Posted on 01/08/2007 11:14:54 AM PST by blam
Archaeologist's find could shake up science
By HEATHER URQUIDES
Published January 7, 2007
Archaeologist Albert Goodyear is working on the find of his life.
Based on radiocarbon tests and artifacts he's found along the Savannah River in South Carolina, Goodyear believes that humans existed in North America as many as 50,000 years ago, shattering the long-held notion that the earliest settlers arrived here about 13,000 years ago in Alaska via a lost land bridge.
Not everyone is convinced, but Goodyear believes further excavation and testing at the South Carolina location, known as the Topper site, will confirm his findings.
He's taking a break next week to come to St. Petersburg for a talk at the Science Center about Florida's first inhabitants. It's a coming home for him. After all, it was here that his interest in all things old first began.
You're from St. Petersburg?
I was born in St. Petersburg. I went to Boca Ciega High School, graduated in 1964.
What drew to you archeology?
I think it was in second grade, at Mount Vernon Elementary, we had a unit on Florida heritage. You study the state tree and the bird and all that, and we studied the Seminole Indians. I was really captivated. I thought, 'Hmm, that's the way to live.' I think that sort of predisposed me. When I was 8, my grandmother pulled out an old family trunk with an Indian arrowhead. That really fired up my imagination.
Your work at the Topper site in South Carolina showed that humans existed in North America far earlier than previously thought. Why does that matter?
People, just regular people, are extremely interested. ... I think it taps into a deep curiosity that humans have about their origins. I don't care whether you're in France or South Africa or South Carolina.
Do you think the Topper site will be your greatest discovery or is that yet to come?
I hope it is. Not just for our site, but for the sake of the program. The profession is slowly moving along to accept that there really were people here before the Clovis (roughly 13,000 years ago). The Topper site is unique ... it looks to me like it's the oldest radiocarbon site in North America. That's a huge statement. We're still working on it. Just to have literally found a site of that antiquity, the implications are just enormous. It does say, if it's that old, that people were getting into the United States the same time they were getting into Australia. That's part of that very old migration story. Literally, if it all works out, and I'm convinced that it will, obviously it will be the find of my lifetime.
What's it like to now be the one that people come to listen to?
It comes with the notoriety of the Topper site. ... People are curious about it and want to know what it is, and is it true? I try to cover that when I give these presentations. For me it's fun. It's pretty gratifying because I've always liked working with the public - especially amateur archeologists, since I started out as one.
Heather Urquides can be reached at hurquides@sptimes.com or 892-2253.
If you go
What: Albert Goodyear talks about "Florida's First Peoples"
When: 1 p.m. Saturday
Where: Science Center, 7701 22nd Ave. N
Details: Tickets are $6. For more information, go to www. sciencecenterofpinellas.com or call 384-0027.
GGG Ping.
Leo G. Carroll can.
The PC correct and Liberals would be upset and shocked to find out that European white man was on the North America continent 50,000 years ago....
Viking ping
And the creationists are upset because the universe is only 6K years old.
Anything that upsets both camps is good in my book.
One model of migration has X splitting in western Asia, and branches going both east and west. The eastern branch could have traversed Alaska and Canada, spreading into the US around the Great Lakes and finally reaching the Southeast. If done before the most recent glacial episodes this should have been possible. (Lots of animals did it too.)
I would like to see this documented. That would be a lot of fun!
Topper (archaeological site)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Topper is an archaeological site located along the Savannah River in Allendale County, South Carolina in the United States. It is noted as the location of controversial artifacts believed by some archaeologists to indicate human habitation of the New World as far back as 50,000 years ago.
Since the 1930s, the most widely-accepted theory concerning the peopling of the New World is that the first human inhabitants were the Clovis people, who are thought to have arrived approximately 13,000 years ago. Artifacts of the Clovis people are found throughout most of the United States and as far south as Panama. The standard theory has been challenged in recent decades, with possible pre-Clovis sites, such as Cactus Hill and Monte Verde, suggested by a growing number of archaeologists. To date, no conclusive evidence of pre-Clovis inhabitation has yet been definitely established.
