[VietVet]

"They are all cats but there are no known crosses between leopards and lions or tigers."

I myself have cross breeds between tigers and lions. They were, of course, bred in captivity (wild lions today are all almost exclusively from Africa, while tigers are from Asia), but the first ones occured by accident: a male and a female of different species penned together because it was thought nothing could happen. Later crosses were done deliberately.

And of course, there is the well known cross between the horse and the donkey, the mule, and lesser known cross-breeding between horses and zebras.

Not to mention the crosses between dogs and wolves. I've seen and touched one of those, too.

But what this latest evidence means to me is that for all their apparent differences, the division of the family of Man into separate species, Erectus, Neadertalis, Sapiens, is artificial, and we should rather consider them as one species, which has changed morphologically through time, but not that much genetically.

[WRhine]

But what this latest evidence means to me is that for all their apparent differences, the division of the family of Man into separate species, Erectus, Neadertalis, Sapiens, is artificial, and we should rather consider them as one species, which has changed morphologically through time, but not that much genetically.

Your points and others are well taken. The fact is we really don't know what happened some 100,000 years ago other than previous hominoid species died out and our specie continued to thrive. I have an open mind about the subject (I really do) but I suspect that this debate will be raging for many decades to come.