The Neanderthal in All of Us

[Ralph]

From The New York Times:

May 6, 2010
Signs of Neanderthals Mating With Humans
By NICHOLAS WADE

Neanderthals mated with some modern humans after all and left their imprint in the human genome, a team of biologists has reported in the first detailed analysis of the Neanderthal genetic sequence.

The biologists, led by Svante Paabo of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, have been slowly reconstructing the genome of Neanderthals, the stocky hunters that dominated Europe until 30,000 years ago, by extracting the fragments of DNA that still exist in their fossil bones. Just last year, when the biologists first announced that they had decoded the Neanderthal genome, they reported no significant evidence of interbreeding.

Scientists say they have recovered 60 percent of the genome so far and hope to complete it. By comparing that genome with those of various present day humans, the team concluded that about 1 percent to 4 percent of the genome of non-Africans today is derived from Neanderthals. But the Neanderthal DNA does not seem to have played a great role in human evolution, they said.

Experts believe that the Neanderthal genome sequence will be of extraordinary importance in understanding human evolutionary history since the two species split some 600,000 years ago.

So far, the team has identified only about 100 genes — surprisingly few — that have contributed to the evolution of modern humans since the split. The nature of the genes in humans that differ from those of Neanderthals is of particular interest because they bear on what it means to be human, or at least not Neanderthal. Some of the genes seem to be involved in cognitive function and others in bone structure.

“Seven years ago, I really thought that it would remain impossible in my lifetime to sequence the whole Neanderthal genome,” Dr. Paabo said at a news conference. But the Leipzig team’s second conclusion, that there was probably interbreeding between Neanderthals and modern humans before Europeans and Asians split, is being met with reserve by some archaeologists.

A degree of interbreeding between modern humans and Neanderthals in Europe would not be greatly surprising given that the species overlapped there from 44,000 years ago when modern humans first entered Europe to 30,000 years ago when the last Neanderthals fell extinct. Archaeologists have been debating for years whether the fossil record shows evidence of individuals with mixed features.

But the new analysis, which is based solely on genetics and statistical calculations, is more difficult to match with the archaeological record. The Leipzig scientists assert that the interbreeding did not occur in Europe but in the Middle East and at a much earlier period, some 100,000 to 60,000 years ago, before the modern human populations of Europe and East Asia split. There is much less archaeological evidence for an overlap between modern humans and Neanderthals at this time and place.

Dr. Paabo has pioneered the extraction and analysis of ancient DNA from fossil bones, overcoming daunting obstacles over the last 13 years in his pursuit of the Neanderthal genome. Perhaps the most serious is that most Neanderthal bones are extensively contaminated with modern human DNA, which is highly similar to Neanderthal DNA. The DNA he has analyzed comes from three small bones from the Vindija cave in Croatia.

“This is a fabulous achievement,” said Ian Tattersall, a paleontologist at the American Museum of Natural History in New York, referring to the draft Neanderthal genome that Dr. Paabo’s team describes in Thursday’s issue of Science.

But he and other archaeologists questioned some of the interpretations put forward by Dr. Paabo and his chief colleagues, Richard E. Green of the Leipzig institute, and David Reich of Harvard Medical School. Geneticists have been making increasingly valuable contributions to human prehistory, but their work depends heavily on complex mathematical statistics that make their arguments hard to follow. And the statistical insights, however informative, do not have the solidity of an archaeological fact.

“This is probably not the authors’ last word, and they are obviously groping to explain what they have found,” Dr. Tattersall said.

Richard Klein, a paleontologist at Stanford, said the authors’ theory of an early interbreeding episode did not seem to have taken full account of the archaeological background. “They are basically saying, ‘Here are our data, you have to accept it.’ But the little part I can judge seems to me to be problematic, so I have to worry about the rest,” he said.

In an earlier report on the Neanderthal genome, the reported DNA sequences were found by other geneticists to be extensively contaminated with human DNA. Dr. Paabo’s group has taken extra precautions but it remains to be seen how successful they have been, Dr. Klein said, especially as another group at the Leipzig institute, presumably using the same methods, has obtained results that Dr. Paabo said he could not confirm.

Dr. Paabo said that episode of human-Neanderthal breeding implied by Dr. Reich’s statistics most plausibly occurred “in the Middle East where the first modern humans appear before 100,000 years ago and there were Neanderthals until 60,000 years ago.” According to Dr. Klein, people in Africa expanded their range and reached just Israel during a warm period some 120,000 years ago. They retreated during a cold period some 80,000 years ago and were replaced by Neanderthals. It is not clear whether or not they overlapped with Neanderthals, he said.

These humans, in any case, were not fully modern and they did not expand from Africa, an episode that occurred some 30,000 years later. If there was any interbreeding, the flow of genes should have been both ways, Dr. Klein said, but Dr. Paabo’s group sees evidence for gene flow only from Neanderthals to modern humans.