In 2004, Albert Goodyear of the University of South Carolina Institute of Archaeology and Anthropology announced that radiocarbon dating of a bit of charcoal found in the Topper Site dated to approximately 50,000 years ago, or approximately 37,000 years before the Clovis people. Goodyear, who began excavating the Topper site in the 1980s, believes that the artifacts are stone tools, although other archaeologists dispute this conclusion, suggesting that the artifacts may be natural and not human-made. Other archaeologists have challenged the radiocarbon dating procedure of the Topper artifacts. Goodyear discovered the artifacts by digging 4 m deeper than the Clovis artifacts. Before discovering the oldest artifacts, he had discovered other artifacts that he claimed were tools dating around 16,000 years old, or about 3,000 years before Clovis. Until the recent challenges to the Clovis theory, it was unusual for archaeologists to dig deeper than the layer of the Clovis culture, on the grounds that no human artifacts would be found older than Clovis.
Upset? Not a chance. I love it, and I'm a professional archaeologist with 35 years of dirt under my fingernails.
These new discoveries are what help keep us going. Some of my recent work has supported an early coastal migration along the west coast, but we're looking at probably no more than 15,000 years ago for that one. Still, its great fun.
I always wondered where Helen Thomas was born.
No - we would just be native rednecks!
That far back it is highly unlikely the concepts "European" and "white man" would have any meaning at all.
Yes it is "upset". you are telling me that the scientific community has accepted with open arms the claims in recent decades that have pushed the migration model as far back as we see it today? They fought it at every turn.
Is this mostly true?
It varies widely, but it certainly can happen.
The normal practice is to excavate until the yield drops to nothing, then do another level or two just to be sure. Often, an auger is used to get another meter down just in case.
Many sites have clear bottoms, with rock or other layers, but when you are in soil deposits you don't have that.
It is common to use a backhoe or other mechanical device to sample the stratigraphy of a site on a major project, but when you're in a cave or down 5 meters, that is not always possible.
So, yes, the lowest layers can be missed if there is a sterile layer between cultural layers. In areas of heavy soil deposition a sterile layer can be several meters in thickness. And, when you are dealing with sites of some reasonable antiquity, there will often be fewer cultural materials, they will cover a smaller area than the overlying sites, and they may be much deeper.
Its enough to give us nightmares! (I like it when I hit a solid rock layer, as then I know there's nothing else down there.)
Yet more evidence that radiocarbon dating is a bunch of BS. It's amazing that anyone still listens to the Darwinists.
Science schmience. This will make no difference at all to physics.
Some did, some didn't. Depends on where you work, and how much you like projectile points.
Folks who had a lot invested in Clovis resisted the idea, while those working on the coasts or in other non-Clovis areas were much quicker to accept the idea. Also, following Kuhn's model, the younger generation accepted the new ideas quicker than some of the older generation.
I agree with that 100%. But you must admit, archeology is one of the founding members of the "good ole boy" network. And old habits are tough to break.
Thank heavens for Kuhn. I'd love to see a middle school or h.s. freshman-level curriculum based on that text.
Kind'a like Oak Island...
The Topper radiocarbon date shows a classic symptoms
of "fringe" science: results that at the edge of resolution
or near the noise floor of any particular measurement method.
He's close to the edge of the ability of radiocarbon dating
(about 60K years), and the anthropogenic origin of his stone
tools is in question.
Time will tell, though. Plate techtonics was hinted at in
the 16th century, and again in 1912, but took another fifty
years after that to become widely accepted.
Paleoanthropology Division
Smithsonian Institute
207 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington, DC 20078
Dear Sir:
Thank you for your latest submission to the Institute, labeled "211-D, layer seven, next to the clothesline post. Hominid skull." We have given this specimen a careful and detailed examination, and regret to inform you that we disagree with your theory that it represents "conclusive proof of the presence of Early Man in Charleston County two million years ago." Rather, it appears that what you have found is the head of a Barbie doll, of the variety one of our staff, who has small children, believes to be the "Malibu Barbie".
It is evident that you have given a great deal of thought to the analysis of this specimen, and you may be quite certain that those of us who are familiar with your prior work in the field were loathe to come to contradiction with your findings. However, we do feel that there are a number of physical attributes of the specimen which might have tipped you off to it's modern origin:
1. The material is molded plastic. Ancient hominid remains are typically fossilized bone.
2. The cranial capacity of the specimen is approximately 9 cubic centimeters, well below the threshold of even the earliest identified proto-hominids.
