Footprints Suggest Different Human Relatives Lived Alongside One Another (nytimes.com) 8
A million and a half years ago, amid giant storks and the ancestors of antelopes, two extinct relatives of humans walked along the same muddy lakeshore in what is today northern Kenya, new research suggests. From a report: An excavation team uncovered four sets of footprints preserved in the mud at the Turkana Basin, a site that has led to important breakthroughs in understanding human evolution. The discovery, announced on Thursday in a paper in the journal Science, is direct evidence that different kinds of human relatives, with distinct anatomies and gaits, inhabited the same place at the same time, the paper's authors say. It also raises questions about the extent of the species' interactions with each other.
"They might have walked by one another," said Kevin Hatala, an evolutionary anthropologist at Chatham University in Pittsburgh who led the study. "They might have looked up in the distance and seen another member of a closely related species, occupying the same landscape." Based on skeletal remains found in the region, Dr. Hatala's team attributed the footprints to Paranthropus boisei and Homo erectus, two types of hominins, the group consisting of our human lineage and closely related species. Paranthropus boisei had smaller brains along with wide, flat faces and massive teeth and chewing muscles; Homo erectus more closely resembled modern human proportions and are thought to be our direct ancestors.
"They might have walked by one another," said Kevin Hatala, an evolutionary anthropologist at Chatham University in Pittsburgh who led the study. "They might have looked up in the distance and seen another member of a closely related species, occupying the same landscape." Based on skeletal remains found in the region, Dr. Hatala's team attributed the footprints to Paranthropus boisei and Homo erectus, two types of hominins, the group consisting of our human lineage and closely related species. Paranthropus boisei had smaller brains along with wide, flat faces and massive teeth and chewing muscles; Homo erectus more closely resembled modern human proportions and are thought to be our direct ancestors.
Well Duh! (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Having two different hominids in the same area would be about as common as having both chimpanzees and monkeys in the same area. Or seeing horses and donkeys in the same area. If the environmental conditions were suitable for one species it isn't surprising to find a similar species there also.
I guess the researchers were surprised to find tracks from those early hominids in the same preserved fossil bed. Finding one preserved footprint set is rare. Finding both preserved side by side is like finding un
First words (Score:2)
"Well, there goes the neighborhood."
Re: (Score:2)
Sad reality (Score:3)
Our ancestors probably enslaved them.
Actual Reality (Score:5, Interesting)
Our ancestors probably enslaved them.
Homo Sapiens evolved roughly 200,000 to 300,000 years ago.
So no, our species hadn't evolved yet.
At about 100,000 years ago, there were about 7 known species of Homo, including Homo Sapens and Homo Neanderthalis ("Man from the Neander valley"). Interestingly, Neanderthals were larger, more muscular, and had bigger brains than Homo Sapens. There were probably more species of Homo, but evidence from that far back is scarce.
(The mental image of Neanderthals [theconversation.com] being short, squat, and monkey-like is now thought to be in error, from one deformed skeleton. A Neanderthal would probably have visible racial characteristics, but would also probably have a body style acceptable as normal in modern days.
Around 70,000 years ago Homo Sapiens got a mutation that allowed them to "believe in fiction" (aka understand abstract concepts), which allowed them to understand systems that don't exist in reality. Such as religion, countries, money, corporations, and so on. This allowed Sapiens to cooperate in the same culture without having to know each other personally: two Christians could go on a crusade together, or collaborate to start a hospital, without knowing each other in detail, only knowing that they both believed the same fictional culture of "Christian".
Up until that time humans could only cooperate in groups of up to around 150, because when your tribe gets larger than that you can't keep track of the personal attributes and interactions of everyone in your tribe.
Because of that mutation, many more than the typical 150 tribal members could cooperate, by believing in the same fictional system. Some people suggest that the mutation in question was with the FOXP2 gene [wikipedia.org], which allowed complex language that could describe abstract concepts and analogies. It's believed that the mutation was random, in that it could just as easily have been Neanderthals, or one of the other species of Homo.
Around 40,000 years ago Homo Sapiens was the last species of Homo surviving.
But yes, slavery goes back further than human recorded history. Humans have had slaves for much longer than humans have *not* had slaves.
Actually, humans keep slaves [wikipedia.org] today, so we could also say that humans have always had slavery. (Example.) [thecollector.com]
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Yes humans have had slavery for thousands of years and all humans have ancestors who were slaves and also some ancestors who enslaved people.
So, basically Homo Erectus outbred everybody else (Score:1)
So, basically Homo Erectus outbred everybody else, which is what would be expected from a name like that