Blog evolutionis

Mjesto: Atapuerca špilja u sjevernoj Španjolskoj
Nađeno: 28 ljudskih tijela.
Starost: Znanstvenik Arsuaga i kolege iz Sime: 600,000 godina
Starost: Chris Stringer iz Natural History Museuma UK: 400,000 godina
Vrsta: Arsuaga tvrdi – to je Homo heidelbergensis, predak Neandertalaca
Vrsta: Stringer tvrdi – to je Neandertalac,
Problem: osim 200,000 godina razlike u datiranju, profesor Stringer tvrdi da je Homo heidelbergensis predak današnjeg čovjeka.

…. the remains of 28 bodies have been dug up, the world’s greatest single haul of ancient human fossils. During this time, Arsuaga and his team pushed back the dates of their finds to 600,000 years ago and assigned them as belonging to Homo heidelbergensis.

But Britain’s leading expert on human evolution, Professor Chris Stringer, of the Natural History Museum, has warned in the journal Evolutionary Anthropology that the team in charge of La Sima has got the ages of its fossils wrong by 200,000 years and has incorrectly identified the species of ancient humans found there.

Sima scientists argue that the fossils must be older. They say the 28 bodies were thrown into the pit as an act of reverence for the dead and that the stalagmite grew over the sediment containing the bones.
However, this interpretation is controversial. No one has found any other evidence of ceremonial behaviour in humans of that antiquity. In addition, there is a deficit of small finger and toe bones. “If complete bodies were thrown in there, you would expect to see every piece of human anatomy down there,” said Stringer. “But you don’t. A lot of skeletal parts seem to be missing.”

This dating and identification has caused increasing upset among other palaeontologists. The scientists at La Sima believe H heidelbergensis is an ancestor of Neanderthals but not of Homo sapiens. However, others, including Stringer, believe it is indeed an ancestor of our species.

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Najnovije studije pokazuju da su preci suvremenih ljudi živjeli na područjima sjeverne Engleski prije više od 40 tisuća godina, što je 7 tisuća godina ranije nego li se do sada mislilo. Analiza komadića kosti zubala, pronađen u špilji kod Torquaya ukazuje da su Neandertalci i preci suvremenih ljudi zajednički živjeli na području Europe.

Independent opširnije.

This image released by the journal Science shows the right hand skeleton of the adult female Australopithecus sediba against a modern human hand. A detailed analysis of 2 million-year-old bones found in South Africa offers the most powerful case so far in identifying the transitional figure that came before modern humans, findings some are calling a potential game-changer in understanding evolution

Yahoo donosi članak LiveScience o ostacima dva kostura koji bi mogli biti pravi preci današnjih ljudi. Dosadašnji nalazi uglavnom se odnose na pretke izumrlih vrsti ljudi, dok bi se ovi ostaci mogli povezati s današnjim ljudima.
Glave poveznice traže se na 1. Veličini i razvijenosti mozga, 2. Obliku zdjelice koja je dovoljno široka za prolaz relativno velike dječje glave, 3. Oblika šake, palac i kažiprst se koriste bez velike upotrebe dlanova, 4. Oblika stopala koje više nije prilagođeno hvatanju za grane.
Vrsta je nazvana Australopithecus sediba i slučajno je pronađena ujednoj špilji južne Afrike.
Procjenjuje se da su fosili stari oko 2 milijuna godina.

Čini se da su nas nendertalski ojačali toliko da smo preživjeli. BBC News objavljuje članak u kojem iznosi da su potomci svih ogranaka ljudi, osim onih koji su ostali u Africi, imunološki ojačali nakon mješanja s Neandertalcima i praljudima Denisove špilje.

Previous research had indicated that prehistoric interbreeding led to up to 4% of the modern human genome.

Makar su “pomogli” ljudima preživjeti, sami u tome nisu uspjeli.

“Initially you have small bands of Europeans exploring, having a difficult time and making friends with the natives; but as they establish themselves, they become less friendly and more likely to take over their resources and eliminate them.

Dan Liberman govori Alanu Aldi o novoj teoriji o tome zašto imamo velike mozgove.

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Serija koja je Carlu Saganu poslužila kao inspiracija za snimanje Kozmosa, “the Ascent of Man” prati razvoj društva kroz razumijevanje znanosti.