Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
Scientists Discover Second Genus of Early Human
By Adrian Blomfield
NAIROBI, Kenya (Reuters) - Scientists said Wednesday evolutionary thinking had been turned on its head with the discovery in Kenya of a second genus of early human that walked the earth 3.6 million years ago.
Until now scientists believed that present-day homo sapiens had a single common ancestor -- Australopithecus afarensis, identified in 1974 with the discovery of the skeleton ``Lucy'' in Ethiopia.
But a team of paleontologists led by mother and daughter Meave and Louise Leakey, say the hominid they found, dubbed Kenyanthropus platyops, is totally different from Australopithecus.
``It revolutionizes the way we look at human ancestry,'' Louise Leakey told Reuters. ``We have found a very flat-faced 3.6 million-year-old hominid which represents something quite different to what we know to have existed at that time.''
The team found fossils of more than 30 individuals in 1998 and 1999. The most crucial was a skull found by research assistant Justus Erus near the Lomekwi River in northern Kenya.
After two years of exhaustive testing on the skull, Leakey said they had accumulated enough evidence to declare not only the discovery of a new species but a new genus as well.
Kenyanthropus had a much flatter face than Lucy as well as particularly small molar teeth, leading scientists to believe it fed on a mixture of fruit, berries, grubs and small mammals and birds.
Enigma
But little else is known of what one of our oldest relatives may have looked like and Leakey says the discovery has raised more questions than it has answered.
``It doesn't simplify the picture at all,'' she said. ``But it does confirm that the evolutionary tree was far more bushy earlier on than we had appreciated.''
Fred Spoor, from University College London's (UCL) department of anatomy, said the discovery meant it was now impossible to know with any certainty who our earliest ancestor was.
``If we don't have to bet on it then it is likely it is neither Kenyanthropus or Australopithecus,'' he said by telephone from London.
Spoor, who has analyzes the fossils, said there was a possibility another new species was found at the site.
``There could be another species, but we just don't know,'' he said. ``The skull is very complete but the other pieces are fragmented.''
The find will throw Louise Leakey, celebrating her 29th birthday Thursday and studying for a doctorate at UCL, into the paleontological limelight.
She is certainly following in distinguished footsteps. Her grandparents Louis and Mary made fossil discoveries in Tanzania's Olduvai gorge that caused a drastic revision of theories about the origin of man.
Her father Richard, now head of Kenya's civil service, also made important finds with his wife Meave, who pushed Louise into a career she was initially reluctant to follow.
``I've tried to keep clear of it being the third
generation,'' she said. ``But having worked very closely with my
mother and she gets terribly excited about the whole thing...
it's infectious.''
``It revolutionizes the way we look at human ancestry,'' Louise Leakey told Reuters.
How can we believe these PT Barnums when they exclaim this phrase every 6 months! If these folks were really scientists they wouldn't have to change their theories as often as they change their socks.
Those Leakeys, always poking about.
Who said that?
Who said that?
Right Whale.
If these folks were really scientists they wouldn't have to change their theories as often as they change their socks.
Yeah, why don't they just stop discovering things already??? Just makes us confused. :-)
That's the definition of a theory. We don't know exactly how humans evolved. And barring new developments in DNA testing, we may never be able to tell exactly which route evolution took.
You're right, keithtoo; jennyp is wrong. Science is done by making up a good story and sticking to it, come what may. Why, some people have been doing science that way for over two thousand years and look at all the lovely cathedrals they've built!
If these folks were really scientists they wouldn't have to change their theories as often as they change their socks.
Scientists should be more dogmatic.
I'm always intrigued by how they know where to look for '"dem bones" in the first place.
``It revolutionizes the way we look at human ancestry,'' Louise Leakey told Reuters.
How can we believe these PT Barnums when they exclaim this phrase every 6 months! If these folks were really scientists they wouldn't have to change their theories as often as they change their socks.
The problem for human evolution is at the near end of the hominid group and not at the far end, such as is being described.
The neanderthal is by far the closest hominid to us both in morphology and in time, and studies of neanderthal DNA reveal that we could not possibly be descended from them. Scientists described their DNA as "about halfway between ours and that of a chimpanzee". That explains why scientists have looked in vain for evidence of interbreeding between us and neanderthals, e.g. the article "Living with Neanderthals" in the September 95 issue of Discover magazine.
