Fossils Bridge Gap in African Mammal Evolution

Reuters to My Yahoo! ^ | Wed Dec 3, 2003 | Patricia Reaney

[Pharmboy]

LONDON (Reuters) - Fossils discovered in Ethiopia's highlands are a missing piece in the puzzle of how African mammals evolved, a team of international scientists said on Wednesday.

Little is known about what happened to mammals between 24 million to 32 million years ago, when Africa and Arabia were still joined together in a single continent.

But the remains of ancestors of modern-day elephants and other animals, unearthed by the team of U.S. and Ethiopian scientists 27 million years on, provide some answers.

"We show that some of these very primitive forms continue to live through the missing years, and then during that period as well, some new forms evolved -- these would be the ancestors of modern elephants," said Dr John Kappelman, who headed the team.

The find included several types of proboscideans, distant relatives of elephants, and fossils from the arsinoithere, a rhinoceros-like creature that had two huge bony horns on its snout and was about 7 feet high at the shoulder.

"It continues to amaze me that we don't have more from this interval of time. We are talking about an enormous continent," said Kappelman, who is based at the University of Texas at Austin.

Scientists had thought arsinoithere had disappeared much earlier but the discovery showed it managed to survive through the missing years. The fossils from the new species found in Ethiopia are the largest, and at 27 million years old, the youngest discovered so far.

"If this animal was still alive today it would be the central attraction at the zoo," Tab Rasmussen, a paleontologist at Washington University in St Louis, Missouri who worked on the project, said in a statement.

Many of the major fossil finds in Ethiopia are from the Rift Valley. But Kappelman and colleagues in the United States and at Ethiopia's National Science Foundation (news - web sites) and Addis Ababa University concentrated on a different area in the northwestern part of the country.

Using high-resolution satellite images to scour a remote area where others had not looked before, his team found the remains in sedimentary rocks about 6,600 feet above sea level.

[Markofhumanfeet]

Well, male chimps, gorillas, and humans, aren't all that diversified from their females. Some studies suggest it's just a matter of a little hormone before birth. Then we have hormone therapy, capable of pretty much, gender changing the male or female into the other sex. So your argument is weak

[Markofhumanfeet]

My point is, why is there even AIDS to begin with

[VadeRetro]

Apparently, some chimps can't get AIDS, no matter how much of the virus you give them. Why then, have humans, having millions of years supposedly, to inherit this trait, in order to survive, not aquired it, from "their closest living relative"?

When the Spaniards brought smallpox to the Americas, the Aztecs died like flies. Is this proof the Spaniards and the Aztecs were a different created kind?

[Markofhumanfeet]

Well, even this thougt won't fly, because she can say "no" all she wants to, but if he's the bigger of the two, he is going to mate

[Markofhumanfeet]

were the spaniards and the Aztecs living together on the continent of Africa for millenia?

[RightWhale]

there are no "skeletal remains" of transitioning "apes" to "humans",

Strawmen don't leave fossil skeletons.

[VadeRetro]

Well, male chimps, gorillas, and humans, aren't all that diversified from their females.

I didn't say sexual selection drove human - neanderthal divergence. You tried to say that male lust alone would have prevented it. Now that's weak!

[js1138]

My point is, why is there even AIDS to begin with

Why is there air? I still don't understand your point.

[VadeRetro]

were the spaniards and the Aztecs living together on the continent of Africa for millenia?

No, and the Spaniards weren't living with the chimps, either.

[js1138]

Well, even this thougt won't fly, because she can say "no" all she wants to, but if he's the bigger of the two, he is going to mate

I presume you know this from personal experience.

[Markofhumanfeet]

No, I said it. If Neandertals were living next to modern humans, there would be intercourse, if they were all the same species. If they were not, as in the case of gorillas, chimps and humans, there wouldn't be.

[VadeRetro]

Well, even this thougt won't fly, because she can say "no" all she wants to, but if he's the bigger of the two, he is going to mate

It works that way in cats, but not in peafowl.

[js1138]

There are literally thousands of known species of plants and animals that are capable of producing viable and fertile hybrid offspring, but which never interbreed in the wild.

[VadeRetro]

If Neandertals were living next to modern humans, there would be intercourse, if they were all the same species.

It may have happened. Lots of discussion on this thread. (Hint! Hint!)

[Markofhumanfeet]

I do not know this from personal experience, and your comment reveals the type of low nature that you posses. Rape is a reality and if you are insinuating that I am capable of it, I will report you to the moderator.

[Markofhumanfeet]

Here's a hint: it did not happen. There is no evidence of Neandertal dna in modern humans

[js1138]

You were the one who said intercourse will occur whenever the male can overpower the female. I really couldn't believe you would believe such a stupid statement, so I illustrated it's stupidity with absurdity.

[js1138]

You don't know that and neither does anyone else.

[Markofhumanfeet]

Yet Africans, notably those who have lived next to chimpanzees, gorillas, and green monkeys supposedly forever, are dying from AIDS. After all this time, if survival of the fittest were true, they would not be dying. Were the Spaniards then, superior to the Aztecs? Is that your belief?

[Markofhumanfeet]

You are the believer in might makes right, ie, the survival of the fittest