# Caveman vs. Astronaut **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 8, 2016, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caveman-vs-astronaut/742502 "2016-01-08T15:34:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2016, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caveman-vs-astronaut/742502/41 "2016-01-09T01:50:06Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > You think the Cro-Mag’s stick is gonna be a match for even my REVOLVER? No, but I stipulated unarmed or environment-armed. ---
**Author:** ![Morgenstern](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Morgenstern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgenstern)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2016, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caveman-vs-astronaut/742502/42 "2016-01-09T01:57:30Z")
_“The chimp-like ancestor was like a power athlete,” said Dan Lieberman, a biological anthropologist at Harvard University. “Much stronger and faster than humans, but they had no endurance.”_ > **[Caveman vs. Modern Human: Who Would Win Olympic Gold?](https://www.livescience.com/2747-caveman-modern-human-win-olympic-gold.html)** > > Human ancestors may win Olympic power sports, but modern humans can run. ---
**Author:** ![Scumpup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce73a5/32.png) [@Scumpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scumpup)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2016, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caveman-vs-astronaut/742502/43 "2016-01-09T02:01:44Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > No, but I stipulated unarmed or environment-armed. Maybe he plucked it fresh from a revolver tree, smartypants. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2016, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caveman-vs-astronaut/742502/44 "2016-01-09T02:02:29Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > No, but I stipulated unarmed or environment-armed. I’m an American. Small arms are part of my environment ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2016, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caveman-vs-astronaut/742502/45 "2016-01-09T02:04:08Z")
If he’s a cosmonaut, [he might’ve been packing heat](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TP-82). Three barrels worth. ---
**Author:** ![kopek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kopek/32/337_2.png) [@kopek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kopek)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2016, 2:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caveman-vs-astronaut/742502/46 "2016-01-09T02:51:42Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > Ooh, ooh, Gronk know who win! I remember that show; it wasn’t the audience who won – trust me on that one. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2016, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caveman-vs-astronaut/742502/47 "2016-01-09T05:03:42Z")
Most likely the “caveman”; he’s going to have a lifetime of experience at wilderness survival and fighting, not just what little training or experience the astronaut has. Most likely the astronaut never even sees the “caveman” and dies in an ambush. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2016, 9:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caveman-vs-astronaut/742502/48 "2016-01-09T09:32:52Z")
This is like asking what would win, a shark or a lion. The answer? Depends where. ---
**Author:** ![madsircool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madsircool/32/3432_2.png) [@madsircool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madsircool)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2016, 9:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caveman-vs-astronaut/742502/49 "2016-01-09T09:36:39Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > This is like asking what would win, a shark or a lion. The answer? Depends where. On ice or grass? ---
**Author:** ![Toxylon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f05b48/32.png) [@Toxylon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Toxylon)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2016, 10:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caveman-vs-astronaut/742502/50 "2016-01-09T10:26:02Z")
> [@Machine\_Elf](#): > > Caveman is likely to be smaller, dumber, and in poorer physical shape due to a lifetime of questionable nutrition. Astronaut may or may not be trained in martial arts, but caveman won’t be. Simply not true. Late Paleolithic Eurasians (the best “caveman” candidate) had an average male height of a little over 5’9", with well over 6-foot-tall individuals around. “Cro-Magnons were robustly built and powerful. The body was generally heavy and solid with a strong musculature.” [Cite](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cro-Magnon) North European Stone Age people typically exhibit high bone density and mass, with prominent muscle attachment points. [Cite](http://faculty.plattsburgh.edu/mark.cohen/BENNIKEFLORIDA.htm) > [@](#): > > Mesolithic limb bones are generally reported to be rather short and stout with irregular surfaces showing protuberances and indentations. The muscle attachments are often prominent as a result of muscular exertion. The bones are sometimes slightly curved, not because of a low calcium content (BMC), but due to excessive muscle activity. They are generally rather heavy with a small medullar cavity and rather thick cortical bone. Both Stone Age bone mass and mineral content values are higher than in modern populations (Ruff 1992; Bennike and Bohr 1990). Plenty of evidence of cavemen experiencing violent encounters, as well: concentrated blunt force trauma in skulls, parrying fractures in lower arms, projectile points embedded in spines etc. These people were used to fighting and most definitely had tactical skills and close combat experience. Bigger brains than us, too. A caveman would almost literally eat an unarmed astronaut alive. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2016, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caveman-vs-astronaut/742502/51 "2016-01-09T20:02:09Z")
Yeah, an adult healthy caveman will probably be in vastly better physical condition even than an astronaut, especially for fighting. Astronaut physical training is about all around health and stamina, cavemen tend to have been “trained” by becoming physically adapted to a world in which you need to have stamina **and** physically explosive strength, ready at a moment’s notice. The cavemen who fail to develop both of those, do not become adult cavemen. Even the “gathering” part of hunter-gathering would break most modern men down into crying, puddled masses of quivering humanity. I’ve read accounts of missionaries and anthropologists who have tried to keep up with the native peoples of the Amazon just going about their day to day lives and the results have been very poor for the first worlders. If you want to put a caveman in a competition, that requires _highly specific adaptive training_ like modern Olympic-level weight lifting, sprinting, swimming then yes, the caveman will get smoked. He’s not adapted to those things. But beating someone literally to death? That’s exactly his game, and an average adult caveman has spent decades doing nothing but live in a world in which he has a threat of death from his environment every single day. I would’t want to scrape with one unless I had a gun and a clear line of sight. ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2016, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caveman-vs-astronaut/742502/52 "2016-01-10T15:46:38Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > This is like asking what would win, a shark or a lion. The answer? Depends where. Napoleon said that fighting the British was like an elephant fighting a whale, the point being that his armies were strong on land battles, while the British navy were strong on the seas. The whale won. ---
**Author:** ![Scumpup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce73a5/32.png) [@Scumpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scumpup)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2016, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caveman-vs-astronaut/742502/53 "2016-01-10T17:17:20Z")
The whale was part of a coalition of animals and weather that won. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/caveman-vs-astronaut/742502.md?page=2)