) 11:48, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

Anyone have this watch listed?
A lot of "extremist" material has been added, much of it not grammatically correct and making much ado out of a couple refs that are themselves very tentative. The material on admixture tacked on at the end of the article could simply be a phrase or a ref in the Interbreeding section. TimidGuy (talk) 10:22, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
 * I've sprotected the article. Let the anon present a coherent proposal in English on talk. --dab (𒁳) 11:45, 26 September 2008 (UTC)


 * u 2 i. look > here u i.ts. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.201.246.30 (talk) 08:16, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

One study doesn't somehow trump all others. Fine to include, but in context. It shouldn't somehow be represented in the lead as being the definitive factual information that negates everything else. So the problem is not with inclusion but the problematic English and the violation of WP:NPOV. So the suggestion is that rather than adding problematic material directly to the article, why not write proposed sentences or a paragraph here first, and then work together to refine the English and to integrate it into the existing article. It would be good use of the Talk page. TimidGuy (talk) 11:52, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Add reference for 'Guns Germs and Steel'?
editsemiprotected

The first paragraph of the "Extinction scenarios / Rapid extinction" section contains the assertion -- "in those genocides of the colonial era in which differential disease susceptibility was most significant, it resulted from the contact between colonists with a long history of agriculture and nomadic hunter-gatherer peoples" --  which is marked with "[original research?]"

I remembered that this assertion is presented and supported by several chapters of Jared Diamond's "Guns, Germs, and Steel" -- so I propose adding this book as a reference, to replace the [original research?] mark.

Then I noticed that "Guns, Germs, and Steel" is already mentioned in this article, at the end of the next paragraph, that begins "On the other hand, many Native Americans before contact with Europeans were not nomadic...". I think whoever added the "Rapid extinction" section had recently read 'Guns, Germs, and Steel', and just didn't add the reference properly.


 * Thanks. I checked, and the speculation is not from Gun, Germs, and Steel. Here are the only sentence that appear related to the matter: "Some 40,000 years ago, into Europe came the Cro-Magnons, with their modern skeletons, superior weapons, and other advanced cultural traits. Within a few thousand years, there were no more Neanderthals, who had been evolving as the sole occupants of Europe for hundreds of thousands of years. That sequence strongly suggests that the modern Cro-Magnons somehow used their far superior technology and their language skills or grains, to infect, kill, or displaces the Neanderthals, leaving behind little or no evidence of hybridization between Neanderthals and Cro-Magnons." p. 40 That's all he says. He doesn't explicitly make an analogy with the genocides of indigenous peoples in recent human history, so I don't think this can be used as a reference for that sentence.  TimidGuy (talk) 16:19, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

Nomadic Lifestyle?
"Nomadic lifestyle", as used here to describe Cro Magnon and Neanderthal lifestyles, redirects to a page regarding nomadic herders. This is a bit misleading and I think it should be replaced with "Hunter gatherer". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.134.193.76 (talk) 13:50, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

No Extinction
Hi. What about the (albeit unlikely) hypothesis that neanderthals did not go extinct? Many cryptozoologists consider this scenario, and identify some primate cryptids seen as "neanderthaloids". Or, is this hypothesis too fringe to be included in this article, even though Wikipedia does have articles about these cryptids? Thanks. ~ A H  1 (TCU) 16:18, 14 February 2009 (UTC)


 * I guess it would depend on the quality of the source. Seems unlikely it would pass muster, but no harm in proposing. TimidGuy (talk) 16:59, 14 February 2009 (UTC)


 * I think the most secure way to do it is to create such articles (properly sourced of course) separately, and add some link thereto in an Unusual theories or See also section, in order to avoid some scrutinizing editors removing these texts on sight. The most usual way to get text deleted is to write it unsourced in partially relevant other articles that many editors has their eyes on. Mentioning the intent in the talk page (as you did) is probably also a good way to avoid premature deletion. ... said: Rursus (bork²) 07:03, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Well considering there is still Uncontacted peoples on the Earth, intelligence is the Neanderthals side, we found 50,000 gorrilas, we shouldn't ignore those factors. There could be small isolated groups, perhaps the Almas? 88.105.17.61 (talk) 01:21, 5 December 2009 (UTC)

errors and forced misleding content
lots of conceptual misleading errors.

