> “One possibility is that they were looking for caves with running water inside,” Muotri said. “Caves contain lead, so they were all contaminated. I'm not buy

> “One possibility is that they were looking for caves with running water inside,” Muotri said. “Caves contain lead, so they were all contaminated. I'm not buying this claim that all caves contain lead (throughout Europe, at least). Europe is not a wonderland for lead mining. Southern Missouri (USA) historically produced a significant amount of the world's lead supply, but no early hominids evolved there. And I don't understand the figure early in the article. It seems to show that Homo sapiens evolved with quite a lot of lead exposure, while H. neanderthalis did not - so they didn't need our "immunity" to lead. Finally, > “If all humans have this newer mutation in all corners of the world, very strong genetic pressure must have selected for it in our species.” Or, it was present in the bottleneck die-off of H. sapiens 800kya, and hasn't mutated since. The added complexity in organoids in the lab is interesting, but the mere presence of a single base pair in a gene doesn't guarantee that it is genetically important. > “The FOXP2 gene is identical between us and the Neanderthals, but it's how the gene is regulated by NOVA1 that likely contributes to language differences.” That at least does underline the importance of this genetic difference.