3. The dentition pattern evident on the "skull" is more consistent with the common domesticated dog than it is with the "ravenous man-eating Pliocene clams" you speculate roamed the wetlands during that time. This latter finding is certainly one of the most intriguing hypotheses you have submitted in your history with this institution, but the evidence seems to weigh rather heavily against it. Without going into too much detail, let us say that:
A. The specimen looks like the head of a Barbie doll that a dog has chewed on.
B. Clams don't have teeth.
It is with feelings tinged with melancholy that we must deny your request to have the specimen carbon dated. This is partially due to the heavy load our lab must bear in it's normal operation, and partly due to carbon dating's notorious inaccuracy in fossils of recent geologic record.
To the best of our knowledge, no Barbie dolls were produced prior to 1956 AD, and carbon dating is likely to produce wildly inaccurate results. Sadly, we must also deny your request that we approach the National Science Foundation's Phylogeny Department with the concept of assigning your specimen the scientific name "Australopithecus spiff-arino." Speaking personally, I, for one, fought tenaciously for the acceptance of your proposed taxonomy, but was ultimately voted down because the species name you selected was hyphenated, and didn't really sound like it might be Latin.
However, we gladly accept your generous donation of this fascinating specimen to the museum. While it is undoubtedly not a hominid fossil, it is, nonetheless, yet another riveting example of the great body of work you seem to accumulate here so effortlessly. You should know that our Director has reserved a special shelf in his own office for the display of the specimens you have previously submitted to the Institution, and the entire staff speculates daily on what you will happen upon next in your digs at the site you have discovered in your back yard.
We eagerly anticipate your trip to our nation's capital that you proposed in your last letter, and several of us are pressing the Director to pay for it. We are particularly interested in hearing you expand on your theories surrounding the "trans-positating fillifitation of ferrous ions in a structural matrix" that makes the excellent juvenile Tyrannosaurus rex femur you recently discovered take on the deceptive appearance of a rusty 9-mm Sears Craftsman automotive crescent wrench.
Yours in Science,
Harvey Rowe
Curator, Antiquities
Always listen to experts.
They'll tell you what can't be done, and why.
Then do it.
LAZARUS LONG
In part because the mechanism was missing from the theory. I find it interesting that even objects suspected of being made by humans require multiple lines of reasoning and evidence to distinguish them from natural formations.
This will be squashed because it violates PC dogma.
--Yet more evidence that radiocarbon dating is a bunch of BS. It's amazing that anyone still listens to the Darwinists.--
Nothing here to indicate problems with radiocarbon dating.
Always some dumbass that has to ruin the thread.
Also, if it's fake, I don't want to know. It's much funnier if I can engage in a willing suspension of disbelief.
I'm a creationist and the scriptural evidence I've seen points to a date of roughly (give or take a bunch of years since I can't remember the exact figures) 4.5 billion years.
Vedas.
Please don't lump all creationists with young earth ones.
Oh, no. that was actually much earlier.
Since this was the remnants of created artifacts, and would come from her productive middle age period, they actually quite later than when she was "born".
Any avid golfer that has read "The Legend of Bagger Vance" knows that this discovery is long over due. Now get in the field Junah.
True, I should have said young earth/universe creationists.
Since this was the remnants of created artifacts, and would come from her productive middle age period, they actually quite later than when she was "born".
Makes sense. She looks older than that.
About how many of you are in the field? I mean anthropology. How much money is behind your investigations?
We're a small private company. We have clients ranging from people building single family dwellings to government agencies.
Mostly true?
I'd say it defined the current state of scientific academia quite well...
My/our theory maintains that...(the earth is flat/square/roundish/tarnished, warming/cooling/flipping over/over populated/under populated/ whatever is popular)....and dissent will NOT be tolerated!
Thanks.
There are a lot of "old earth" creationists! ;-)
The 6000 year figure was arrived at by a certain irish bishop named Ushur, using the bible as the only data-set of his scientific study. His middle name was probably MURPHY. This proves once again what Marilyn Von Savant(IQ 230)said : You can convince a 5 year old(in sunday school)of ANYTHING, and a 95 year old of NOTHING.
Would that mean the Indians wiped out the white man first. And instead of us stealing and occupying their land we were just reclaiming what was ours from the beginning. No surely NOT. The only one who will care will be the liberals as their myth story will have to change in their religion.
Well not really. Not all creationists believe the earth is 6 millon years old. Most probably believe in some aspect of evolution of all of evolution and still find it compatable with The Creation.
Question: three hundred years ago, the Appalachians were covered with very tall trees, most of which were cut down as part of settelment. How much of the deposit along rivers running into the Atlantic is that recent?
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