Fertility as scenario of extinction. Misleading, stupid and edit protected. Is here anybody in enforced stupidity department to correct those nonsenses or to unblock the fallacy (you call it encyclopedia article) ?.

Interaction with modern humans
"To what extent did Neanderthals and modern humans interact?" Kristian J. Herrera 1, Jason A. Somarelli 1,2 , Robert K. Lowery 1,2 and Rene J. Herrera Biological Reviews Volume 84 Issue 2, Pages 245 - 257

ABSTRACT

Neanderthals represent an extinct hominid lineage that existed in Europe and Asia for nearly 400,000 years. They thrived in these regions for much of this time, but declined in numbers and went extinct around 30,000 years ago. Interestingly, their disappearance occurred subsequent to the arrival of modern humans into these areas, which has prompted some to argue that Neanderthals were displaced by better suited and more adaptable modern humans. Still others have postulated that Neanderthals were assimilated into the gene pool of modern humans by admixture. Until relatively recently, conclusions about the relationships between Neanderthals and contemporary humans were based solely upon evidence left behind in the fossil and archaeological records. However, in the last decade, we have witnessed the introduction of metagenomic analyses, which have provided novel tools with which to study the levels of genetic interactions between this fascinating Homo lineage and modern humans. Were Neanderthals replaced by contemporary humans through dramatic extinction resulting from competition and/or hostility or through admixture? Were Neanderthals and modern humans two independent, genetically unique species or were they a single species, capable of producing fertile offspring? Here, we review the current anthropological, archaeological and genetic data, which shed some light on these questions and provide insight into the exact nature of the relationships between these two groups of humans. If anyone can get this we should be able to get a good section on the subject. Dougweller (talk) 14:52, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

genocide theory?
Has this genocide theory been suggested by anyone other than Jared Diamond? Diamond's generally pretty reliable (though often quite speculative, they're usually very defensible speculations) but this seems awfully strange. As Neanderthals seem to have been hardier, stronger and larger-brained than ourselves, I see no reason why they would have lost such a conflict. (This is really a problem with any extinction theory involving direct competition... except possibly reproductively? Maybe Neanderthals reproduced slower?)98.197.66.213 (talk) 07:36, 10 October 2009 (UTC)
 * "You could say that Neanderthals were the earliest victims of genocide, but you would have to emphasize could." - Ian Tattersal. The idea of the Cro-Magnon instigating a genocide against Neanderthals is certainly not just Diamond's, but it's far from accepted or proven. Fences  &amp;  Windows  03:33, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
 * It should be called specicide. At any rate, it is almost certainly not true, given that the Neanderthals didn't die that quickly, and the Cro-Magnons were not a single tribe or nation with the kind of organisation required for efficient mass killings. That honor is reserved for the industrial age, I'm afraid. Abductive  (reasoning) 08:04, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
 * It definitely shouldn't be called "specicide", as the term has little currency and hasn't been used in any reliable sources with regards to the extinction of the Neanderthals. Fences  &amp;  Windows  16:52, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Oh, I wasn't saying the article needed to be changed, I was saying that ideally the real world term should be changed. Abductive  (reasoning) 19:35, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
 * reply to: "...I see no reason why..." Diamond explains this in his theory. The difference is a sudden acceleration in the use of technology by cro-magnon, rather than strength and brain size. His primary attribution of success for Cro-magnon is "innovation". For example, beaded necklaces are only found in a few later neanderthal sites that also have geographic proximity to cro-magnon and at time period long after which such objects are much more readily found in cro-magnon sites; this suggests the technology could have been learned from cro-magnon. He also asserts that neanderthal never had the advantage of long-distance trade that has been noted in their cro-magnon contemporaries. The larger muscle mass and stronger teeth of neanderthal also suggested a much larger need for available food source. He suggests the cro-magnon advantage was a combination of advanced technology, longer life-span (and resultant aged-wisdom), long-distance trade, possible genocide, environmental scarcity, but mostly a crowding out (which could include warfare, disease and displacement). - Steve3849 talk 04:42, 5 December 2009 (UTC)