All of that says that, in order to believe that modern man has evolved, there would have to be some closer relative THAN the neanderthal, some other hominid CLOSER TO, not further from us than the neanderthal both in time and in appearance and, since the neanderthal was very close and his remains and works are all over the place and easy to find, the remains and works of this closer hominid would be even easier to find IF it existed.
But, again, it doesn't. No such closer hominid exists as a plausible ancestor for modern man. Modern man could not plausibly have evolved. We were either genetically re-engineered from the neanderthal, or created outright.
Well, that's refreshing: usually scientists studying the origin of humans get blasted on FR for not changing their theories.
Give a neodarwinist some grant money and promise him publication in a peer-reviewed journal, and some notoriety, and HE WILL FIND an evolutionary link!
Very interesting article. Two different species of hominids found at the same site?
How can we believe these PT Barnums when they exclaim this phrase every 6 months! If these folks were really scientists they wouldn't have to change their theories as often as they change their socks.
Scientists should stop changing their theories when new evidence is discovered. Why can't they just cling to wrong ideas like everyone else?
"the neanderthal is by far the closest hominid to us both in morphology and in time, "
I thought crow-magnons were closer to us than Neanderthals, and that is why the human race has so many bird-brains. Am I in error?
Anyone else remember The Nairobi Trio?
I'm always intrigued by how they know where to look for '"dem bones" in the first place.
Well, they asked the earliest Democrats where the bodies were burried.
I thought crow-magnons were closer to us than Neanderthals, and that is why the human race has so many bird-brains. Am I in error?
15 Posted on 03/21/2001 15:20:01 PST by parsifal
Very funny.
All of that says that, in order to believe that modern man has evolved, there would have to be some closer relative THAN the neanderthal, some other hominid CLOSER TO, not further from us than the neanderthal both in time and in appearance and, since the neanderthal was very close and his remains and works are all over the place and easy to find, the remains and works of this closer hominid would be even easier to find IF it existed.
All of which only goes to show that you don't have a conceptual understanding of how things evolve. Neanderthals and modern humans would have shared a common ancestor some time in the past. Of course such a population of human ancestors wouldn't be more recent than Neanderthals, which existed contemporaneously with modern humans only 30,000 years ago, having evolved from the progenitor species in parallel with our ancestors. Should these hypothetical fossils be common? We can't say. Who knows how populous they might have been?
I think, keithtoo's objection is over the sensationalistic headlines that regularly accompany such discoveries. We've seen plenty of cases in which the evidence either did not quite add up to what the initial headlines declared it to be, or turned out to be outright fraudulant.
The objection is not all that dissimular to that voiced in a thread a few weeks ago that pointed out that several long-ago debunked "evidences" for evolution (i.e. the pepper moth experiment) were still being used to promote the theory in school books. Each of these evidences were highly touted in the popular press of their time, and used to guide the popular culture to a wide acceptance of the theory of evolution.
This find may turn out to be correct in both the facts and in the impact of the facts. It may turn out to be correct as far as the facts are, but to lose some of its effect on current viewpoints when further information comes to light (i.e. if genetic testing showed that the owner of the skull suffered from a disorder that altered the shape of his/her skull). It may turn out to be a hoax. Given the number of supposed evidences that have turned out to be choice b or c, we are right to roll our eyes at the trumpeted "revolutionary" nature of this find.
If scientists and the press weren't constantly declaring the evidence to be more than it is, maybe we wouldn't be quite so cynical.
Yours in Truth,
>>>Well, they asked the earliest Democrats where the bodies were burried.<<<
Oh, yeah, sure! Like THEY'D tell us the truth!
Scientists should be more dogmatic
Politicians should be dogmatic. When they become statesmen they should be pragmatic. Scientists should be vegematic.
Well, someone SAID scientists are DOGMATIC ...
Why can't they just cling to wrong ideas like everyone else?
Yeah! Psst: Wanna join the Phlogistine Society?
:))
Yeah, why don't they just stop discovering things already??? Just makes us confused. :-)
We should write them a letter. "Dear scientist fellars. Please stop discoverin' things. Ya puts us in a tizzy."
