DailyDirt: Looking Back At Ancient Humans

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

Our ancient ancestors had a pretty tough life without fire, farming techniques and 4G wireless internet connections. But they managed to create cave paintings that still exist today, and we're still finding cool stuff that pre-historic people left behind. Here are just a few interesting links to our great-great-great...-great grandparents.

• The mother of humanity lived approximately 200,000 years ago, according to a statistical analysis of a sampling of our genes that could be linked to a "mitochondrial Eve." Note that dinosaurs went extinct about 65 million years ago. [url]
• Red Deer Cave people lived in China thousands of years ago and seemed to like eating cooked venison meat (so they were nicknamed after their meals). These Stone Aged people could be a new species in human evolution, and they show that Neanderthals had plenty of company in Asia. [url]
• Homo floresiensis is another human ancestor who lived in Asia and could possibly have met Homo sapiens about 13,000 years ago. These folks were nicknamed 'Hobbits' because they're the smallest human species ever discovered. [url]
• Recently discovered fossils show that Homo erectus wasn't alone in East Africa, and at least two other Homo species lived nearby around the same time. These findings suggest that the evolution of Homo sapiens wasn't a linear progression (as depicted in many cartoons), and there's no "missing link" in the human family tree. [url]

If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post.

Filed Under: ancestors, evolution, genetics, homo erectus, homo floresiensis, homo sapiens, neanderthals

DailyDirt: Ancient Food & Modern Food

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

Food has changed a lot over the last few decades. There's a lot more stuff like high fructose corn syrup in the food we eat, and formerly obscure techniques like sous-vide cooking are becoming more well-known. Here are a few quick links on some modern foods.

• A recent study suggests that Neanderthals gathered plants and cooked their food -- making their diet more similar to ours than previously thought. Unless you're comparing microwaved frozen dinners to Neanderthal meals... [url]
• A "Molecular Cuisine Starter Kit" sells for about $70 and includes ingredients such as calcium lactate, sodium alginate, soy lecithin and xanthan gum. And remember not to eat the little packets of silica gel in the packing material. [url]
• Here are two great tastes that taste great together: beer and marshmallows. Chocolate and peanut butter will always be the classic combination. [url]
• The first printing of Nathan Myhrvold's $625 cookbook has sold out -- so 25,000 more sets are being printed. When will the lawsuits over "stolen recipes" start? [url]
• To discover more food-related links, check out what's floating around in StumbleUpon. [url]  

By the way, StumbleUpon can also recommend some good Techdirt articles, too.

Filed Under: cookbook, food, modern cuisine, nathan myhrvold, neanderthals