Posted on 03/15/2012 8:14:19 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
Your family tree just got wider. Scientists have analyzed fossils found in China, and deemed them to be from a new human species unlike any ever identified before; say hello to your long-lost cousin.
The skull, originally unearthed in 1979 in the Guangxi Province of China, has only now been fully analyzed (talk about procrastination, right?). It turns out that it has thick bones, extremely prominent brow ridges, a very short, flat face, and also lacks our typically human chin. "In short, it is anatomically unique among all members of the human evolutionary tree," explains researcher Darren Curnoe to New Scientist.
What's more, despite its huge differences, in many ways the new species acted like other humans. There's evidence they cooked large deer in caves, for instance, which clearly separates them from apes, a finding reported in the research which appears in PLoS One.
The finer details of how the new species fits in to our family tree are a little fuzzy. One theory is that they were a new evolutionary line that evolved concurrently with our species, just like Neanderthals did. Another suggests that they could have been descendants of the Denisovan people who inhabbited Siberia. DNA testing might help solve the problem -- and help work out just how closely related we really are. [PLoS One and New Scientist; Image: Darren Curnoe]
(Excerpt) Read more at gizmodo.com ...
Shameful. 21 posts and no helen Thomas picp
“Are we not men?’’
Any discoveries in America are covered up, I hear. Just in case they are natives!!!
Looks like a skeleton with a Darth Vader helmet.
The problem with Chinese fossils is that most of them are’t excavate by scientists, they are sold on the black market by illegal fossil hunters. When that happens, there’s no provenance, no way of knowing if the bones come from the same site, or have been altered. Unless the scientists can track down where they were dug up, go there and excavate themselves and find similar fossils, they are permanently questionable.
I shouldn’t laugh but I can’t help it.
Just a thought, the creator made many batches before he was compleatly satisfied, just like old Henry started out with the model “T” and now the 2012 explorer,
“Scientists have analyzed fossils found in China, and deemed them to be from a new human species unlike any ever identified before; say hello to your long-lost cousin.”
Thank God he’s dead or he’d move into the White House with his relative.
A new soecies of ANIMAL, not human.
“A new soecies of ANIMAL, not human”
Er, Humans are animals. Though I’ve been called a Vegitable more than once...
Isn’t this how every zombie book starts?
Just saying.
Was it driving a Buick?
There are 7 billion members of Homo sapiens alive today. How many of them have ever cooked a large deer in a cave? Probably not one in a billion. Looks like H. sapiens fails the "human" test.
I don’t think it was the questions that did it, it was the too many answers. :’) Someone tried the same scam (if it was one; I don’t think it was ever studied, it just vanished into the woodwork) about ten years ago, if memory serves.
Hu Phlong Dong is the author of the paper about this new find.
A Fatal Attraction
by Milford Wolpoff
and Rachel Caspari
hardcover
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