The Leipzig group’s interbreeding theory would undercut the present belief that all human populations today draw from the same gene pool that existed a mere 50,000 years ago. “What we falsify here is the strong out-of-Africa hypothesis that everyone comes from the same population,” Dr. Paabo said.

In his and Dr. Reich’s view, Neanderthals interbred only with non-Africans, the people who left Africa, which would mean that non-Africans drew from a second gene pool not available to Africans.

[NancyElla]

I read the Washington Post article about this research this morning and found it fascinating. I wonder what other cross-breeding maybe have been going on. The world is full of wonders.

[MarkC]

What I wonder is how that would have gone on.

I mean really "how."

Was it mostly "consensual"? Or did the Neanderthals rape the whomevers? (They call it "humans.")

Or did the whomevers rape the Neanderthals?

Were there attitudes in the different groups about each other? Like, did many of the whomevers tell their kids, "Stay away from those Neanderthals!" And then, did the rebellious kid whomevers tend to hang out with the Neanderthals, and then get punished for it?

Or, for that matter, did the Neanderthal parents tell their kids to stay away from those newfangled arriviste whomevers?

There's a movie in this.

[NancyElla]

Who will play the shy Neanderthal maiden? Who will play the dashing human lad? Who will be the angry parents -- two Neanderthal, two human? What possibilities!

[Ralph]

What I wonder is how that would have gone on.

I mean really "how."

Was it mostly "consensual"? Or did the Neanderthals rape the whomevers? (They call it "humans.")

Or did the whomevers rape the Neanderthals?

Were there attitudes in the different groups about each other? Like, did many of the whomevers tell their kids, "Stay away from those Neanderthals!" And then, did the rebellious kid whomevers tend to hang out with the Neanderthals, and then get punished for it?

Or, for that matter, did the Neanderthal parents tell their kids to stay away from those newfangled arriviste whomevers?

There's a movie in this.

*****

Consider whether the concept of rape has any relevance to prehistoric humanoids.

[Ralph]

Who will play the shy Neanderthal maiden? Who will play the dashing human lad? Who will be the angry parents -- two Neanderthal, two human? What possibilities!

*****

Obviously Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes and they will show how Neanderthals discovered Scientology.

[MarkC]

Who will play the shy Neanderthal maiden? Who will play the dashing human lad? Who will be the angry parents -- two Neanderthal, two human? What possibilities!

Paging those TV "cavemen"............

[jbuck919]

What I wonder is how that would have gone on.

I mean really "how."

Was it mostly "consensual"? Or did the Neanderthals rape the whomevers? (They call it "humans.")

Or did the whomevers rape the Neanderthals?

Were there attitudes in the different groups about each other? Like, did many of the whomevers tell their kids, "Stay away from those Neanderthals!" And then, did the rebellious kid whomevers tend to hang out with the Neanderthals, and then get punished for it?

Or, for that matter, did the Neanderthal parents tell their kids to stay away from those newfangled arriviste whomevers?

There's a movie in this.

*****

Consider whether the concept of rape has any relevance to prehistoric humanoids.

But isn't the alternative the concept of perversion?

[Jean]

Did anyone ever see the movie Daryl Hannah made years ago, The Clan of the Cave Bear? She played a blond human child that was orphened by natural disaster and raised by a clan of Neanderthals.
The movie portrayed a brutal life. Eventually she had a child that was half human and half neathderthal.
It was an interesting, although predictable, idea about what it may have been like.

[MarkC]

Huh..........those scientists need to check Daryl Hannah's DNA to see if that's her!!

But seriously folks.......good get, Jean.
So the movie has already been made!

[josé echenique]

I knew my stupid neighbour had something of a Neanderthal in him.

[Ralph]

What I wonder is how that would have gone on.

I mean really "how."

Was it mostly "consensual"? Or did the Neanderthals rape the whomevers? (They call it "humans.")

Or did the whomevers rape the Neanderthals?

Were there attitudes in the different groups about each other? Like, did many of the whomevers tell their kids, "Stay away from those Neanderthals!" And then, did the rebellious kid whomevers tend to hang out with the Neanderthals, and then get punished for it?

Or, for that matter, did the Neanderthal parents tell their kids to stay away from those newfangled arriviste whomevers?

There's a movie in this.

*****

Consider whether the concept of rape has any relevance to prehistoric humanoids.

But isn't the alternative the concept of perversion?

*****

Perversion is a value based upon knowledge. Did our forbears have such understanding?

[jbuck919]

What I wonder is how that would have gone on.

I mean really "how."

Was it mostly "consensual"? Or did the Neanderthals rape the whomevers? (They call it "humans.")

Or did the whomevers rape the Neanderthals?

