My most fringe theory I give credence to is that advanced hominid evolution was heavily driven by coastal foraging, think about how much better adapted humans are to water than any other primate?
It is also a heavy selector for tool use and brain development with ready access to iodine, iron, salt, and other hard to acquire nutrients and minerals, but said resources required tool use and development to catch, pry open, crack, etc.
The problem scientifically is that there is essentially zero discoveries backing it up as those types of environments are now all submerged, eroded etc.
Yeah, I know that one and do not fully support/or agree with it as a catch all. It does make some Iinteresting points that I do think were part of our species journey, as the ability to swim and dive is pretty freaking unique in the animal kingdom for non aquartic creatures as well as the point around access to dietary iodine and other hard to acquire nutrient for brain development. And as natural selection is rather "lazy" species dont just acquire random, complex traits for no reason, being able to access aquatic resources other land animals could not had to have been incredibly important at some point in human evolution or we would not have picked those traits up and retained them.
My personal belief is that periods of glaciation had a push-pull effect on our development as the changing climate altered which biomes had the most resources for early humans and human ancestors to exploit.
For example early Savanah adaptations to be able to walk upright, be taller to see over grass and run farther/faster/more efficiently for pursuit predwtion gave us better bodies for swimming and the running endurance translated into the ability to hold our breath and dive. Less body hair for more efficent sweating made us more streamlined and dry off much faster, which then got further selected for in aquatic environments which also forced more advanced tool use which then opened up aditional biomes and resources....and now we have adapted to infest every corner of the planet.
Hominids Neanderthal and homo sapien made particular extra efforts to learn to exploit marine environments during several bottleneck events, in particular the Wallacea /southeast Asia areas. Climate change altered the land, but the sea showed fewer and slower amendments.
I farm mussels and I always say that at least it’s good in a collapse. They’re super sustainable protein with very little mechanized labor required. It brings a lot of ecological benefit as a practice and has very little downside and is relatively simple. Something about it feels right for my human brain. It’s a rewarding cultivation process and feels very participatory with nature, and the mussels don’t really mind that they’re on a farm I would think, until the harvesting and processing and shipping and cooking of course >.>
I have oysters and mussels that I get to go cook right now! I also love the potlucking abilities that it gives me. I’m always looking for new recipes and Im doing my best to grow the culture because the farm needs it! Totally not self-serving at all
I see your angle and it feels plausible from here, from someone who lives and breathes shellfish 🦪
Too bad it is so hard to do field work there, so many early whales, spinos, and leftovers from the "green Sahara" period which from what we do know had a fascinating biome
IIRC your theory is at least partly corroborated by genetic evidence. I believe it is discussed in Deep Ancestry: Inside the Genographic Project. There is strong evidence that human migration followed coastlines
There is an older theory, I haven’t heard it in awhile, that based on the direction and reduction of our hair growth providing more streamlining for swimming, the fat underlayment under our skin providing more insulation for water activity and the wrinkling of the skin on our fingers providing better grasping in water as evidenced we spent some time in water as hominids
Some Neanderthal populations lived exclusively on marine prey. Their populations diets and habits (much like ours) were quite different from each other.
I agree. But weird things crop up like shellfish allergies. Which makes me think we did a lot of coastal living but sometimes or something made us go inland for extended periods?
This isn't actually true, this concept of there being a near-extinction level event for modern humans was disregarded decades ago but for some reason persists. There are genetic bottlenecks in various populations caused by initial migratory groups being small and then expanding in isolation, but as a species there's never been a "near extinction" event.
I get the temporal misalignment, but the reason of the proliferation of that theory are the publications in leading scientific journals (science, proceedings of national academy of sciences, and many others)
There is some evidence that humans occupied the intertidal zones where, when the tide recedes, puddles are left with entrapped sea life. I imagine it was like a buffet for those who have not developed any fishing gear more sophisticated then a sharp stick.
To summarize, or to make a long story short, in some of these areas there have been findings of tools and compactified fossils that suggests human activity. Here "tools" means flakes of rocks, like obsidian, that are not native to these locations.
