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Earth Science

Early Humans Wiped Out in Europe By 'Glacial Cooling,' Study Suggests 61

Posted by msmash from the unraveling-mysteries dept.
Extreme "glacial cooling" that occurred more than a million years ago in southern Europe is likely to have caused an "extinction of early humans" on the continent, according to new research. From a report: The previously unknown ice age pushed the European climate to "beyond what archaic humans could tolerate" and likely wiped out human life on the continent temporarily, concluded an academic paper published in the journal Science. The findings by 11 researchers from institutions including University College London and the University of Cambridge challenge the long-held idea that humans have continuously occupied Europe since first arriving in the region.

The newly discovered cooling event was "comparable to some of the most severe events of recent ice ages," said the paper's lead author Vasiliki Margari from UCL. "We suggest that these extreme conditions led to the depopulation of Europe," the researchers concluded. Glacial-interglacial cycles, or warmer and colder periods each lasting thousands of years, have occurred cyclically over the past 2.6mn years, with large ice sheets forming during the colder spells and melting during the warmer periods. According to the academic paper, a previously unknown glacial period that occurred about 1.1mn years ago led to abrupt cooling that lasted about 4,000 years. This happened as conditions began to warm and large ice sheets melted into the Atlantic Ocean, which pushed down European sea and land temperatures.
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Early Humans Wiped Out in Europe By 'Glacial Cooling,' Study Suggests More

Early Humans Wiped Out in Europe By 'Glacial Cooling,' Study Suggests

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  • But we fought back (Score:5, Funny)

    by wakeboarder ( 2695839 ) on Thursday August 10, 2023 @05:44PM (#63757314)
    and we won, and where are those glaciers now? Huh?

  • I read the summary (Score:5, Interesting)

    by iAmWaySmarterThanYou ( 10095012 ) on Thursday August 10, 2023 @05:53PM (#63757330)

    Which makes an interesting side comment that really should have been highlighted.

    Massive sheets melting due to global warming triggered a 4000 year ice age in Europe by cooling the oceans.

    The planet is staggeringly complex.

  • More hysteria (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Brett Buck ( 811747 ) on Thursday August 10, 2023 @05:55PM (#63757336)

    By "wiped out", I expect that really means "moved somewhere else aside from some exceptional circumstances. Climate change is not like you dropped a bomb on them, they gradually found it less-viable than other places and either adapted or moved on.

    • By "wiped out", I expect that really means "moved somewhere else aside from some exceptional circumstances. Climate change is not like you dropped a bomb on them, they gradually found it less-viable than other places and either adapted or moved on.

      I take "wiped out" literally. I suspect God wadded up a giant piece of proto-TP (aka academic paper) in his giant hand and smeared these fuckers out.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by suutar ( 1860506 )

      given that "on the continent" is a significant part of what got "wiped out", "moved somewhere else" still counts.

      • East of Trieste (at the north end of the Adriatic), the option to be driven south (and further east into the Levant and the "Fertile Crescent".

        West of Trieste though, and you (or your descendents) end up in southern Spain, just able to see the relatively clement "Barbary" coast of North Africa, and wishing you'd invented the boat (or raft) before the ice killed off the trees.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by evanh ( 627108 )

      It's also many decades old knowledge. The story goes that there was supposedly to be a recurrence ice-age on its way as well.

    • Now the dinosaurs, that was a wipeout.
      • Really? So what was it that shat on my car this afternoon?

        If you've disabled display of "signatures", this might not make much sense.

    • I wish the glaciers would adapt and move on.
  • For the climate denalists. I mean, AGW was always a george soros plot, but in case it’s real, it’s a good thing anyway cause it’ll keep those pesky glaciers from wiping us out, amirite?

    • Is this fodder?

      I think the crux of the so called "climate deniers" is that the earths climate is always in natural flux and that our contribution is minimal.
      The fact that there were significant climate events before man had any possible impact kind of goes to show that the earths climate has the capacity to radically change without human intervention. Am I right?

      • Re: (Score:1, Offtopic)

        by Train0987 ( 1059246 )

        "Climate denier" is a slur used to sway low-IQ people and avoid any debate. They use many such slurs.

      • Re:This will be great fodder (Score:5, Funny)

        by bug_hunter ( 32923 ) on Thursday August 10, 2023 @07:57PM (#63757646)

        Person A: You just shot that person with a gun and they died!!

        Person B: While yes I did just shoot this gun, but can you deny that people's health fluctuates all the time, many people died well before I pulled the trigger. What we're witnessing is just a human's natural capacity to die.

  • Hominins not Anatomically Modern Humans ... (Score:3)

    by kbahey ( 102895 ) on Thursday August 10, 2023 @07:22PM (#63757556) Homepage

    I should note that 1.1 Mya there were no anatomically modern humans yet. Even Neanderthals were not present in that far off past.

    Oh, I see that the paper [science.org] says Hominins, not Humans ...

    That is what you get when the 'editors' post science articles from the Financial Times.

    • They *were* humans. Just not *Homo Sapien* (modern) humans. Probably Homo Erectus (early humans).

      All humans are also hominins, but not all hominins are human.

  • Archeologist seem to constantly underestimate the capabilities of early humans. The last sentence of the summary lends credence to that this is once again the case: "We suggest that these extreme conditions led to the depopulation of Europe, perhaps lasting for several successive glacial-interglacial cycles."

    They are clearly underestimating the ability of humans to migrate. A group of humans is capable of walking the entire Mediterranean coastline in a few years. Glacial-interglacial cycles have ~100

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by dfghjk ( 711126 )

      I guess those losers didn't get the text message that they needed to split, huh?

      "...but asserting that humans wouldn't return over 100,000 year time frames is ignoring the well known range and mobility of humans."

      This topic has dumber than normal posters, quite an achievement for /. The article is about depopulation, not about and failure to "return". Also, our ancestors DID return to Africa, and eventually return to Europe as well. Couldn't have offered a dumber post had you tried.

  • ...of Slashdot posting an article, when you can't even read the source material (requires subscription)????

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