The Saint-Césaire Neanderthal skull suffered a blow that split the skull. (Smithsonian Institution)HUMANS

NICHOLAS R. LONGRICH, THE CONVERSATION3 NOVEMBER 2020

Around 600,000 years ago, humanity split in two. One group stayed in Africa, evolving into us. The other struck out overland, into Asia, then Europe, becomingHomo neanderthalensis– theNeanderthals. They weren’t our ancestors, but a sister species, evolving in parallel.

Neanderthals fascinate us because of what they tell us about ourselves – who we were, and who we might have become. It’s tempting to see them in idyllic terms, living peacefully with nature andeach other, like Adam and Eve in the Garden.

If so, maybe humanity’s ills – especially our territoriality, violence, wars – aren’t innate, but modern inventions.

Biology and palaeontology paint a darker picture. Far from peaceful, Neanderthals were likely skilled fighters and dangerous warriors, rivalled only by modern humans.

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Gore Vidal: The United States of Amnesia

Directed by Nicholas Wrathall (2013)

Film Review

This film is dedicated to the memory of US dissident and iconoclast Gore Vidal, who died at 87 in 2012. Born to privilege, Vidal was one of the few Eastern- Washington DC elite to turn against his class. His maternal great-grandfather Thomas Pryor Gore was a long serving US Senator and his mother married into the Auchincloss* family, resulting in close ties to the Kennedy family.

Vidal spent three years in the Pacific during World War II before being invalided out for rheumatoid arthritis. He published his first novel at 19.

After Vidal was blackballed by the mainstream media (the New York Times and Washington Post refused to review his books) for publishing the first American novel explaining the mechanics of gay sex, he moved to Hollywood to write TV and movie scripts. He would receive…

Here is the link and what I wrote yesterday after reflecting on a quote by  Noam Chomsky.

https://auntyuta.com/2017/12/07/december-diary-2017/

. . . .  the expression “diverted to consumerism or hatred of the vulnerable” demands my attention. As a pensioner in Australia without major assets (except for owning own house), I would have to count myself to the bottom half in the population. And yet I must say I lead a comfortable life with most medical expenses covered by Medicare. Is it because the general population in Australia is “diverted to consumerism”? Or is it “hatred of the vulnerable” especially hatred of so called illegal migrants that makes us prosper in Australia? Well, this is something to contemplate. If we stop being “apathetic and passive” does our good life end then? How important is it to have a “good ” life at the expense of the vulnerable? Would the vulnerable have a…

Well, so far I survived for eighty-three years. So what is there to contemplate? The answer: There is a whole lot to contemplate!

I looked this up in Wikipedia:

“Avram Noam Chomsky(US: /ævˈrɑːm ˈnoʊm ˈtʃɒmski/ ( listen) av-RAHMNOHM CHOM-skee; born December 7, 1928) is an American linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, historian, social critic, and political activist. Sometimes described as “the father of modern linguistics,” Chomsky is also a major figure in analytic philosophy and one of the founders of the field of cognitive science. He is the author of over 100 books on topics such as linguistics, war, politics, and mass media. Ideologically, he aligns with anarcho-syndicalism and libertarian socialism

Ja, dies ist ein Liebesfilm der ‘Grosse Gefühle’ zeigt. Ich finde die Liebes-Beziehungen die die unterschiedlichsten Menschen eingehen, sehr interessant. Dies ist wahrscheinlich ein Film der nicht mehr so gut in unsere Zeit hineinpasst. Mir gefällt der Film sehr, und er hätte mir sicher auch gefallen, als ich jünger war. Vielleicht kann sich die heutige jüngere Generation in das Leben von damals nicht so richtig hineindenken und findet die Handlung zum Teil etwas langweilig und unverständlich, während ich als ältere Person den Film äusserst spannend finde, besonders den 2. Teil!!

Hier ist der 2. Teil: