Welcome to the After-On podcast. I'm your host, Rob Reed.

And this is a series of conversations with thinkers, founders, and scientists.

Take a little time and stretch out because these talks are unhurry and meant to bring you

to a top percentile understanding of something important.

Also, whether you're ready to start up square ideas, a techie or a lit major, take your

time, engage your mind, and you'll be glad you did.

Especially this week when we'll be talking to...

David Reich, who is a leading pioneer in the field of ancient DNA.

Specifically that of archaeocumins, that of our extinct cousins, including the Neanderthals,

and that of anatomically modern humans who lived tens or hundreds of thousands of years

ago.

In the past few years, David and a tiny handful of other scientists have reordered our understanding

of humanity's prehistory.

Open questions pondered by generations of archaeologists have been suddenly and definitively answered.

Jarring truths no one ever even speculated about have come to light.

And vast populations of big-brained cousins of homo sapiens who had their own art, cultures,

and perhaps even religions have been quite literally unearthed.

It's hard to overstate the significance of this work and the speed with which it's unfolding.

So rapidly that even electronic scientific journals can't keep up with it.

It's prompting one of the biggest shifts ever in our understanding of ourselves as a

species.

Yet most people are hardly aware of it.

...