This book addresses the question of why the neanderthals died out while homo sapiens survived it rejects the genetic superiority of the later and is scathing on the thesis that homo sapiens played a causal role in the extinction of the neanderthals instead finlayson argues that the main culprit was the cooling climate moreover he argues that this development disproportionately affected the somewhat more successful neanderthals because they were more used to one way of life rather than the. Just 28000 years ago the blink of an eye in geological time the last of neanderthals died out in their last outpost in caves near gibraltar thanks to cartoons and folk accounts we have a distorted view of these other humans for that is what they were we think of them as crude and clumsy and not very bright easily driven to extinction by the lithe smart modern humans that came out of africa some 100000 years ago but was it really as simple as that clive finlayson reminds us that . Today we think of neanderthals as crude and clumsy easily driven to extinction by the lithe smart humans who came out of africa some 100000 years ago but clive finlayson reminds us that the neanderthals were another kind of human and their culture was not so very different from that of our own ancestors in this book he presents a wider view of the events that led to the migration of . Just 28000 years ago the blink of an eye in geological time the last of neanderthals died out in their last outpost in caves near gibraltar thanks to cartoons and folk accounts we have a distorted view of these other humans for that is what they were we think of them as crude and clumsy and not very bright easily driven to extinction by the lithe smart modern humans that came out of africa some 100000 years ago. Just 28000 years ago the blink of an eye in geological time the last of neanderthals died out in their last outpost in caves near gibraltar thanks to cartoons and folk accounts we have a distorted view of these other humans for that is what they were we think of them as crude and clumsy and not very bright easily driven to extinction by the lithe smart modern humans that came out of africa some 100000 years ago but was it really as simple as that