Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Neanderthals 'Were Ahead Of Their Time'
The Telegraph (UK) ^ | 6-15-2007

Posted on 06/14/2007 5:56:19 PM PDT by blam

Neanderthals 'were ahead of their time'

Last Updated: 2:42am BST 14/06/2007

Big, brutish and stupid - it's a commonly held view that our prehistoric predecessors were as wild and unsophisticated as the animals they hunted.

Neanderthal man was 'as smart as we are'

But Neanderthal man was not as slow-witted as he looked and was in reality as smart as we are, an archaeologist claims.

They were actually innovators who used different forms of tools to adapt to the ecological challenges posed by harsh habitats as they spread through Europe. Although our ancestors have become the butt of jokes about people who are stupid or unenlightened, they were years ahead of their time.

Dr Terry Hopkinson, of Leicester University, said Neanderthals were far from behaviourally static and incorporated different forms of tool construction into a single technique.

He said: "There has been a consensus that the modern human mind turned on like a light switch about 50,000 years ago, only in Africa."

But the modern traits accompanying the change such as abstract art, the use of grindstones and elongated stone blades, and big-game hunting began to accumulate in Africa from 300,000 years ago.

Archaeological finds from across Europe also show the Neanderthals fused two forms of tool-making called the faconnage and the debitage techniques. Neanderthals had previously been thought of as incapable of innovation, said Dr Hopkinson, as it was assumed to be something unique to Homo sapiens.


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: brutish; godsgravesglyphs; neandertal; neandertals; neanderthal; neanderthals; smart; sophisticated
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-6061-78 last
To: Renfield

I’ve always wondered how the cavemen could be reconciled on a time scale with Biblical teachings of Adam & Eve being the origination of humans?


61 posted on 06/15/2007 4:22:49 AM PDT by newfreep ("Liberalism is just Communism sold by the drink." - P.J. O'Rourke)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 60 | View Replies]

To: Michael A. Velli

“Lynndie England: the missing link between neanderthals and modern man?”

Ah, but, to my knowledge, she’s managed to crank out several (fatherless) babies... In my neighborhood, she would be considered a Darwinian success story.


62 posted on 06/15/2007 5:29:15 AM PDT by Harrius Magnus (Pucker up Mo, and your dhimmi Leftist freaks, here comes your Jizya!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 39 | View Replies]

To: Blood of Tyrants
If that were true, whales would be the most intelligent creatures on earth.

Whales brains have a very large task-specific portion of their brain, which appears devoted to sonar and associated spatial navigation. As I recall, Neanderthal's brain is enlarged most prominently in the areas associated with the visual cortex and navigation.

63 posted on 06/15/2007 5:37:59 AM PDT by lepton ("It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into"--Jonathan Swift)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: Salamander
yet we have not a single clue what *they* are saying.

Really? I knew a dozen or so sounds that each of my dogs would make, and what each meant. The problem was more that they would use the same "word" for a score of different things.

64 posted on 06/15/2007 6:15:49 AM PDT by lepton ("It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into"--Jonathan Swift)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 58 | View Replies]

To: newfreep
I’ve always wondered how the cavemen could be reconciled on a time scale with Biblical teachings of Adam & Eve being the origination of humans?

Use the same definition of "human".

65 posted on 06/15/2007 6:17:15 AM PDT by lepton ("It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into"--Jonathan Swift)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 61 | View Replies]

To: lepton
"As I recall, Neanderthal's brain is enlarged most prominently in the areas associated with the visual cortex and navigation. "

The 'Hobbit' skull(s) found on the Indonesian island of Flores have a Broca's Area four times larger than Modern Humans. No-one knows why.

66 posted on 06/15/2007 6:36:45 AM PDT by blam
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 63 | View Replies]

To: StACase

It is a good joke, one I will lie about to people. Thanks for the ammo.


67 posted on 06/15/2007 6:53:55 AM PDT by U S Army EOD
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 59 | View Replies]

To: Dysart

Mark


68 posted on 06/15/2007 6:55:26 AM PDT by Dysart
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: blam

Size alone does not dictate intelligence... The surface area of the brain certainly seems to have a large impact in general. But overall size by weight or by volume does not.


69 posted on 06/15/2007 7:01:13 AM PDT by HamiltonJay
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: labette
"If “Neanderthals” were stronger and smarter than we, Why are we the survivors?"

Alleys, late at night, one at a time.

70 posted on 06/15/2007 8:37:22 AM PDT by norton
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: blam

We were all created. Many devolve.


71 posted on 06/15/2007 8:39:39 AM PDT by PGalt
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: chilepepper
"If that were true, whales would be the most intelligent creatures on earth.
perhaps they are..."

'So long and thanks for all the plankton'?

72 posted on 06/15/2007 8:43:04 AM PDT by norton (I'm sorry it looks like one of those days...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 49 | View Replies]

To: HamiltonJay
IQ Intelligence: The Surprising Truth
73 posted on 06/15/2007 8:46:53 AM PDT by blam
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 69 | View Replies]

To: AEMILIUS PAULUS

Neanderthals were men. They may not have been as similar genetically as two people randomly selected from around the world today, but they were human.


74 posted on 06/15/2007 8:53:29 AM PDT by Jedi Master Pikachu ( What is your take on Acts 15:20 (abstaining from blood) about eating meat? Could you freepmail?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 37 | View Replies]

To: labette

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1850445/posts?page=53#53


75 posted on 06/15/2007 9:15:28 AM PDT by SunkenCiv (Time heals all wounds, particularly when they're not yours. Profile updated June 8, 2007.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: newfreep
There are cavemen still in existence today (in Malta). And probably a few eccentrics in other parts of the world.

As for Neanderthals, Creationist models vary. One idea is that modern day Europeans and people in the Levant and Central Asia (the places where Neanderthals used to live) are the descendants of Neanderthals.

Another is that they could have been people who actually obeyed the command to spread out after the Flood, and sort of became a subspecies of humans while the rest of humanity loitered in Mesopotamia, and after Babel, some of those Mesopotamians--the ancestors of modern mankind--wiped out the Neanderthals.

A rarer view is that Neanderthals were humans living in the antediluvian world; this hypothesis is chiefly for other advanced hominids such as Homo erectus and Homo habilis and similar homo species (as in Latin nomenclature)--less advanced homo species were probably just types of ape that have since gone extinct (and humans aren't apes).

76 posted on 06/15/2007 9:34:10 AM PDT by Jedi Master Pikachu ( What is your take on Acts 15:20 (abstaining from blood) about eating meat? Could you freepmail?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 61 | View Replies]

To: blam

It isn’t the volume (at least that is the modern, general consensus).


77 posted on 06/15/2007 9:35:30 AM PDT by Jedi Master Pikachu ( What is your take on Acts 15:20 (abstaining from blood) about eating meat? Could you freepmail?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 73 | View Replies]

To: blam
But Neanderthal man was not as slow-witted as he looked and was in reality as smart as we are, an archaeologist claims.

For those of us who follow these stories, the above line has become a painful cliche. It is included in EVERY story about Neanderthals. No well-read person thinks they were dumb brutes any more, and hasn't for the past 30 years. Sheesh ...

78 posted on 06/15/2007 11:12:10 AM PDT by ElkGroveDan (When toilet paper is a luxury, you have achieved communism.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-6061-78 last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson