Neanderthal Man 'Never Walked In Northern Europe'

The Telegraph (UK) ^ | 8-22-2004 | Tony Paterson

[blam]

Neanderthal Man 'never walked in northern Europe'

By Tony Paterson in Berlin
(Filed: 22/08/2004)

Historians of the Stone Age fear that they will have to rip up their theories about Neanderthal Man after doubt has been cast on the carbon dating of skeletons by a leading German anthropologist.

Work by the flamboyant Professor Reiner Protsch von Zieten showed that Neanderthal Man existed in northern Europe. Calculations on skeletal remains found at Hahnofersand, near Hamburg, stated they were 36,000 years old.

Yet recent research at Oxford University's carbon-dating laboratory has suggested that they date back a mere 7,500 years. By that time, Homo sapiens was already well-established and the Neanderthals were extinct.

Chris Stringer, a Stone Age specialist and head of human origins at London's Natural History Museum, said: "What was considered a major piece of evidence showing that the Neanderthals once lived in northern Europe has fallen by the wayside. We are having to rewrite prehistory."

But Prof von Zieten, 65, the descendant of a famous 18th-century Prussian general, rejected the evidence from Oxford University last week.

"The new data from Oxford is all wrong," he told Germany's Der Spiegel. He said that the university's scientists had failed to remove shellac preservative from the specimens. As a result, the remains appeared to be much younger.

"Unfortunately, archaeologists and most anthropologists do not study physics or chemistry and therefore they cannot make judgments on carbon dating," he said. "Wrong measurements are made in all laboratories."

Prof von Zieten, who has a penchant for large Havana cigars and Porsche cars, has been considered an expert in carbon-dating techniques since the 1970s. He has tested hundreds of prehistoric bone finds from Europe and Africa over the past 30 years.

Now, however, important remains that Oxford scientists no longer believe are prehistoric include the female "Bischof-Speyer" skeleton, found near the south-west German town of Speyer with unusually good teeth. Their evidence suggests that she is 3,300 years old, not 21,300.

Another apparent misdating involved an allegedly prehistoric skull discovered near Paderborn in 1976 and considered the oldest human remain ever found in the region. Prof von Zieten dated the skull at 27,400 years old. The latest research, however, indicates that it belonged to an elderly man who died around 1750.

Germany's Herne anthropological museum, which owns the Paderborn skull, was so disturbed by the findings that it did its own tests. "We had the skull cut open and it still smelt," the museum's director, Barbara Ruschoff-Thale, said last week. "We are naturally very disappointed."

Concern about Prof von Zieten's carbon-dating estimates arose last year following a routine investigation of German prehistoric remains by the German and British anthropologists Thomas Terberger and Martin Street.

"We had decided to subject many of these finds to modern techniques to check their authenticity so we sent them to Oxford for testing," Mr Street told The Sunday Telegraph. "It was a routine examination and in no way an attempt to discredit Prof von Zieten."

In their report, though, both anthropologists described this as a "dating disaster".

The scandal engulfing Prof von Zieten goes further. Police are investigating allegations that he tried to sell 280 chimpanzee skulls from his university to buyers in America for $70,000 (£38,000).

Prof von Zieten denies the claims, saying that he legitimately obtained the skulls from a Heidelberg ethnologist in 1975. Frankfurt university last month suspended the professor from his post in the anthropology department while it runs its own inquiry.

[RightWhale]

it is appropriate to question models that were built on refuted evidence

Where is the science? BTW, Newton sent over 100 to the gallows for faking.

[VadeRetro]

And yes, Google is our friend.

Have to confess, I actually used Yahoo! I'm getting in the habit of saying "Google" because that's becoming the term of choice.

[VadeRetro]

The data changed. In light of new evidence, it is appropriate to question models that were built on refuted evidence. Why is that hard for "science-oriented" people to see? Isn't that the essence of the scientific method?

