Recipe for Resurrection- Return of the Neanderthals..?

Neanderthals, our long extinct cousins weren't as stupid as everyone thinks they were. They had larger brains than modern day humans but still never developed into huge civilizations. Some of the things they did-

Recent genetic research have demonstrated that Neanderthals contributed at least 1-4% to the non-African genome. Aspie Quiz have demonstrated in a large survey in the US population that Afroamericans have only 1/6 of the autism incidence of non-African groups.

Wood-working for shelters and fences
Rodeo-type injuries from wrestling large animals
Flutes and whistles for calling upon animals
Animals killed & eaten at the top of their usability
Many of the bones are of currently domestic species, and several of these "speciated" during the Neanderthal era
High-protein diet of Neanderthals

90,000 - 100,000 years ago Neanderthals had phalange whistles. 41 of them have been found in Prolom II in the Crimea. 70,000 - 80,000 years ago there is a flute in Haua Fteah, Libya, which has been found together with Neanderthal mandibles. Finally, 40,000 years ago there is another flute in Divje Babe

Cooperation with wolves were most likely a key to the ability for Neanderthals to survive in the cold Europe. Genetic research shows that dog and wolf parted 135,000 years ago. 76 They also reveal that the dogs ancestor is the European gray wolf.

Mitochondrial DNA lineages go back at least 300,000 years. A lot of the lineages are considerably older than 10,000 years when the horse was supposedly domesticated. 85 This result seems to indicate Neanderthals were involved in horse domestication as well.

www.rdos.net...

This gives us an important clue to why Neanderthals failed in the competition with Homo Sapiens. One of the most important means by which innovations are preserved and transmitted is language. Neanderthals had language themselves.

The overall conclusion would be that, although Neanderthals did have the ability to speak, they were capable of articulating only a smaller number of phonemes. Jared Diamond described this limitation using the following example: imagine how many words you could say if the only sounds you were able to make were a, u, c, p. Imagine trying to say "Trinity College is a fine place to work." All you could say were something like "Capupa Cappap up a cap capupap."

news.softpedia.com...

Clearly, they were intelligent. However it seems like their language was limited and might be why they could not gather technology like our ancestors did.





From National Geographic -

For now, the Neanderthal genome is an abstract string of billions of DNA letters stored in computer databases. But it naturally sparks the imagination: Could scientists use that genetic blueprint to create neo-Neanderthals in the flesh? In the not-so-distant future, advances in genetic engineering might enable that feat, experts say. But whether such a resurrection should happen is another story.

If a human cell could be Neanderthalized, it would be implanted into the womb of a surrogate mother, either a woman or a chimp, and then develop into a fetus. But this step, too, would be extremely challenging. "We know from cloning experience that there's a very high failure rate," says geneticist James Noonan of Yale University.

Cannot post video from this link but its a much watch for how resurrection would happen.
news.nationalgeographic.com...

So my fellow ATS'ers what do you think? Now that we have the technology to bring back our distant cousins the Neanderthals? Should we? Personally I would be interested in if their higher brain capacity could give us a leap in technology or if we could use their genome to further our own evolution..

Yup, I guess they are my relatives. They made whistles to whistle at the girls walking by their construction sites.

Good thread OP. I feel that the northern Europeans have more neanderthal in them. I think that Neanderthals may have been white.

reply to post by rickymouse


Actually east asians have the highest Neanderthal DNA. Seems to coincide with higher IQ (completely subjectively). People in our populations with high amount of mixing are usually autistic..

www.genetics.org...

you sure they are extinct as i seem to see a lot of neanderthals on a daily basis

There was a thread a while back about scientists looking for women to be surrogate mothers to Neanderthal babies. Neanderthal and early modern humans could obviously communicate as both cultures shared many similarities including their burial practices, the same can be said for Denisovans too. I don't think Neanderthal could enhance Homo Sapien Sapien gene pool today, unless you like hairy women.

Scientist seeks surrogate mother for Neanderthal baby thread

reply to post by LeLeu


They have bigger brains than us, better eyes, more strength. Kids who have more of their genes usually have different thought process eg: Autistic people. I wonder how a developed but differently evolved brain would work especially with modern technology.. thanks for the thread link

reply to post by an0nThinker


Neanderthal did have a larger brain case, and more robust skeleton for sure, but Homo Sapien were slightly more efficent and perhaps better breeders. I think our ancestors simply had better neural networks that enabled them to succeed over other hominids. This is an interesting subject.

reply to post by LeLeu


Better breeders for sure. Also neanderthals had smaller frontal lobes which means they socialized less and had less imagination.
listverse.com...

reply to post by rickymouse


They were almost bound to be light skinned. Living though harsh winters, inside a hut or cave, with animal skin clothing, vitamin D deficiency would have been a significant problem---and it would have been much worse if they had significant amounts of melanin in their skin.

Originally posted by MuzzleBreak
reply to post by rickymouse

 

They were almost bound to be light skinned. Living though harsh winters, inside a hut or cave, with animal skin clothing, vitamin D deficiency would have been a significant problem---and it would have been much worse if they had significant amounts of melanin in their skin.

Sounds like you are describing New Yorkers. Caves...apartment buildings...same thing.