If these folks were really scientists they wouldn't have to change their theories as often as they change their socks.
What?
---max
Gee. Thank you, my career in paleoanthropology is about to be replaced with something else.
---max
Recent genetic research shows that there is no Neanderthal DNA in modern humans. Obviously no Democrats were used in the sample.
For once the evolution vs. creation discussion on this forum has some life. Bravo the ironic and sardonic comments. BTTT.
No. They don't tell the truth. We look where they say they didn't leave them. Grin...
Yeah, why don't they just stop discovering things already??? Just makes us confused. :-)
No, not until they find a way to teleport a beer from the 'fridge to my chair then they may stop :)
I ain't no kin to no monkey. When they find the missing link, gimme a call. Until then, lemme know when they have an eye witness to a toad changing into moose. Hah, all them scientists are frauds.
daggum scientists.
I thought crow-magnons were closer to us than Neanderthals, and that is why the human race has so many bird-brains. Am I in error?
The cromagnon was a modern man.
all them scientists
You made a grammatical error. It should read "all those scientist".
All of which only goes to show that you don't have a conceptual understanding of how things evolve. Neanderthals and modern humans would have shared a common ancestor some time in the past....
Neanderthals could not EVOLVE from something close enough to us for us top have evolved from it; that would be DEVOLUTION, and not evolution.
Moreover, something close enough to us for us to have evolved from it would not have allowed neanderthals to evolve from it as well. A neanderthal baby being born to such a creature would have been regarded as a birth defective and killed.
Gee. Thank you, my career in paleoanthropology is about to be replaced with something else.
Keep your chin up, evolutionism can't be the norm, i.e. there has to be some branch or aspect of paleoanthropology which amounts to something more than a bunch of ideological BS, all you need to do is find it. Good Luck!
"I'm always intrigued by how they know where to look for '"dem bones" in the first place." Yup. I always snickered at some of these theories. Go to the best place in the world (the best environment) for bones to be preserved, find some bones and declare everything started here! Don't even look for artifacts, etc. in harsher environments. I'm still waiting to hear an explanation for the 2.25 myo homonoid bones and tools discovered in China. By all accepted theories, they're not there! Ha!
"the remains and works of this closer hominid would be even easier to find IF it existed." A young female skeleton was found recently that has all the facial features of modern humans and a body of a neanderthal. Some are calling her a hybrid. Some are also questioning the validity of the DNA testing.
"Two different species of hominids found at the same site?" There was a time when 2-3 different species of homonoids lived at the same time. Read, "Extinct Humans."
The article by Leaky et al in March 22 Nature is available here -- New hominin genus from eastern Africa shows diverse middle Pliocene lineages. It extensively describes the bones and their surroundings, but doesn't venture off into discussing much in the way of implications.
A companion piece in the same issue -- Daniel E. Lieberman (Anthropology Dept, GW - danlieb@gwu.edu), "Another face in our family tree", Nature 410, 419 - 420 (March 22, 2001) -- discusss implications. Here's the Lieberman piece:
The evolutionary history of humans is complex and unresolved. It now looks set to be thrown into further confusion by the discovery of another species and genus, dated to 3.5 million years ago.
Until a few years ago, the evolutionary history of our species was thought to be reasonably straightforward. Only three diverse groups of hominins Ð species more closely related to humans than to chimpanzees Ð were known, namely Australopithecus, Paranthropus and Homo, the genus to which humans belong. Of these, Paranthropus and Homo were presumed to have evolved between two and three million years ago [1, 2] from an early species in the genus Australopithecus, most likely A. afarensis, made famous by the fossil Lucy.
But lately, confusion has been sown in the human evolutionary tree. The discovery of three new australopithecine species Ð A. anamensis [3], A. garhi [4] and A. bahrelghazali [5], in Kenya, Ethiopia and Chad, respectively Ð showed that genus to be more diverse and widespread than had been thought. Then there was the finding of another, as yet poorly understood, genus of early hominin, Ardipithecus, which is dated to 4.4 million years ago [6]. And earlier this year, a French team claimed to have discovered another (albeit controversial) candidate for the oldest known hominin, Orrorin tugenensis (ref. [7]; to be discussed here next week). To those of us who are interested in reconstructing the evolutionary history of our species, these discoveries have been fun, if a little bewildering.
