[SunkenCiv]

Which scientist do you believe? NOVA ran a series this week on the evolution of man. They said in this show that the entire Neanderthal genome has now been sequenced and that from this evidence there was no interbreeding between modern man and Neanderthals for 200,000 years.

Which episode of NOVA do you believe? The "Neanderthals on Trial" episode transcript shows Svante Pääbo saying nothing of the kind. In fact, no one appears to say anything of the kind. I did a search for the string "200", and found nothing even close to what you said.

And the earliest broadcast date is 2002, iow, almost ten years ago now.

And just so you know, the entire Neandertal genome STILL hasn't been sequenced.

I mean, really, do you just believe PBS when it tells you something you want to believe anyway?

[DManA]

The three hour series was called “Becoming Human”. It ran all three hours in a row last week on the Twin Cities public TV station. I in no way vouch for the accuracy of anything in the series. They claimed in the third hour that the Neanderthal genome has been sequenced. I was very surprised by that. I wouldn’t be surprised of it was false.

[DManA]

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/evolution/becoming-human-part-1.html

[DManA]

NARRATOR: But finally, taking great care not to contaminate it with their own, they isolated the first piece of Neanderthal D.N.A. Svante's dream is now a reality. He and his team have made a draft of the entire Neanderthal genome. Now scientists all over the world can compare key parts of it to the human genome. And one such comparison is already giving us deeper insight into the Neanderthal brain: the gene called FOXP2.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/evolution/becoming-human-part-3.html

[DManA]

Sorry, 300,000 to 400,000 years ago.

With a technique called the molecular clock, scientists can now find out. That's because D.N.A. mutates, or changes, at a surprisingly regular rate. By counting the differences in the genetic code of Neanderthal and ourselves, simply comparing the As, Ts, Cs and Gs in our D.N.A., scientists can calculate how long the two species have been diverging.

SVANTE PÄÄBO: We can then estimate when there was a common ancestor population, where some individuals went on to become modern humans, some went on to become Neanderthals. It's in the order of say 300,000 to 400,000 years ago.

Interesting contradiction of the premise of the "molecular clock" techique a few minutes later:

SPENCER WELLS: The rate of evolution at the genomic level has increased over the last 10,000 years, and it will probably continue over the next few thousand years.