Were there attitudes in the different groups about each other? Like, did many of the whomevers tell their kids, "Stay away from those Neanderthals!" And then, did the rebellious kid whomevers tend to hang out with the Neanderthals, and then get punished for it?

Or, for that matter, did the Neanderthal parents tell their kids to stay away from those newfangled arriviste whomevers?

There's a movie in this.

*****

Consider whether the concept of rape has any relevance to prehistoric humanoids.

But isn't the alternative the concept of perversion?

*****

Perversion is a value based upon knowledge. Did our forbears have such understanding?

I don't see how one can have it both ways, Ralph. Either the populations of homo sapiens were modern enough to consider inter-species sex deviant behavior based at least in part on cognition, or they were pre-modern and would have eschewed it by instinct as do virtually all animals. Your suggestion--and I realize it is only that--that they were in some ontologically intermediate stage like Blake's Nebuchadnezzar even though we know they were anatomically modern represents a bigger assumption than attributing values to them.

[NancyElla]

I think rape is entirely a human invention. In animal studies I have read, the female is the who chooses the mate and signals her willingness for sex. Had humans come up with the innovation of rape by this period? There's no way to know.

[MarkC]

.....In animal studies I have read, the female is the who chooses the mate and signals her willingness for sex........

So what happened with us???????????????

[Jean]

Hmmm. Consider perhaps that the males were the dominant hunters and women subserviant. If women excepted this, and submitted to any and all sexual whims of the males regardless if they might not really want it, was it rape?

If the answer is no, then I would say that rape is a more modern situation. If you subscribe to the theory that rape is when a woman feels empowered enough to say no or resist, case, then it would probably parallel women's cultural evolution. Which is pretty much the track the law regarding rape has taken.

Probably an interesting law article in there somewhere.

[Agnes Selby]

Although I decided not to post here anymore as I find
the language offensive particularly when it is directed at my
best friend of many years, I would like to respond to this thread.

I am afraid you are all under a misconception as far as the
diversity of humanity goes. All you have to do is walk down
the street of any city and observe the diversity around you.
Had there not been interbreeding, we would still look like the
humans who left Africa to invade the world. The best example
are Australian Aborigines who share the ancient African genes
due to their isolation. In fact, had there been no interbreeding,
you would not have your President today.

So what do we know about the Neanderthals?

First of all their skin was white.
They had blue eyes
and red or blond hair. This has been determined through DNA.

They occupied Europe throughout the Ice Ages, lived in homogenous
groups, buried their dead facing East and covered the graves with
flowers.

What exactly does this mean?

It means respect for their loved ones and some kind of spirituality
or belief in what was perhaps the beginning of religion.

Remains of medicinal herbs were found in their caves. Also, it appears
they cared for their injured members as healed bones show care
after major accidents. They hunted with spears glued to wood
with glue that scientist found difficult to replicate under primitive conditions.

We know from their DNA that they could speak.

What do we know about the hunter gatherers from Africa. They were
certainly not the handsome long legged creatures which imagination
and our desire to be special would like us to think. They were dirty
and smelly no doubt just as were the Neanderthals but some hygiene
must have existed in the Neanderthal world as their perfect teeth indicate.

We also know that they used colours to beauify their bodies.
Was this the beginning of art? We don't know as it developed later
and the African homosapiens did not bring it from Africa.

Finally, there need not have been rape but mutual attraction. The
black man from Africa may have found the white, blue-eyed Neanderthal
maiden attractive and she may have fancied the black guy.
This interbreeding continues bringing with it enhancement of all sorts
to humanity.
Attractions and interpreeding are constantly repeated, again, just take a walk in any
city in the world.

[MarkC]

Although I decided not to post here anymore as I find the language offensive particularly when it is directed at my
best friend of many years.....

I'm probably fortunate that I have no idea whom or what that's been about.

I certainly haven't noticed anything on this thread being directed at anybody.

BTW.......I wonder if you may have misunderstood the gist of much of the material here.

[Agnes Selby]

Although I decided not to post here anymore as I find the language offensive particularly when it is directed at my
best friend of many years.....

I'm probably fortunate that I have no idea whom or what that's been about.

I certainly haven't noticed anything on this thread being directed at anybody.

BTW.......I wonder if you may have misunderstood the gist of much of the material here.

1). There were no insulting missiles on this thread. I am referring to
Mr. David Ross's insults directed at my friend Teresa which were
completely unjustified. As I admire Teresa who is a friend of long standing,
I would have expected an apology to her from Mr. Ross as would
befit a gentleman.

2). In what way did I misunderstand this thread? Please qualify.

So far we know that 4% of European and Asian genes come from the Neanderthals.
If you consult the Max Planck's Institute's website you will learn
that the research is ongoing. It will take some time to learn more.