I do not see much evidence for a genocide, although I guess it would be possible since many other animals kill their relatives. Neitherless, we should not imply too much that there was. 173.183.79.81 (talk) 00:59, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Spate of improvements
Thanks to Fences and windows for reworking the article into something readable. Abductive (reasoning) 19:35, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

Division of labor?
I was reading the section on Division of labor and I don't see how that would explain the extinction of Neanderthals. I'm considering deleting the section unless someone objects.  Azure Fury  (talk | contribs) 18:23, 19 March 2010 (UTC)


 * I've commented it out for now, perhaps someone will come along with the knowledge to fix it.  Azure Fury  (talk | contribs) 16:15, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
 * I dunno, it seemed pretty straightforward; Neanderthals were less efficient than AMHs at extracting food from the environment because they had not invented the standard hunter-gatherer division of labor in which women gathered and men hunted. Abductive  (reasoning) 18:11, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
 * How would that alone explain their complete extinction? That's what was missing from the section.  Anyway, I've only commented it out for now, it's ready to be re-inserted if anyone has the answers to these questions.  Azure Fury   (talk | contribs) 20:38, 20 March 2010 (UTC)

The article is about hypotheses, and this is a notable hypothesis put forward by Jared Diamond, and well-sourced. As such it belongs in the article. The fact that some Wikipedia editors do not think the hypothesis is a good one is not at all relevant. Even if we had statements in reliable sources indicating that respected authorities thought the hypothesis inadequate then that would justify only recording their opinions, not removing the information that the hypothesis exists, and has coverage in reliable sources. JamesBWatson (talk) 09:35, 22 March 2010 (UTC)
 * There's no need to get up in arms. You're misunderstanding the reason I removed it.  The section is missing a critical piece of information, how that theory could explain the Neanderthal extinction.  The section says "the Neanderthals did something differently than AMHs," and leaves the rest up to us.  That's not enough.  The connection needs to be explicitly made from the difference in habits to the Neanderthal extinction.  Azure Fury   (talk | contribs) 14:30, 22 March 2010 (UTC)
 * I added a little explanation about why this is relevant to the end of the paragraph in the Division of Labor section.Tickle me gusta (talk) 07:14, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

New DNA evidence for interbreeding
Please update the article. Pääbo quote: "They are not totally extinct. In some of us they live on, a little bit" Nature: Neanderthals may have interbred with humans BBC: Neanderthal genes 'survive in us'.--87.162.15.84 (talk) 01:30, 7 May 2010 (UTC)
 * I imagine that people are still integrating this into the main Neanderthal article. I've asked that the article be opened up for editing by people without accounts, so perhaps you will be able to make the change(s) yourself soon. Abductive  (reasoning) 04:48, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Needs update
Hi,

Article needs to be updated. New research and conclussions 7th May in favour of hybridization. Neanderthal apports from 1% up to 4% of current genes. Please do it competent people.

Bye —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.34.249.18 (talk) 08:35, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

very intriguing. possibly sensational. This is apparently an article by Svante Pääbo et al. in Science.  The Science reference is Science 7 May 2010: Vol. 328. no. 5979, pp. 680 - 684, DOI: 10.1126/science.328.5979.680. This isn't the primary publication but a popular summary by Ann Gibbons. The actual publication is Science 7 May 2010: Vol. 328. no. 5979, pp. 710 - 722. DOI: 10.1126/science.1188021 --dab (𒁳) 10:24, 7 May 2010 (UTC)
 * The publication on the Neanderthal Genome website actually uses more direct and plain language to argue their conclusions then the science mag article.--Senor Freebie (talk) 15:20, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Is the conclusion generally accepted, or just an informed scientific opinion with which some respectable authorities still disagree? The way the article has been edited makes it look like the former. JamesBWatson (talk) 17:28, 7 May 2010 (UTC)
 * The best thing to do is see what caveats the Pääbo paper itself mentions. For example, do they give a confidence interval that is less than 95%? Abductive  (reasoning) 19:37, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Intro
"The publication of a draft of the sequenced Neanderthal genome in May 2010[2] claims to substantiate the hybridization scenario - although there is no consensus in the scientific community, some researchers believe that interbreeding between Neanderthals and H. sapiens did take place." In fact the researchers do not claim to have substantiated this hypothesis, quite the opposite. I have pasted in relevant sections from the conclusion of their paper:

