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Find opens debate about whether man's earliest ancestors came from Asia and were diurnal or nocturnal CHICAGO--A skull and jawbones recently found in China is the oldest well-preserved primate fossil ever discovered ? as well as the best evidence of the presence of early primates in Asia. But the fossil raises the tantalizing possibility that remote human ancestors may have originated in Asia and stirs up debate about the nature of early primates. In the words of Robert D. Martin, Provost and Vice President of Academic Affairs at Chicago's Field Museum, "It was once thought that primates originated in North...

As elusive as the Cheshire Cat, the first people to arrive in the Americas have tended to appear and vanish with each new twist in the archaeological record. The latest disappearing act may be taking place on page 501, where new evidence, some claim, casts another shadow over a once-cherished idea: that Asian big-game hunters crossed the Bering Land Bridge to give rise to the Clovis people, who were considered the first Americans. New dates show that a crucial Siberian site, thought to be a way station along the Bering road, wasn't occupied until after the Clovis had begun killing...

EVERY mammal, including Man, is descended from a creature that was genetically similar to the modern aardvark, scientists have found. The last common ancestor of the placental mammals lived about 100 million years ago and had a genetic profile that is closer to that of the African anteater than to any other species that survives today, according to new research. Detailed analysis of the chromosomes of several representative species — including aardvarks, African and Asian elephants and human beings — has revealed that the aardvark has the greatest number of features in common with other mammals. That suggests that it...

Discover Feb, 1999 First Americans.(origins of man) Author/s: Karen Wright Not long ago we thought the first humans in the New World were mammoth hunters from Siberia who crossed the Bering Strait at the end of the Ice Age. Now, we are learning, none of that may be true not the who, not the where, not the how, and certainly not the when. You don't expect someone who has been dead for more than 9,000 years to have any odor left--let alone a strong one. But you don't expect him to have any hair or skin or clothes left, either,...

The acronym GIGO, (Garbage In, Garbage Out) reflects that most working around computer models knew the problem. Some suggest that in climate science, it actually stands for Gospel In, Gospel Out. This is an interesting observation, but underscores a serious conundrum. The Gospel Out results are the IPCC predictions, (projections), and they are consistently wrong. This is no surprise to me, because I have spoken out from the start about the inadequacy of the models. I watched modelers take over and dominate climate conferences as keynote presenters. It was modelers who dominated the Climatic Research Unit (CRU), and through them,...