# How do we know cave men were hairy? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 20, 2011, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198 "2011-06-20T20:17:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/41 "2011-06-22T00:23:33Z")
> [@mac\_bolan00](#): > > in afghanistan, US soldiers discovered that shaving everyday is near-fatal. the reason the taliban required beards for males is not due to some cockamamey religious rule but rather out of concern. beards, mustaches, and mutton chop sideburns protect you from the fierce sun. GIs learned quickly to grow long beards while in 'stan. You’ve never served in any branch of the U.S. military, have you? Stranger ---
**Author:** ![mac\_bolan00](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b3f665/32.png) [@mac\_bolan00](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mac_bolan00)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 12:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/42 "2011-06-22T00:28:24Z")
nope, read it from time. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/43 "2011-06-22T00:51:17Z")
You really have to define what ‘cavemen’ really were too. The science behind human lineages is evolving very rapidly to the point in which most assumptions are partially incorrect as compared to a couple of decades ago if not much less. Many things that were assumed to be true even a decade ago now are in serious dispute or discredited now. When I think of cavemen, I think of Neanderthals but some people think of Cromagnon man. Neanderthals were once thought to an ancestor of modern homo sapiens and later an evolutionary dead-end. That isn’t quite true. We know now that Neanderthals never really did die out. They hybridized with the early European and Asian homo sapiens so that they never went away fully. If you are white, you are about 5% Neanderthal on average. If you are pure sub-Saharan African black, you have little to no Neanderthal genetic legacy. It doesn’t stop there. There is probably at least one more modern human species from Indonesia called [Homo floresiensis](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo_floresiensis) that was discovered in 2004. There is another good candidate for a new modern human species coming out of Russia that may have hybridized with homo sapiens as well. The point is that the current best understanding of human lineages can’t be represented well with 2-D models walking more and more upright. There were several of them that developed and probably interbred long after they left Africa. Some may have been very hairy but that would have been just a selected group. There was a lot more variation in even recent human development than assumed even a few years ago. ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 1:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/44 "2011-06-22T01:10:40Z")
> [@mac\_bolan00](#): > > in afghanistan, US soldiers discovered that shaving everyday is near-fatal. the reason the taliban required beards for males is not due to some cockamamey religious rule but rather out of concern. beards, mustaches, and mutton chop sideburns protect you from the fierce sun. GIs learned quickly to grow long beards while in 'stan. Once again, I would like to think this is a joke, but it probably isn’t. You seriously think that soldier can function in outback Australia or the Andes without any facial hair, but somehow the sun in Afghanistan is so “fierce” that anyone without a beard burns to death? WTF do you think the women and children do in Afghanistan? Never go outside? Only go outside at night? Or maybe you think they have beards too? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![mac\_bolan00](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b3f665/32.png) [@mac\_bolan00](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mac_bolan00)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 1:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/45 "2011-06-22T01:21:07Z")
go complain to Time magazine. the army command was said to have been angered by the proliferation of biblical beards on soldiers they ordered them shaved off. but then, it could have been a leftist report. who knows. i can stand a 110F sun with a clean face. but i don’t follow a soldier’s regimen so it’s an open case. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/46 "2011-06-22T02:07:48Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > You’ve never served in any branch of the U.S. military, have you? > > Stranger Are soldiers and marines even allowed to sport full beards? ---
**Author:** ![mac\_bolan00](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b3f665/32.png) [@mac\_bolan00](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mac_bolan00)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/47 "2011-06-22T02:36:31Z")
special forces in 'stan were, until they were ordered to desist. they complained that carrying beard made them less of a target when minggling with locals and it also sat well with men there who believed a beard was an important symbol of manhood. my clean-shaven-soldiers-frying-in-the-sun quote is no longer to be found. ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/48 "2011-06-22T02:50:46Z")
> [@mac\_bolan00](#): > > my clean-shaven-soldiers-frying-in-the-sun quote is no longer to be found. What a surprise. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![mac\_bolan00](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b3f665/32.png) [@mac\_bolan00](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mac_bolan00)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/49 "2011-06-22T03:19:37Z")
sorry if you were born yeserday. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/50 "2011-06-22T03:26:17Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > What a surprise. :rolleyes: > [@mac\_bolan00](#): > > sorry if you were born yeserday. :rolleyes: [Moderating] OK, guys, let’s dial back on the snark and lay off the rolleyes. No warnings issued. Colibri General Questions Moderator ---
**Author:** ![jackdavinci](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackdavinci/32/3259_2.png) [@jackdavinci](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackdavinci)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 8:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/51 "2011-06-22T08:03:18Z")
Based on the fact that the 5k year old fossil “Ötzi the Iceman” is completely hairless after being frozen, I’m guessing we have no way of knowing what older specimens actually were like in terms of hairiness other than extrapolation. ---
**Author:** ![mac\_bolan00](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b3f665/32.png) [@mac\_bolan00](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mac_bolan00)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 8:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/52 "2011-06-22T08:36:45Z")
why would esau, a farmer, be hairy while jacob, a shepherd, is smooth? ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 12:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/53 "2011-06-22T12:26:32Z")