So it isn't impossible to see evidence of the coastal life of our ancestors.
There's also a bit of genetic evidence to reconstruct how coastal humans might have lived. This is usually about haplotypes, but there's also the Bajau people (aka, the "sea nomads") who have physiologically adapted to their lifestyle of free-diving fishing. They have a few genes that alter their blood and the deep diving reflex to better handle spending so much time underwater. They can also hold their breath, on average, longer than other humans, but I don't know if that involves any genetic changes.
Other than that, I don't think humans have any special adaptations to support the idea of having aquatic monkey-men in our lineage.
There were still cannibal tribes in Indonesia in the 1940s and 50s. A friend's grandmother was the last generation to have eaten neighboring tribes before she was 12. By 16, she spoke 2 additional languages, married a dutch sailor, and settled in the US. All 4 of her daughters doubted her stories, but then visited her island in their 30s and stopped doubting. She didn't pass away until the 2010s.
I'm always immediately turned off any thesis that uses a comparison between homo neanderthal and homo sapien with a morality or violence clause.
One thing we know without a doubt is that homo sapien has always demonstrated it's okay with destruction in order to survive. The dogma that neanderthal or any other human species was not as civilized or sophisticated just won't die. We can't stop killing each other and I guess it makes us feel superior to assume neanderthals were worse.
We didn't evolve from neanderthals, they weren't less than us and we don't really know if their psychology was similar. Human development is not linear. We know what we're capable of but it doesn't mean the other humans were too.
Individually, people can be a lot of things. But as a species, we're meant to survive. Sometimes that means turning to cannibalism, and we've got tons of evidence to prove it.
Yes. Also, “Neanderthals … apparently didn't share the squeamishness we Homo sapiens feel at the idea of eating our fellow humans.”
There’s no proof whatsoever about that. They may have been racked with guilt the same way modern day survivors have been when faced with these life and death choices.
It would be interesting to know if it was a funeral right, along the lines of "this beloved person will live on in the bodies of their tribe" a ritualistic combat thing "we have killed and consumed our rivals/enemies" or if it was during a period of incredible hardship "person in our tribe died, everyone is starving, dead person is made of meat"
If I recall correctly in Kindred which is an incredible and comprehensive book on Neanderthals the author mentioned how the skeletons were not strewn about despite having butchering marks. Like they were taken apart, eaten, and put back together. Hinting it could have been your first mention about a member living on through the rest kind of thing.
>”Neanderthal cannibalism appears to encompass a broad range of motivations,” the researchers said in a study published in Scientific Reports. “However, despite its apparent recurrence and timeframe, interpreting [it] remains particularly challenging, especially given the fragmentary condition of most skeletal assemblages and the difficulties in assessing the cultural contexts in which these practices occurred.”
We have no way of telling if this is a case of endo- or exo-cannibalism. We have no way of telling if this was something done in times of hardship or as a funerary rite. Maybe they had different ways of handling men, women, and children and that’s why there’s no adult male skeletons present. Maybe the male skeleton parts were too fragmentary to discern.
I don’t want to be a bummer or anything, but cannibalism is way more prevalent than people realize. Tons of it happened in Europe during bad years. Tons is an over exaggeration but it happened often enough to be recorded. And there are reports and/or rumors (I can’t find where I read this) but lynchings in the South sometimes led to cannibalism for whatever racist reasons. I don’t think it happens much at all anymore except here and there like dahlmer or in severe situations like donner party. But historically speaking, it wasn’t uncommon to do it as a way to establish dominance? Erase the enemy? Or an unhinged racist claiming eating a lesser being is no different than beef or pork. It’s unsettling and horrifying that our history has things like this. They’re not widely known for obvious reasons but you can find it in your library and credible historical or reference websites. All that being said it’s an incredible discovery. Every dig gives us answers and new questions. I love science.