No models were questioned after Archaeoraptor except maybe the model of buying from Chinese fossil merchants. No more was appropriate. A tiny fraction of a percent of the data changed, and the Luddites on FR were shrieking (in delight) that all of science since 1859 had collapsed, a serious overstatement of the situation. Why is THAT hard to understand?

[Elsie]

...just another impenetrably dense YEC.

This IS what happens if Mom dresses you funny, right??

[Elsie]

Extrapolation is predicting results beyond the spread of the data, ...

Like 99.93% of politicians and their pollsters do!

[Elsie]

Kinda like kleenex has devolved into the common lexicon.

[Elsie]

... the model of buying from Chinese fossil merchants.

They merely gave you what you expected to see.

---

Now if GERMAN fossilateers were to dig up something in China...........

;^)

[bondserv]

All of this one individual's work (and that of the lab he ran) must for now be considered suspect. Anything important he ever did will have to be redone. Do I have it wrong? Am I being dishonest?

Thank you. That is all we can ask of anyone.

[MacDorcha]

"Isn't it obvious? In the future mankind has discovered how to travel backward in time and they have used that technique to seed the ancient earth with life."

thats more realistic than randomly applying statistical mathematics.

and regardless of when Rome was built, it seems quite a simple procedure considering the materials involved. carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, hydrogen, and even silicone SHOULD provide life when presented with adequate energy and in the right combinations. at least according to "its all chemicals" theories. we've done all that. beyond that would require designing it, which would still prove life cant exist without intellegent design.

[Dajjal]

In their report, though, both anthropologists described this as a "dating disaster".

Yeah. I've had some of those.

[edsheppa]

beyond ["its all chemicals"] would require designing it,

Sez who?

[PoorMuttly]

Um...I know you guys are busy and all, but...uh....do you think that maybe when all this blows over, that...uh...maybe little Muttly could have the 280 monkey skulls....?.....Pleeeeeeeeease..(twiddling claw in dimple, and scuffing the ground...)

BTW...is Twaddle edible ?

[SunkenCiv]

You can have these monkey skulls, but I'm not sure the condition will be satisfactory ('Civ wrote, as he chucked a set of chopsticks).

Please FREEPMAIL me if you want on, off, or alter the "Gods, Graves, Glyphs" PING list --
Archaeology/Anthropology/Ancient Cultures/Artifacts/Antiquities, etc.
The GGG Digest -- Gods, Graves, Glyphs (alpha order)

[Bernard Marx]

scientists no longer believe are prehistoric include the female "Bischof-Speyer" skeleton

That's one of the problems with dating an older woman.

[SunkenCiv]

I hated Carville in "The Hills Have Eyes".

The Future of the Past: Archaeology in the 21st Century by Eberhard Zangger

[W]hen the headteacher Johann Karl Fuhlrott discovered the bones of a Neanderthal in a cave near Dusseldorf in 1856... Rudolf Virchow, President of the Deutsche Gessellschaft fur Anthropologie... who personally promoted the principle 'always practise honesty and stand by the facts whatever happens' -- endorsed the interpretation that the Neanderthal was a bow-legged, Mongolian Cossack with rickets, who had been lucky enough to survive multiple head injuries, but who, during a campaign b Russian forces against France in 1814, had been wounded, and (stark naked) had crawled into a cave, where he had died. Thirty years passed before the specialists recognised their mistake.[pp 288-289]

[PoorMuttly]

They'll be fine, as long as they are not the fossilized kind. Those are much too crunchy...but I try !

(...so they're still talking about poor Yuri in the cave, and how he lost the strip-poker game with the Neanderthals. I told him that tying rocks to his head was no replacement for a helmet, and that it would get him into trouble some say. 'Never thought it would damage his card playing abilities...so you see...you just never know.)

[newheart]

You seem to be itching for a fight with a 'creationist'. I'm not sure i qualify. Mostly because I have no idea what your definition of creationist is and I suspect it is largely dismissive. Even then, I am no scientist and certainly not as knowledgeable as you are on these issues.

