Posted on 03/20/2008 2:54:39 PM PDT by blam
Upright Walking Began 6 Million Years Ago
Newswise — A shape comparison of the most complete fossil femur (thigh bone) of one of the earliest known pre-humans, or hominins, with the femora of living apes, modern humans and other fossils, indicates the earliest form of bipedalism occurred at least six million years ago and persisted for at least four million years. William Jungers, Ph.D., of Stony Brook University, and Brian Richmond, Ph.D., of George Washington University, say their finding indicates that the fossil belongs to very early human ancestors, and that upright walking is one of the first human characteristics to appear in our lineage, right after the split between human and chimpanzee lineages. Their findings are published in the March 21 issue of the journal Science.
The research is the first thorough quantitative analysis of the Orrorin tugenensis fossil – a fragmentary piece of femur – which was discovered in Kenya in 2000 by a French research team. Dr. Jungers, Chair of Anatomical Sciences at SBU School of Medicine, and Dr. Richmond, Associate Professor of Anthropology at GWU and a member of GWU’s Center for the Advanced Study of Hominid Paleobiology, completed a multivariate analysis of the proximal femora shape of a young adult O. tugenensis that enabled them to pinpoint the pattern of bipedal gait for this controversial hominin. Their analysis included a large and diverse sample of apes, other early hominins, including Australopithecus, and modern humans of all body sizes.
“This research solidifies the evidence that the human lineage split off as far back as six million years ago, that we share ancestry with Orrorin, and that our ancestors were walking upright at the time,” says Dr. Richmond. “These answers were not clear before this analysis.”
“Our study confirms that as early as six million years ago, basal hominins in Africa were already similar to later australopithecines in their anatomy and inferred locomotor biomechanics,” adds Dr. Jungers. “At the same time, by way of the analysis, we see no special phylogenetic connection between Orrorin and our own genus, Homo.”
In “Orrorin tugenensis Femoral Morphology and the Evolution of Hominin Bipedalism,” the authors articulate that the analysis and morphological comparisons among femora from the fossils showed that O. tugenensis is distinct from those of modern humans and the great apes in having a long, anteroposteriorly narrow neck and wide proximal shaft. Early Homo femora have larger heads and broader necks compared to early hominins. In addition to these features, modern human femora have short necks and mediolaterally narrow shafts.
The challenge ahead, explains Dr. Jungers, is “to identify what precipitated the change from this ancient and successful adaptation of upright walking, and climbing, to our own obligate form of bipedalism.”
The Department of Anatomical Sciences at Stony Brook University School of Medicine is known internationally for the scope and significance of its research into evolutionary morphology, including paleoanthropology, field-based vertebrate paelontology and experimental functional anatomy. The department interacts with other departments in the School of Medicine, as well as those in Biological Sciences and the Department of Anthropology, through which the Interdepartmental Doctoral Program in Anthropological Sciences (IDPAS) is administered. The Stony Brook IDPAS faculty brings world-renowned strengths in functional morphology and human evolution.
This current article and Lucy seem to argue the other way.
Do you have any citations for your view?
Or are you considering tool use on the order of chimps? And language more on the order of signaling?
God created -- therefore the rules of science belong to him. And have you ever though that maybe, just maybe, the methods of dating are wrong? You guys always go back to your dating methods invented by men and proclaimed true. Forgive me if I go back to God's Word and trust that as truth over what man has to say.
Nooooo...THIS is it: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1971511/posts?page=1324#1324
This is my idea. I have no citations. The article triggered me to think about why an arboreal ape would prefer to develop upright walking. I would imagine an omnivorous ape (chimps are omnivores) would find more food on the open plains if he hunted like a plains predator. I see having the ability to communicate and effectively use weapons as necessary to carry out such a hunt. I see no advantage to upright walking if it does not reward the ape with a greater food supply.
I’m so tired of this.
We ran most of the conservative scientists off this site a couple of years ago.
It made no sense.