We also have cultures who fairly recently practiced endo-cannibalism as a funerary rite. Being horrified at eating other humans is cultural and not biological.
i know we like to perpetuate that neanderthals were 'more primitive/animal' than us 'oh so evolved' sapiens but we know homo sapiens has a longgg history of cannibalism too (and that's only what's on current record) often for ritualistic purposes and far more common and recent than we've been led to (and like to) believe.
Eating another human to survive thousands of years ago during antiquitous society is one thing - flying all your rich, famous and powerful friends to your island to eat parts of babies and children in the present is truly crazed and evil.
Homosapiens did that to, in some places we still do. Being it was Neanderthal bones found what says it was Neanderthals being cannibals, and not Homosapiens cannibalising their cousins?
Hungry modern people still eat other people given the right set of circumstances… the siege of Leningrad and the Great Chinese Famine being such examples. I’m not sure why they are characterizing it as so shocking that neanderthals would engage in the behavior in this article. I’d be shocked if they hadn’t.
I wonder whether a lot of diseases that we currently understand as genetically-based with prion overlap like Parkinson's, ALS, etc. might have originally proliferated this way.
Actually, prions can spontaneously appear. The diseases don't need to proliferate from eating, there just be an inheritable gene that makes a fragile protein prone to misfolding.
Parkinson’s seems mostly an environmental disease. See recent study about the age (read level of contamination by modern pollutants) of the drinking water and its relationship to rates od Parkinson’s.
There could be many more than just neanderthals. But knowing our penchance for racism, I'd imagine that'd be turned up to 11 if we had actual different species of homos walking around the planet.
Stone-age humans didn't think in terms of "the human species", but in terms of their own band and tribe. Most tribal names simply translate out to "The People", which is why those names are never translated, unlike, say, animal or other nature names that bands might have.
Which means that other human(-like creatures), to them, were seen as "animals that can speak", "animals that trade", etc. Not necessarily treated with hostility, but not "fully a person" like those of your own tribe, who share your family band's language, beliefs, and customs.
So if you were to ask them if they are "cannibals", they would say "Certainly not! We don't eat our own kind", even as they're chowing down on enemy thigh.
They needed food and meat is meat. The idea of cannibalism being “horrifying” is a social belief, not a natural belief. If it’s easier to hunt your neighbors for food than brave the wilderness, you’re going to take the path of least resistance.
We don't know what kind of social organization Cro-Magnon had, although some sort of kinship-based organization ("tribes") is likely, and there is no reason to think that neanderthals didn't have something similar. They certainly interbred with Cro-Magnons.
There is absolutely no reason to think that Cro-Magnons were "white." in fact it is more likely that their skin was pigmented.
Biologically speaking, "race" is a social construct rather than a rigid genetic category. Humans share 99.9% of their DNA; the traits we associate with race are adaptations to environment occurring on the very surface of our genetic makeup.If you’re looking for a specific "start date," science suggests that the specific combination of "white" traits we recognize today only became widespread in Europe roughly 5,000 to 8,000 years ago (during the Bronze Age). Before that, Europeans looked significantly different than they do today.
Yeh this isn’t cheddar man where they show the image and then darken it a week later for political wokeness. Already books out regarding this subject and Neanderthals, nothing new in what you posted.
Everything is being revealed overtime, we are also going to find Atlantis.
Call me crazy but i theres something going on both personal and in the world, i have gained talents that automatically make me draw masterpieces and i can dance to any music, i also can defeat anyone in combat.
All automatic, like muscle memory but i have no clue how i activated all this.
I also can speak some foreign language, it has vocabulary and it combines well with movement.
Maybe someone out there can explain it, perhaps its acquired Savant syndrome.
That explains why it is Homo Sapian not Neanderthal took over the world, we are the kindest Sapian, we cooperated with each other more frequent than any other species.
Necessary-Apricot339 | a day ago
I imagine there's a lot more such, submerged now in what used to be coastal area caves during ice age maximums.
Echo017 | a day ago
My most fringe theory I give credence to is that advanced hominid evolution was heavily driven by coastal foraging, think about how much better adapted humans are to water than any other primate?
