My Mom has a bookshelf full of National Geographics going back to the 1960s. They have recently published some serious pieces on genomic discoveries of early humans. There work and illustrations on the Neanderthal have been particularly good. (You can see some of the facial reconstructions in this on-line piece.)
Did Dog-Human Relationship Drive Out the Neanderthal?
An interesting thesis, but I am the only long-term reader that thinks the magazine is deteriorating into Popular Science? I am also disturbed by the “everyone” agrees that “The traditional wisdom has been that climate change did them in, possibly triggered by the super-eruption of the Campi Flegrei volcano, near Naples, which sent already-cold Ice Age temperatures plummeting.” is, well, an overstatement? Pat Shipman, the author who is being interviewed, knocked that back nicely. Does her thesis hold up? I like it of course because I am a dog person, but …
Thoughts on Western Civilization 