Sunday, July 7, 2019

Why were there two different species of early hominids?

Joseph Layden
Joseph Layden, Author of The Unnamed Bears Favor
There were lot more than that. We have at least five represented in our genome. There are a good deal more represented in the fossil record.
In short, the answer is “That’s how evolution works.”
Up until now, scientists have grossly underestimated the role hybridization plays in speciation.
For example, the ancestors of chimps and humans did not simply split apart 12 million years ago and then evolve into chimps and humans.
Rather, 12 million years ago one group of apes speciated into multiple types of ape. For the next 9 million years these multiple lineages occasionally interbred with one another. They formed many hybrids, which became species, which occasionally mated with one another….becoming more hybrid species.
Once, there were various species of apes all over Eurasia, Africa, and Sundaland.
The only great apes who survived multiple extinction events, assimilation/genocide by Denisovans, then assimilation by Neanderthals, then assimilation by us are Orangs, Chimps, Bili apes, Bonobos, and gorillas (and us).
Note: assimilation is the process by which one species “absorbs” another, keeping only the genes they need.
Before medicine, it was usually necessary for a species to gain immunities for a particular environment by hybridizing with sub-species who already lived there.
Until the Upper Paleolithic, there were usually at least two species of ape in any ecosystem; a large bodied and a small bodied one. Often there was a third medium-sized ape, either a hybrid of the two or an invasive species in the process of assimilating the other two. population moving in to assimilate both.
Thus, the various “ape niches” within any ecosystem were filled and exploited.
We are hybrids of various hominins that were assimilated during the Upper Paleolithic and Mesolithic.
We are one part tribe of Y Haplogroup Adam, one part tribe of Mito Eve, and one part tribe of LM3 (the “sister species” of Homo Sapiens who left a part of their mtDNA in our 11th Chromosome).
The vast majority of us are also one part Neanderthal. The few who aren’t live in very specific regions of Africa, and are one part something else: a hominid which split from us 1.3 million years ago, a hominid which split from us 700,000 years ago, or an archaic Homo Sapien population which split from us 325 thousand years ago represented by Y Haplogroup A00 (found in only a handful of people from Nigeria).
Some Polynesians and South Asians have genes from a species which broke off 3.1 million years ago.
Most Andaman Islanders and Pacific Islanders have genes from one or more species which broke off 550,000 years ago.
70% of people one Earth have a gene from the Microcephalin D hominid, which initially split from us 1.1 million years ago. And many humn populations have genes from various populations of archaic homo sapiens which split from us over 300 thousand years ago. For instance, most Siberians and Tibetans have genes from the now extinct Paleo=Siberians, and many Africans have genes from a group known as Paleo-East Africans.
This is not unique to ape evolution. Wild monkeys in S. America have introgressed genes from closely related “sister species” of monkey. Domesticated pigs are hybrids of at least three sub-species of wild pig.

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Wednesday, July 3, 2019

Do you think dragons were actually dinosaurs that escaped extinction until humans eliminated them?

Joseph Layden
Joseph Layden, Author of The Unnamed Bears Favor




In a way.
Depictions resembling terror birds, which aren’t much different from dinosaur raptors, have been found in ancient texts concerning “dragons.” Man definitely met giant terrestrial birds in SE Asia, the Pacific, and America and maybe even Eurasia.
Man also met giant flying birds with wingspans of 30 feet. Though the terratorns lived in S. America and would not have contributed to Eurasian dragon legends, we aren’t entirely sure when massive sea birds went extinct. They may have inspired stories of rocs and dragons too.
And birds are technically dinosaurs.
The pig dragons of Ancient China (Hongshan Culture) may have been based on the fossils of certain small sauropod dinosaurs with known fossil beds along the Yellow River.
However, the same culture’s dragon sculptures remind us of the so called “Sirrush” dragon of Babylon. This Sumerian dragon is considered the first known western dragon depiction, but it looks most like a pangolin relative. Pangolins the size of horses roamed Mesolithic Asia, and maybe much later. Though pangolins are armor plated and scaly, they aren’t dinosaurs they’re mammals’.
In many cultures dragons and giant snakes are the same thing, and much bigger snakes existed in ancient times.
Snakes were associated with dragons because of their instinctive knowledge of earthquakes and volcanos, and giant salamanders were associated with volcanos because they’re often found in volcanic lakes. Modern giant salamanders grow to 8 feet and can live 200 years in the wild. In polynesia and in some parts of ancient China, there are stories of virgin sacrifice or mock-sacrifice to dragons who live in volcanos and control the rain.
The Australian aborigines also believed that giant snakes underground controlled the rain.
In parts of ancient China, any breed of horse over 9 feet was considered a dragon.
SE Asia was often considered a place of dragons in both Western and Chinese myth. There have been ginat monitor lizards there since 100,000 years ago…some reaching over 25 foot long. Their breath was “poisonous” and “hot as fire,” just like the earliest Western description of a dragon states.
“Hot as fire” does not mean “fire,” but later writers took their liberties I guess.
Also there were giant turtles in the Pacific with horns and clubbed tales until relatively recently (5000 years ago or later). Like glyptodonts, they are thought to be examples of “convergent evolution” with akylosaur dinosaurs. However, the Pantestudine clade these turtles have been put into is a “wastebasket taxon.” There’s little to link them to other turtles except that they are “anapsids,” which is really no longer a valid reason for association. Some ankylosaurs became anapsids before the YKT Event, and fenestrae counting is no longer a valid criteria. Their skulls are almost identical to late ankylosaurs, not just the tail clubs and horns. All we’ve found of them is skulls, shells, and tails. There is just as big a time gap between them and their supposed turtle-like ancestor as there is between them and ankylosaurs, and they may have more in common. Several species of ankylosaur were fully aquatic and had plastrons, just like turtles.