The confusion (and enjoyment) now looks set to increase still further. On page 433 of this issue [8], Leakey and colleagues describe what they assert to be a new genus and species of early hominin, Kenyanthropus platyops. The species, whose type specimen is a spectacular partial skull, called KNM-WT 40000 (Fig. 1), was found at the site of Lomekwi on the western side of Lake Turkana in northern Kenya. The hominin bones discovered there include more than 30 skull and dental fragments, two of which have been assigned to K. platyops. (The other fragments have not yet been assigned to any genus or species.) These fossils were all found in deposits reliably dated to between 3.5 million and 3.2 million years ago. The other mammalian species found at Lomekwi suggest that, during this period, the site was part of a complex mixture of grassland and wooded habitats, not unlike other roughly contemporary sites such as Laetoli (Tanzania) and Hadar (Ethiopia), where remains of A. afarensis have been found.
[Figure 1 Two fossil skulls from early hominin species. Full legend High resolution image and legend (57k)]
Is the authors' claim [8] Ð that the fossils represent a new species and genus Ð likely to be true? The first part is easier to answer; KNM-WT 40000 is almost certainly a new species. The fossil has a dizzying mosaic of features. None of these characteristics is in itself new. But the combination of features is not found in any other known species, and would be hard to explain even if the species were remarkably diverse, with considerable morphological differences between sexes. The fossil resembles chimpanzees and one of the australopithecine species, A. anamensis, in having a small earhole. And it shares many other features of primitive hominins with A. afarensis and A. anamensis, such as cheek teeth with thick enamel, a small brain the size of that of a chimpanzee, and flat nasal margins.
But the fossil's face also has several important 'derived features' (defined as those not present in the closest known ancestor) that unequivocally distinguish it from A. anamensis, A. afarensis and A. africanus. These include an anterior origin for the root of the cheekbone arch on the upper jaw; the existence of a flat plane beneath the nose bone (and so the appearance of a flat face); and a tall cheek region. KNM-WT 40000 also differs from A. garhi in a number of ways: for example, the postcanine teeth and brow of the skull are smaller in KNM-WT 40000. The skull also lacks most of the derived features of Paranthropus, with a few exceptions such as the presence of three roots in the upper premolars. And, most interestingly, KNM-WT 40000 has a small cranial capacity but otherwise much in common with the famous KNM-ER 1470 fossil (Fig. 1), which is generally referred to as Homo rudolfensis1. These similarities are mostly in the face, and include the flat plane beneath the nose bone, the tall, vertically oriented cheek region, and the lack of a depression behind the ridge of the brow.
A harder problem is whether KNM-WT 40000 belongs in a new genus. The difficulty is that, ideally, a genus should reflect a lineage that is unique, in terms of both its adaptations to a given environment and its relationships with other genera [9]. At present, it is hard to believe any reconstruction of hominin relationships because of the abundance of independently evolved similarities in the hominin fossil record. The complex mosaic of features seen in the new fossil will only exacerbate the problem.
Yet Leakey et al.'s proposal [8] to erect a new genus, Kenyanthropus, for the fossil is attractive, for the simple reason that none of the other possible solutions seem feasible. First, the species does not fit comfortably in the diagnoses of any existing genus, whether Ardipithecus, Australopithecus, Paranthropus or Homo. Second, classifying the species as Australopithecus would also create problems because of the many derived features that KNM-WT 40000 shares with H. rudolfensis, which, in turn, shares other derived features with Paranthropus [10]. Species in a genus should be 'monophyletic' (have a single origin), but these similarities would probably render current definitions of Australopithecus species non-monophyletic. A third way round the problem might have been to dump the whole lot, including Paranthropus and early Homo, into Australopithecus for the time being. The advantage of this solution Ð my favourite of the three Ð is that it avoids non-monophyletic genera. But, as Leakey et al. point out, this scheme would render Australopithecus a confusing 'garbage can' genus. Hence the new genus, Kenyanthropus.
