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 ...
There’s a job for anyone and everyone. :’)
Isn’t that the point guard on the NMSU basketball team?
Most of us go to the store now, it’s labor specialization. It’s been going that way since sometime before that recent revolutionary book by Adam Smith. ;’)
LOL!
It’s not the law of averages, it has to do with China’s isolation from the sciences beginning with the Japanese invasion of Manchuria and not ending until Mao kicked off. The economic transformation Mao was never able or willing to accomplish has been underway for thirty or so years, and China’s got about a sixth of the world’s population and better higher ed. There’s also a nationalist need to stake a claim to its own history and prehistory, much as the US did with the dinosaurs, and the colonial powers did in Egypt, Mesopotamia, India, and elsewhere.
Thanks PIF.
This thread is useful without pics. ;’)
It’s the sauce that does it. :’)
Every zombie book starts with the words, “Democratic Party Platform”.
Reconstruction of the anatomy of an entire (often but not always) extinct form from fractions of the original was pioneered and popularized by Georges Cuvier — but I know what you mean, he was a YEC.
Judging from that skull I say a thriving alien civilization once flourished on the moon but came to western China when the air ran out through global warming....
heh
Well, for some people, it’s just too risky to have attractive cousins.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDUhe2J_2XQ
http://www.whoateallthepies.tv/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/inbred.jpg
http://www.buddyhead.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/Ozzy_teeth.jpeg.jpg
Imagine, an entire civilization that ran on cheese.
Yep, food and fuel!
okay, you’re a vegetable.
And I have ranch dressing.
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