The possibility of human hybridsiation.

[Blake]

Too avoid a hoijack of this thread

Human and Chimp Offspring

which hinges on an asusmption that hybrids are possible I’m starting a new thread for those who wish to discuss whether the hypoisthetical situation which is explicietely assumed as the basis of that thread is in fact scientifcally possible.

[Blake]

@John Mace

But you are correct, in that the genetic data we **do **have does not support the idea that chimps and humnas can hybridize. We can still hope, though, can’t we?

But it doesn’t in any way undermine the idea either. That’s the important point. It’s 100% neutral on such an issue.

@Loopydude

Well, Blake, those caveats are all entirely valid, but when you look at likelihood, it’s difficult to argue that all the possible dead-ends simply vanished, given the enormity of the overlapping human and Neanderthal habitat. Australia is a relatively isolated landmass off the Southeastern tip of Asia. Certainly human migration occurred into and out of the Australian continent; but contrast Australia with Europe and especially the Middle East, which is at the confluence of three continents. To quote the article I cited: “‘There is still a remote possibility that only nuclear DNA was contributed, or that any Neanderthal mtDNA lineage has been lost during human population bottlenecks in the last glacial max, but the odds appear pretty slim,’ said Cooper.”

First off Australia was never isolated. It was more isolated perhaps than Palestine, but nit more isolated than Russia or Portugal, which is where our Neanderthal DNA samples come from. That’s point that needs to be realised, that our sample of Neanderthal DNA come from the last isolated pockets of Neandertals, not the mainstream Levantine population you refer to. Neither Portugal nor Russia were a confluence of anywhere, they were the last areas colonised by both Sapiens and Neanderthalensis, total isolated backwaters comparable to Australia. That’s why Neanderthals held out there so long and why the DNA samples were available form the fairly recent remains found there.

Prof Cooper of course can state his opinion that the odds are slim, but since he isn’t able to provide any statistical tests that he used to gauge the probabilities it’s worthless opinion. We have no idea how common dead ends in human populations are. They may have been the norm until very recently.