It is also a heavy selector for tool use and brain development with ready access to iodine, iron, salt, and other hard to acquire nutrients and minerals, but said resources required tool use and development to catch, pry open, crack, etc.
The problem scientifically is that there is essentially zero discoveries backing it up as those types of environments are now all submerged, eroded etc.
BearsLikeBeets | a day ago
This is reminiscent of the aquatic ape theory
Echo017 | 23 hours ago
Yeah, I know that one and do not fully support/or agree with it as a catch all. It does make some Iinteresting points that I do think were part of our species journey, as the ability to swim and dive is pretty freaking unique in the animal kingdom for non aquartic creatures as well as the point around access to dietary iodine and other hard to acquire nutrient for brain development. And as natural selection is rather "lazy" species dont just acquire random, complex traits for no reason, being able to access aquatic resources other land animals could not had to have been incredibly important at some point in human evolution or we would not have picked those traits up and retained them.
My personal belief is that periods of glaciation had a push-pull effect on our development as the changing climate altered which biomes had the most resources for early humans and human ancestors to exploit.
For example early Savanah adaptations to be able to walk upright, be taller to see over grass and run farther/faster/more efficiently for pursuit predwtion gave us better bodies for swimming and the running endurance translated into the ability to hold our breath and dive. Less body hair for more efficent sweating made us more streamlined and dry off much faster, which then got further selected for in aquatic environments which also forced more advanced tool use which then opened up aditional biomes and resources....and now we have adapted to infest every corner of the planet.
EagieDuckCome | 23 hours ago
-slow claps-
Proxy--Moronic | 22 hours ago
-clapping speeds up-
Salute-Major-Echidna | 21 hours ago
Hominids Neanderthal and homo sapien made particular extra efforts to learn to exploit marine environments during several bottleneck events, in particular the Wallacea /southeast Asia areas. Climate change altered the land, but the sea showed fewer and slower amendments.
HambScramble | 15 hours ago
I farm mussels and I always say that at least it’s good in a collapse. They’re super sustainable protein with very little mechanized labor required. It brings a lot of ecological benefit as a practice and has very little downside and is relatively simple. Something about it feels right for my human brain. It’s a rewarding cultivation process and feels very participatory with nature, and the mussels don’t really mind that they’re on a farm I would think, until the harvesting and processing and shipping and cooking of course >.>
I have oysters and mussels that I get to go cook right now! I also love the potlucking abilities that it gives me. I’m always looking for new recipes and Im doing my best to grow the culture because the farm needs it! Totally not self-serving at all
I see your angle and it feels plausible from here, from someone who lives and breathes shellfish 🦪
KIBO_IV | 9 hours ago
God I love shellfish, you're doing the lords work
bigfatfurrytexan | 19 hours ago
We take rocks and fly them to other planets.
WobbleKing | a day ago
Not all submerged. The Sahara is a goldmine of ancient sites.
The research will come
Echo017 | 23 hours ago
Too bad it is so hard to do field work there, so many early whales, spinos, and leftovers from the "green Sahara" period which from what we do know had a fascinating biome
JellyfishMinute4375 | 20 hours ago
IIRC your theory is at least partly corroborated by genetic evidence. I believe it is discussed in Deep Ancestry: Inside the Genographic Project. There is strong evidence that human migration followed coastlines
HoldMyMessages | 13 hours ago
There is an older theory, I haven’t heard it in awhile, that based on the direction and reduction of our hair growth providing more streamlining for swimming, the fat underlayment under our skin providing more insulation for water activity and the wrinkling of the skin on our fingers providing better grasping in water as evidenced we spent some time in water as hominids
I_think_were_out_of_ | 12 hours ago
It’s not just coasts. We go inland….along the rivers. I consider us riparian obligates as much as anything.
randomlemon9192 | 10 hours ago
Some Neanderthal populations lived exclusively on marine prey. Their populations diets and habits (much like ours) were quite different from each other.
IndiRefEarthLeaveSol | 20 hours ago
All that nutritious omega fatty oils, are brains were bathed in.