The nature of Kenyanthropus platyops raises all kinds of questions, about human evolution in general and the behaviour of this species in particular. Why, for example, does it have the unusual combination of small cheek teeth and a big flat face with an anteriorly positioned arch of the cheek bone? All other known hominin species with big faces and similarly positioned cheek bones have big teeth. I suspect the chief role of K. platyops in the next few years will be to act as a sort of party spoiler, highlighting the confusion that confronts research into evolutionary relationships among hominins (Fig. 2).
[Figure 2] Possible evolutionary relationships of the hominins, indicating the five major genera, with Kenyanthropus in red, Homo in blue, Paranthropus in green, Australopithecus in black and Ardipithecus in yellow. Full legend High resolution image and legend (60k)
The confusion is in part a testament to the intense, successful fieldwork efforts that have almost doubled the number of recognized hominin species over the past 15 years. We can now say with confidence that hominin evolution, like that of many other mammalian groups, occurred through a series of complex radiations, in which many new species evolve and diversify rapidly. It seems that between 3.5 and 2 million years ago there were several human-like species, which were well adapted to life in different environments, although in ways that we have yet to appreciate fully. But these radiations bring with them systematic headaches, because they make it hard to work out where new species fit in by using standard information from skull and teeth fossils. A challenge for the next decade will be for skeletal biologists, palaeontologists and molecular biologists to work together, to devise new analytical methods with which to tease trustworthy signals from these data. My guess is that it will be quite a while before we can confidently determine the position of Kenyanthropus platyops in the human evolutionary tree.
References
1. Wood, B. A. Koobi Fora Research Project, Volume 4: Hominid Cranial Remains (Clarendon, Oxford, 1991).
2. Strait, D. S., Grine, F. E. & Moniz, M. A. J. Hum. Evol. 32, 17-82 (1997). | Article | PubMed |
3. Leakey, M. G., Feibel, C. S., McDougall, I. & Walker, A. C. Nature 376, 565-571 (1995). | PubMed |
4. Asfaw, B. et al. Science 284, 629-635 (1999). | Article | PubMed |
5. Brunet, M. et al. Nature 378, 273-275 (1995). | PubMed |
6. White, T. D., Suwa, G. & Asfaw, B. Nature 371, 306-312 (1994). | PubMed |
7. Senut, B. et al. CR Acad. Sci. 332, 137-144 (2001).
8. Leakey, M. G. et al. Nature 410, 433-440 (2001).
9. Wood, B. A. & Collard, M. C. Science 284, 65-71 (1999). | Article | PubMed |
10. Lieberman, D. E., Pilbeam, D. R. & Wood, B. A. J. Hum. Evol. 30, 97-120 (1996). | Article |
Nature © Macmillan Publishers Ltd 2001 Registered No. 785998 England.
"having evolved from the progenitor species in parallel with our ancestors." The current theory is that the Neanderthals were seperate for about 250k years.
Neanderthals could not EVOLVE from something close enough to us for us top have evolved from it; that would be DEVOLUTION, and not evolution.
There are no preferred directions in evolution, for one thing. For another thing, who's to say how many steps there were in each chain? But anyway, I disagree that we are obviously more evolutionarily advanced than the Neanderthals. They had bigger brains than we do now, and they were physically stronger, too.
Moreover, something close enough to us for us to have evolved from it would not have allowed neanderthals to evolve from it as well. A neanderthal baby being born to such a creature would have been regarded as a birth defective and killed.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder (ever heard the saying "a face that only a mother could love"?), but that's not the issue, here. Evolution happens by unnoticeable degrees; each child looked more or less like its parents. And then, perhaps we were the ugly ones, but nobody could bear to tell us.
"the remains and works of this closer hominid would be even easier to find IF it existed." A young female skeleton was found recently that has all the facial features of modern humans and a body of a neanderthal. Some are calling her a hybrid. Some are also questioning the validity of the DNA testing.
Sounds like somebody's idea of a joke, back in the days of Alley Oop. Check out the Sept. 95 issue of Discover. The article is titled:
The point was, that all available evidence indicates that there was never any interbreeding. Given the discovery two years later that neanderthal DNA was "about halfway between ours and that of a chimpanzee", that becomes understandable.
