Very interesting. Loved the flow of thoughts. Made me think about a or of things. Like, we know that both Neanderthals and modern humans made tools and even used fire. Neaderthals seem to have both hammers and spears like weapons so did modern humans. Though slight differences in tool making could make a lot of difference. Though alternatively these tools might not have been weapons, but tools for getting food. Neanderthals, though omnivores were major meat eaters compared to modern humans. Modern humans could have had tools to better harvest plants and hunt, while neaderthals tools might have been majorly about hunting. The micropatterns on molars of these two species tells a story that diet might have given modern humans some advantage in Eurasian climate.

I think hairloss of terminal hair happened about 1 million years ago, if you go with molecular clock hypothesis. There are two competing hypothesis regarding this. One being that for evolution in savanna
and being active most of the day, sweating came handy. Sweating won't be efficient in thick fur pad. Plus sweating with fur pad also invited a lot of parasites and diseases so there might have been sexual selection for that as well. But then when it came to iceage, you are right we would have not survived without technology we call clothing, and now fashion.

This makes me wonder how is medical technology like C section and use of antibiotics shaping us. The anorexic models and popularized by media how would they survive without medical technology. Though on the other hand I think increasing survival of all possible genes in population via technology would increase our adaptive radiation and may come handy for some individuals in some bottleneck event.