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Post by brobear on May 7, 2021 8:10:47 GMT -5
I wasn't going to include this, but its difficult to study the origins of the great apes without including those leading up to - us. 
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Post by brobear on May 7, 2021 8:14:44 GMT -5
www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/05/210506142133.htm Most human origins stories are not compatible with known fossils. Fossil apes can inform us about essential aspects of ape and human evolution, including the nature of our last common ancestor. In the 150 years since Charles Darwin speculated that humans originated in Africa, the number of species in the human family tree has exploded, but so has the level of dispute concerning early human evolution. A new review looks at the major discoveries in hominin origins since Darwin's works and argues that fossil apes can inform us about essential aspects of ape and human evolution, including the nature of our last common ancestor. In the 150 years since Charles Darwin speculated that humans originated in Africa, the number of species in the human family tree has exploded, but so has the level of dispute concerning early human evolution. Fossil apes are often at the center of the debate, with some scientists dismissing their importance to the origins of the human lineage (the "hominins"), and others conferring them starring evolutionary roles. A new review out on May 7 in the journal Science looks at the major discoveries in hominin origins since Darwin's works and argues that fossil apes can inform us about essential aspects of ape and human evolution, including the nature of our last common ancestor. Humans diverged from apes -- specifically, the chimpanzee lineage -- at some point between about 9.3 million and 6.5 million years ago, towards the end of the Miocene epoch. To understand hominin origins, paleoanthropologists aim to reconstruct the physical characteristics, behavior, and environment of the last common ancestor of humans and chimps. "When you look at the narrative for hominin origins, it's just a big mess -- there's no consensus whatsoever," said Sergio Almécija, a senior research scientist in the American Museum of Natural History's Division of Anthropology and the lead author of the review. "People are working under completely different paradigms, and that's something that I don't see happening in other fields of science." There are two major approaches to resolving the human origins problem: "Top-down," which relies on analysis of living apes, especially chimpanzees; and "bottom-up," which puts importance on the larger tree of mostly extinct apes. For example, some scientists assume that hominins originated from a chimp-like knuckle-walking ancestor. Others argue that the human lineage originated from an ancestor more closely resembling, in some features, some of the strange Miocene apes. In reviewing the studies surrounding these diverging approaches, Almécija and colleagues with expertise ranging from paleontology to functional morphology and phylogenetics discuss the limitations of relying exclusively on one of these opposing approaches to the hominin origins problem. "Top-down" studies sometimes ignore the reality that living apes (humans, chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans, and hylobatids) are just the survivors of a much larger, and now mostly extinct, group. On the other hand, studies based on the "bottom-up"approach are prone to giving individual fossil apes an important evolutionary role that fits a preexisting narrative. "In The Descent of Man in 1871, Darwin speculated that humans originated in Africa from an ancestor different from any living species. However, he remained cautious given the scarcity of fossils at the time," Almécija said. "One hundred fifty years later, possible hominins -- approaching the time of the human-chimpanzee divergence -- have been found in eastern and central Africa, and some claim even in Europe. In addition, more than 50 fossil ape genera are now documented across Africa and Eurasia. However, many of these fossils show mosaic combinations of features that do not match expectations for ancient representatives of the modern ape and human lineages. As a consequence, there is no scientific consensus on the evolutionary role played by these fossil apes." Overall, the researchers found that most stories of human origins are not compatible with the fossils that we have today. "Living ape species are specialized species, relicts of a much larger group of now extinct apes. When we consider all evidence -- that is, both living and fossil apes and hominins -- it is clear that a human evolutionary story based on the few ape species currently alive is missing much of the bigger picture," said study co-author Ashley Hammond, an assistant curator in the Museum's Division of Anthropology. Kelsey Pugh, a Museum postdoctoral fellow and study co-author adds, "The unique and sometimes unexpected features and combinations of features observed among fossil apes, which often differ from those of living apes, are necessary to untangle which features hominins inherited from our ape ancestors and which are unique to our lineage." Living apes alone, the authors conclude, offer insufficient evidence. "Current disparate theories regarding ape and human evolution would be much more informed if, together with early hominins and living apes, Miocene apes were also included in the equation," says Almécija. "In other words, fossil apes are essential to reconstruct the 'starting point' from which humans and chimpanzees evolved."
