[gpm]

> So we have found evidence of the feathers of dinosaurs, but not the fur of something from 40k years ago? that seems rather unlikely

Does it? Dinosaurs existed for hundreds of millions years, that's a lot of time for things to be preserved. Neanderthals for hundreds of thousands of years, that's not nearly as much.

Sure, fur/feathers is less likely to be preserved for 65 million years (+ however far into the mesozioic you go) than 40 thousand years (+ however far back into the history of neanderthals you go), but by how many orders of magnitude? Is it enough to make up for the many orders of magnitude difference in the number of times it could be preserved?

[13of40]

I think it's interesting how much traction the question of whether Neanderthals had body is getting in this discussion. I haven't read into it too deeply, so I'm not confident to say which side is correct, but the fact that nearly all mammals, and every extant primate species save one have thick body hair, regardless of what climate they live in, means it wouldn't surprise me to find out that Neanderthals also did. It also wouldn't surprise me to find out they walked around with crude animal skin drapings (like Wikipedia claims) or that they had expertly tailored leather suits as described in that linked article. What surprises me is that so many people really, really want it to have been one way or the other. Here's a theory: Their range was so vast, and the time they spent on earth was so long, that some of them were bald and made clothes, and some of them were hairy from head to toe (like some modern people) and walked around naked. Probably some of them were mean and some were nice, and sometimes they traded with Homo Sapiens, and sometimes they dined on them.

For what it's worth, my dad was an anthropologist and he liked to point out that their women probably had beards.

[evilduck]

In addition, dinosaur feathers that have been discovered have been in fossils where it's obviously still part of the animal, or preserved in amber where feathers were unexpected and it raised questions.

Who's been looking for neanderthal fur at any scale? It could be hiding in plain sight. AFAIK, geologists and archeologists don't try to run DNA tests on every bit of biological matter they come across. Humans are known tool users and clothing (and fur) wearers. If someone found fur near a hominid and it wasn't on their head, would anyone be jumping to this conclusion?