The Origin Modern Humans

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The origin of modern humans is a matter of debate. There are two different theories regarding the origin of modern humans or Homo sapiens. The first and primary theory states modern humans emerged in one place and from a single origin. This theory is known as the Recent African Origin Model. It suggests that modern humans are the product of speciation during the late Pleistocene in Africa. Homo sapiens eventually migrated out of Africa to Eurasia, and replaced all other human populations, without interbreeding. Some of the replaced populations are believe to be the Neanderthals and the Homo erectus. The second theory proposes that modern human evolution happened trough emigration, this is known as the multiregional evolution model. This model assumes that modern humans have an ancient rather than a recent African origin. This theory also talks about how all living humans derive from the species Homo erectus that left Africa nearly two million-years-ago. The multiregional view states that genes from all human populations of the Old World flowed among diverse areas and by coexisting, contributed to how modern humans look like nowadays. In order to understand the rise of modern human, it is important to first learn about the Neanderthals, group who existed and coexisted during the modern human evolution times. The Neanderthals are classified as an extinct subspecies of modern humans known as Homo sapiens Neanderthals, or as a separate human species called the Homo neanderthalensis. Both, the modern human and Neanderthal share some features and differ in others

Neanderthals represent one of the most complex early human cultures. They were a rugged people with complex social and material lives. They lived under very rough environm...

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...gardless if they interbreed or not with modern humans, Neanderthal DNA is 99.7 percent identical to present-day human DNA. DNA study showed that most humans have a little Neanderthal in them, at least 1 to 4 percent of a person's genetic makeup.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Erik Trinkaus, "Hard Times Among the Neanderthals", Natural History,1978, s. 10

2. Martínez Moreno, Jorge. Mora, Rafael. De La Torre, Ignacio. The Middle-to-Upper Paleolithic transition in Cova Gran (Catalunya, Spain) and the extinction of Neanderthals in the Iberian Peninsula.

3. Ker Than, National Geographic News .Published May 6, 2010

4. Alper, Joe. Rethinking Neanderthal, Smithsonian, June 2003, pp 83-87.

5. Noonan, James P. Neanderthal genomics and the evolution of modern humans. Journal List Genome Res, v.20(5); May 2010

6. O'Neil, Dennis. Early Modern Human Culture, October 30, 2010.

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