Posted on 08/28/2022 5:13:37 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
A blackened, broken leg bone from Earth’s prehistoric past may hold the answer to when early humans diverged from apes and started their own evolutionary path.
The fossilized find, first uncovered two decades ago, suggests that early humans regularly walked on two feet some seven million years ago... Since many consider bipedalism the major milestone that put our own lineage on a different evolutionary path than the apes, Sahelanthropus could be the very oldest known hominin—the group consisting of modern humans, extinct human species and all of our immediate ancestors.
The species could even be our oldest non-ape ancestor, if its lineage led to Homo sapiens instead of dying out. But while the fossil femur appears to have supported the demands of habitual upright walking, Sahelanthropus’s chimp-like forearms show that it still spent plenty of time in the trees. Two surviving arm bones reveal that the species used a grasping climbing technique to support a type of hybrid lifestyle that could have persisted among early hominins for some three million years...
Boisserie and colleagues, some of whom originally described Sahelanthropus in 2002, compared more than 20 traits of the femur and forearm bones with a large sample of living chimpanzees, gorillas and orangutans, fossil Miocene apes, early hominin bipeds like Orrorin tugenensis and Ardipithecus Ramidus, and remains of prehistoric Homo and Homo sapiens. They compared external shapes, curves, internal structures and thicknesses to learn if the bone had the same characteristics as those known to be well-suited to the demands of force, balance and other requirements of upright walking. The femur of S. tchadensis showed many similarities with other hominin species, while no traits of the femur were also found exclusively in apes.
(Excerpt) Read more at smithsonianmag.com ...
These 3-D models of the bones of Sahelanthropus show the femur in posterior and medial view (left) and the right and left ulnae in anterior and lateral view (right).Franck Guy / PALEVOPRIM / CNRS – University of Poitiers
Helen Thomas was walking that long ago?
Nah, they found Alley Oop’s shin bone. Dr Wonmug lost track of him when he didn’t pay the power bill on his time machine.
Do you credit as true the theory that humans evolved from apes?
Future Rat voters.
They had a common ancestor. Study ToE a bit more closely.
Seven million years ago there were plenty of reasons
for early man to be quickly able to get up in a tree...
Human history extends into deep time. Make no mistake, most evidence of ancient human civilization is under 350 feet of ocean.
“Seven Million Years Ago, the Oldest Known Early Human Was Already Walking”
...and Nasty Nanzi Peelousy can personally attest to that fact!
I feel like him when I get out of bed in the morning
As in Adam made in the image of God.
That's what happens when you have a flood 6000 years ago.
I'm looking forward to when they announce the discovery of Sahelanthropus jeremyensis.
There’s an image of what the monkey was said to look like here.
https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2022/08/24/15/61686509-11142015-image-a-230_1661350956872.jpg
...from this article.
Did sometimes walking on two legs make it human?
Different theory.
If one where to do a man on the street type question we would discover that quite a number of people do not know the difference between a monkey and an ape.
Photo caption of Helen Thomas and that certain look across the room....
Strangers in the night
Exchanging glances
Wandering in the night
What were the chances
We’d be sharing love
Before the night was through?
Something in your eyes
Was so inviting
Something in your smile
Was so exciting
Something in my heart told me I must have you
Strangers in the night, two lonely people
We were strangers in the night
Up to the moment when we said our first hello
Little did we know
Love was just a glance away, a warm embracing dance away
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