Why did humans take over the world while our closest relatives, the Neanderthals, became extinct? It’s possible we were just smarter, but there’s surprisingly little evidence that’s true.
Neanderthals had big brains, language and sophisticated tools. They made art and jewelry. They were smart, suggesting a curious possibility. Maybe the crucial differences weren’t at the individual level, but in our societies.
Two hundred and fifty thousand years ago, Europe and western Asia were Neanderthal lands. Homo sapiens inhabited southern Africa. Estimates vary but perhaps 100,000 years ago, modern humans migrated out of Africa.
Forty thousand years ago Neanderthals disappeared from Asia and Europe, replaced by humans. Their slow, inevitable replacement suggests humans had some advantage, but not what it was.
Problem or solution?
As in: Did I describe a problem or solution? I don’t view nature as a problem, so I have no solution.
What I described is, what is. I can’t justify violence, but I also know it may be unavoidable. Honestly, the only solution I know of to the human problem is just be cool to one another. (I need to follow my own advice more, TBH.)
I personally have mixed views on the nature of humanity, but that is a conversation for another day.
Edit: Oh, I meant that humans having bows made them more efficient killers. That problem being how neanderthals might have been eliminated by violence.