Characteristics Of Decoding Neanderthal

The film correlates with most of what we know as true. We were able to observe Neanderthals, apelike beings, and any natural wildlife in this film. Quest for Fire portrayed highly evolved versions of Neanderthals. I could only assume that these were not one of the first tribes of Neanderthals. Their walking movement was more advanced than that of their ape ancestors. Although more evolved because of the non-prominent C curve in their back, the Neanderthals crouched and occasionally knuckle-walked while moving around. There were times when they even ran and moved rapidly just on their two legs, showing signs of their shift to bipedalism (Lecture 09/13).

The first Neanderthal remains, discovered in Germany in 1856, were presented to the world of science at a meeting of the Lower Rhine Medical and Natural History Society held in Bonn in February 1857 and named a species, Homo neanderthalensis, by William King in 1864. Some Neanderthal fossils and other remains are in excellent condition, giving a good idea of Neanderthal culture. In 1887, two complete skeletons were found in a cave near Spy in Belgium, and more from sites in France in 1887, 1908 and 1911. These and other finds showed that the Neanderthals had populated Europe widely from about 130,000 to 28,000 years ago after which they became extinct. Most of these fossils were found in caves. Usually they are associated with cold

In a skeleton found in Asia, the discovery of a hyoid bone in the the throat raised the question of whether or not Neanderthals had language capabilities. There has been much debate over this and many different theories, but the most widely accepted is that they were capable of producing human speech sounds, but whether or not they used this speech to communicate in any kind of language is still largely up for debate. In height, Neanderthals were roughly about the same size as modern humans, but did not live as long as modern humans. A Neanderthal who lived into his or her 40's was considered to be long lived, which is comparatively short to our much longer lives of roughly double that. Genetically, Neaderthals and humans differ in their DNA structure both in the mitochondrial DNA and in the nuclear DNA. The significance of the DNA evidence is that it is crucial in determining whether remains that are found are truly Neanderthal or an older hominin relative.

The most recent ancestor to the modern human, Homo neanderthalensis existed between 300,000 and 35,000 years ago. Originating in Africa, ancestors of the early Neanderthals migrated northwards almost 800,000 years ago. These migrants colonized much of the Old World with the majority based in Europe and small groups scattered throughout the Middle East and Asia. Historically, the Neanderthals were among the most resiliant creatures to exist on Earth. As a population, they thrived during the European ice age 40,000 years ago. This ice age enveloped the majority of Northern and Central Europe and due to their physique were the Neanderthals were able to surive. Physcially, the Neanderthals were larger and more muscular than today’s human

It's widely agreed by scientists that Neanderthals and Homo sapiens (modern man) are different species. However, it's thought that 1.5 - 2.1% of DNA from anyone born outside of Africa is Neanderthal which means that they co-existed and interbred with our Homo sapien ancestors approximately 35,000 years ago. Researchers say, the only human ancestors who didn't interbreed with Neanderthals were sub-Saharan Africans. Neanderthals typically lived in Europe and Asia up until approximately 33,000 BC when they are said to have become extinct. They lived during the Ice Age and can be considered as early cave men who are likely to have been covered in hair and had an ape like appearance very similar to the conventional perception of Bigfoot. Their eyes and brains were larger than those of Homo sapiens but they were sophisticated enough to carry tools, make fire and bury their dead. One scientific explanation as to why the Neanderthals died out is climate change, More likely, they were unable to compete with the better adapted early humans who either killed them, took over their land or interbred with them and they were absorbed into our

The Neanderthals lived in areas ranging from Western Europe through central Asia from about 200,000 to between 36,000 and 24,000 years ago. The Neanderthals lived in groups of 30 to 50 individuals, they invented many of the tool types that were to be perfected by fully sapient peoples, they had weapons adequate to deal with both the cave lion and cave bear, they used body paint, buried their dead. Neanderthal Man survived through the Ice Age. They are thought to have had fire. Neanderthals lived side by side with modern humans for over 10,000 years.

Neanderthals and modern humans coexisted for well over 100,000 years.  Then suddenly Homo neandertalensis began to die out and surrender the earth to Homo sapiens.  Paleontologists and anthropologists have entertained several possibilities to the causes of this event: interbreeding among Neanderthals and humans, competition for natural resources, and Darwin’s theory of “survival of the fittest.”  What the real cause has been has plagued scientists for years. Now, due to an international research team from Germany, those possibilities have been even further deduced, making it easier to pinpoint the exact reason Homo neandertalensis became extinct.

