Neanderthals in the News

[Dark Lightning]

It would have been an unpleasant situation, all around. I remember having a tooth extracted that I could taste the pus when I pushed on it with my tongue. Not a pleasant taste. I was 11 years old, and pretty sure I didn't even have a toothbrush. We were poor. I honestly don't know how the dentist got paid. That would have been in '63; I think that the parents signed for a second mortgage that year by candle light, because the power (and gas heat) had already been turned off.

[Recusant]

Yes, a bit amazing (pun intended) and I think indirect evidence of language capacity in the Neanderthal, though I think that question is already in the past. I think without language it would be excessively difficult if not impossible to convey the idea of grinding a sharp rock in somebody's tooth to (eventually!) relieve the pain. 

[zorkan]

https://english.elpais.com/science-tech/2026-02-16/ludovic-slimak-on-neanderthals-it-was-suicide-humans-disappear-when-they-no-longer-want-to-live-because-their-values-have-collapsed.html

A reason to ditch AI?

[Recusant]

https://english.elpais.com/science-tech/2026-02-16/ludovic-slimak-on-neanderthals-it-was-suicide-humans-disappear-when-they-no-longer-want-to-live-because-their-values-have-collapsed.html

A reason to ditch AI?

Hmm, El Pais wanted me to sign up to read the article. There is an archived version here. That version also pops up a sign-up request, but refreshing the page gets rid of it.

Slimak presents an intriguing hypothesis, but I don't think there's any clear evidence to support it. He claims that Neanderthals had a fundamentally different brain structure such that even if he raised one with his own children "There would be something inside them that would condition them to see the world in their own way; limitations that not even the culture I taught them could overcome." Maybe there's physical evidence to substantiate that claim, but I doubt it.

However he also extrapolates from human mentality (essentially claiming that Neanderthals would exhibit a reaction to cultural shock that is seen in some Homo sapiens) as evidence to support his hypothesis. It's self-contradictory. If you hypothesize that Neanderthal had a fundamentally different brain structure then you can't use the mentality of some Homo sapiens to support your hypothesis about Neanderthal behavior. Maybe he's able to mend that contradiction convincingly in his book but I don't see how. I'd think he'd have explained it in the interview.

[zorkan]

Not sure if you have read his book.
Not only did it challenge the way I think about Neanderthals, but it provided a great answer to why Catholics are obsessed with love and the eucharist. They are linked by cannibalism.

He had written an earlier book on Neanderthals.

[Recusant]

In my post it's clear that I've not read the book. If you have, maybe you can explain how Slimak supports his claim regarding the difference between the mentalities of Neanderthal and anatomically modern humans and overcomes the contradiction within his hypothesis.