New Neanderthal, Continued

I wish the graph were larger but I couldn't make Blogger make it bigger. One of these days I'm going to have to put a little more effort into mastering a little more computer mechanics.

Note on the far left, far up, clustered above the zero (zero, because in geological time it's as if at that point no time has passed at all), are a number of small black squares. Those are Neanderthal. To the left of them, because more recent but still in geological time in effect above the zero of no time passing at all, are two little circles. Look closely. This graph is not large, and those little circles are rather far down. Once you spot them you'll note that they're the Greek symbols for male and female. They represent, by sex, the average brain capacities for modern man. To help in spotting them McHenry has helpfully put in vertical brackets "expressing the natural individual variation in modern human brain size." Now, really, why do you think McHenry so helpfully put in those brackets?

Next I turn to a pretty good website. Over the last two weeks I've had time to look at many dozens of such sites. But this is a new area for me. I have no background. It's been very hard for me to judge which sites are telling me the truth and which are not, but I judge this site to be pretty good. Note first some good data:

Range (cm3) Average (cm3)

chimpanzees 300-500 ----
australopithecines 400-540 ----
Homo habilis 509-752 610
Homo erectus 750-1250 958
Neandertals 1300-1750 1500
modern Homo sapiens 900-1880 1345 *

But then this:

There is a considerable range in body size among modern Homo sapiens, including large numbers of small people. Subsequently, the average brain size is smaller than would initially seem likely. However, the average for some modern populations (especially European and most African ones) is slightly larger than that of Neandertals. (My emphasis)

And then this:

CAUTION: It would be a mistake to assume that a minor difference in overall brain size is directly correlated with intelligence among archaic or modern Homo sapiens. However, the gross difference in cranial capacity between the earliest human species and recent Homo sapiens probably does reflect potential intelligence differences. In order to trace the development of intelligence, speech, and other mental capabilities, it is more useful to examine changes in specific brain regions.

Why? Do I detect...sensitivity?

This study, at least for a while, is going to be fun. I assert: The evidence is in, Neanderthal was smarter than man. Modern man, that is. Us. Modern man either; one, is an inferior species to what has gone before; or two, and this is going to be my working presumption, is in incredibly rapid evolutionary decline. I'll read more, and see where the argument goes.

But I like this idea, because it fits exactly with my personal philosophy, that I'm here but for a brief time and I'd better make my life count, at least in terms personal to myself. Man too, in the brief time he has left before his brain becomes that of a chipmunk, must do what he can in those things personal to man.

There are only three obvious oppositional arguments:

• The fossil record, accidentally, has preserved only large-brained individual variations, well within the variations that occur in modern man and so in size not superior to modern man.
• That there is no genetic contact between Neanderthal and modern man and that thus though Neanderthal may have had a larger brain than modern man the comparative data is not evidence of an evolutionarily diminution of brain size. Work is being done with mtDNA presumably with the intent of making this argument (Vive Boule). But we'll see. And there's still the problem of Cro Magnon, accepted as fully modern and thus a part of our genetic inheritance yet with an apparently larger brain.
• That at any rate our brains are superior because better organized. ("Size doesn't matter.") The proof that we're superior is that we have technology and Darwin.

(I would note, that the American Indian, undoubtedly a modern man, at the time of the discovery of the New World had neither technology nor Darwin but only stone implements. --I'm uncertain as to what degree they were superior to those of Neanderthal. One could mention Clovis.

And I wonder if there's been any similar diminution among any other primate? As I understand no ancient fossil of any ape, monkey, gibbon or chimpanzee has ever been found. Jungles apparently are not optimal for the preservation of a fossil record.

Whatever, this is fun. The arguments aren't certain and won't be certain. But it is fun. Vive ut Vivas.