Posted on 08/13/2006 4:11:37 PM PDT by blam
Sleep with Neanderthals? Apparently we (homo Sapiens) did
By Faye Flam
The Philadelphia Inquirer
Though it's been 150 years since mysteriously humanlike bones first turned up in Germany's Neander Valley, the find continues to shake our collective sense of human identity.
Neanderthals are humanity's closest relatives, with brains at least as big as ours, and yet we don't know whether we should include them as members of our own species.
No longer does science consider them our direct ancestors but some suspect Neanderthals and modern homo Sapiens interbred during the 20,000 some-odd years we co-existed in Europe. The archaeological record doesn't tell us one way or another, but earlier, researchers announced they would seek more clues by scraping DNA from Neanderthal bones and teeth.
The question of sex with Neanderthals speaks to our understanding of ourselves, our origins and our uniqueness. If this other type of human being wasn't like us, what was he like?
As I started researching this issue, I found myself staring at a picture of a nude Neanderthal man — a forensic sculpture created by Duke University paleoanthropologist Steve Churchill that was published last year in the journal Science. The model, based on a skeleton found at La Ferrassie in France, is mesmerizing in its combination of familiarity and alienness.
To be honest, he's really not half bad looking. He's got a good, muscular body, and while he's nobody's idea of handsome, that could be forgiven if he had a nice personality or I was starving and he offered to throw some rhino steaks on the fire for me.
We're not talking about the stoop-shouldered, hairy, apelike Neanderthal of popular culture. There's no evidence they were hairier than modern people, says anthropologist Harold Dibble, a curator at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology. . .
(Excerpt) Read more at seattletimes.nwsource.com ...
GGG Ping.
But I don't drink anymore....
Well Ayla did. But what good did it do?
I've dated a few
Now, now, they are talkng about sleeping with a cavewoman. Not Helen Thomas.
Please note I created two opportunities to post pictures. Don't let me down.
L
Things have gone seriesly downhill...
There is no evidence presented in this article to support the title. None whatsoever. Quite to the contrary, the article falsely proclaims: "The archaeological record doesn't tell us one way or another.." In actuality, this article is completely divorced from the most recent research, which points exclusively in the opposite direction: That modern humans did not interbreed with Neanderthal.
I had a girl friend from New Jersey!
Oh, GROSS!!!
I am trying to eat dinner, here!!
:P
I may have to hit abuse....
This might explain who Cain slept with after he took off after killing Able.
Ok, OK, I was really desperate. Now will you just shut up about this?
Serious question - I've always been curious as to how one reconciles this with the biblical version of the origins of man..
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