Did Neanderthals Sing Opera?
“do re me fa so la ti Doh!”
In his book entitled, The Singing Neanderthals, Steven Mithen, has decided that Neanderthals sang opera as a form of pre-linguistic communication.
“The musicality of the Neanderthals can be identified more with opera than with rap because in addition to music, these hominids also used dance and body language as forms of communication.” said Mithen, a researcher who has made it his life’s work to think up things Neanderthals might have done and then state them in such a way as to make him sound like he knows what he’s talking about.
After staring at several Neanderthal skeletons, Mithen has ascertained that there is no question that several, if not all, were definitely making “jazz hands” when they died.
Mithen who is a researcher at the University of Reading, and who is purported to be an excellent reader, condescended to explain that the Neanderthal sang opera and not rap because “Rap is associated with a particular type of music based on words and phrases, something Neanderthals lacked,” Mitchen went on to explain in an unprecedented burst of making stuff up.
When told that operas contain many words and phrases, Mithen stated that he had never had the time to attend an actual opera due to his round-the-clock dedication to making stuff up about the Neanderthals shortly before kicking the reporter in the shins and running away.
“Woof? Roof? Arf possibly?
What Do Dogs Say When They Bark?
After exhaustively watching dogs, Professional Dog Barking Researcher, Raymond Coppinger, has concluded that dogs “tend to bark quite a lot– often at strangers or at anyone who walks by” and that “the purpose and significance of dog barking is not entirely understood and seems to occur indiscriminately.”
Blown away by his observations, but being careful not to use too many exclamation marks when writing up his findings in an effort to keep things as scientific as possible, Raymond Coppinger also pointed out that barking dogs are simply relieving some inner state of arousal. “The arousal model is that dogs do not have much control over their barks.”
Raymond Coppinger spent hundreds of hours wondering, scientifically, (which made the hours billable) about the barking of his own dog, Mystique.
If there were a strange man with a gun approaching the house, Raymond Coppinger proposed, would Mystique bark in a way that would alert him that there was something dangerous and different about the person?
Unfortunately, Raymond Coppinger was recently shot dead by a strange man with a gun who approached his house after failing to hear any barking at all, so, sadly, science will never know the answer to that question.
“Dang! This ring used to fit!”
King Richard III Skeleton Find Confirmed
The final resting place of a former English King has finally been discovered after 528 years of looking.
It is purported that researchers began their search for the grave of King Richard III a couple days after originally burying him in 1485. It seems the serf in charge of bringing King Richard III’s headstone to the churchyard contracted The Sweating Sickness, became delirious, got all turned around and cattywampus and nobody has seen him or it since.
“It is the academic conclusion of the University of Leicester that the individual exhumed at Greyfriars in August 2012 is indeed, King Richard III the last Plantagenet King of England,” Richard Buckley, the lead archaeologist of the four-year project said in his very deepest voice he reserves only for important statements such as this one.
The quest for King Richard III was embarked upon by the University of Leicester after enthusiastic amateurs somehow knew that Richard III might be buried underneath a parking lot which they picked at random to be the parking lot wherein the body of King Richard III has been residing for the last 528 years.
“Everyone thought I was mad when I wanted to dig up the parking lot!” said Philippa Langely, a member and soon-to-be president of the Where’s Richard III? Society.
Work has already begun on digging up a parking lot at an undisclosed location where King Richard III will be re-buried, thus ensuring that the University of Leicester will have something to look forward to finding.
Until next time . . . I love you
I love your Monday science posts, because they make me feel so much more intelligent than the brainiacs. Dogs bark because of some unidentified inner arousal. Bwhahahah!
I like the idea that Richard III is a living– ummm, dead?- Easter Egg! Will they equip him with a GPS? Maybe change his hat every time the bury him again… like geocaching? Possibilities=endless.
As for dogs and their indiscriminate barks, people do it too, but that doesn’t mean every person is a Kardashian.
LOL!!!! Neanderthals doing jazz hands made me spit up my drink, Linda!! You’re killing me with these science posts. I’m so glad there are professional dog barking researchers to finally help us unravel the mysteries of dog barking. These are the burning questions that keep us all awake at night, right? Or is it the actual dog barking that keeps us awake? I forget?
King Richard the III’s remains – how totally random! Imagine what else is buried beneath the streets and parking lots of London — Probably a whole Neanderthal opera troupe!!!
All of it is great, but “do re me fa so la ti Doh!” is brilliant!
Reblogged this on The Ranting Papizilla and commented:
Oh those wacky scientists. Now Opera singing Neanderthals?
What do Neanderthal dogs bark at?
I’m now thinking of getting a grant to study ‘why cats meow’! LOL – this is great, I’m so glad the Neanderthal’s were into opera – I hate rap