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Post by brobear on Aug 15, 2021 3:55:15 GMT -5
www.discovermagazine.com/planet-earth/the-doom-of-homo-erectus-mass-death-marks-end-of-species?utm_source=dscfb&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=dscfb&fbclid=IwAR2tkt1N5AnouZPNS-2me2v73wFLLEJ7cK_BLdEEO2g4NOITlwryF5h6gW4 The Doom of Homo Erectus: Mass Death Marks End of Species. Indonesian site suggests archaic humans perished about 110,000 years ago. In the family tree charting human evolution, Homo erectus stands out. Originating in Africa about 2 million years ago, H. erectus was the first hominin — our closest evolutionary kin — with modern human proportions. It was also the first known hominin to venture beyond Africa and into Europe and Asia, reaching China by about 1.7 million years ago and Indonesia by 1.5 million years ago. But the accomplishments of H. erectus don’t end there. It’s also the earliest known hominin to have lived in temperate environments, such as the Transcaucasus region that today includes the Republic of Georgia. The longevity, range and adaptability of H. erectus make it the most successful hominin species in the fossil record. ( Sure, we modern humans live on all seven continents, surviving — often with some help from technology — everywhere from the South Pole to the Sahara, but we’ve only been around a few hundred thousand years. ) So, how did it all end for this mega-successful archaic human? When, and where, did the last H. erectus shuffle off this mortal coil? These are questions that have long bedeviled paleoanthropologists. One of the most promising sites in the hunt to find the erectus expiration date, Indonesia’s Ngandong, yielded numerous fossils of the hominins during excavations in the 1930s. Features on the skulls and other bones suggested the individuals were among the most evolved of the species. Dating the material, however, was challenging. Previous estimates of how old the fossils were ranged from half a million years old to less than 30,000 years old, largely because of the geography of the site. Ngandong’s bonebeds are near the Solo River in Central Java, on a terrace. As the course of the river changed over time, slices of land eroded and were rebuilt. In short, things got jumbled up. Now, however, researchers painstakingly recreated a regional chronology for Ngandong, charting changes in both the river’s course and topography of the surrounding hills. The team also used multiple dating methods to determine the age of the fossils and material that accumulated with them, such as quartz grains and pumice. The result: The H. erectus fossils of Ngandong are 108,000 to 117,000 years old. The new, more robust date range confirms the Ngandong hominins are the last known members of H. erectus in the fossil record. And that’s by more than 100,000 years — other late H. erectus fossils from a site near Beijing have been dated to about 230,000 years ago. The new ages for the Ngandong fossils also rule out an overlap of H. erectus and anatomically modern humans in the region. The Ngandong fossils, mostly pieces of skull, represent at least a dozen members of H. erectus that appear to have died at the same time. Bones of other animals were also deposited at the site, but researchers have not found stone tools or other artifacts. The immediate area where the fossils were found was, at the time the bones accumulated there, gravel or sand channel bars in the river itself. Despite apparently being washed downriver and deposited at the site, the partial fossils show little wear and tear, something expected in bones getting tossed and tumbled for a while in turbulent waters. The evidence suggests that the individuals died in a single flood event a short way upriver. It was an inglorious end to the species … … Or was it? Genomic studies of modern populations in nearby New Guinea have identified about 1 percent of their DNA comes from an archaic human that’s not Denisovan, Neanderthal or Homo sapiens. It may well represent interbreeding with a late population of H. erectus, suggesting that a sliver of this successful species lives on in the genes of some modern humans.
