70,000-year-old religious snake icon found

wolveraptor · Post by **wolveraptor** » 2006-12-02 12:34am

Were any of these species even interacting at this point? I know that they were rather specialized to their particular environments (especially the other three species).

Junghalli · Post by **Junghalli** » 2006-12-02 02:51am

If it's 70,000 years old doesn't that mean it predates the "Great Leap Forward"? Interesting.

Ariphaos · Post by **Ariphaos** » 2006-12-02 06:59am

Seggybop wrote:This makes me wonder if a fantasy-style story taking place 70,000 years ago would work well. Instead of the generic fake fantasy races of humans, elves, and dwarves, we could have the real ones: humans, neanderthals and homo erectuses (erecti?).

I think Erectus is extinct at this point, but there is also the small matter that, of the three known extant races (Neanderthal, Florensis and late Homo Sapiens), only the last are capable of a full range of speech.

Darth Servo · Post by **Darth Servo** » 2006-12-02 01:35pm

Setesh wrote:Though you know what the YEC twits will say:
a)Its satanic lies
b)Its atheist lies
c)dating system is faulty, since carbon dating isn't reliable all dating methods aren't either
d)God made it look that old to fool us

e) Its just a funny shaped rock. Nothing special. Nothing showing humans made it that way.

Lord Zentei · Post by **Lord Zentei** » 2006-12-02 02:03pm

Xeriar wrote:
Seggybop wrote:This makes me wonder if a fantasy-style story taking place 70,000 years ago would work well. Instead of the generic fake fantasy races of humans, elves, and dwarves, we could have the real ones: humans, neanderthals and homo erectuses (erecti?).
I think Erectus is extinct at this point, but there is also the small matter that, of the three known extant races (Neanderthal, Florensis and late Homo Sapiens), only the last are capable of a full range of speech.

The idea that the Neanderthals were incapable of speech, while widespread, is nonetheless controversial.

Cao Cao · Post by **Cao Cao** » 2006-12-02 02:07pm

That is what they're going crazy over?
Peh. Reminds me of the face on Mars.

Big Orange · Post by **Big Orange** » 2006-12-02 03:01pm

Lord Zentei wrote: The idea that the Neanderthals were incapable of speech, while widespread, is nonetheless controversial.

I imagine they were capable of fairly articulate speech, but nothing up to modern human standard.

CaptainChewbacca · Post by **CaptainChewbacca** » 2006-12-02 03:50pm

Anthropologists can't prove that neanderthals and humans ever interacted, but we DO know that they often inhabited the same regions at approximately the same time.

And yes, Great Leap Forward was about 30,000 BCE.

darthbob88 · Post by **darthbob88** » 2006-12-02 04:36pm

Big Orange wrote:
Lord Zentei wrote: The idea that the Neanderthals were incapable of speech, while widespread, is nonetheless controversial.
I imagine they were capable of fairly articulate speech, but nothing up to modern human standard.

Naturally, that depends on which human you use as "modern human standard". Compared to Dubya, I imagine Neanderthals were downright eloquent.

Isana Kadeb · Post by **Isana Kadeb** » 2006-12-02 05:01pm

I though a lot of scientists were arguing that Florensis is just a diseased human?

CaptainChewbacca · Post by **CaptainChewbacca** » 2006-12-02 05:20pm

Isana Kadeb wrote:I though a lot of scientists were arguing that Florensis is just a diseased human?

At this point there's equal evidence for and against.

Winston Blake · Post by **Winston Blake** » 2006-12-03 02:57am

CaptainChewbacca wrote:Yeah, I meant hominid species, not humanoid ones.

Maybe I'm crazy, but I can't see the snake.

Looks more like a giant penis, which as silly as it sounds, have often been worshipped by older cultures. It would've been harder to get this story into the news though.

Srynerson · Post by **Srynerson** » 2006-12-03 10:38pm

Junghalli wrote:If it's 70,000 years old doesn't that mean it predates the "Great Leap Forward"? Interesting.

As CaptainChewbacca pointed out, yes it does. However there have been archeological discoveries in recent years that (controversially) suggest people in southern Africa were producing unusually sophisticated bone tools 80,000 to 100,000 years ago: +http://cogweb.ucla.edu/ep/Blombos.html This site might be further evidence of an earlier "leap" which possibly regressed for some reason or otherwise remained confined to that geographic region.

General Brock · Post by **General Brock** » 2006-12-04 12:39am

By Crom! Set rises anew!