> I think the extinction of the Neanderthals is
> unutterably sad. There used to be two intelligent
> species on this planet, and not that long ago either.
>
> I wonder if we have enough genetic material to clone
> one, in principle, but that would be cruel. Maybe we
> could give them an island somewhere. (Would a
> Neanderthal foetus gestate in a human womb?)
> Doug
Two? The Homo floresiensis were with us long after Neanderthals. Apparently the evidence suggests they were intelligent enough to have evolved language and they died out no more recently than 10,000 years ago. Possibly as late as the 15th century BC although that last part is total conjecture.
With all the race problems we face today imagine how fucked up things would be were there to exist one or two intellectually inferior species of hominid.
John Thornton