If Neanderthals did in fact comport themselves in ways once thought to distinguish anatomically modern humans and enable the latter’s rise to world domination, that similarity makes the Neanderthals’ decline and eventual extinction all the more mystifying. One theory is that H. sapiens had a broader variety of tools that may have enhanced their ability to forage. When they brought their superior technology with them out of Africa and into Eurasia, they were thus better able to exploit the environment more effectively than the resident Neanderthals could. Still, the arrival of H. sapiens did not equal an instant demise for Neanderthals. The latest attempt to track their decline, carried out by Thomas Higham of Oxford and his colleagues, applied

Contemporary Europeans have roughly three times more Neanderthal variable in their genes involved in lipid catabolism than Asian and African people. Even though Neanderthals are extinct, small pieces of their genomes tend to exist in modern humans. These similarities are unevenly distributed across the genome and some regions are particularly enriched with Neanderthal variants. While analyzing the influence of Neanderthal variants on lipid processing in modern humans, the researchers found revolutionary changes in lipid concentration and expression of metabolic enzymes in brains of humans of European

Additional interesting facts about Neanderthals include: They had the same gene associated with language that modern humans have, but the anatomy of their vocal chords would not allow them to make certain sounds. They found a way to make adhesive through a complex thermal process, where they extracted pitch from stones. Amongst the artifacts found from the Neanderthal time period there are bones which appear to have been made into instruments. They were the first in history to have buried their dead. It appears they may have even marked their graves and perhaps had burial rituals. Finally, it has been discovered that at least some of the Neanderthals had pale skin and red hair. Qualities that may have helped them to absorb vitamin D which in

Despite this, they were very similar to ours. Endocasts from Neanderthal skulls have shown very similar frontal lobes, so much so that it’s difficult to tell the different between a Neanderthal and modern Homo sapiens one. 3-D images of a Neanderthal skull is low and elongated, unlike our which is dome-like. This could possibly show the shape of the brain. Also, some parts of the Neanderthal brains were smaller than ours, such as the parietal and temporal lobes, which could have an impact on their cognition, especially regarding language, memory, and spatial

Throughout the documentary “Decoding Neanderthals” there was a push of research to push the human view of Neanderthals. Over the year’s research showed that we coexisted with Neanderthals and out beat their species. Many believed that Neanderthals where like the stereotypical unintelligent and wild caveman. With new technology, enhanced research, and the exposing documentary “Decoding Neanderthals” pushed the boundaries of these past ideologies. Through this we have learned how intelligent, symbolic, and closely related this species is to homo-sapiens species. This research proved that the Neanderthal may have not became extent due to in ability to create weapons but, due to inter breading with humans

Several different hypotheses have been formulated to explain the extinction of Neanderthals, from climate changes to intoxication from cave-associated contaminants like smoke, from cannibalism to diseases (Herrera et al., 2009). It is only certain that Neanderthals disappeared from fossil record after the arrival of modern humans, around 40,000 years in Asia, and 10,000-15,000 years in Europe (Shreeve, 1995). Fossil evidence shows the presence of modern humans in Middle East from 130,000 to 75,000 years ago, in the same areas where Neanderthals retreated between 65,000 and 47,000 years ago (Mellars, 2004).

The next species to appear were the Homo erectus which might have descended from Homo habilis. They were the first human whose fossils were found outside of Africa. They also had larger brain than the species before them. Homo sapiens sapiens came after the Homo Neanderthalensis; they are the only human species around. This could have been due to the result of increase brain sizes that allows more cognitive abilities that help them adapt to different environment changes and hence survive. Global evidence have been found of art, music, and culture and advanced tool making. In Mithen’s 3 phase of mind proposes that the shape of the Neanderthals’ frontal lobe was similar to the one of the modern Homo sapiens and this indicated that they were able to cope with complex cognitive functioning. Evidence for this could be explained using the phonological approach by Frank Gall (1758-1828).

There is evidence to suggest that Homo neanderthalensis and Homo sapiens had coexisted for approximately 35-40,000 years, (Fagan 2010) from around 60,000 years ago to 25,000 years ago when they finally went extinct (Gibbon 2001). Anthropologists are still uncertain what the cause of their extinction was. This paper will analyze three main theories of Neanderthal extinction. The first theory is the competition theory, which claims that the Homo sapiens and Neanderthals had to compete for resources, ultimately leading to their demise. The second theory I will discuss is the climate change theory, which claims that Homo sapiens lived while Neanderthals died because they were better adapted to the climate. The last theory I will discuss is