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Post by brobear on Aug 15, 2021 23:25:41 GMT -5
www.ancient-origins.net/human-origins-science/lapedo-child-00903?fbclid=IwAR1kZ9M9Fw2I3OmdI7-iozhqWHcaV26Y0FFLsfLvfRVWhlrcs1KBWn7RygY The Controversial Lapedo Child – A Neanderthal / Human Hybrid? Buried for millennia in the rear of a rock-shelter in the Lapedo Valley 85 miles north of Lisbon, Portugal, archaeologists uncovered the bones of a four-year-old child, comprising the first complete Palaeolithic skeleton ever dug in Iberia. But the significance of the discovery was far greater than this because analysis of the bones revealed that the child had the chin and lower arms of a human, but the jaw and build of a Neanderthal, suggesting that he was a hybrid, the result of interbreeding between the two species. The finding casts doubt on the accepted theory that Neanderthals disappeared from existence approximately 30,000 years ago and were replaced by Cro-Magnons, the first early modern humans. Rather, it suggests that Neanderthals interbred with modern humans and became part of our family, a fact that would have dramatic implications for evolutionary theorists around the world.
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Post by brobear on Aug 15, 2021 23:37:13 GMT -5
www.discovermagazine.com/mind/what-happened-to-the-hominids-who-may-have-been-smarter-than-us?utm_source=dscfb&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=dscfb&fbclid=IwAR2SU3RKRW_BZvQQwErrD6v37WmWww2ZCc472ZCkEftcSIBPOQ-W9Be7GzI What Happened to the Hominids Who May Have Been Smarter Than Us? Two neuroscientists say that a now-extinct race of humans had big eyes, child-like faces and an average intelligence of around 150, making them geniuses among Homo sapiens. Our facial structure bears some resemblance to that of an immature ape. Boskop’s appearance may be described in terms of this trait. A typical current European adult, for instance, has a face that takes up roughly one-third of his overall cranium size. Boskop has a face that takes up only about one-fifth of his cranium size, closer to the proportions of a child. Examination of individual bones confirmed that the nose, cheeks, and jaw were all childlike. The combination of a large cranium and immature face would look decidedly unusual to modern eyes, but not entirely unfamiliar. Such faces peer out from the covers of countless science fiction books and are often attached to “alien abductors” in movies. The naturalist Loren Eiseley made exactly this point in a lyrical and chilling passage from his popular book, The Immense Journey, describing a Boskop fossil: “There’s just one thing we haven’t quite dared to mention. It’s this, and you won’t believe it. It’s all happened already. Back there in the past, ten thousand years ago. The man of the future, with the big brain, the small teeth. He lived in Africa. His brain was bigger than your brain. His face was straight and small, almost a child’s face.” Yet today, although Neanderthals and Homo erectus are widely known, Boskops are almost entirely forgotten. Some of our ancestors are clearly inferior to us, with smaller brains and apelike countenances. They’re easy to make fun of and easy to accept as our precursors. In contrast, the very fact of an ancient ancestor like Boskop, who appears un-apelike and in fact in most ways seems to have had characteristics superior to ours, was destined never to be popular.
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Post by brobear on Aug 20, 2021 2:41:21 GMT -5
cdn.wazimo.com/media/images/dna-different-species/60df878d410d5.jpg A Changed Perception The discovery that Denny was the offspring of a Neanderthal and a Denisovan challenged the perception of human evolution. Up until 2018, scientists believed that interbreeding was a rarity, however, with this new evidence it is apparent that it was more common than they thought. During an interview with The Evening Standard, Pääbo explained, “Neanderthals and Denisovans may not have had many opportunities to meet. But when they did, they must have mated frequently – much more so than we previously thought.”
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Post by brobear on Oct 25, 2021 2:59:20 GMT -5
www.livescience.com/how-many-human-species.html?fbclid=IwAR3OOBqh9hI97C5ou8n6JX5baLjXsBOXkJzhnMI1ynqzT8k02ValI-V0_i4 How many early human species existed on Earth? WE'RE THE LAST OF AT LEAST 23 SPECIES OF HUMANS. The Smithsonian Museum of Natural History lists 21 species that they claim are recognized by most scientists. Evolutionary paleoecologist John Stewart thinks the list is likely to keep growing and is already at least 23, with new additions like Denisovans and Homo luzonensis. The exact numbers accepted by individual scientists vary widely mainly based on two definitions: What defines a human, and what defines a species. It used to be accepted that if two individuals could produce fertile offspring, they were the same species. But the lines have blurred as researchers struggle with many gray areas such as asexual reproduction or hybrids like ligers, which come from lion-tiger combinations. Many, perhaps most, scientists think we need a more expansive definition of species. And what defines humanity is an even thornier question. If you accept the 23-and-growing number of human species (and that's likely to depend on whether you're a lumper or a splitter), it's astonishing that more than a third of these overlapped in time with us - Homo sapiens. At least eight other human species lived alongside us, and we interbred with several of these and today carry their genes. However, except for a few genetic traces, they're all gone now, and I find myself deeply saddened by that. We often look up at the stars and wonder if there is, or ever was, other intelligent life out there. It turns out there WAS - right here on Earth. But no longer.