Oddisredit | 10 hours ago
I agree. But weird things crop up like shellfish allergies. Which makes me think we did a lot of coastal living but sometimes or something made us go inland for extended periods?
mrszubris | 7 hours ago
Aquatic ape is my FAVE theory.
Lazy_Resolve_9747 | 15 hours ago
We ultimately came from the ocean. I agree with you, but isn’t our aquatic history enough of an explanation?
Petrichordates | 23 hours ago
Except modern humans didnt evolve on a coast, which immediately disproves this theory.
jessepence | 22 hours ago
East Africa and the Middle East have a huge coast line?
Edit: I researched a bit, and even the inland candidates like the Great Rift Valley are filled with lakes and rivers.
notAllBits | a day ago
Our genetics imply a near extinction of our species. Neanderthals are extinct. I do not want to swap with the individuals in that cave in their time.
lynbod | 23 hours ago
This isn't actually true, this concept of there being a near-extinction level event for modern humans was disregarded decades ago but for some reason persists. There are genetic bottlenecks in various populations caused by initial migratory groups being small and then expanding in isolation, but as a species there's never been a "near extinction" event.
notAllBits | 23 hours ago
I get the temporal misalignment, but the reason of the proliferation of that theory are the publications in leading scientific journals (science, proceedings of national academy of sciences, and many others)
mystyc | 13 hours ago
There is some evidence that humans occupied the intertidal zones where, when the tide recedes, puddles are left with entrapped sea life. I imagine it was like a buffet for those who have not developed any fishing gear more sophisticated then a sharp stick.
To summarize, or to make a long story short, in some of these areas there have been findings of tools and compactified fossils that suggests human activity. Here "tools" means flakes of rocks, like obsidian, that are not native to these locations.
So it isn't impossible to see evidence of the coastal life of our ancestors.
There's also a bit of genetic evidence to reconstruct how coastal humans might have lived. This is usually about haplotypes, but there's also the Bajau people (aka, the "sea nomads") who have physiologically adapted to their lifestyle of free-diving fishing. They have a few genes that alter their blood and the deep diving reflex to better handle spending so much time underwater. They can also hold their breath, on average, longer than other humans, but I don't know if that involves any genetic changes.
Other than that, I don't think humans have any special adaptations to support the idea of having aquatic monkey-men in our lineage.
Chevey0 | 7 hours ago
It’s such a shame we can’t scan under the silt of the ocean to find evidence before the end of the ice age.
Other-Comfortable-64 | a day ago
Yeah Homo Sapiens did that too, nothing radical here.
BreadKnifeSeppuku | a day ago
There's even examples within the last hundred years due to famine/war etc
Morbanth | a day ago
I'd bet you five euros it's happening somewhere right now.
mini-z1994 | 23 hours ago
Wouldn't surprise me if one of those uncontactable tribes are this way where humans are on the menu because they are outsiders or whatever really.
Morbanth | 22 hours ago
I was rather thinking South Sudan or some other place in a besieged city.
jellobend | 10 hours ago
I was thinking about billionnaires
MessNox | 22 hours ago
it's probably happening in first world countries as well.
the_town_bike | 22 hours ago
Especially if we keep destroying their ecosystem/food source
PerhapsDeceased | 13 hours ago
Been happening with the billionaires for the last couple of decades at least
somafiend1987 | 23 hours ago
There were still cannibal tribes in Indonesia in the 1940s and 50s. A friend's grandmother was the last generation to have eaten neighboring tribes before she was 12. By 16, she spoke 2 additional languages, married a dutch sailor, and settled in the US. All 4 of her daughters doubted her stories, but then visited her island in their 30s and stopped doubting. She didn't pass away until the 2010s.
Ms_Emilys_Picture | 22 hours ago
Or being stuck in the Chilean mountains after a plane crash surrounded by frozen bodies.
roygbivasaur | 23 hours ago
Slave owners in the US allegedly practiced cannibalism as well.
