Posted on 02/16/2005 11:01:16 AM PST by 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.
So you admit that Sternberg has no peer-reviewed work? BTW, you lack of humbleness is showing ...
Then perhaps you shouldn't have jumped in to the conversation and attacked the man and his work, seeing as you didn't have a clue as to what or who I was talking about.
Oh, I see why you are confused. He published the work of Meyers. That was NOT his work. He was the publisher of another's work. So you were in error when you said his work was peer-reviewed since it wasn't even his work to start with.
Seeing as y'all think it was Sternberg's work on ID that was rejected means that y'all are really out to lunch.
Actually, the whole creationist stick is that they may be YOUR relatives, but they're not ours...
(I'm new to this 'peer review' stuff because I've avoided crevo threads like the plague until recently.........with good reason).
See how much humbleness I have, Turkey?
Is that the Neanderthal's mother?
Humility is always respected.
Please tell me how the scientific method could possibly detect & measure God in a way that would distinguish his characteristics from merely unexplained natural phenomena?If you can't detect it you must deny its existence? That's not very scientific. Pluto didn't exist until it was discovered?
No, I said that if you can't detect it in principle. The point is that if something is by its nature impossible for us to detect, then it's not a scientific hypothesis. (I knew I should have bolded "in principle" in the post after all!)
You've got 7 PhD's, huh?
Oh, and tell me, when was dark matter detected?
I dunno much about dark matter. If the astrophysicists who put the hypothesis forth can't come up with a way that it could be detected (directly or indirectly), then it's more a non-scientific speculation than a hypothesis. Is your claim that God exists a scientific hypothesis or is it a non-scientific speculation? Hence my question: Please tell me how the scientific method could possibly detect & measure God in a way that would distinguish his characteristics from merely unexplained natural phenomena?
It isn't consistency I observe in this relatively recent exclusion of the Creator who gives us equality and inalienable rights, it's willful, unbending, bias.
Ah, back to the real agenda. You think that postmodernists are correct: There are no objective moral truths. But instead of living with this (false) assumption, as the postmodernists do, you want there to be a supernatural Authority Figure person who can "give us equality and inalienable rights", which can stand in for the equality & inalienable rights that you don't believe really exist.
Bad mistake. Because though it doesn't change the essence of anything I've said, you will pretend it does.
The question remains....if Meyer's work is peer reviewed, and makes a case for ID, how can you support your accusation that it is 'religious propaganda' and not authentic research?
Just to make sure we are talking about the same person:
Stephen C. Meyers:
B.S., Christian Ministries from Tennessee Temple University in 1980.Now about those three reviewers that are "un-named ...M.A., Counseling from Liberty University School of Lifelong Learning in 1994.
Th.D., from Trinity Evangelical Seminary of Florida in 1997. Dissertation entitled, The Date of the Exodus in Ancient Writings.
It changes the very essence of your argument that a "scientist" with two PHD's in evolutionary biology was rejected after having performed peer-reviewed work.
Who were his reviewers. Since you say "peer reviewed" I assume then that they would be other non-science creationists.
Stephen C. Meyer, Senior Fellow - Discovery Institute
Articles by Stephen C. Meyer
Stephen C. Meyer is director and Senior Fellow of the Center for Science and Culture at the Discovery Institute, in Seattle.
Meyer earned his Ph.D. in the History and Philosophy of Science from Cambridge University for a dissertation on the history of origin of life biology and the methodology of the historical sciences. Previously he worked as a geophysicist with the Atlantic Richfield Company after earning his undergraduate degrees in Physics and Geology.
I have a problem with certain "Christians" that believe that they have exclusive knowledge of "God's Word".
I guess that you also have problems with the members of certain fundamental Judeo-Christian sects who relentlessly and dishonestly conflate support of mainstream scientific views with secularism, willfully ignoring the fact that numerous Judeo-Christian believers are also scientists (and non-scientists) who support the mainstream scientific view.
The burden of proof is on you, jenny. Prove, one objective moral truth.
OK, I'll develop a "proof" for you after dinner. Note: I'm saying that objective truth is a fact of the world, so the "fact vs. value dichotomy" doesn't apply. All I'm saying is that the best moral system for humans to live under is something that we should all be able to agree on by referring to objective facts of history, etc.
Postmodernists & creationists say that morality is just a social construction (accepted tradition of a particular group, subjective whim, etc.) that's not tied to anything inherently valuable about being a human being. Therefore the world could never converge on a common set of moral codes. It'll always be Hobbes' war of all against all. (The only way the world could converge on one set of accepted truths is by the sheer force & ruthlessness of the victorious interest group.)
Your argument is against the facts, not me.
(btw, there's no 's' at the end of Dr. Meyer's name. I think it makes a different, no?)
There is NO difference in the essence of my argument.......but as I predicted, you would pretend it did.
Until later, Turkey........
What???? Where in the world did you get this idea???
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