Is it true that our ancestors killed the Neanderthals?

About 40 thousand years ago, they immediately lived on Earthseveral representatives of the human race. The most numerous of them were our distant ancestors Homo sapiens and Neanderthals. It was extremely difficult to live on one planet at once for several types of upright creatures, able to make weapons, heat food and hunt. Scientists are sure that a war broke out between the two species and the Neanderthals, because of their relatively poor development, were defeated and died out in it. However, some scholars believe that the sudden formation of a harsh climate, to which they could not adapt, became the reason for the extinction of Neanderthals. So which theory is correct? Finding an answer to this question recently took up supercomputer.

Neanderthals could die at the hands of our ancestors

Supercomputer - special computing machine,whose characteristics are much better than conventional computers. As a rule, they are a collection of several server computers interconnected by a high-speed network.

Ancient times

Neanderthals arose about 400 thousand years agoand inhabited the territory of modern Eurasia. They had broad shoulders, hunted, ate meat and plants, and their life expectancy was only 20 years. While they were trying to survive in a harsh world, representatives of Homo sapiens, the same Homo sapiens, to which we belong, also moved from Africa to Eurasia. It was then that the confrontation began, lasting about one million years, due to lack of territory and food.

About what Neanderthals were and what they ate, I wrote in detail in this material.

Even if the scientists theory of exterminationNeanderthals faithful to our distant ancestors, they killed them not only with weapons and other manifestations of violence. The first representatives of Homo Sapiens could simply not leave Neanderthals with places to live and food sources. Most likely, the broad shoulders of men and women became extinct due to the totality of actions taken by the sapiens.

This is what Homo Sapiens looked like against the backdrop of Neanderthals

Hazardous Climate Change

But do not forget about the existence of the secondtheories about the extinction of Neanderthals. It was at a time when the last representatives of Neanderthals died, on our planet there was a sharp change in climate. Perhaps they could not adapt to cold conditions and moved from one place to another until they became extinct.

In cold times, Neanderthals had a hard time

Cause of Neanderthal Death

Which of these theories is closer to the truth,scientists still do not know. To shed some light on this mystery, researcher Axel Timmermann decided to use a supercomputer. He loaded into his memory data on climatic changes of Neanderthal times, as well as information on their movements and contacts with representatives of other species of people.

Homo sapiens killed not only Neanderthals, but also each other. They committed real crimes - one of them can be read in this article.

Timmerman used computer simulation,because in it he could see what would happen to Neanderthals if one of the alleged reasons for their extinction did not exist. The food managed to look at the fate of Neanderthals without the invasion of Homo sapiens in their territory, but with a cold climate. Then he looked what would have happened to the Neanderthals if the invasion had nevertheless occurred, but the climate would have remained familiar. Comparing the two results, he identified the most likely cause of their death.

Red shows the population density of Neanderthals, and green shows Homo sapiens.

The comparison showed that Neanderthal society inmore was destroyed by “sapiens,” not by climate change. This is not surprising, because Neanderthals lived hundreds of thousands of years in a row and sometimes nature sent more severe colds on them than during their disappearance. They actively mined and used fire and were experienced hunters, so the harsh climate could hardly destroy them all to the last.

See also: How did Neanderthals treat the skin, making it soft and waterproof?

With all this, the computer model showed thatHomo sapiens hunted and collected plants much more actively than Neanderthals. They literally devastated food resources, developed and multiplied faster, in the end, just to get rid of competitors. So, we can assume that our species is really guilty of the disappearance of Neanderthals.

Homo sapiens are more experienced hunters than Neanderthals

No matter how hard it is to admit it, wecontinue to exterminate other species of living things. In the Red Book, which contains the names of endangered or already extinct animals and plants, thousands of exterminated species are already listed. And there are many reasons for this, ranging from harmful emissions from factories and automobiles to hunting.

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