DocumentExternal6240 | 21 hours ago
Crazy - never heard about this, so I googled.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Delectable_Negro
https://www.sciencedirect.com/org/science/article/pii/S1382237322000484
https://www.academia.edu/91641242/Edible_People_The_Historical_Consumption_of_Slaves_and_Foreigners_and_the_Cannibalistic_Trade_in_Human_Flesh
And no, homo sapiens isn’t better, really.
Agueybana | 21 hours ago
> homo sapiens isn’t better
We're very often better at hiding the parts of our history that embarrasses us.
DocumentExternal6240 | 5 hours ago
only because we have so much to hide over a long time 😅
ellecamille | 23 hours ago
What? I’ve never heard this.
dandrevee | 23 hours ago
Probably in the future too, if we get off our butts and start ritually cannibalizing the uber Rich for breaking other social mores
neocondiment | 15 hours ago
And on Epstein Island!
seldom_r | 23 hours ago
I'm always immediately turned off any thesis that uses a comparison between homo neanderthal and homo sapien with a morality or violence clause.
One thing we know without a doubt is that homo sapien has always demonstrated it's okay with destruction in order to survive. The dogma that neanderthal or any other human species was not as civilized or sophisticated just won't die. We can't stop killing each other and I guess it makes us feel superior to assume neanderthals were worse.
We didn't evolve from neanderthals, they weren't less than us and we don't really know if their psychology was similar. Human development is not linear. We know what we're capable of but it doesn't mean the other humans were too.
Ms_Emilys_Picture | 22 hours ago
There's evidence of cannibalism at Jamestown.
Individually, people can be a lot of things. But as a species, we're meant to survive. Sometimes that means turning to cannibalism, and we've got tons of evidence to prove it.
DrawPitiful6103 | 20 hours ago
The natives called it 'long pig'... never cared for it myself.
DeBlasioDeBlowMe | 20 hours ago
Yes. Also, “Neanderthals … apparently didn't share the squeamishness we Homo sapiens feel at the idea of eating our fellow humans.”
There’s no proof whatsoever about that. They may have been racked with guilt the same way modern day survivors have been when faced with these life and death choices.
riffter | 4 hours ago
Ops breathless claims of universal taboo are so counterfactual to be almost funny.
valkenar | 23 hours ago
Interesting subject, but I hate the sensationalism of this article.
shah_reza | 22 hours ago
Pop Mechanics has that tendency. It was a great read as a kid and teen, much less so as an educated adult.
earlyworm | 22 hours ago
Experts reached a horrifying conclusion: Neanderthals were delicious.
Echo017 | 23 hours ago
It would be interesting to know if it was a funeral right, along the lines of "this beloved person will live on in the bodies of their tribe" a ritualistic combat thing "we have killed and consumed our rivals/enemies" or if it was during a period of incredible hardship "person in our tribe died, everyone is starving, dead person is made of meat"
usefulbuns | 18 hours ago
If I recall correctly in Kindred which is an incredible and comprehensive book on Neanderthals the author mentioned how the skeletons were not strewn about despite having butchering marks. Like they were taken apart, eaten, and put back together. Hinting it could have been your first mention about a member living on through the rest kind of thing.
Banjoschmanjo | 18 hours ago
rite*
shannonshanoff | 22 hours ago
Did you read the article?
Echo017 | 21 hours ago
I did, I meant more in general from other cases of remains found with similar butchering evidence but was not clear in my original reply
thejoeface | 20 hours ago
>”Neanderthal cannibalism appears to encompass a broad range of motivations,” the researchers said in a study published in Scientific Reports. “However, despite its apparent recurrence and timeframe, interpreting [it] remains particularly challenging, especially given the fragmentary condition of most skeletal assemblages and the difficulties in assessing the cultural contexts in which these practices occurred.”
We have no way of telling if this is a case of endo- or exo-cannibalism. We have no way of telling if this was something done in times of hardship or as a funerary rite. Maybe they had different ways of handling men, women, and children and that’s why there’s no adult male skeletons present. Maybe the male skeleton parts were too fragmentary to discern.
