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What did Neanderthals look like? An overview of “the evolution of Neanderthal portraits” since the 1800s. “Interpretations sometimes say more about their makers than their subjects.”

Discussion  2 comments

Matt Ittigson

Reminds me very much of a favorite This American Life segment: https://www.thisamericanlife.org/38/simulated-worlds/act-two-9

Talking with dinosaur experts like Jack Horner (whose work was the basis of much of the film Jurassic Park), Hitt finds that most of what you think you know about dinosaurs is probably wrong, and that Americans' ideas about dinosaurs go through "fashions" that reflect the national mood: We believed dinosaurs were more aggressive when we were on the brink of World Wars One and Two. And these days we focus on their family values.

Matthew Battles

(SPOILER ALERT) There's a depiction of Neanderthals in the 2022 film Out of Darkness, currently in US theaters (and ripping good, I think), which differs a great deal from the version featured in Quest for Fire (1981)—not only in terms of physiognomy, cut cultural and cognitive capacities. Film, too, has its caveman fashions!

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