What I'm reading at the moment. Fascinating story of the long, all-too-imperfect-and-human, messy search for the evolutionary history of homo sapiens. Who else finds this interesting? Any favorite parts (of the general story, I mean, not of this book)? Editing to add: the book is "Extinct Humans" by Ian Tattersall and Jeffrey Schwartz. I uploaded a photo of the cover but it does not seem to have survived review.
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Feel free to reply to any comment by clicking the "Reply" button.I find it interesting that about 200000 years ago humans were on the verge of extinction and numbers were down to between 600 to 2000 humans!!
ripcurldane
Level 7
Jan 9, 2018
1
My recollection (from which book, of course I can no longer recall) is that it was around 10,000, and it was 100,000 years ago. Guess I'll have to look this up now, because I'm intrigued. 
That is one of my favour interests early hominids seem to have been nearly as diverse as many other families like canines and like them we seem to have often crossbred. The human genome seems to show the presence of at least 5 other species' DNA. What is more the presence of this DNA in some populations and not others give a clear timeline of our specie around the globe. T he discover of the physical remains of several other species that are not present in our genome such as Homo florencias means that we may not have even been alone in recent times either.
HeathenFarmer
Level 8
Jan 9, 2018
3
that covers what I was thinking pretty well, thanks for saving me the typing.
@Rugglesby , no problem anything I can do to prevent the spread of carpal tunnel is all good.
This is the thing that fascinates me most about it all. It's amazing how long they clung to the idea that we were "different", even in the case of evolution. We aren't.
I've read several including about a year ago "Sapiens" by Yuval Noah Harari. It was very interesting.
gearl
Level 8
Jan 9, 2018
1
Thank you! I shall add this to my list.
I am fascinated with the fact that, almost certainly, in the not too too distant past, several species of humans or proto humans could have co-existed at the same time on earth. Cro-magnon and Neanderthal, homo erectus and homo habilis or some such species we haven't even discovered yet. Surely they all got along, right?
MrLink
Level 8
Jan 8, 2018
1
<g> depends on what you mean by "got along". Given our own species' proclivities, I imagine there was a lot of war and betrayal. But there was apparently some sex, too -- whether consentual or not we'll never know -- because we now now there is Neanderthal in our DNA.
Sounds great! I'm gonna check it out. Thanks
MrLink
Level 8
Jan 8, 2018
1
Great! Let me know what you think!
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