Here’s a curious question: What did Neanderthals evolve from?

Kirikagure, But Smithsonian Mag says "a menagerie of different human species lived, evolved and died..." Isn't that profound? Andrew asauber

neatherdals did not "evolve" from anywhere, they were one of the many human tribes that lived in ancient mesoppotamia before the dispersion (and they all had the same human ancestors), if you dressed up a neatherdal with "modern" human clothes they would look no different than any other human, also comparing the skeleton is laughable because if you look at a midget's skeleton they look like some sort of alien baby, yet they are counted as human, they are all humans also comparing neatherdals with humans is a category error fallacy, you might as well compare africans with humans, midgets with humans and eskimos with humans, they are all humans but we look different, mainle from the effects of degration of genes over time @JVL the problem with your comment is that none of the examples that you gave are evolution.... none of the organisms created new genetic information and changed into something further, what happened is they permantely lost information depending on where they landed (via natural selection) and some of them disappeared, the factors for that are many, the environment, wars, and other sources, but calling it "evolution" is misleading since the opposite is happening we are devolving as time passes Kirikagure

JVL, Thanks for the thoughtful response, but the short answer to my question: "Is there a way to quantify in a particular situation, how much evolution was a factor in the survival or demise of anything?" is no. Andrew asauber

Asauber: Is there a way to quantify in a particular situation, how much evolution was a factor in the survival or demise of anything? I'm am going to try and answer for the fourth time! Not the fault of this site, my internet is very flakey tonight. There are situations when we know why a certain species died out. Like the Passenger Pigeon. Like the Dodo. There are situations when we think we've got a good idea, like most of the dinosaurs. Then there are situations when we just have a guess like with the Neanderthals. In a lot of the pretty sure cases we know that a species died out from competition (which includes humans shooting and/or eating them) or a radical change in the local conditions (an asteroid hitting the Earth). But each situation is different and, to answer your question, can evolution be considered a factor? IF evolution is unguided and without a goal then it's just trying to slowly find new variations that are better able to exploit their local conditions and resources. And even saying 'trying' is a bit wrong. So, if after millions and millions of years of evolution grooming and enabling lots of dinosaur species is it to blame when an asteroid/comet took most of them down? I don't think you can assign blame without some kind of direction or cause. And I don't think unguided evolution has a goal or a cause. Was evolution a 'factor'? Unguided evolution just happens. All the time. Unbidden. Un-asked for. So, sure, some species get wiped out because local conditions changed and unguided evolution helped bring them about based on previous conditions. Sometimes. Not always. JVL

"So, to answer your question: it would depend on the particular situation." JVL, Sorry for all the questions, but... Is there a way to quantify in a particular situation, how much evolution was a factor in the survival or demise of anything? Andrew asauber

Asauber: So was evolution irrelevant to whether they lived or died? Unguided evolution would tend to favour variation which was better suited to exploit the local environment. But, it's possible, that a local variant might all of a sudden be much less 'fit' because of a change in the environment. Like when the asteroid/comet effectively killed off the dinosaurs. Evolution, being unguided, takes time and slowly favours variation which works well with local conditions over long periods of time IF the local conditions stay constant. IF local conditions change OR another variation arises which is even better at acquiring food or producing offspring then what was once a 'winner' can become a 'loser'. Evolution has no idea if the local conditions will stay the same or change. When local conditions change then the winners and losers can radically change. So, to answer your question: it would depend on the particular situation. JVL

"It means that several species of humans lived, changed and died out most likely because they were out-competed for limited resources OR were less able to adapt to changing conditions. It’s also possible that some species, with a severely limited population, just didn’t produce enough offspring to continue." JVL, So was evolution irrelevant to whether they lived or died? Andrew asauber

Asauber: “During that long interim, a menagerie of different human species lived, evolved and died out…” It means that several species of humans lived, changed and died out most likely because they were out-competed for limited resources OR were less able to adapt to changing conditions. It's also possible that some species, with a severely limited population, just didn't produce enough offspring to continue. JVL

"But no one ‘evolves’ out of existence. Sounds like you need to brush up on what modern unguided evolutionary theory actually says!" JVL, Please help me out, then. What does this sentence mean? "During that long interim, a menagerie of different human species lived, evolved and died out..." https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/essential-timeline-understanding-evolution-homo-sapiens-180976807/ Andrew asauber

ET: There isn’t any such theory so it doesn’t say anything! No one says things 'evolve out of existence'. You could tell Asauber that they don't even understand the claims being made. You could, but you won't. JVL

JVL:

Sounds like you need to brush up on what modern unguided evolutionary theory actually says!

There isn't any such theory so it doesn't say anything! ET

Asuaber: If Neanderthals weren’t human ancestors Evolved out of existence, what caused them to disappear? Any speculations? Are you really unaware of the various thoughts about this? It's pretty easy to find some of the speculation. One of the most widely held notion is that homo sapiens outcompeted the Neanderthals because they were just a bit better at exploiting the environment. But that is just speculation. Probably we will never be able to say definitively why the Neanderthals died out. Also, it's fairly well accepted that Neanderthals were not in the direct line of the development of homo sapiens but that too might change with the discovery of more evidence. But no one 'evolves' out of existence. Sounds like you need to brush up on what modern unguided evolutionary theory actually says! JVL

There still isn't any naturalistic mechanism capable of producing upright bipeds from populations of knuckle-walkers. ET

If Neanderthals weren't human ancestors Evolved out of existence, what caused them to disappear? Any speculations? Andrew asauber

Pugs and greyhounds have extremely distinct skull shapes and skeletal shapes. Why aren't we looking for a missing link? polistra

What is meant by a "missing link" between modern humans and Neanderthals? Couldn't they have just diverged from a common ancestor a few hundred thousand years ago with, as they say, more recent fossils showing more pronounced differences but older fossils much less so? Seversky