Who were the Neanderthals? And what can our discoveries about them teach us about intelligence, our extractivist relationship to the planet, and what it means to be human?

Ludovic Slimak is a paleoanthropologist at the University of Toulouse in France and Director of the Grotte Mandrin research project. His work focuses on the last Neanderthal societies, and he is the author of several hundred scientific studies on these populations. His research has been featured in Nature, Science, the New York Times, and other publications. He is the author of The Naked Neanderthal: A New Understanding of the Human Creature.

"As long as your children believe your traditions are a good way to be human on Earth, they will continue to be like you. And your society and your civilization will continue. But the moment they see a better and more efficient way to do things, they will no longer believe in your ways, and your traditions will collapse in a whisper. 

I think what is very, very important for the young generations - because they hear every day and everywhere that this is the end of our world because of many things, particularly about the question of climate change - and we must tell young generations, first of all, we don't know anything about the future. Maybe the future is incredibly nice. Incredibly nice, because we are going to have at a certain moment absolute energy, the ability to travel anywhere in space, the ability to colonize any satellite in our solar system, and maybe with no more any kind of fitness, no more cancer, nothing else. So the future can be bright and incredible. And the young generations should keep in mind that they are on a magical planet which is full of beauty and they must love it and preserve it as best as they can with hope."

http://ww5.pegasusbooks.com/books/the-naked-neanderthal-9781639366163-hardcover
https://lampea.cnrs.fr/spip.php?article3767
www.odilejacob.fr/catalogue/sciences-humaines/archeologie-paleontologie-prehistoire/dernier-neandertalien_9782415004927.php

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