megrdj
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Presenting: Cro-Magnon v. Neanderthal in the Battle of Extinction
Back in pre-historic times, say, 130,000-30,000 years ago, Europe was dominated not by quaint cafes and dainty bakeries, but by a group of not-quite humans called Neanderthals. In the form of a common insult, their legacy lives on today, and perhaps more accurately than we think: new research suggests that the Neanderthal's extinction was not due to climate change (as was previously argued) but rather to their inability to beat the competition, which came in the form of Cro-Magnon—the first anatomically modern human population.
1.4.2009 at 06:01am - Comment by megrdjMore likely they caught some disease from us that swept through the population and killed most of them. A more modern version of this is when the Europeans moved to the Americas and interacted with the Indians and they died in massive numbers. Interestingly there was some event that reduced the modern human population down to extremely low numbers (a bottleneck event) around 50,000 years ago. Could we have caught something from them as well?
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December 2009: Best of What's New
In our December issue, Popular Science names the 100 best innovations of the year: bombproof wallpaper, self-parking cars, the fastest helicopter, and 97 more. Plus inventor profiles and videos.
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