Anthropologist Louise Leakey Carries "Family Banner"
What is the specific focus of your work on the Turkana Basin Research Initiative?
There are several research questions that we really want to approach. One of them is relating to the sudden emergence of Homo erectus, or our genus Homo, around about two million years ago. Where does it suddenly appear from? Does that tie into Homo habilis? Then the other question is,"What is Homo habilis?" because there's still a lot of disagreement or controversy surrounding Homo habilis.
Thanks for the reply.
There are still a lot of details to work out. That's what keeps paleontologists and archaeologists interested and working!
I think the point I was making--that there are a lot of transitional fossils, rather than none as others have claimed--is accurate. We may not know every detail about every part of the tree and about every specimen, but it does look like Homo habilis qualifies as a transitional fossil. And there are many others.
Note also the Leakey's scientific approach: "There are several research questions that we really want to approach." Science does not claim to know all the answers, and sometimes doesn't even know the question to ask. As a result, theories can be modified or even discarded as new data arise. That's just the way science works.
Right now the ape (or rather the 6 million year old common ancestor)-to-man theory looks best. There is a lot of evidence supporting it and none contradicting it.
The "Hobbit" was thought to be a new species based upon the way it "looked." Turns out, it was a vertically-challenged dude with a brain impedement.