When Neandertals Became Apex Predators

Climbing to the summit of the Eurasian food chain was one of the Neandertals’ most impressive evolutionary feats, but in the end, it may have actually been what doomed them.

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References:

[TonyTylerDraws]

I think one of the reason we started looking at Neanderthals as more sophisticated is because we started finding more of their DNA in ours 😂

[TsuchiGamer]

"no mean feat getting all of that feet meat"

crazy line reading LOL

[talideon]

From what I've read, the reason the Neanderthals didn't adopt our hunting style was in part down to a non-obvious physical different: modern humans have a much greater degree of arm motion around the shoulders, allowing us to throw overarm, which is really useful if you want to be able to throw long distances accurately and with force.

[rl]

Cave Lion: “I fear no animal, but that thing…”

Neanderthals: (thinking about how great of an idea of stabbing things with sharp sticks would be)

Cave Lion: “It scares me.”

[KoneSkirata]

In "The Last Neanderthal" by Claire Cameron we follow the perspective of a neanderthal who struggles to survive in a landscape once home to vast numbers of her kin, who now face extinction through a number of different factors, Homo sapiens being one. It's tragic and very, very lonely, but also full of love and hope. Great read imo.

[brettsmith]

The hot air balloon scene cracked me up. Thank you for all of the research and presentation you do over there at PBS.

[Alice_Walker]

I absolutely LOVE all these early human ish videos. Thank you so much! 💜

[Alias_Anybody]

This reminds me of those "human vs" scenarios, which always bug me, because all humans starting with Homo Erectus distinctly evolved to actually put those brains and legs to use, not to casually walk into the forest and punch some deer. Give me 20 buddies, hunting bows, stone tipped spears and javelins, flint daggers and bone clubs, and we'll see how many animals can still beat us.

[elmorty]

I NEED to know: Who wrote the epic feet meat pun? I mean, there is the obvious choice, but dad jokes contagion is real.

[Cornerdog]

I have a sudden urge to rewatch Genndy Tartakovsky's Primal.

[cnawan]

I'd like to know more about Neanderthal clothing, and tool use and construction in general. I've read that we haven't found any evidence of Neanderthal's using needles or awls, so it's implied that they didn't use tailored clothing in the same way we do, despite living in chilly Northern Europe. There's a lot one can do with tying fabrics together, or tying them to the body with cords, but I wonder if that cold period that coincided with their disappearance was too much for their clothing technologies.

[rl]

Cave Lion and Palaeoloxodon: “We’re immune from predation, right?”

Neanderthals: “…”

Cave Lion and Palaeoloxodon: “Right?”

[sohumshah]

12:49 Lmaooo of course Nico Robin is supporting archeology videos

[xwiick]

Thanks for all the hard work on these videos!

[shipwreck]

I wonder if they realized what was happening. Were any homo sapiens ever like, "there were a lot more neanderthals when I was young."

[wvhaugen]

Glad to hear the emphasis on climatic factors for the demise of the Neandertals. I did my master's thesis on the replacement vs. multiregional model. My favorite theory comes from Ezra Dubrow, who postulated a 1% drop in population replacement would doom the Neandertals to become extinct in 50 generations, or about 1000 years. This was published in 1989 BTW. (You can look up "The demographic modelling of Neanderthal extinction.") Since it took at least 10, 000 years for extinction, the demographic extinction rate was much less than 1% per year. Little pressures add up.

[tiffanymarie]

I think the answer to "why did neanderthals disappear" is all of the above AND cultural assimilation. (Also I'm of the opinion that they haven't truly disappeared, since their descendants are walking around right this moment).

[Akujiking]

Damn the French! They killed the Neanderthals!!

[Binarokaro]

I think their extinction would make a lot of sense if we were to conceptualize Neanderthals as specialists and Sapiens as generalists, because generalist species tend to have more resilience under changing environmental conditions, while specialist species are more vulnerable to extinction if their food source is threatened. Even if Neanderthals and Sapiens partitioned their niche to avoid competing with each other for the same prey, changing climates and ecosystems would have threatened their food source

[smurfyday]

Within the past week a study came out that argued all human species, along with large animals, went extinct in Europe during the climatic changes you mentioned towards the end. The climate would swing from cool to ice age within a person's lifetime. Both Neanderthals & homo sapiens disappeared. Modern humans appeared to have survived not because of their superiority in any way, but other sapiens went elsewhere in Asia, survived the catastrophes, and came back to repopulate the continent.