5 ms·
What our DNA reveals about the sex life of Neanderthals
https://archive.is/9mQKV https://archive.is/9mQKV
- marojejian 7mo agoBoy it so tempting to come up with "just so" stories to explain this. And so frustrating that we will probably never be able to determine the answer. but still cool.
- Terr_ 7mo agoBefore anyone jaunts too far down the road of literal survivorship bias, I'd like to point out that it'd be incredibly premature—or perhaps way too late—to speculate much on the social side of things. Elsewhere I've seen some people making hay about exactly whose-males were with whose-females, and want to point out that it's normal for genes to cause asymmetries. In particular, consider the modern problem of RH incompatibility [0], where one pairing is more likely to end up with a child than an identical but gender-bent one. [0] https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/diseases/21053-rh-factor https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/diseases/21053-rh-fact...
- maxrf 7mo agoor even as simple as mitochondria...
- catcowcostume 7mo agoIs there any non-paywalled link for this?
- garciasn 7mo agohttps://archive.is/9mQKV https://archive.is/9mQKV For future reference: head on over to archive.is or .ph and you, too, can get around the paywall.
- jyscao 7mo agoAny browser with reader mode should also work. Worked for me on Brave, both mobile and desktop.
- Beijinger 7mo agoI recommend the "Pass paywalls clean" plug-in
- coolius 7mo agohere's an iOS shortcut that automates the process: https://www.icloud.com/shortcuts/81c670b532e340e38a35cc62e3e9397d https://www.icloud.com/shortcuts/81c670b532e340e38a35cc62e3e...
- nemosaltat 7mo agoIn those days, there were γίγαντες and also after.
- jjtheblunt 7mo agoevidently, i'm not the only one who has watched Ancient Aliens (though with the fam for historical mysteries blended with hilarity)
- rayiner 7mo ago[flagged]
- rngfnby 7mo agoWell, ya. Of course it was rape. And in retaliation we genocided them, hence the lack of Y and mRNA.
- jyscao 7mo ago>And in retaliation we genocided them This is far from being the only or even main explanation to their extinction. The Neanderthal populations were extremely inbred, so I'd guess that was a bigger factor to their decline.
- treyd 7mo ago> and mRNA This might be seen as a bit of a nitpick but I believe you mean mtDNA (mitochondrial).
- SoftTalker 7mo agoWe don't know that, and we don't know that neanderthal males were more prone to rape than homo sapiens males. And it's weird to even apply the 21st century concept of rape to prehistoric societies.
- bloqs 7mo agoI have to agree, theres a bizarre and worrying internet-brained hysterical element to that original comment which betrays a totally absent education. the casual title is because of the scientific and prehistoric nature of the subject
- deleted 7mo ago[deleted]
- TimorousBestie 7mo agoHowever, if one happens to be a race science type, there’s a lot of profit that can be made telling suggestive “just so” stories about which homo sapiens genetic lines are allegedly tainted with a larger proportion of neanderthal genes, or however that’s supposed to work.
- jyscao 7mo agoPresumably this hypothesis is meant to explain why there is this observed asymmetry in the type of Neanderthal DNA we find in modern human populations that contain them, which is entirely autosomal. With none in the mitochondrial form, which is exclusively passed down along the female line, and also none in the Y-chromosome form, which is exclusively passed down along the male line. Without weighing on the validity of their hypothesis that one or both sides found the other“especially attractive”, an alternative mechanism that could explain why we only see Neanderthal autosomal DNA in modern humans could be that only the female offspring of male-Neanderthal and female-sapiens pairings were reproductively fertile. This is more commonly the case in interspecies hybrids, see Haldane’s rule.
- microgpt 7mo agowhy no mitochondrial then?
- jyscao 7mo agoBecause these hybrids would contain mtDNA from their human female line. Neanderthal mtDNA could only be passed down by Neanderthal females. And because none of those are found in any modern human populations, we can conclude no humans today are descended from female Neanderthals. Though whether hybridized descendants from male-sapiens female-Neanderthal pairings never existed, or they did exist for some time then eventually went extinct, we cannot currently say with certainty.
- jjtheblunt 7mo ago> we can conclude no humans today are descended from female Neanderthals. that looks worded wrong, strictly speaking. if there's a male neanderthal ancestor, then he very likely has a neanderthal mom or grandma or ... great^N grandma for some N.
- jyscao 7mo agoOk yes, you're right. Guess I meant to say: no humans today are descended from someone between a male sapenis-female Neanderthals hybrid.
- dzink 7mo agoOne reason for that might be the size of the baby homo sapiens scull/head upon birth. Bigger brain might have meant female Neanderthals couldn’t give birth to Homo Sapiens babies. Just a theory.
- senderista 7mo agoNeanderthals had larger cranial capacity than modern humans.
- tempestn 7mo agoPossibly not at birth?
- trick-or-treat 7mo ago[dead]
- aurareturn 7mo agoYou do realize that Neanderthals had significantly bigger brain sizes than Homo sapiens?
- DeathArrow 7mo agoI always wondered if Neanderthals disappeared or if they melted in the general human population since it was quite possible their numbers were much smaller than Homo Sapiens.
- b112 7mo agoOne thing, this jives in some fashion. If we all seem to have neanderthal DNA in us, then we're all the progeny of someone which, to a degree, preferred certain "cross-pollination" behaviours. Certainly, there would have been no revulsion. And potentially, there would have been preference. So if so, well.. why wouldn't that preference continue in the line?
- vasco 7mo ago> Certainly, there would have been no revulsion Farmers have sex with goats. I think you underestimate the places a lonely guy is willing to put his dick in.
- ThrowawayTestr 7mo agoManatees were the choice for sailors