Oldest Remains of Modern Humans Are Identified by Scientists

New York Times (AP Wire) ^ | February 16, 2005 | AP Wire

[Alter Kaker]

NEW YORK (AP) -- A new analysis of bones unearthed nearly 40 years ago in Ethiopia has pushed the fossil record of modern humans back to nearly 200,000 years ago -- perhaps close to the dawn of the species.

Researchers determined that the specimens are around 195,000 years old. Previously, the oldest known fossils of Homo sapiens were Ethiopian skulls dated to about 160,000 years ago.

Genetic studies estimate that Homo sapiens arose about 200,000 years ago, so the new research brings the fossil record more in line with that, said John Fleagle of Stony Brook University in New York, an author of the study.

The fossils were found in 1967 near the Omo River in southwestern Ethiopia. One location yielded Omo I, which includes part of a skull plus skeletal bones. Another site produced Omo II, which has more of a skull but no skeletal bones. Neither specimen has a complete face.

Although Omo II shows more primitive characteristics than Omo I, scientists called both specimens Homo sapiens and assigned a tentative age of 130,000 years.

Now, after visiting the discovery sites, analyzing their geology and testing rock samples with more modern dating techniques, Fleagle and colleagues report in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature that both specimens are 195,000 years old, give or take 5,000 years.

Fleagle said the more primitive traits of Omo II may mean the two specimens came from different but overlapping Homo sapiens populations, or that they just represent natural variation within a single population.

To find the age of the skulls, the researchers determined that volcanic rock lying just below the sediment that contained the fossils was about 196,000 years old. They then found evidence that the fossil-bearing sediment was deposited soon after that time.

Paul Renne, director of the Berkeley Geochronology Center, which specializes in dating rocks, said the researchers made "a reasonably good argument" to support their dating of the fossils.

"It's more likely than not," he said, calling the work "very exciting and important."

Rick Potts, director of the Human Origins Program at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History, said he considered the case for the new fossil ages "very strong." The work suggests that "we're right on the cusp of where the genetic evidence says the origin of modern humans ... should be," he said.

G. Philip Rightmire, a paleoanthropologist at Binghamton University in New York, said he believes the Omo fossils show Homo sapiens plus a more primitive ancestor. The find appears to represent the aftermath of the birth of Homo sapiens, when it was still living alongside its ancestral species, he said.

[Messianic Jews Net]

I know light generates heat, but here it is anyway. The primary error in Wiens' OEC article is on page 20: "Much of the light following a supernova blast is powered by newly created radioactive parents. So we observe radiometric decay in the supernova light. The half-lives of decays occurring hundreds of thousands of years ago are thus carefully recorded! These half-lives completely agree with the half-lives measured from decays occurring today. We must conclude that all evidence points towards unchanging radioactive half-lives."

The Setterfield hypothesis of lightspeed decay is obtaining multiple independent verifications in peer-reviewed journals. Even Hawking admits inconstant lightspeed to support his no-boundary condition, and Wiens at least admits it as a rival theory. It doesn't reject Einstein but expands him, because lightspeed is still constant to all observers at the same time, but not universally. If lightspeed has been decreasing by a factor of a million or trillion as suggested, it accounts for all the evidence.

Let the speed of decaying particles in the supernova be nc (which also works for those who think n=1), and let t be the time the observed decay actually takes. The half-life was then today's observed half-life, over n. If lightspeed is slower, an event that takes t will be witnessed today in nt, and the half-life will be observed to be over n times n. In other words, if lightspeed changes, Wiens' assumption that we could tell by supernova half-lives is false, because the factors cancel. This casts global doubt on all radiometric dating.

[jennyp]

To me, CDK is a textbook example of an apologetical theory in crisis: It was created precisely in order to shore up the YEC interpretation of Genesis, and it requires an ever-increasing set of ad-hoc assumptions to keep it from flying apart at the seams. But I'm pinging Vade 'cuz he's researched CDK much more than I have, and Physicist 'cuz, well, he's a physicist.

[Stultis]

Wiens' assumption that we could tell by supernova half-lives is false, because the factors cancel. This casts global doubt on all radiometric dating.

Uh, when do the factors NOT cancel? IOW, what conceivable observations crucially confirm Setterfields theory (i.e. are consistent with it but NOT with conventional theory) and/or what possible observations would falsify Setterfields theory?

If there are not answers to these questions then Setterfield's theory is meaningless because it is unobservable. (Whether it's true or false makes literally no difference to anyone.) It's like Last Thursdayism, or the claim that God buried the fossils to make the earth seem old.

