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To: bondserv; PatrickHenry
Already posted (and discussed) here.

And as I posted at the time, Henneberg's "analysis" is so simplistic as to be worthless (but when has that been a problem for the creationists before?):

The problem is that such a "weights and heights" measure is an extremely simplistic measure. Just because there are modern humans who are midgets, that doesn't mean that an Australopithecus would be taken for a "normal" modern human if one were to be brought to the present using a time machine. You'd still freak out if you saw one walk into the 7-11.

I don't know *any* modern humans who look even remotely like *this*:

Massive brow ridge, *NO* forehead, a braincase you could wrap your hand around like a football, a prominent protruding muzzle, small close-set eyes, jawbone larger than the braincase, etc. etc. Compare to the proportions and angles of a modern human skull:


For Henneberg to say, "well they're in the same extreme size range, they must have been have been the same species", is utterly ludicrous. Not, of course, that that stops "Creation-Evolution Headlines" from using it as "proof" of their misconceptions about biology...
14 posted on 01/02/2005 10:21:17 PM PST by Ichneumon
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To: Ichneumon


16 posted on 01/02/2005 10:34:12 PM PST by bondserv (Sincerity with God is the most powerful instigator for change! † [Check out my profile page])
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To: Ichneumon
From the article.

"Other authorities hailed Prof Henneberg's findings as a much-needed reality check. 'Clearly there is a need to be more aware of the possibility of variation - but that is not the inclination today,' said Geoffrey Harrison, emeritus professor of biological anthropology at the University of Oxford. 'It has been a problem because the discoverers have usually put so much effort into finding the evidence, so they want it to be important'."

"Professor Chris Stringer, a leading expert on human fossils at the Natural History Museum, London, said even Neanderthals were not significantly different in skull or body size from modern humans. However, he added that they do differ in other details, such as inner ear bones."

18 posted on 01/02/2005 11:07:19 PM PST by bondserv (Sincerity with God is the most powerful instigator for change! † [Check out my profile page])
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To: Ichneumon
Australopithecus would be taken for a "normal" modern human if one were to be brought to the present using a time machine. You'd still freak out if you saw one walk into the 7-11. I don't know *any* modern humans who look even remotely like *this*:

Does the complete skull of an Australopithecus exist?

77 posted on 01/03/2005 5:11:48 PM PST by DouglasKC
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