The analysis of the Neandertal genome shows that they are likely to have had a role in the genetic ancestry of present-day humans outside of Africa, although this role was relatively minor given that only a few percent of the genomes of present-day people outside Africa are derived from Neandertals.

Please correct. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 131.111.185.88 (talk) 13:00, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

Intro
I have removed this statement from the article "The publication of a draft of the sequenced Neanderthal genome in May 2010[2] claims to substantiate the hybridization scenario - although there is no consensus in the scientific community, some researchers believe that interbreeding between Neanderthals and H. sapiens did take place." The statement is factually inaccurate while there is dispute about the hybridization scenario in the academic community generally, the 2010 article does not claim to substantiate the hybridization scenario. The 2010 publication of the draft sequence is very carefully worded and only finds evidence of some, interbreeding in the middle-east, that is all, the paper makes no statement about Neanderthal extinction and claims only to validate a less-conservative version of the Out of Africa hypothesis, which contends that Neanderthals did not contribute substantially (the 'weak out of Africa hypothesis) or at all (the simplest out of Africa hypothesis) to the human genome. I have pasted in some relevant sections (starting with the abstract) from the 2010 draft sequence below:

Article abstract: Neandertals, the closest evolutionary relatives of present-day humans, lived in large parts of Europe and western Asia before disappearing 30,000 years ago. We present a draft sequence of the Neandertal genome composed of more than 4 billion nucleotides from three individuals. Comparisons of the Neandertal genome to the genomes of five present-day humans from different parts of the world identify a number of genomic regions that may have been affected by positive selection in ancestral modern humans, including genes involved in metabolism and in cognitive and skeletal development. We show that Neandertals shared more genetic variants with present-day humans in Eurasia than with present-day humans in sub-Saharan Africa, suggesting that gene flow from Neandertals into the ancestors of non-Africans occurred before the divergence of Eurasian groups from each other. (from the 2010 publication of the draft sequence).

Out of Africa: The data suggest that between 1 and 4% of the genomes of people in Eurasia are derived from Neandertals. Thus, while the Neandertal genome presents a challenge to the simplest version of an “out-of-Africa” model for modern human origins, it continues to support the view that the vast majority of genetic variants that exist at appreciable frequencies outside Africa came from Africa with the spread of anatomically modern humans. (From the 2010 publication of the draft sequence).

Neandertal role in genetic ancestry of Eurasians: The analysis of the Neandertal genome shows that they are likely to have had a role in the genetic ancestry of present-day humans outside of Africa, although this role was relatively minor given that only a few percent of the genomes of present-day people outside Africa are derived from Neandertals. (From the conclusion of the 2010 publication of the draft sequence). —Preceding unsigned comment added by Pk328 (talk • contribs) 15:37, 3 July 2010 (UTC)


 * yeah, the paper makes the claim that H sapiens and H neanderthalensis did interbreed, and consequently that they were able to produce fertile offspring. This is in itself a very tall and very significant claim in the context of Neanterthal extinction and perfectly relevant to this article even if the authors do not go into extinction hypotheses any further. If you think that a few pecent are "relatively minor" let me tell you that I would consider anything above 1% a stunningly huge contribution. Remember that the question is whether there is any contribution at all. A contribution of the order of 1% would suggest to me that there is even a chance to find Neanderthal Y- or mt-DNA in living people. --dab (𒁳) 13:41, 7 March 2011 (UTC)