# Talk:Harbin cranium

"DNA evidence suggests Denisovans are more closely related to Neanderthals than modern humans." Should this be interpreted as "more closely related to Neanderthals than to modern humans" or "more closely related to Neanderthals than modern humans are"? 104.153.40.58 (talk) 14:50, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

Dunkleosteus77 I have looked at this as a result of the comment above, and I am not sure of your interpretation. You say that the describers postulate both that longi is a member of the Denisovans and that longi is closer to sapiens than to Neanderthals. These seem to me to be rival interpretations of two different papers by mostly the same authors, that the authors must have changed their minds even though the papers were published almost simultaneously. The 'Massive cranium' paper at [1] says "The Harbin cranium is one of the best preserved of all archaic human fossils and its estimated late Middle Pleistocene age places it as an Asian contemporary of the evolving H. sapiens, H. neanderthalensis, and Denisovan lineages." It then says "Our analyses also suggest a potential link between the Harbin cranium and the Xiahe mandible, a fossil attributed to the Denisovan lineage." Thus it was contemporary with the other three lineages with a possible closer connection to Denisovan. The other paper at [2] does not even mention the Denisovans and says longi was closer to sapiens than Neanderthal. These are rival interpretations which cannot be combined to give one view.
Also the family tree appears to have Neanderthals diverging before antecessor, but the Massive cranium article says the opposite. Dudley Miles (talk) 21:58, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
Yeah these authors used a really different family tree which contradicts genomic evidence, placing Denisovans (Xiahe) and H. antecessor as more closely related to modern humans than to Neanderthals, which is why I mentioned that "DNA evidence suggests Denisovans are more closely related to Neanderthals than [to] modern humans." Dunkleosteus77 (talk) 23:44, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
Where does it say that? I read "To separately reflect recent results from palaeoproteomic and ancient DNA research,5,21,22,32 partial backbone constraints were used to force the Xiahe mandible as the sister group of Neanderthals and to force H. antecessor outside of the Neanderthal-Xiahe-H. sapiens clade (see the supplemental information)." as saying they rejected that family tree in light of the DNA evidence. Dudley Miles (talk) 07:29, 28 April 2023 (UTC)
"Ji, Ni and colleagues further contend that Middle Pleistocene Asian specimens are more closely related to modern humans (H. sapiens) than the European Neanderthals, though nuclear DNA and ancient protein analyses place the Xiahe mandible and Denisovans more closely to Neanderthals than to modern humans."
Read literally and in isolation, the "though" part is consistent with the preceding part, if Denisovans are somehow between Neanderthals and modern humans, but closer to Neanderthals than to modern humans. A clarification would be good. I noticed the same strange pattern in one of the press articles, though. So maybe it stems from one of the papers.
To be honest, the whole research smells a bit fishy. The intense harassment of skeptical voices in discussions here is not reassuring either.
I think the article should be named "Harbin skull" and focus on the finding, of course also mentioning the homo longi proposal and its possible relation to "Denisovans".
Elias (talk) 07:15, 25 May 2023 (UTC)

He has been confirmed as Denisovan. Can we get a serious update to this page please?

Kikiopae (talk) 01:57, 28 June 2025 (UTC)

How about merging this page and the Denisovan one for example?
Kikiopae (talk) 02:03, 28 June 2025 (UTC)
There is extensive discussion. The articles will need to be merged but I think it is too soon as it is not yet clear what the title of the merged article should be. Dudley Miles (talk) 08:48, 28 June 2025 (UTC)
I don't think they should be merged. This article is mostly about the skull. Maybe it could be renamed? Vpab15 (talk) 12:47, 29 June 2025 (UTC)
It's about the Homo longi species as a taxon.
Which has been confirmed to be Denisovan, lol.
I dont see how this should be contradicting? having two pages for the same species overcomplicates this...
Kikioran (talk) 22:25, 22 July 2025 (UTC)