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Neanderthal or Cretin? A Debate Over Iodine
New York Times ^ | December 1, 1998 | John Noble Wilford
Posted on 08/24/2006 11:13:28 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
In a study already drawing the fire of controversy, an American geographer has pointed out evidence suggesting, in his view, that little more than the amount of
Iodine in their diets may have been responsible for the physical differences between Neanderthals and modern humans and that this might solve the mystery of what happened to the Neanderthals. According to this interpretation, the skeletons of Neanderthals bear signs of physical deformities and possibly impaired mental health, which could be a result of iodine-deficient diets... It may even mean that Neanderthals could actually have been anatomically modern humans who were pathologically altered by iodine-deficiency diseases, like cretinism. Perhaps the Neanderthals did not so much disappear as change their diets some time before 30,000 years ago to include more iodine-rich foods. In that case, this could explain why certain Neanderthal physical traits -- heavy brows, thick bones and musculature and propensities for degenerative joint diseases, which are also associated with iodine-deficiency diseases -- did not persist even if their genes continued into later European populations. These are the provocative ideas of Dr. Jerome E. Dobson, a geographer at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory... "I compared Neanderthal and cretin morphology and ultimately concluded that Neanderthals were iodine-deficient," Dr. Dobson said last week... An authority on Neanderthals, Dr. Fred H. Smith of Northern Illinois University, in De Kalb, said the
Iodine hypothesis reminded him of the arguments raised, and rejected, in the past to explain away Neanderthal anatomy as examples of rickets-caused deformities. Dr. Eric Trinkaus, a paleontologist at Washington University, in St. Louis, who has written several books on Neanderthals, also disputed Dr. Dobson's evidence for widespread
Iodine deficiency in Neanderthal skeletons as well as his interpretations.