You are right that Neanderthal man isn't really one of the pillars of evolutionary theory. But that depends on whose perspective you are taking into account. From the scientific community, the answer is no. In the popular mind, Neanderthal Man, thanks to that popular picture of the 'evolution of man' is most certainly thought to be evidence for the veracity of the theory of eveolution. In the popular mind the idea exists that we 'evolved' from apes through Neanderthal Man to modern enlightened technologically superior humanity.

The popular mind has no idea about the work that has been done by William Dembski, Michael Behe,and others. (I do realize that you have probably read them). In the mind of many, if not most, who went to college since the Scopes trial it is simply a commonplace to assume that anyone who challenges macroeconomic evolution theory on any grounds is simply an un-educated fundamentalist bigot.

It certainly is not unreasonable to stand with Darwin, Dawkins and Gould in this dispute. Reasonable minds can disagree. But please remember that Galileo was condemned by people who believed that they had the corner on knowledge and the power to enforce it. From my admittedly limited perspective the paradigm is shifting again. I just hope it does not take the academy 350 years before it issues its apology to Dembski, et al.

[SunkenCiv]

Recent studies of neanderthal DNA turned up the result that neanderthal DNA is "about halfway between ours and that of a chimpanzee", and that there is no way we could interbreed with them or be descended from them via any process resembling evolution.

those mtDNA studies tend to be GIGO, and that one in particular was heinous. :')

[Michael_Michaelangelo]

Oops!

Oops is right! Or is it: "oog"? :)

This 'Fraud' is one of the biggest names in paleoanthropology; for what it's worth. At least his webpage is offline. http://www.neanderthal-modern.com/weeurope.htm

"The current form of the modern human origins debate in paleoanthropology originated with Reiner Protsch’s (1975) contention that modern humans could be identified as a distinct entity and were of African origin." Source: http://www-personal.umich.edu/~wolpoff/Papers/aa-hawks.pdf

Here are a few of his papers that I found with a quick websearch. Many of his papers are used as references by government and educational websites and textbooks. As far as I am concerned, anything he's done is suspect.

====================================

1992 Craniofacial Evidence for theOrigin of Modern Humans in China.Yearbook of PhysicalAnthropology 35:243–298. Protsch, Reiner

Protsch, R. 1975. "The absolute dating of Upper Pleistocene sub-Saharan fossil hominids and their place in human evolution." In Journal of Human Evolution, vol. 4, pp. 297-322.

Bada, Jeffrey L. and Reiner Protsch. 1973. Racemization reaction of aspartic acid and its use in dating fossil bones. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science 70:1331-1334.

Bada, Jeffrey L., Reiner Protsch, and Roy A. Schroeder. 1973. The racemization reaction of isoleucine used as a paleotemperature indicator. Nature 241:394-395.

Protsch, Reiner R. R. Catalog of fossil hominids of North America. New York, G. Fischer, 1978. 86 p. E71.P76 Includes bibliographical references

Bada, JL, Schroeder, R, Protsch, R, & Berger, R 1974. Concordance of collagen-based radiocarbon and aspartic acid racemization ages. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA 71:914-917.

Berger, R. and R. Protsch, 1989. UCLA Radiocarbon Dates XI. Radiology. Vol.31, No. 1. pp. 55-67.

MacNeish, R.S., R. Berger, and R. Protsch (1970) Megafauna and Man from Ayacucho, Highland Peru. Science 168:975-977.

Protsch R. R. R., 1981. Die archäologischen und anthropologischen Ergebnisse der Kolh-Larsen-Expeditionen in Nord-Tanzania 1933-1939. Band 4, 3., Tübinger Monographien zur Urgeschichte. Universität Tübingen, Tübingen.

Reiner Protsch, "The Age and Stratigraphic Position of Olduvai Hominid I," Journal of Human Evolution, Vol. 3 (1974), pp: 379--385.

Berger, R., Protsch, R.R., Reynolds, R., Rozaire, C., and Sackett, J.R. (1971) New radiocarbon dates based on bone collagen of California paleoindians. Contributions of the University of California Archaeological Research Facility 12:43-49.