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Post by brobear on Nov 13, 2021 0:48:55 GMT -5
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Post by brobear on Nov 14, 2021 8:58:29 GMT -5
www.ancient-origins.net/news-evolution-human-origins/saber-toothed-cat-0016065?fbclid=IwAR3i3SfpBZlXt5vdAjndha3JOVWcUMofCNdr5DF9sFCIlyXj4o-ys9cQuRg Early Hominins Competed with Saber-Toothed Cats 2 Million Years Ago. Homo erectus , literally upright man, is an extinct species of archaic human from the Pleistocene, first occurring 2 million years ago, and is widely identified as the first recognizable members of the genus Homo. In 2019, at the site called Orozmani, in Georgia, sustained excavation work and research has revealed artifacts and the fossilized remains of animals, including saber tooth cats, suggesting a new origin for the ancient Homo erectus , outside the African continent, reports Agenda. The finds support the radical thesis that Homo erectus was the first hominin to reach Eurasia. Did the Saber Toothed Cat Clash with Homo Erectus? The most fascinating of the animal finds was the Homotherium, a predatory saber-toothed cat (or scimitar-toothed cat), that inhabited North America, South America, Eurasia, and Africa from 4.5 million years ago, till the waning of the last Ice Age, which was roughly 11,500 years ago. It was the size of a male African lion, weighing 190 kilos (420 pounds) and was at a height of 1.1 meters (3 feet and 7 inches) with shorter upper canine teeth suited for slashing rather than purely stabbing. This predator, the researchers posit, actually came into competition with homo erectus over meat and territory. Homo erectus was a dedicated carnivore, with high degrees of meat consumption. There is a possibility that the hominin clashed with the saber-toothed cat, and the remains of the predatory beast are an example of early hunting. 
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Post by brobear on Nov 22, 2021 3:44:05 GMT -5
www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=5052813461414821&set=pcb.4739278309484558 Hello all. We have engaged a small team of villagers in Sangiran, Central Java, Indonesia, to help us excavate fossils for research & studies for the past few years. Sangiran is the only early man site located in South East Asia endorsed by UNESCO. Late last year, an unusual skull was discovered. A few key notes, the foramen magnum is located near to the back of the skull, suggesting it to slouch like a primate. However, the upper jaw has a maxilla that is "U" shape suggesting that it is most likely a homo. What is also most interesting is that it has 14 teeth plus 2 large fans. The brows are heavy and the eye sockets are deep. Other details are on the pics. I come in peace to seek your opinion in this wonderful group and also, if there are individuals who may be interested to further research with us, kindly email me at tommy.ong@SSNHR.org . Thank you very much.
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Post by brobear on Nov 25, 2021 0:05:48 GMT -5
www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/11/211123130821.htm Ancient human relative, Australopithecus sediba, 'walked like a human, but climbed like an ape'. The recovery of new lumbar vertebrae from the lower back of a single individual of the human relative, Australopithecus sediba, and portions of other vertebrae of the same female from Malapa, South Africa, together with previously discovered vertebrae, form one of the most complete lower backs ever discovered in the early hominid record and give insight into how this ancient human relative walked and climbed. The study concludes that sediba is a transitional form of ancient human relative and its spine is clearly intermediate in shape between those of modern humans (and Neandertals) and great apes. "Issa walked somewhat like a human but could climb like an ape," says Berger.
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Post by brobear on Nov 25, 2021 1:39:12 GMT -5
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