No, Britain did not destroy a prosperous Mughal rule in India. When EIC took Bengal, India was deep in a century-long economic depression. But this does not let the British off the hook — and the effects are still felt today. 🙏 Bishnupriya Gupta Read or listen: substack.com/home/post/p-...

I love reading John's substack, but this one has me particularly chuffed since he is highlighting the part of this new paper that got me most excited (and was ignored in a lot of the coverage). He gives a great summary of identifying matrilineal kin networks/ -based migration in the human genome.

"The chimps at Ngogo and Taï are ingesting the equivalent of more than two drinks a day on average." And they start young! 🙏 @katewong.bsky.social

Where did humans evolve? What was the scenery like? And what should we make of the "savanna hypothesis"? What a pleasure to find so much clarity on these questions! My brilliant guest was Denise Su at ASU's Institute of Human Origins! @asuiho.bsky.social. 🎧 Enjoy!

Priceless interview for all anthropologists and fieldworkers. Thank you, @ilarimakela.bsky.social & RB Lee!! Lee’s discussions on establishing new field sites closely parallel my experiences in the Omo in Ethiopia with the @omovalleyresearchproject.org

A new podcast interview by @ilarimakela.bsky.social with Richard B. Lee about Man the Hunter! Should be fascinating. onhumans.substack.com/p/the-origin...

It's out: the first ever podcast interview with Richard B. Lee! 🥁 We discuss the 60 year legacy of Man the Hunter conference, including: The Original Affluent Society The Dawn of Everything The choice of the term "Man" in the conference name. Enjoy!

What can shamanism teach us about religion -- and the human mind? What a pleasure to share this excellent conversation to the listeners of On Humans! The hard work was done by @manymindspod.bsky.social and @manvir.bsky.social 🙏 Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/4nhm3fG... Apple 👇

What a pleasure to do this swap with one of my favourite shows, Many Minds! Do check their work out if you haven't already. And stay tuned for my turn in an hour or so ;)

The talk was superb, do check it ou!

"Rather than framing cooperation as a moral innovation or a product of stable communal life, [the] researchers propose that cooperation may actually flourish when the world is unstable." www.anthropology.net/p/when-the-w... by @anthropology.net

The trilogy ends! The final episodes of Decoding Our Story traces the last miles in the human journey out of Africa: South America in the west, Polynesia in the east, and .... Can you guess? 🙏 @morestrada.bsky.social & @anthropogeny.org Listen >> open.spotify.com/episode/16l1...

How cool! "The long coexistence of humans and leopard cats is one of the most overlooked relationships in East Asian zooarchaeology. Yet it represents a case where a wild species began down a pathway toward domestication but never reached the final steps." www.anthropology.net/p/strangers-...

The top artists amongst On Humans listeners in 2025 -- a surprising mix 😂 I guess this speaks about a diverse crowd. Glad if so 👏 Thanks to everyone who've been listening!

Yes, there are genetic differences between human populations. But how big are they? Diyendo Massilani's lab has produced a fascinating analysis on this. What a pleasure to have him on! open.spotify.com/episode/043H...

It’s live! 👏 Decoding Our Story is a three-part series on how genetics is rewriting the human story🏺 Recorded at the @salkinstitute.bsky.social's CARTA symposium on ancient DNA, these episodes take you behind the scenes of one of the most exciting frontiers in modern science. Enjoy!

If David is right, you should check this out too 😉 onhumans.substack.com/p/can-we-tel...

A telling graph about climate change and human origins. onhumans.substack.com/p/can-we-tel... #PaleoSky

"Why did violence break out all across the LBK at the same time, and with such lasting consequences?" Very interesting reminder of how early European farming was quite peaceful -- until it wasn't. www.science.org/content/arti...

And many thanks to @dremmabird.bsky.social for help with this!

Why do we exist? The science of human origins keeps producing new theories. But are we any closer to telling a true story of human origins? Or are we simply drowning in data? I think we have a story--a story centered on calories, childhoods, cooperation, and climate. Here is the story.

You decided to read this. But could you have chosen otherwise? Are we ever free to choose? 🧠 A short episode on a big topic! Read or listen at onhumans.substack.com/p/is-the-bra.... 🙏 Thanks to @timcoulson.bsky.social from @biology.ox.ac.uk!