So who knows we might be talking dinosaurs after all.
Finally, the giant sloth and armadillo evolved from an ancestor with an osteoderm (armor) that burrowed underground. It’s only assumed that the sloth’s fur fully covered its armor.
And we’re just talking about the megafauna we have fossils for here. That’s only about a third of the megafauna we know probably existed during the Paleolithic and later.
So who can truly say? It’s not as crazy as many think, if seen from an informed perspective.

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What were Denisovans like?

Joseph Layden
Joseph Layden, Author of The Unnamed Bears Favor
From what we can tell from their genes and close supposed relatives, they were much like Neanderthals except a good bit taller. At least some of them adapted to extremely high altitudes, hence their lineage is the first known in Tibet and the Altai regions. Sherpas inherited a gene from them which helps survival at high altitudes. 
Female specimens of Western Neanderthals and Denisova relatives such as Dali stand 6 foot tall and are hyper robust. Though male full skeletons haven't been found of them or their lineage, if they had the same sexual dimorphism ration as other archaics that would put males at well over 7 feet tall.
They were extremely sophisticated compared to us, with the first jewelry and sewing needles known.
Because of their association with late Peking Man, who lived with small canines,,,and since the first domesticated dogs hail from the Altai region before homo sapiens are known there…we might suspect they had some kind of canine domestication going on.They lived and breeded with one type of Neanderthal in the Altai, but were replaced by another type of Neanderthal some 32000 years ago, so they may not have been as hyper-aggressive as later Neanderthals.
Because of the early sewing needles, we may assume they had little body hair. Though most scientists assume Neanderthals had lost their body hair too, there are no known Neanderthal sewing needles and they dont seem to have used fire for warmth, even in the artic. Though the gene for nakedness swept through Africa around 1.2 million years ago, there is no reason to assume the same gene underwent positive sexual selection in Neanderthals. i.e. Though one ancestor of Neanderthals entered Europe 60,000 to 900,000 years ago as a naked ape, they seem to have hybridized with Homo Erectus Antecessor there who likely still had fur, Maybe Denisovans still had fur too, and blankets were still needed that high up during the Ice Age. Denisovan would have known about fire, since Peking Man used it, but we don’t know if they used it for warmth. Neanderthals seem to have used it mostly for making complex tars and glue.
So basically they were either like Yetis or like Titans from Greek mythology.


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Tuesday, July 2, 2019

News for the Week 7/02/19 Arctic Neanderthals and Medical Salamanders


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Enter to Win a FREE Copy of The Unnamed Bears Favor

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The Unnamed Bears Favor

“A horn grew from the woman’s forehead—something like a rhino’s, but much smaller and darker in hue.”

Mythical China, 9000 B.C.E. A nameless outcast is summoned by the village priestess to undergo his initiation into the Rik-Sika, a band of hunter-assassins. To earn his place, he must travel with them to the ruins of his people’s stronghold, which sits on a plateau near the roof of the world. On the perilous journey, he encounters restless ghosts, giant man-bears, and the dreaded ogres who rule the mountains. Faced with unimaginable odds, the unnamed discovers his true origins and with it, a powerful secret buried by generations long ago. Armed with dark knowledge, the boy must choose between his life and the fate of his people.

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Monday, July 1, 2019

Why did our ancestors mix with Neanderthals?

One reason is that we didn’t have much choice. They were more advanced and stronger than us during the Middle Paleolithic. When they invaded the Middle East 120,000 to 45,000 years ago they completely eradicated Homo Sapiens from the area, effectively splitting our genome in two. During this time they traded Homo Sapien women from the Levant all the way up to Siberia. Siberian Neanderthals during this time have Levantine Homo Sapien introgression.
Another reason is that it would not have seemed so strange back then. Some of the fossils we call Homo Sapiens nowadays are just as strange compared to us as Neanderthals were. There were no chins before 120,000 years ago, and they didn’t become popular worldwide until around 10,000 years ago.
We are a very specific type of Homo Sapien hybrid, originating from several subspecies of Homo Sapien. Every population on Earth except for sub Saharan pygmies also has at least a dash of Neanderthal too. This is the result of sexual and natural selection. We have experienced several bottlenecks in our evolution and apparently the dominant subspecies of Homo Sapien likes chins and small brow ridges. They chose accordingly while assimilating the world.

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