>>>How could we live side by side for 50,000 years and never have sex?<<<
And you know this would be even MORE baffling for the folks in San Francisco!
>>Scientists should be vegematic.<<
No,no. It's Kennedy's that are vegematics. Scientists are Hydromatics.
>> Obviously no Democrats were used in the sample.<<
Looks like they didn't test Charles Bronson,either.
>> Obviously no Democrats were used in the sample.<<
Or pro-wrestler "Andre,the Giant".
Oh I didn't realize it was time for another Piltdown Man. No wait, it was the Leakys who knew for years it was a hoax, but didn't tell.
The evolution of man...
I take Discover and remember reading that. A good magazine you may consider is, "Discovering Archaeology." Frankly, I enjoy it better than Discover, it's a quarterly though.
And you know this would be even MORE baffling for the folks in San Francisco!
You might want to post that in the San Francisco papers' personals sections, and see if anything turns up...
Ah Buggman, if these folks are determined to believe they are a deerivative of an ape, so be it. Each of these theories thrown up or it is out ;) by evolutionists has turned out to be either a hoax or something else disruptive to their evolution theory.
What a relief it is to know that I am designed by God, er an Intellignent Designer and my ancestors looked very similar to what they look like today. Sure eskimos may look alittle different than caucasians but there is no doubt that either it human and not animal.
It's downright hillarious how this chemical soup LACKS intelligence. No matter how they analyze DNA and what they learn they refuse to believe that intelligence was injected into it and that was by God and not recreatable. The cause is God and the effects are what we see. The effects alone should be enough for anyone to see that Intelligent Design brought about all we see and don't see. What evolutionists suggest as a "cause" is a gardne variety sci-fi adventure, not repeatable or for that matter thinkable since it defies the very laws of science they worship, er when it suits the outcome they seek.
From what I've observed on television, that Hugh Rodham fella shure 'nuff looks like a Neanderthal to me. They ain't ex-stink. They's in the democrat party. Big time.
#50 - LOL! You made my night. It's been along time since I saw that nonsense taken seriously by intelligent people. I suppose I was mistaken about you... .
What a relief it is to know ...
Believing something because it is "a relief" is a logical fallacy. Nothing wrong with that as long as you're honest with yourself.
The fact that nothing certain has been found and that there is contradictory evidence to progressive human evolution has never stopped the Darwinists from saying that evolution is fact. Evolution is not science, it is an ideology.
LOL! So true. Where did you get that? The last time I saw that was on sexwork.com (hilarious site for libertarian prostitutes).
The point is though that Darwinists keep saying that their theory is "science" when all there is out there about human evolution contradicts their theory.
" We were either genetically re-engineered from the neanderthal, or created outright"
Given the dearth of genetic engineers during that time, and the utter implausibilty of creation, evolution stands as the only sane solution. Do you suppose there were all these hominids milling about upon the precipice of becoming Homo Sapiens
when some cartoon-character / imaginary friend comes along and CREATES out of nothing that to which these hominids aspire to be? That would be a malicious act. Unconcionably cruel.
The Leaky's are fairly honest people. I do not think that any have been caught in any hoaxes. I tend to believe this.
The famous "list-o-links" (so the creationists don't get to start each new thread from ground zero).
"Speak not in the ears of a fool: for he will despise the wisdom of thy words." -- Proverbs 23, 9
[
Reply |
Private Reply | To 59 | Top | Last ]
Good point. One thing the evolutionist forget is that babies who have partially "evolved" would be killed as freaks by the parents.
This sounds ridiculous but think about this - occassionally babies are born with two heads. Now, everyone says two heads are better than one, but those children are regularly killed by us humans.
55: The World of Richard Dawkins: Evolution, Science, and Reason
Something to look at.
occassionally babies are born with two heads
In any natural environment such a baby would kill the woman giving birth to it, therefore she would produce fewer children than other women and the freak genes would be selected against.
If these folks were really scientists they wouldn't have to change their theories as often as they change their socks.
Science, unlike Fundamentalism, changes based on new data.
I’ve got an old Creationist book here, published in the 1920s. It tells about a German scientist who, around 1912, discovered a human skull in “Oldavi Gulch”, in German East Africa, that