Excalibur, The Rock That May Mark A New Dawn For Man

The Guardian (UK) ^ | 1-9-2003 | Giles Tremlett

[blam]

Morning ping.

[aruanan]

The find means that man's development of a mind capable of thinking beyond reality and needs into a world of shared ideas, symbols, fantasy and imagination, may have developed 310,000 years earlier than was thought.

Ha ha ha. The life of the mind as being something "beyond reality"! How thoroughly the belief in the ghost in the machine has insinuated itself.

[aruanan]

In 1997, three wooden spears some 400,000 years old were found in an open-cast coalmine at Schoningen, Germany.

A lot of interesting stuff has been found in and with coal over the centuries. It has always been dismissed out of hand as a hoax by people whose geological preconceptions have forbidden them to consider any other interpretation.

[RightWhale]

There are several flood myths. One takes place in the Indus Valley, and has a boat that ended up stranded in the Himilayas near the disputed Kashmir/Jammu and Alqaida/madrassan training camps.

[r9etb]

The Atapuerca team have produced some of the most remarkable palaeontological finds of the past decade, producing 350,000-year-old crania and proof that Homo heidelbergensis was a cannibal.

IIRC, cannibalism in primitive tribes is almost always a ceremonial/superstitious sort of thing: something done to get strength over enemies, or having to do with ancestor worship. I don't think it's too common for it to be a mostly nutritional thing.

Which suggests to me that the combination of cannibalism, burial practices, and now this tool are indeed all evidence of the existence of some sort of ancient culture.

[#3Fan]

I read a report a long time ago that gorillas look to the sun and moon when one in their group dies. Don't know if it was true or not.

[Billthedrill]

Well, it you really want to get technical, "Cro-Magnon" isn't a taxonomic classification at all, and is mostly used only in popular literature. The sort of humans found in Cro-Magnon in France are supposedly different in certain speciation-related characteristics from the ones found in the Neander valley in Germany, (Homo sapiens sapiens as opposed to Homo sapiens neanderthalensis), but these days that is a subspecies difference, not the Homo sapiens vs Homo neanderthalensis species dichotomy of a few years ago. Most of the stuff I've read recently states that DNA evidence from recovered bone tissue seems to lead to this sort of taxonomic classification, but I haven't looked into the matter deeply enough to advance a personal opinion.

One thing, though - the literature states that Cro-Magnon men were "excellent hunters, toolmakers, and artists," so I can't be related to them...

[gonzo]

"...Where did you get that info? I'm willing to look into it. In college I had an English Professor as wide as a linebacker, 5'9'', stocky, and with a bit of a browridge. His "Neanderthalness" did not make him mentally challenged. Wasn't the Neanderthal cranial capacity about 1600ccs as opposed to modern man's 1500ccs?..."

Damned if I can remember exactly, sheik, but it was either a NOVA program on PBS or a Discovery series. They just examined the archeological data, and produced some programs showing the two species of man co-existing at the same time.

The videos should be available, and they're very interesting..................FRegards

[gonzo]

"... One thing, though - the literature states that Cro-Magnon men were "excellent hunters, toolmakers, and artists," so I can't be related to them..."

Well, you can type, Bill, so you must be related! I can't type worth-a-damn, so I must be Polish. Stay well, pally, and Happy New Year.............FRegards

[SunkenCiv]

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[SunkenCiv]

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[SunkenCiv]

The Neandertal Enigma
by James Shreeve

Frayer's own reading of the record reveals a number of overlooked traits that clearly and specifically link the Neandertals to the Cro-Magnons. One such trait is the shape of the opening of the nerve canal in the lower jaw, a spot where dentists often give a pain-blocking injection. In many Neandertal, the upper portion of the opening is covered by a broad bony ridge, a curious feature also carried by a significant number of Cro-Magnons. But none of the alleged 'ancestors of us all' fossils from Africa have it, and it is extremely rare in modern people outside Europe." [pp 126-127]

[SunkenCiv]

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