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freekoout t1_ja9ho75 wrote

Reply to comment by KmartQuality in Revealed: Europe's Oldest Humans had Surprisingly Frequent Intermingling with Neanderthals by OptimalCrew7992

As to your last point, I addressed that in my comment. As for your comment about "grocery store" cannibalism, you realize humanity and neanderthals went through an Ice Age? We had to eat what ever we could to survive, and humans/neanderthals from other tribes would've been free game. As for your ritualism comment, there has to be origins for rituals, and society and religion has to exist for rituals to exist. There's no evidence of structured society or religion in that time period. Cannibalism would've been a last resort survival tactic, not a prestigious event.

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KmartQuality t1_ja9lfz6 wrote

There's no evidence for lack of structured religion.

Of course they had religion. They talked...not grunted. They had opposable thumbs. They had tribes. They got weird. They defended their territories and attacked weaker people.

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gwaydms t1_jaa062v wrote

Both species engaged in ritual behavior of some sort. This may not constitute what we think of as "religion". But the root word in Latin means "that which binds", with the sense of bringing/keeping a community closer together. In this context, we can certainly put H. neandertalensis, as well as H. sapiens, ritual behaviors into the category of religion. They didn't necessarily believe in supernatural beings, but they pretty clearly believed in something beyond their tangible experience.

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freekoout t1_ja9ozro wrote

Okay, so you know how science works right? Facts aren't based on assumptions. But you apparently know more than the experts, so go ahead, give your version of events. I'll wait here for your sources.

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