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Vegeta
Skeptic Friend
United Kingdom
238 Posts |
 Posted - 10/31/2006 : 04:47:18
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http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6099422.stm
early eurpoeans show some neanderthal features
edit: just posted this quickly before going to work, after re-reading it, I'm wondering, is there actually anything new here?
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What are you looking at? Haven't you ever seen a pink shirt before?
"I was asked if I would do a similar sketch but focusing on the shortcomings of Islam rather than Christianity. I said, 'No, no I wouldn't. I may be an atheist but I'm not stupid.'" - Steward Lee |
Edited by - Vegeta on 10/31/2006 07:20:12
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 10/31/2006 : 16:36:43 [Permalink]
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As a distant, lay observer, I have long suspected, though without the scientific evidence having really been in, that modern humans and Neanderthals had essentially not interbred. The physical measurement and comparison of bones used by the researchers mentioned in the new study is subject to a great deal of subjectivity. Physical anthropologists have been having endless, screaming debates based upon bone measurements since Dr. Cain killed Professor Abel over one such dispute.
At any rate, the very earliest Homo sapiens in Europe would naturally be likely to have a few more archaic, "primitive" features than their later descendants.
The key is in the new tools of genetic comparison. So far, in that only partially-explored arena, humans and Neanderthal have been shown by mitochondrial DNA comparisons to be genetically separated by a vast divide of many hundreds of thousands of years. (I suspect -- but can't prove -- that the one partial exception that has been found, the Lagar Velho boy mentioned in the article, may have been a one-off, sterile hybrid "mule" from the mating of a human and one of the last Neanderthals.)
This stuff is fascinating. Bones shapes have many contradictory tales to tell, tailored to the perception of their audiences. Wherever it leads (and I'm sure there will be some wonderful surprises), I'd be interested to see further genetic comparison done, and to hear the more coherent and quantifiable tales told by the genes. This would be an even more powerful
tool when and if nuclear DNA can be compared. (Maybe an understanding of how
Deinococcus radiodurans reassembles its fractured nuclear DNA may someday make such comparisons practical.)
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“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
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