Chinese Roots: Skull May Complicate Human-Origins Debate

Science News ^ | 12-21/28-2002 | Bruce Bower

[Little Bill]

I hope so, this whole thing is based on. "I found it there it must have originated there", BS. The DNA evidence is conjectural and is based on flawed, in my opinion, evidence.

I am not a big banger, like Blam, but I do believe that if you take a close look at the evidence central Asia is the place.

[Pharmboy]

Now just vyou waaaaiiiit a minute, bud; Wolpoff is MY guy.

;-)Thanks for the ping.

[Marysecretary]

Hi, Grampa Dave! Happy New Year. Your post reminds me of the old saying, "Don't confuse me with facts. My mind is made up!" xxxM

[LiteKeeper]

YEC read later

[PatrickHenry]

Somewhat related thread from a couple of weeks ago: Gene Study Identifies 5 Main Human Populations

[ZULU]

I agree with Wolpoff also. That does not, however, obviate the movement of groups of peoples throughout Asia, Africa and Europe during the same time period, resulting in genetic intermixture.

Before the development of organized states, mass movements of people from one area to another, albeit slow in time sequence, was probably more common than after emergent states marked off territories defended by military forces.

[<1/1,000,000th%]

The more complicated the better.

[Grampa Dave]

It seems most of my adult life, I have run into people who should have your poster posted all over their offices, homes and cars.

Happy New Year!

[edwin hubble]

Thanks for the ping, PatrickHenry

My colleagues in anthropology will find this interesting.

It's neat to look at a new discovery like this and know that it is at dead center of the questions currently at hand. This skull sure does look modern.

It is made even more curious by the fact that the time frame lies in an area (range) not well covered (accurately) by radioactive dating process. (Too old for real accuracy with carbon).

[stanz]

It's useless to take sides until the evidence is in, but mitochondrial DNA points toward the out-of-Africa idea.

[Alas Babylon!]

Since the "Out-of-Africa theory (OOA) postulates a migration between 100K-200K ya, why would it negate such a theory to find remains in EasT Asia that are 150K yo?

At some point, human ancestory can be traced to Africa. Australiopithecus and Homo Habilis for sure. I think various Homo Erectus evolving into the various races of Homo Sapiens is a compeling theory, I even believe it is more likely than not, but this discovery hardly disputes OOA. If any single group of humans wandered persuing game, than it is very likely that within only a few thousand years they may have well migrated 10,000 miles. Certainly at this time there were huge migration of fauna--horses and camels to the old world, bison and elephants to the new. Has anybody postulated how long it took for horses to appear in say, Spain, or Asia Minor, as opposed to Tibet or China?

[Physicist]

If the Liujiang dates were confirmed, out-of-Africa adherents would need to find older African H. sapiens fossils than they now have or show that modern humans migrated extremely quickly from Africa to eastern Asia.

But humans are obviously capable of migrating extremely quickly. It's entirely possible for a nomadic group of humans to travel from Africa to eastern Siberia and back again by way of Scandanavia in far less than a single human lifetime; all that's needed is the desire to do it. To me, it seems highly unlikely for some long-distance travel not to have happened.

Of course, this neither supports nor refutes the "Out-of-Africa" hypothesis. What it means is that some of the most important migrations may well have happened too quickly to have left any trace. "Out-of-Africa" and "evolved everywhere" may be indistinguishable. It might as easily have been "Out-of-India".

[Right Wing Professor]

How does this square with Peking Man, allegedly 250,000 years old?

Peking Man was Homo erectus.

I'd be very skeptical about any date in the region of 100,000 years that wasn't accompanied by first rate archaeological and dating techniques. Carbon dating is essentially impossible at that age, and uranium dating imprecise. Indeed, the idea that Europeans, Asians and Africans may have diverged far earlier is intriguing, and would drive the 'race is mythical' people bonkers; since we consider H. erectus a different species from H. sapiens, then consistency would demand the (at least) three distinct descents from H. erectus be three distinct species. I can't think of anything more politically incorrect, offhand. :-)

However, the preponderance of the evidence does still seem to support 'Africa first'. If you push the divergence date back to 1/4 million years, you have to assume we all evolved from Homo erectus almost in perfect parallel; typical Mongoloids, Caucasoids and Negroids are far more similar to each other than to H. erectus or even H. neanderthalensis.

[Right Wing Professor]

The key question, though, is where and when the evolutionary bottleneck occured. Any model of geographically separated but commingling populations has to be consistent with the genetic data, which has been interpreted in terms of a very small number of humans, and a single maternal ancestor, at some time in the period 50,000 - 100,000 B.C..

[blam]

"I seemed to have droped off your ping list, would you please re-add me to the list."

I don't have a 'ping' list, I just ping whoever I happen to remember, lol.

[blam]

"Has anybody postulated how long it took for horses to appear in say, Spain, or Asia Minor, as opposed to Tibet or China?"

I believe Victor Mair covers that in his book The Tarim Mummies.

[blam]

"The key question, though, is where and when the evolutionary bottleneck occured. Any model of geographically separated but commingling populations has to be consistent with the genetic data, which has been interpreted in terms of a very small number of humans, and a single maternal ancestor, at some time in the period 50,000 - 100,000 B.C.."

Toba fills that requirement. Many believe only 2,000-5,000 humans worldwide survived this catastrophe.

[jlogajan]

There are some who will continue to believe in the Out of Africa theory, no matter what - just like they still believe Cleopatra was black. So silly.

Well, there were many Nubian queens of Egypt, such as Nefertari, as the Nubians invaded Egypt and ruled for many years. However, Cleopatra was of Greek blood.

[Right Wing Professor]

I agree Toba's a plausible candidate. If the bottleneck was 75,000 years ago, that sets the date of racial divergence no earlier than that date. Furthermore, if it really was the catastrophe a lot of people believe it was, survival in China would have been far more difficult than in Africa.

[Physicist]

The key question, though, is where and when the evolutionary bottleneck occured. Any model of geographically separated but commingling populations has to be consistent with the genetic data, which has been interpreted in terms of a very small number of humans, and a single maternal ancestor, at some time in the period 50,000 - 100,000 B.C..

But a single common ancestor (e.g., a "mitochondrial Eve") doesn't necessarily imply a genetic bottleneck. It's possible that a (mutant) woman was born with significantly superior mitochondria, which slowly over time supplanted the other mitochondria throughout a large and sustained population with an otherwise diverse gene pool, without the need for a mass die-off, or for one population pushing out another. (This could similarly work for any given chromosome.)