Neanderthal Technology

Angela

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See:
https://www.pnas.org/content/early/2019/10/15/1907828116

"[h=2]Significance[/h][FONT=&quot]We report the discovery of a 50,000-y-old Neandertal tar-hafted flint tool found off the present-day Dutch coastline. The production of birch tar adhesives was a major technological development, demonstrating complex Neandertal technology and advanced cognitive ability. The rarity of Middle Paleolithic adhesive finds makes each new discovery crucial for improving our understanding of Neandertal lifeways. We demonstrate that birch tar was a routine part of the Neandertal technological repertoire. In addition, the complex know-how required for adhesive production in northwestern Europe during Marine Isotope Stage 4 and 3 was maintained in small groups leading highly mobile lives. This suggests a degree of task specialization and supports the hypothesis that ecological risk drives the development of complex technology."[/FONT]
 

I certainly think that's a possibility.

However, homo sapiens sapiens was also a small, interbred population always on the verge of extinction. We made it. Was it just luck?

I wouldn't bet against superior technology being part of the equation, along with other factors.

I think it's informative that Neanderthal genes seem to be associated with issues with verbal communication. That's a big handicap.

Still, luck always helps. :)
 

The report says that according to that study: "[FONT=&quot]he first was inbreeding, which harms the fitness of the population. The second involved so-called Allee effects, where small populations fail to grow because of limited mate choice, and have too few people to hunt, protect food from other animals, and raise the group’s children."

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To me that sounds a lot like a severe lack of social and political skills (compared to us at least) to create complex societies and maintain networks and alliances with other communities and individuals, perhaps partly related to the assumed deficiency in complex verbal communication that Angela alludes to. Homo sapiens sapiens peoples have been practicing exogamy and creating long-distance political alliances and trade networks since a very long time ago, well before the Neolithic. Well before their groups' survival became unsustainable modern humans would've sought to contact other groups or even merge with them (peacefully or not).

Maybe they were just as intelligent as us in many things, but not in interpersonal intelligence, which is key in the long term. Were the Neanderthals perhaps comparably antisocial and unexploring? Even if they were just as capable of practical deeds as the Homo sapiens sapiens, were they too isolated from each other to resist hardships and thrive via mutual cooperation? I remember having read that Neanderthal genes related to melancholy and preference for loneliness and isolation. Something tells me their behavior might have been more relevant than their material culture for their demise.
 
Angela: Since this is the only Neanderthal Thread I saw, I was wondering if you are going to start a thread about the recent finding of Neanderthal admixture in Sub-Saharan Populations that was just announced on 30 January by some major academic researchers. One implication for the study is that there could have been an even earlier admixture event between Neanderthals and Sapiens. Not a thread I wanted to started because there are some Neanderthal-Cist (not a word I know) out there on youtube and blogs, etc.
 

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