[WildTurkey]

If lightspeed has been decreasing by a factor of a million or trillion as suggested, it accounts for all the evidence.

Suggested where?

[ValenB4]

Octavian allowed Antony to put Cicero's name on their proscription list. Then he was executed.

[WildTurkey]

Setterfield

conviently determines that the speed of light has ceased to decrease in recent decades thus making his hypothesis unfalsifiable.

[WildTurkey]

According to Setterfield, in an expanding universe the density is decreasing. According to Setterfield decreasing density leads to an increase in the speed of light. According to Setterfield, the speed of light is slowing as the universe expands ...

[Thatcherite]

Exactly, it's circular reasoning in my opinion.

And your scientific credentials that entitle you to an opinion on this detailed technical matter are....?

[Thatcherite]

You've found one Christian who supports radiometric dating and who presents a one-sided view of it.

Many, many christians who are also scientists support maintstream radiometric dating theory. I can say this with confidence because a considerable majority of Christians worldwide accepts mainstream science and rejects YEC. The one in that article is one who has troubled to explain it.

He doesn't acknowledge that all fossils have been found to have more than expected Carbon-14 still in them, which should have been fully depleted.

Oh dear, you have been sold standard creationist website lie #8545. Do some more research. But not on poisoned wells like ICR and AiG which are designed to spin lies to the uninformed. Look up the real science on this issue. Its generally best to know something about a technical subject before you sound off about it.

[Thatcherite]

The Setterfield hypothesis of lightspeed decay is obtaining multiple independent verifications in peer-reviewed journals.

Citations please.

[DannyTN]

"Its generally best to know something about a technical subject before you sound off about it."

I understand that under older technology, background radiation which could be mistaken for C-14, made it impossible to determine the C-14 level below a certain threshold. That's what effectively limited C-14 dating methods to 50,000 years.

Using new technolgoties, (accelerator mass spectrometer) the actual molecules in a sample can be counted, not relying on the radiation for an inferred count. This extends the accuracy of C-14 dating to 90,000 years. However, using the new technique, the amount of C-14 in the fossils were orders of magnitude higher than expected.

Secular scientists examining the fossils say the C-14 appears to be intrinsic to the fossils and no source of contamination to explain the levels has been identified.

Carbon Dating Undercuts Evolution's long ages

There are some on Freerepublic thought that have suggested groundwater contamination. But if fossils are so easily contaminated, what does that say about all the other radiometric dating methods.

[PatrickHenry]

This is good. I don't have a "lightspeed was different then" link because the topic got beaten to death before I ever started the ol List. So I'm awaiting the debunking so I can add the resultant goodies to the List. Until then:
Talk.Origins has dealt with this "speed of light" issue.

[Thatcherite]

Carbon Dating Undercuts Evolution's long ages

That article, as usual (invariable for documents from the poisoned source that is ICR/AiG, are you not yet getting concerned by the repeated weakness of their science and arguments?) does not state the counter arguments against its position. How often do you see a creationist website article linking to refutations? (Hint: almost never, they have no confidence in the strength of their arguments against the strength of the refutations) And they call themselves scientists.

Anyway, here are some suggestions for the source of the absolutely minute amounts of C14 that contaminate some coals:

C14 is itself a decay product.

Groundwater contamination.

Sulfur Bacteria.

Sample contamination from atmospheric C14.

None of this invalidates standard carbon dating techniques at < ~70ky. It might conceivably make things at the older end of the measurable spectrum seem a little younger than they really are, but such contamination will never make things seem older than they are (which is what the YEC would like)

[DannyTN]

If we were talking about coal instead of fossils, maybe your post might have some relevance.

You can't expect Creationist sites to anticipate every completely unrelated argument that evolutionists are going to throw at them.

Why are you bringing up something completely unrelated? Oh, because talk origins doesn't have a response. And they won't list a creationist claim that they don't have a direct response to.

Talk Origins:Deception by Ommision

[Thatcherite]

If we were talking about coal instead of fossils, maybe your post might have some relevance. You can't expect Creationist sites to anticipate every completely unrelated argument that evolutionists are going to throw at them. Why are you bringing up something completely unrelated? Oh, because talk origins doesn't have a response. And they won't list a creationist claim that they don't have a direct response to.

Perhaps you should try reading the article that you posted to me! Here is the relevant paragraph. Do try to keep up.

In view of the profound significance of these AMS 14C measurements, the ICR Radioisotopes and the Age of the Earth (RATE) team has undertaken its own AMS 14C analyses of such fossil material.2 The first set of samples consisted of ten coals obtained from the U. S. Department of Energy Coal Sample Bank maintained at the Pennsylvania State University. The ten samples include three coals from the Eocene part of the geological record, three from the Cretaceous, and four from the Pennsylvanian. These samples were analyzed by one of the foremost AMS laboratories in the world. Figure 1 below shows in histogram form the results of these analyses.

