Study shows competition, not climate change, led to Neanderthal extinction

www.physorg.com ^ | 12/29/2008 | Source: Public Library of Science

[Red Badger]

In a recently conducted study, a multidisciplinary French-American research team with expertise in archaeology, past climates, and ecology reported that Neanderthal extinction was principally a result of competition with Cro-Magnon populations, rather than the consequences of climate change.

The study, reported in the online, open-access journal PLoS ONE on December 24, figures in the ongoing debate on the reasons behind the eventual disappearance of Neanderthal populations, which occupied Europe prior to the arrival of human populations like us around 40,000 years ago. Led by Dr William E. Banks, the authors, who belong to the French Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, l'Ecole Pratique d'Hautes Etudes, and the University of Kansas, reached their conclusion by reconstructing climatic conditions during this period and analyzing the distribution of archaeological sites associated with the last Neanderthals and the first modern human populations with an approach typically used to study the impact of climate change on biodiversity.

This method uses geographic locations of archaeological sites dated by radiocarbon, in conjunction with high-resolution simulations of past climates for specific periods, and employs an algorithm to analyze relationships between the two datasets to reconstruct potential areas occupied by each human population and to determine if and how climatic conditions played a role in shaping these areas. In other words, by integrating archaeological and paleoenvironmental datasets, this predictive method can reconstruct the regions that a past population could potentially have occupied. By repeating the modeling process hundreds of times and evaluating where the errors occur, this machine-learning algorithm is able to provide robust predictions of regions that could have been occupied by specific human cultures.

This modeling approach also allows the projection of the ecological footprint of one culture onto the environmental conditions of a later climatic phase―by comparing this projected prediction to the known archaeological sites dated to this later period, it is possible to determine if the ecological niche exploited by this human population remained the same, or if it contracted or expanded during that period of time.

Comparing these reconstructed areas for Neanderthals and anatomically modern humans during each of the climatic phases concerned, and by projecting each niche onto the subsequent climatic phases, Banks and colleagues determined that Neanderthals had the possibility to maintain their range across Europe during a period of less severe climatic conditions called Greenland Interstadial 8 (GI8).

However, the archaeological record shows that this did not occur, and Neanderthal disappearance occurs at a point when we see the geographic expansion of the ecological niche occupied by modern humans during GI8. The researchers' models predict the southern limit of the modern human territory to be near the Ebro River Valley in northern Spain during the preceding cold period called Heinrich Event 4 (H4), and that this southern boundary moved to the south during the more temperate phase GI8.

The researchers conclude that the Neanderthal populations that occupied what is now southern Spain were the last to survive because they were able to avoid direct competition with modern humans since the two populations exploited distinct territories during the cold climatic conditions of H4. They also point out that during this population event contact between Neanderthals and modern humans may have permitted cultural and genetic exchanges.

[blam]

"Here’s me wishing you a 2009 that is full of healthy dogs and free of storms.'

Thanks...And, a happy and prosperous new year to you too.

[ANGGAPO]

You are on the right track. They coexisted for a long time, and finally died out. Their off-springs still exist today, they are called Democrats. Now you know.

[dmz]

Yup. The Wright Brothers only THOUGHT, they did not KNOW.

You do realize that human knowledge increases every time we learn something didn’t happen a particular way, as much as when we learn that something DID happen a certain way.

Scientists represent chump change in the grand scheme of things. I’m OK with the money they are spending and, in fact, what they are spending it on.

[sergeantdave]

Our early Homo sapien ancestors survived the ice ages better than the Neanderthals, resulting in our dominance of Earth today, say scientists in Discovery magazine.

Quite simply, our caveman cousins had better tools and brains for securing food and shelter. Plus the Homo sapiens were built better anatomically to survive the freezing ice-age temperaturtes. Neanderthals and Homo Sapiens competed for dominance until about 30,000 years ago when the Neanderthals went extinct.

Homo sapiens had the latest high-tech tools, including warm clothing made of fur, enclosed shelters and effective weapons to kill and ensnare animals and fish. Specialized projectile weaponry like javelins and spearthrowers also increased the range to effectively kill animals.

Neanderthals, meanwhile, mostly hunted with spear in hand. This decreased their effective hunting range, especially in winter when animals were scarce and hunting was more difficult.

Because the Neanderthals literally didn’t “bring home the bacon” that meant less food and fewer calories to burn in ice-age temperatures when those calories were needed for survival.

In the end, the Homo sapien brain and superior body simply out-competed Neanderthal brute force.