There is no reason why FR should be anti-science.
Whatever is truth, is truth.
We shouldn’t be afraid of truth because it contradicts something we were taught.
It takes "faith" to accept that. Good for you.
I don't know what you base that on. Evidence would be good.
Even intuitive thought would be good.
I just don't get it.
This forum is so opposed to 2008 science that it's hard to understand.
Refulte the science if it's wrong, but that is not the approach.
It's ban the scientists.
This is not a long term strategy for growth.
Ok. If you say so I will accept 99.5 %.
not
What it says, and what you have deduced from it might be two different things.
IN THE BEGINNING GOD CREATED THE HEAVEN AND EARTH is likely true.
That it didn't happen the way you think is certainly true.
I really don't mind if you reach a different conclusion. I just wish you'd allow some of us to reach a different conclusion without getting banned.
Granted. In the case of the embryo, DNA provides the script. A magnificently sophisticated organism reproduces. How is this analogous to an slime mold evolving into a human? It is counter intuitive and anti-intellectual to simply accept that. I grant you that it is "possible."
That’s right so why are people afraid of the Bible? because it is not convient, we will have to answer for our lives and actions, and that scares us.
OK, thanks for the explanation.
When I was in grad school some decades ago we were taught that the groups of "chimps" that headed toward the plains were not doing so voluntarily, but were being crowded out by the more successful groups of "chimps" who remained in the forests -- which at that time were shrinking.
Over time they moved toward the edges of the forests, and then onto the plains. It must have been a time of tremendous selection pressure, with lots of opportunity for "survival of the fittest" to occur. This split between two forest groups is likely to have occurred some 6 million years ago.
Chimps have been found to use tools, so there is no reason to think that the groups of "chimps" being forced out of the forests did not also use tools. But the earliest truly shaped stone tools are about 2 or so million years ago, so there was a bit of a lag during which the more primitive tools probably were all that were used.
Language--that is a trickier subject. Fully modern language is often placed something like 60,000 years ago, but we know that chimps can communicate after a fashion, so it is likely that early hominids could also.
As for upright walking, that would have been one way of making a living (and staying alive) on the plains. Certainly it would free up the hands for carrying tools and weapons, and also it would allow better visibility in grasslands.
sigh!!!
THAT IS THE POINT! Think about it & try not to let your ego interfere with what you discover.
It wouldn’t be so bad if there were more and/or better arguments to support faith. But I suppose it wouldn’t be faith if one could reason it out...
Refulte the science if it's wrong, but that is not the approach.
It's ban the scientists.
This is not a long term strategy for growth.
I'm still here (for the moment).
Signed: token scientist
Or a longer life? Avoiding predators is a good thing!
Scientists are not afraid of the Bible.
We are responsible for our lives, and whether it comes down to some court in Heavan where we have to plead our case, it really just doesn’t matter here.
Science is resonsible for science. God gave us intelligence, so we should accept what is provable.
If it contradicts what some guy said in the name of Jesus a few hundred years ago without the new information, well, it ain’t true.
If God really wants us to know what’s going on, he should send Jesus down here, make him indestructible, and give hime a microphone. He could even give him his own network television.
He’s chosen not to do that, so all of us are kind of left to figuring it out for ourselves, and occasionally killing each other because we figured it out differently.
You’re the token, dude.
You are the MurrayMom of scientists here.
That could mean you’re bulletproof, but it also means you’re an endangered species.
People should sit down and think about that phrase for a sec...literal interpretation. What does that mean? If you have to interpret it, how can it be literal? Someone must interpret it first, then tell you it is literal. So who has the authority to decide which interpretation is literal and which is not?
Science is the act of inventing the rules so that they give us an answer that agrees with our “interpretation” of the world around us. We need to sit down and think about that for a sec.
Now, after thinking about these two absurdities, how does one go about taking sides in an argument between the two?
I have thought about it. It means the universe will eventually end. Nothing more. Nothing less.
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