[VadeRetro]

CDK has virtually faded out of sight in these discussions, as defending it has apparently grown onerous.

I tend to lump CDK problems in two areas. Most of the focus is on his data points and whether they show any real evidence for decay in historical times.

This Ichneumon post goes into that area.

Speaking of the speed of light, some creationists (Setterfield, et al) try to "prove" that the speed of light is decreasing over time by taking various measurements of the speed of light (including some from hundreds of years ago) and drawing a sloping line through them. They "forget" (*cough*) to draw the appropriate error bars around each measurement. When that is done, it's obvious that all the measurements, even some of the very old ones, are all consistent with a constant, unchanging "true" speed of light. Except for some very ancient measurements, they were *all* correct, KEEPING IN MIND THE SIZE OF ERROR INHERENT IN EACH TYPE OF MEASUREMENT:

The bare "x" measurements were made without any estimate of their error range (which most likely was huge, given the antiquity of the measurements). The interesting thing to note is that once measuring methods became sufficiently good, around 1875, all of the measurements (plus their error range, don't forget) correctly measure the true speed of light, but that over time (and especially since around 1900), the precision of the measurements rapidly increase (i.e. the error bars get smaller and smaller until they're practically invisible) to the point where the measurements converge very closely on the "right" answer and there is little if any disagreement (or error range) on any measurement done post-1950. In fact, today's measurements of the speed of light are accurate to beyond the fourth decimal place: 299,792.4358 km/sec.

The other area is Setterfield's claim that you can mess with the speed of light, increasing or decreasing it to some spectacular degree, and jack the other "constants" of nature around in a way that hides the change from any person or even most instruments (except maybe something designed to measure light speed) present in the world at the time of the change.

I played around with that ad nauseam in this thread, *Please* Use Extreme Caution In Messing With the Speed of Light -- Perils of CDK. It's a rather cumbersome read, but the essence is that transparency is elusive.

Jacking c (as you go back to Young Earth Creation Week) adds energy. Worse, Setterfield has allowed the same phenomenon (a lowered resistance constant for the vacuum) which raises c to raise the reaction rate of all nuclear reactions in the universe, so the Sun and Earth are cooking off like mad in their respective fusion and fission reactions.

Setterfield plays with lowering some other "constants" to hide the changes. He lowers the energy of each photon to offset the fact there are so many more of them because the Sun is cooking off so fast. He lowers Planck's "constant" to offset how raising c itself raises the energy of the photon. He lowers the mass of every nucleon so the energy of nuclear reactions will be lower and the photons will be redder so they don't cook Adam in the Garden of Eden. He raises gravity so the lower masses will still work for orbital mechanics. Yes, "ad hoc," thy name is CDK.

I don't think he ever got all the tangled stuff to work out. I especially don't see how the photons are not shifted so far infrared that Adam is blind. As explained on the thread, I tried asking Lambert Dolphin, who forwarded my question to Settefield. I got an answer from Helen Fryman, his technical editor, which bobbed and weaved and said there was no problem but didn't say why not.

And I still don't know why not.

[WestVirginiaRebel]

Actually, you can tell the age of the Earth by the layers of plastic surgery that Joan Rivers has had.

Seriously, has it ever occured to some Bible literalists that maybe God doesn't do things the way they want him to?

[Thatcherite]

You'd think that the declarations of Biblical inerrancy that ICR employees have to sign before they do any research or interpretation in ICR's name might give anyone who was truly interested in science or the data a moment's pause. Talk about presuming your conclusion.

[Thatcherite]

Talk Origins:Deception by Ommision

I've had time to read this now. I see you are widening your trawl through the web for arguments; hopefully you are near to giving up on ICR and AiG having been let down so many times by them, but sadly you have only discovered more poisoned water. I hadn't read Fernandez's screed before but luckily I found it to be a good laugh. It is particularly hilarious, containing as it does numerous examples of deception by omission in Fernandez's own arguments.

[DannyTN]

"You'd think that the declarations of Biblical inerrancy that ICR employees have to sign before they do any research or interpretation in ICR's name might give anyone who was truly interested in science or the data a moment's pause."

That doesn't stop a person from exploring science, that just stops them from jumping to wrong conclusions. At least ICR is up front. Many science organizations won't tell you, that you can't be a christian to work there. But you say anything supporting Intelligent Design and you are quickly shown the door.