"New research at Semiyarka is challenging long-held ideas about mobility, metallurgy, and the unexpected shape of early cities in Eurasia." www.anthropology.net/p/city-of-th... @anthropology.net

"How is it that Brazil imported so many more enslaved people than the US, yet by the mid-19th century the US had 2.5 times more?" aeon.co/essays/way-d...

A classic challenge: human brain is only ~2% of our body mass but takes about ~20% of our base metabolism. A bigger challenge: during early childhood, the number climbs over 50%! How to afford that? So much of human evolution wrapped in one puzzle www.nature.com/articles/npr... 🏺 #paleosky

Diving with Sea Lions in San Diego 🦭 Turn on the sound to hear their vocalisations! Not a bad start to a Wednesday. I could get used to this... #animal

Did Neanderthals speak? We don't know. But DNA evidence shows our ancestors experienced speedier evolution in the vocal tract. This is highly suggestive of a more important role for speech amongst Homo sapiens. By the way, the methods are insane 🤯 pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32132541/ 🏺 #paleosky

Okay. It's over. What an incredible weekend! Thank you to all the wonderful folks who made this possible! BONUS: I managed to record short live episodes with three speakers... Stay tuned 👀 @anthropogeny.org @salkinstitute.bsky.social

Meet your dinosaur-era ancestor 🏺 news.berkeley.edu/2021/02/24/o...

Reading this, I'm not surprised that many of the aDNA pioneers have simply dropped using latin names.

Forgive me for one LinkedIn style post... But this did feel good! ★★★★★ Grateful to those 100 people who, against all odds, actually discovered how rate a show on Spotify! (I still struggle to find it at times...) 🙏 open.spotify.com/show/4nhm3fG...

"Startups are exploring using [period blood] to test for a wide range of health conditions .. including endometriosis"

This looks like an excellent introduction.

Were Neanderthals killed by... scurvy? 🏺 #paleosky www.mdpi.com/2571-550X/6/...

I posted this article already, but only highlighting the negative trend. Here is a more hopeful point: change is possible! www.nature.com/articles/s41...

The backdrop to human evolution: an increasingly erratic climate. 🏺 #paleosky www.youtube.com/watch?v=jK9P...

I'll be here in person! Hit me up if you're coming, too. The lineup is incredible -- do check out the webcast if not in sunny San Diego ☀️ carta.anthropogeny.org/events/ancie... @anthropogeny.org #paleosky 🏺

"It is a profound gift to know that when a chimpanzee stares into a person’s eyes, they too could be reflecting on their beliefs about humans." Brian Hare in @science.org www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

4. Veneto Region, Italy. A 16th century female skeleton from a mass grave of plague victims was discovered with a brick forced between her jaws. Vampires were believed by some to cause plague so the brick was meant to stop the spread. (Image: Archaeology-World.com). More at: tinyurl.com/socmedarch36

Certainly made me think

Rome wasn't built in a day — nor without immigrants. 🏺

Forget the Hard Problem. Here comes the "Lobster Problem of Consciousness" 🧠 onhumans.substack.com/p/can-the-br... with @matthewcobb.bsky.social

No. The spark of humanity was not a sudden climactic shift from forest to savanna. Yet we should miss the forest from the trees! The general pattern is still there. 1/👇 🏺 #paleosky

Chatting with Joel Mokyr soon. What should I ask? #econsky

The best thing about race realism is that its nonsense. Imagine a world where it would be true... I don't want to. 🙏 @killgrove.bsky.social 🏺 #paleosky

"History no longer feels like something unfolding behind us but something rushing toward us, urgent and impossible to ignore." ~ @kaiserkuo.bsky.social substack.com/home/post/p-...

Hearsay from Beijing: Joel Mokyr is being surrounded by hundreds of Chinese students wanting his autograph. Lovely image -- also a good reality check to those who say the Nobel committee but a nostalgic bunch of eurocentric Whigs. #econsky

👀 For those who agree that Shrödinger's biological wisdom went beyond cats. Thanks to @djnicholson.bsky.social !

“When AI systems lack adequate exposure to a language, they have blind spots in their comprehension of human experience.” For example, "Hindi is spoken by around 7.5 per cent of the world’s population" but "accounts for 0.02% of Common Crawl training data".

Interesting, but title seems misleading.