FrankCantRead | 22 hours ago
I don’t want to be a bummer or anything, but cannibalism is way more prevalent than people realize. Tons of it happened in Europe during bad years. Tons is an over exaggeration but it happened often enough to be recorded. And there are reports and/or rumors (I can’t find where I read this) but lynchings in the South sometimes led to cannibalism for whatever racist reasons. I don’t think it happens much at all anymore except here and there like dahlmer or in severe situations like donner party. But historically speaking, it wasn’t uncommon to do it as a way to establish dominance? Erase the enemy? Or an unhinged racist claiming eating a lesser being is no different than beef or pork. It’s unsettling and horrifying that our history has things like this. They’re not widely known for obvious reasons but you can find it in your library and credible historical or reference websites. All that being said it’s an incredible discovery. Every dig gives us answers and new questions. I love science.
thejoeface | 20 hours ago
We also have cultures who fairly recently practiced endo-cannibalism as a funerary rite. Being horrified at eating other humans is cultural and not biological.
boycott-evil | 15 hours ago
The current Haitian gang boss has at least sampled human flesh in a dominance show.
FrankCantRead | 15 hours ago
I did not know that and wow
classicalworld | 14 hours ago
Famine - and shipwrecks
coco_fr10 | 22 hours ago
i know we like to perpetuate that neanderthals were 'more primitive/animal' than us 'oh so evolved' sapiens but we know homo sapiens has a longgg history of cannibalism too (and that's only what's on current record) often for ritualistic purposes and far more common and recent than we've been led to (and like to) believe.
Gastropod podcast has a great episode on it
https://gastropod.com/cannibalism-from-calories-to-kuru/
Myis | 22 hours ago
Dammit Ayla.
DickWater | 11 hours ago
Eating another human to survive thousands of years ago during antiquitous society is one thing - flying all your rich, famous and powerful friends to your island to eat parts of babies and children in the present is truly crazed and evil.
DrachenDad | 20 hours ago
Homosapiens did that to, in some places we still do. Being it was Neanderthal bones found what says it was Neanderthals being cannibals, and not Homosapiens cannibalising their cousins?
wyald23 | 19 hours ago
"Fuck vegan, go cannibal!"
Anonymous neanderthalensis
DanishWhoreHens | 13 hours ago
Hungry modern people still eat other people given the right set of circumstances… the siege of Leningrad and the Great Chinese Famine being such examples. I’m not sure why they are characterizing it as so shocking that neanderthals would engage in the behavior in this article. I’d be shocked if they hadn’t.
MurseMackey | a day ago
I wonder whether a lot of diseases that we currently understand as genetically-based with prion overlap like Parkinson's, ALS, etc. might have originally proliferated this way.
Spare-Locksmith-2162 | a day ago
Actually, prions can spontaneously appear. The diseases don't need to proliferate from eating, there just be an inheritable gene that makes a fragile protein prone to misfolding.
Rozenheg | 21 hours ago
Parkinson’s seems mostly an environmental disease. See recent study about the age (read level of contamination by modern pollutants) of the drinking water and its relationship to rates od Parkinson’s.
getaway_dreamer | 21 hours ago
Do we know that these particular fellows weren't starving at the time? It might not have been considered an ideal situation.
Master-Pangolin-353 | 20 hours ago
Is it possible that at least some of the cannibalism was related to funeral rites instead of predation?
https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/news/2023/october/oldest-evidence-of-human-cannibalism-as-a-funerary-practice.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endocannibalism
predat3d | 22 hours ago
"There is NO cannibalism among our Neanderthal brethren. And when I say there is none, I mean, there is certain amount."
OnlyImprovement9796 | 22 hours ago
This is not surprising at all.
glormond | 23 hours ago
Just imagine if they survived, there could be actually two different sentient species on Earth
NeedNameGenerator | 22 hours ago
There could be many more than just neanderthals. But knowing our penchance for racism, I'd imagine that'd be turned up to 11 if we had actual different species of homos walking around the planet.
