Re: anthropological news

Glenn Morton (grmorton@waymark.net)
Tue, 30 Dec 1997 18:38:35 -0600

At 05:28 AM 12/31/97 +0800, Stephen Jones wrote:
>Glenn
>
>On Fri, 26 Dec 1997 12:20:00 -0600, Glenn Morton wrote:
>
>>At 03:06 PM 12/26/97 +0800, Stephen Jones wrote:
>
>[...]
>
>>SJ>This argues against your point. Why go to all the trouble to
>>>make a neat bowl out of the top of the skull, when the easiest
>>>way to get at brains is through the existing opening at the
>>>neck?
>
>GM>Precisely, The Neanderthal didn't simply get to the brain via the
>>foramen magnum--he carved the skull which took a lot of work if all
>>he wanted was brain he could have gotten it a lot simpler. Why the
>>extra work? ritual???
>
>Your original point was that the carved skull was evidence of ritual
>cannibalism. Yet now you admit that there could have been
>cannibalism without carving the skull, ie. by extracting the brain
>through the neck. Equally, there is no reason why there could have
>been carving of the skull without cannibalism, eg. carving the skull
>for utilitarian puposes-a bowl. Why then does carving the skull have
>anything necessarily to do with cannibalism in general, and ritual
>cannibalism in particular?

Steve, I don't know what your point is here. They carved the skull. They
didn't do it the simple way. You seem to be arguing for the sake of arguing.

>
>The article at http://www.archaeology.org/online/news/neandertal.html
>does not lend any support to your ritual cannibalism interpretation,
>stating that it "appears to have been deliberately shaped, perhaps to
>form a sort of vessel", and that "there was no evidence of either
>occupation or other remains, human or animal":

>>SJ>I asked you below how you know it was "an experimental error" and
>>>you simply cite the article. How about a quote where it says its
>>>was "an experimental error".
>
>GM>Stephen, Stephen, when one has performed experiments one can
>>recognize an experimental error. There was no anthropologist that
>>disagreed with my contribution in the Anthro E-mail news.
>
>I take it then that the original article does not actually say that
>the range of 22-26 nucleotide differences was an "experimental
>error". Did any anthropologist on the Anthro E-mail news agree with
>you that this range is correctly termed an "experimental error"?

Steve, I do tire of your word games where you insist that somebody say the
precise word that you desire or you will not believe anybody. If this is
the best you can do in argumentation, then let's not go further.

>>>GM>No a random sample would be expected to have a maximum of 24
>>>>differences. 8 is the average difference.
>
>>SJ>OK. I will rephrase it: from a random sample of modern humans we
>>>would have expected an average difference of 5-8 base-pairs:
>
>GM>Good But averages are averages it is the range that is important.
>
>The SCIENCE and NATURE articles seem to think that the *averages*
>were more important. Besides, if the ranges are "experimental
>errors" (according to you) why do you claim they are more important
>than the averages which are not?

The Science and Nature articles are not the original source. I don't care
what they think or thought.

>
>>SJ>See above. It would be appreciated if you would please supply a
>>>quote from the Cell article that says that this was an "experimental
>>>error". Thanks.
>
>GM>"Neandertal sequence is 27.2+/-2.2 (range 22-36)
>>substitutions."~Krings, Matthias, et al, 1997. "Neandertal DNA
>>Sequences and the Origin of Modern Humans," Cell, 90:19-30, p.
>>24-25
>>
>>The +/- is one standard deviation and (range 22-36) are the range of the
>>individual measurments.
>
>Thanks. Now why is this "range of the individual measurements"
>necessarily "experimental errors"? Are you claiming that one
>scientist looked at a string of mtDNA and found 22 differences
>between it and the reference string of human mtDNA, and another
>scientist looked at the exact same strings and found 36 differences,
>and that therefore one or both of them were in error to the tune of
>*14* differences?

When you read the original report and not just the derivative reports you
will find that they ran the experiment many times with different results.
Sometimes they saw only 22 differences sometimes they found more.

>
>>>GM>It was accepted into the Anthropological E mail news. That is
>>what I said.
>
>>SJ>I know what you "said". What I asked was "What was the
>>>*result*?" Since its been "nearly 5 months", I would have thought
>>>that if your point had any validity it would have been a hot topic
>>>and would have largely invalidated the study. What happened?
>
>GM>No one criticised it.
>
>I take it therefore that no one positively endorsed it either? If
>this was the case then it seems that your claim was simply ignored?

Wrong, Milford Wolpoff did.

glenn

Adam, Apes, and Anthropology: Finding the Soul of Fossil Man

and

Foundation, Fall and Flood
http://www.isource.net/~grmorton/dmd.htm