Headline March 10, 2018/ ''' NEANDERTHALS SAD NEANDERSCOPE '''

''' NEANDERTHALS 

SAD NEANDERSCOPE '''

*THE EARLIEST MISUNDERSTOOD ARTISTS* were Neanderthals. But then, just so very  tragically- '' *Population extinction, has been a part of human history forever.* ''

Dating flowstones is a big advance on previous techniques for determining the age of cave art, but the technology has one major limitation :

It can assign only a minimum age to cave paintings. Flowstones may have begun forming the day after a painting was finished - or 10,000 year afterward. 

In a second study, which Dr. Zilhao and his colleagues published in the journal Science Advances, hints that Neanderthals might well have been painting long before long before 64,000 years ago.

The scientists traveled to a cave on the coast of Spain where Dr. Zilhao had earlier discovered shells that had been drilled with holes and painted with ocher.

In 2010, he and his colleagues had used radiocarbon dating to estimate the age of other shells in the same layer of rock at 45,000 to 50,000 years old.

That result did not tell the team who made the ornaments. Neanderthals might be responsible, but it was also possible that the earliest modern humans in Europe made them.

And the uncertainties of radiocarbon dating also had left open the possibility that the shells were, in fact, far older.

Dr. Zilhao returned to the cave to try uranium dating. He and his colleagues discovered a layer of  flowstone sitting atop a rock where they had found the shell jewelry.

That flowstone turned out to be about 115,000 years old.

The colored, pierced shell themselves are probably not much older than that. Up until about 118,000  years ago, the cave was flooded, thanks to higher sea levels.

That finding provides strong evidence that the shells were made by Neanderthals. They were definitely living in Spain 115,000 years ago, while modern humans would not arrive in Europe for another 70,000 years.

The two new studies don't just indicate that Neanderthals could make cave art and jewelry.

They also established that Neanderthals were making these things long before modern humans - a blow to the idea that they simply copied their cousins.

The earliest known cave paintings made by modern humans are only about 40,000 years old, while Neanderthal cave art is at least 24,000 years older.

The oldest known shell jewelry made by modern humans is about 70,000 years old, but Neanderthals were making it 45,000 years before then.

The new studies raises another intriguing possibility, said Clive Finlayson, director of the Gibraltar Museum :

That the capacity for symbolic thought was already present 600,000 years ago in the ancestors of both Neanderthals and modern Humans.

He agreed with Dr. Zilhao that the new study supports the idea that Neanderthals used language.

Researchers have found that inner ears of Neanderthals were tuned to the frequencies of speech, much like our own.

The cave paintings that Dr. Pike and his colleagues have dated are generally abstract. There's no evidence so far that Neanderthals painted images of lions and other animals.

But. Dr. Pike doesn't think a lack of animal imagery marks a mental deficiency in Neanderthals.

''It could just be that they just had a different belief system and didn't think animals were important to depict in deep caves.,'' he said.

"If you have to prepare your pigment and get to place in the pitch dark to paint a red line, that's as, meaningful as someone painting a bison.''

In the past, many researchers have claimed that mental differences between modern humans and    Neanderthals were the reason Neanderthal population vanished.

Our own ancestors, it's been argued could come up with creative solutions for survival.

The accumulating evidence puts Neanderthals on a more equal footing. They evolved physical differences after the split from modern humans, possibly as they adapted to the harsh northern climates where they settled.

But their culture developed in parallel with that of modern humans, in Africa. And their disappearance is not evidence of inferiority, only of the inexorable mechanics of evolution.

''Neanderthals have disappeared. So have Fuegian Indians. So have Greenland Vikings,'' said Dr. Zilaho.

''Population extinction has been a part of human history forever.''

With most respectful dedication to all the Women and females of the world. The World Students Society wishes them the very best on the *International Women' Day*, and assures them of every honor and respect.

So, with most respectful dedication to the Honorary Global President of The World Students Society -for the week, Ms. Sajida Sultan Abbasi, the revered mother of her four  outstanding children :

Merium, Rabo, Haider and Aqsa, and then-

All Leaders, The Grandmothers, all Mothers, Students, Professors and Teachers of the world. See Ya all ''register'' on !WOW! - the World Students Society and Twitter -!E-WOW! - the Ecosystem 2011:

''' 115,000 -to- 120,000 Years To Go '''

Good Night and God Bless

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