[SaulChanukah]

Welcome to Monkeys Against Evolution, the web’s number one site by creationist monkeys. It’s been more than a hundred years since Mr. Darwin put forth his Sapienist nonsense in the form of his so called “Theory of Evolution.” This site is dedicated to challenging many of the crazy ideas being put forth adherents of this "theory." Particularly ridiculous is the idea that people evolved from monkeys! Insanity!

While this site is created by monkeys, we are not creating it for our benefit. We monkeys already understand and agree on the history of our world. You humans are the ones who need help. Also, many of us do not type well, which limits our web access.

We are new here and just getting started, so the site is mostly empty now, but not for long. Check back with us; Barry the monkey will answer all of your questions and will dispel all those kooky ideas that are floating around out there.

[MarkC]

.....In what way did I misunderstand this thread? Please qualify....

I can do better than qualify it.
I take it back.

As I said, I was "wondering," and it was only because I thought maybe you had been referring to things on this thread -- which, as you just said, you weren't.

[Ralph]

Welcome to Monkeys Against Evolution, the web’s number one site by creationist monkeys. It’s been more than a hundred years since Mr. Darwin put forth his Sapienist nonsense in the form of his so called “Theory of Evolution.” This site is dedicated to challenging many of the crazy ideas being put forth adherents of this "theory." Particularly ridiculous is the idea that people evolved from monkeys! Insanity!

While this site is created by monkeys, we are not creating it for our benefit. We monkeys already understand and agree on the history of our world. You humans are the ones who need help. Also, many of us do not type well, which limits our web access.

We are new here and just getting started, so the site is mostly empty now, but not for long. Check back with us; Barry the monkey will answer all of your questions and will dispel all those kooky ideas that are floating around out there.

*****

These are Orthodox Jewish monkeys, right? As far as I know Reform and Conservative monkeys accept Darwin.

[SaulChanukah]

Welcome to Monkeys Against Evolution, the web’s number one site by creationist monkeys. It’s been more than a hundred years since Mr. Darwin put forth his Sapienist nonsense in the form of his so called “Theory of Evolution.” This site is dedicated to challenging many of the crazy ideas being put forth adherents of this "theory." Particularly ridiculous is the idea that people evolved from monkeys! Insanity!

While this site is created by monkeys, we are not creating it for our benefit. We monkeys already understand and agree on the history of our world. You humans are the ones who need help. Also, many of us do not type well, which limits our web access.

We are new here and just getting started, so the site is mostly empty now, but not for long. Check back with us; Barry the monkey will answer all of your questions and will dispel all those kooky ideas that are floating around out there.

*****

These are Orthodox Jewish monkeys, right? As far as I know Reform and Conservative monkeys accept Darwin.

No, as far as I know Apes and Monkeys don't have any religion. We are talking about real monkeys who reject evolution. Too bad that the self made monkey-human like yourself insist to be an animal, while even the monkeys created a website called http://monkeysagainstevolution.com/ and urge humans like yourself that fight to become monkeys to reject this aweful idiotic notion and embrace and come back to humanity, these monkeys reject you with both hands, and we humans will accept you back, you just have to want to return, Ralphy.

BTW I was listening to Beethoven's Piano Sonata No.3 Op.2 while writing this, a very human music written by a very human person.

[HoustonDavid]

Ralph and Saul:

Not to be a nitpicker (they used to have value when most people wore wigs), but the
creature Saul has selected to represent Monkeys Against Evolution is not a monkey
but a chimpanzee, a much more evolved member of the same species as monkeys and
humans, at least if you believe in evolution.

[SaulChanukah]

Ralph and Saul:

Not to be a nitpicker (they used to have value when most people wore wigs), but the
creature Saul has selected to represent Monkeys Against Evolution is not a monkey
but a chimpanzee, a much more evolved member of the same species as monkeys and
humans, at least if you believe in evolution.

Huh...!

Excuse my 'mistake'...

For one likes Brahms, and the other likes Satie...

How could have I made such a mistake with creatures so 'different'?

[Ralph]

I'm listening to Dittersdorf now, Saul, and I'm eating a second banana. So drawn to that fruit!

[NancyElla]

.....In animal studies I have read, the female is the who chooses the mate and signals her willingness for sex........

So what happened with us???????????????

Sorry Mark. Are you saying you haven't been chosen?

[MarkC]

.....In animal studies I have read, the female is the who chooses the mate and signals her willingness for sex........

So what happened with us???????????????

Sorry Mark. Are you saying you haven't been chosen?

LOL.......nah, I'm just talking about the tendencies and practices of our species of homo sapiens.

[SaulChanukah]

I'm listening to Dittersdorf now, Saul, and I'm eating a second banana. So drawn to that fruit!

I'm surprised you didnt get the joke, Ralph.