• Skip to main content
  • Skip to header right navigation
  • Skip to site footer
  • WordPress
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • YouTube
Science Update

Science Update

Sharing Science | Satisfying Curiosity | Debunking BS

  • Spotlights
  • Reality Check
  • Why Is It?
  • Radio Archives
  • Sciup @ School
Home » Radio Archive » Daily Show » Neanderthal Hands

Neanderthal Hands

June 22, 2011
https://podcast.scienceupdate.com/110622_sciup_hand.mp3

Podcast: Play in new window

BOB HIRSHON (host):

What the teeth say about the hands…I’m Bob Hirshon and this is Science Update.

The majority of Neanderthals, like modern humans, were right-handed. That’s the conclusion reached by University of Kansas anthropologist David Frayer and his colleagues after they examined Neanderthal teeth. He says our extinct cousins probably held meat in their teeth, pulling it away from themselves with one hand while using the other to cut it with stone tools. Sometimes the tools would slip, leaving scratch marks.

DAVID FRAYER (University of Kansas):

The marks that are done when an individual is pulling with the left and then cutting with the right hand run from the upper left to the bottom right of the tooth.

HIRSHON:

He says that 90% of the teeth they looked at had marks indicating right-handedness. Modern humans have the same ratio of right-hand dominance. It’s thought that the left side of the brain controls the right side of the body and also language, so the results support the controversial idea that Neanderthals may have been capable of speech. I’m Bob Hirshon, for AAAS, the science society.

Category: Daily Show, Station DownloadTag: Anthropology, Archaeology, Brain Science, Genetics & Evolution, Social & Behavioral Sciences
Previous Post:Barbie Effect
Next Post:A Nestling Mystery

Sidebar

Radio Program Archives

Want to learn more about the brain? The environment? Here you can browse the topics that come up regularly on Science Update.

Search the Archives

Categories

  • Daily Show
  • Station Download
  • Weekly Show

Find By Tag

  • 2020
  • Acoustics & Sound
  • Aging
  • Animal Behavior
  • Anthropology
  • Archaeology
  • Astronomy & Space
  • Biology
  • Brain Science
  • Bugs
  • Chemistry
  • Children & Families
  • cicadas
  • Climate & Weather
  • Communications
  • Computer Science
  • Economics & Business
  • Education
  • Energy
  • Engineering & Technology
  • Environment & Conservation
  • Genetics & Evolution
  • Geology
  • Marine Science
  • Materials Science
  • Mathematics
  • Medicine & Health
  • Microbiology
  • Nanotechnology
  • Nutrition & Food Science
  • Paleontology & Dinosaurs
  • Physics
  • Plants & Agriculture
  • Political Science
  • Reality Check
  • Social & Behavioral Sciences
  • Sports & Fitness
  • spotlight
  • Spotlight Bugs
  • Terrorism & War
  • Why Is It? Questions
  • Wildlife
  • Year in Review

Find By Date

Science Update
  • About Science Update
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of Use

Follow Us

  • Facebook
  • YouTube

Recent Posts

Mayan Honeybee hives
House sparrow wearing top hat rides aboard a red fireworks rocket

Copyright © 2023 · Springtail Media LLC · All Rights Reserved · Powered by Pongos