Haunt_Fox | 21 hours ago
Stone-age humans didn't think in terms of "the human species", but in terms of their own band and tribe. Most tribal names simply translate out to "The People", which is why those names are never translated, unlike, say, animal or other nature names that bands might have.
Which means that other human(-like creatures), to them, were seen as "animals that can speak", "animals that trade", etc. Not necessarily treated with hostility, but not "fully a person" like those of your own tribe, who share your family band's language, beliefs, and customs.
So if you were to ask them if they are "cannibals", they would say "Certainly not! We don't eat our own kind", even as they're chowing down on enemy thigh.
Flashy_Emergency_263 | 21 hours ago
That sounds a bit like some tribes in South America and some other continents/islands.
CrisCanadian | 21 hours ago
I learned this in my Ancient People’s class 4 years ago so I’m sure this isn’t exactly new news unless my prof just assumed it at the time
Global_Snow_5220 | 16 hours ago
So the 13th Warrior was right
MetaStressed | 9 hours ago
We are and have always been animals, plain and simple.
TeeStar | 7 hours ago
Waste not want not.
I wonder what was going on for this to happen.
blahblahgingerblahbl | 6 hours ago
isn’t this common knowledge? i’ve been telling ppl for YEARS that the actual paleo diet included other paleos.
-Renee | 3 hours ago
Lots of examples of homo sapiens cannibals, too. From cultural practices, to fetishes, to survival needs.
Flashy_Emergency_263 | 21 hours ago
Wow! It's a good thing no homo sapiens ever committed cannibalism. We are soooo much better than Neanderthals.
Right, Donner Party descendants?
electronDog | 22 hours ago
Oh I think Homo sapiens definitely get the win on disturbing…read The Rape of Nanking.
secrectsea | 23 hours ago
Lol
FigureFourWoo | 20 hours ago
They needed food and meat is meat. The idea of cannibalism being “horrifying” is a social belief, not a natural belief. If it’s easier to hunt your neighbors for food than brave the wilderness, you’re going to take the path of least resistance.
Mrslinkydragon | 17 hours ago
Ideally itll be another clan and not your own...
Nephurus | 13 hours ago
From my understanding this is not new .bones with signs of predation by them and other hominids
Ok-Sentence-6419 | 16 hours ago
Yeh this is well known and it led to Cro Magnon, modern day Whites, forming tribes and settlements to defend themselves.
[OP] DryDeer775 | 14 hours ago
We don't know what kind of social organization Cro-Magnon had, although some sort of kinship-based organization ("tribes") is likely, and there is no reason to think that neanderthals didn't have something similar. They certainly interbred with Cro-Magnons.
There is absolutely no reason to think that Cro-Magnons were "white." in fact it is more likely that their skin was pigmented.
Biologically speaking, "race" is a social construct rather than a rigid genetic category. Humans share 99.9% of their DNA; the traits we associate with race are adaptations to environment occurring on the very surface of our genetic makeup.If you’re looking for a specific "start date," science suggests that the specific combination of "white" traits we recognize today only became widespread in Europe roughly 5,000 to 8,000 years ago (during the Bronze Age). Before that, Europeans looked significantly different than they do today.
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thespice | 13 hours ago
Great response. Thank you. And thank you for not smoking kool-aid.
Ok-Sentence-6419 | 7 hours ago
Yeh this isn’t cheddar man where they show the image and then darken it a week later for political wokeness. Already books out regarding this subject and Neanderthals, nothing new in what you posted.
ChosenExaltedOne | 21 hours ago
Everything is being revealed overtime, we are also going to find Atlantis.
Call me crazy but i theres something going on both personal and in the world, i have gained talents that automatically make me draw masterpieces and i can dance to any music, i also can defeat anyone in combat. All automatic, like muscle memory but i have no clue how i activated all this. I also can speak some foreign language, it has vocabulary and it combines well with movement.
Maybe someone out there can explain it, perhaps its acquired Savant syndrome.
Jealous_Disaster_738 | 12 hours ago
That explains why it is Homo Sapian not Neanderthal took over the world, we are the kindest Sapian, we cooperated with each other more frequent than any other species.