When the idea that humans evolved from an apelike\* ancestor first became widespread in the 19th century, there were different theories as to what the intermediate forms would have looked like. Modern humans have upright posture, a large brain, relative hairlessness, speech, and the ability to make and use tools routinely, all of which apes mostly don’t. Exactly which traits changed at what rate no one knew. The cliche’ of Neandertal Man having a slouching posture was accepted because no one knew when fully upright posture first began. The infamous Piltdown Man hoax endured because it fit one proposed model of development- a large brain with primitive jaws. We now believe that the approximate order of development was upright posture, hairlessness, progressively large brain, progressively more sophisticated tool making, and probably speech only within the last 150,000 years or so. \*Yes, I’ve heard a million times “humans didn’t evolve from apes; humans and apes evolved from a common ancestor”. Which probably was hairy, arboreal with opposing big toes, and had a pronounced muzzle. What any person would call an “ape” if they saw it. ---
**Author:** ![gytalf2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ac91a4/32.png) [@gytalf2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gytalf2000)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 1:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/54 "2011-06-22T13:26:27Z")
> [@bump](#): > > Speak for yourself, bub. You obviously haven’t seen some of the guys I’ve seen without shirts on. (myself included) > > Seems to me though, that chest/back hair on men is some kind of secondary sex characteristic like deep voices, beards, etc.. > > If they were a survival mechanism, women would be pretty hairy too, but they’re not nearly so hairy as men. Ha! You’re right, there are plenty of men today who have quite a bit of body hair, that’s for sure. Robin Williams, Steve Carell, and Alec Baldwin, for example! ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/55 "2011-06-22T15:00:32Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > When the idea that humans evolved from an apelike\* ancestor first became widespread in the 19th century, there were different theories as to what the intermediate forms would have looked like. Modern humans have upright posture, a large brain, relative hairlessness, speech, and the ability to make and use tools routinely, all of which apes mostly don’t. Exactly which traits changed at what rate no one knew. The cliche’ of Neandertal Man having a slouching posture was accepted because no one knew when fully upright posture first began. The infamous Piltdown Man hoax endured because it fit one proposed model of development- a large brain with primitive jaws. We now believe that the approximate order of development was upright posture, hairlessness, progressively large brain, progressively more sophisticated tool making, and probably speech only within the last 150,000 years or so.[/SIZE] Not sure where you’re getting that. I think the best consensus right now would be: Upright posture Increased brain size Progressively more complex tools Reduced hairiness Speech But there might not be much of a consensus on some of those things. Since chimps make tools, we think our earliest ancestors did, too. Stone tools, however, appear in the fossil record about 2.5M years ago. Reduced hairiness might have been a response to us making long treks across the savanna, which was probably more associated with _H. erecuts_ (about 2M years ago) than earlier forms. ---
**Author:** ![Romeo\_and\_Whatsherface](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@Romeo\_and\_Whatsherface](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Romeo_and_Whatsherface)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/56 "2011-06-22T20:17:47Z")
I agree that the term “Cave man” is somewhat ambiguous. How far back are we going? Would Otzi the Iceman qualify? He lived around 3300 BC in the Alps. In the photo of his remains, I’m not seeing hair, but there must have been some, because they did chemical analysis on it. The artist’s rendition shows an impressive beard and scalp hair, but no hairy knuckles. I’m also wondering about variations in hairiness between and within “cave man” populations. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/57 "2011-06-22T20:56:51Z")
> [@Romeo\_and\_Whatsherface](#): > > I agree that the term “Cave man” is somewhat ambiguous. How far back are we going? Would Otzi the Iceman qualify? He lived around 3300 BC in the Alps. In the photo of his remains, I’m not seeing hair, but there must have been some, because they did chemical analysis on it. The artist’s rendition shows an impressive beard and scalp hair, but no hairy knuckles. > > I’m also wondering about variations in hairiness between and within “cave man” populations. When my friends ask me questions about “cavemen”, I usually tell them I’m giving them info about Neanderthals. I think that fits most peoples’ image. But you are absolutely correct that it is a very ill-defined term. Otzi lived in a hut, not a cave, so he wouldn’t qualify. He also had a copper tool, which puts him out of the stone age. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/58 "2011-06-22T21:13:08Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Not sure where you’re getting that. I think the best consensus right now would be: > Upright posture > Increased brain size > Progressively more complex tools > Reduced hairiness > Speech > > But there might not be much of a consensus on some of those things. Since chimps make tools, we think our earliest ancestors did, too. Stone tools, however, appear in the fossil record about 2.5M years ago. Reduced hairiness might have been a response to us making long treks across the savanna, which was probably more associated with _H. erecuts_ (about 2M years ago) than earlier forms. Better thumbs would go in there. And there is a lot of disagreement about the order. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2011, 2:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/59 "2011-06-24T02:51:40Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > Better thumbs would go in there. And there is a lot of disagreement about the order. Yes. As similar as we are to chimps, their thumbs are pretty pathetic. ---
**Author:** ![mr.jp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/48db29/32.png) [@mr.jp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mr.jp)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2011, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198/60 "2011-06-24T14:02:58Z")
> [@Susanann](#): > > Actually, just the opposite. > > The first humans were hairless. Ditto for the first Chimps. > > In evolution, the first creature necessarily is hairless, bc the development of hair is a reaction or a response to the environment. Hair, fur, feathers, evolved later, probably evolved when the creatures migrated to cooler climates. The creatures with hair, feathers , fur, more hair, more feathers, more fur survived better at some point in time. > > Ditto for the very first cell/spark of life to be created on Earth, the first bird, the first frog, the first puppy, etc were all t also hairless in the earliest stages of evolution. This might be the weirdest claim I have ever seen in an evolution discussion in GQ, and that’s saying a lot. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-we-know-cave-men-were-hairy/586198.md?page=4)