Science a GoGo's Home Page Forums General Discussion General Science Discussion Forum An Ape with Human Traits?

Or should that be a Pre-Human with Ape traits?

Discovered in cave near Johannesburg in 2008, the fossils of a species named "Australopithecus sediba". A 2 million-year-old ancestor of man had a mixture of ape and human-like features that allowed it to hike vast distances on two legs with as much ease as it could scurry up trees, according to research published yesterday.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2013/04/12/us-safrica-fossils-idUKBRE93B0XG20130412

Well, that really isn't the question. A. sediba seems to have been in the line of descent of modern humans. Of course he may have been in a a side branch, right now that period of time is rather murky. But it is generally felt that the Australopithecenes were not Apes. The Australopithecenes shared some characteristics with modern apes, but were not really apes.

Here is a longer report Phys.Org:Australopithecus sediba hominin...ewed, and moved.

Based on this report A. sediba may indeed be more in the line to Homo than has been previously thought. So it is possible that he should be moved to the genus Homo. But that gets to be a problem involving the definition of Homo.

The definition of Homo is rather vague. It basically means like us, but just how much like us a fossil has to be to qualify as Homo is rather hard to say. Traditionally the first species to be given the name Homo was Homo habilis (handy man). This was based on his apparent manufacture and use of stone tools. Of course that gets a bit fuzzy since it appears that at least some Australopthecines also made and used tools. One thing that gives credence to the making of stone tools by H. habilis is that they gathered good rocks for tool making and transported them to other places where they actually made the tools. This is a definite advance over any other animals use of tools.

For my thinking the first species that was positively Homo was H. ergaster*. Ergaster was fully bipedal, with no apelike traits to his gait. He manufactured and used stone tools of a more advanced sort than H. habilis. Back past that the edge is very murky, but we can assume that Homo came into being someplace between Lucy and ergaster, probably from some branch of the Australopithecenes. Based on the studies mentioned in this report A. sediba seems to be well placed to be in the line to us.

Bill Gill

*In the article H. ergaster is referred to as H. erectus. I follow the lead of Ian Tattersall, who considers H. erectus to be an asian development from some hominin that immigrated from Africa at some time around 1.5 to 1.8 million years ago. Tattersall believes that some of the same hominins stayed home and developed eventually into us.

BG

I believe you are right Bill, and I have also come round to
'Ian Tattersall's' idea that a number of hominids left Africa
1.8 Million years ago for Europe and Asia.
Leaving many more to follow much later.

There have been findings hominid findings in China that pre-date the out of Africa theory.

And this one- from the Qesem Cave in Israel (which is gradually being updated}.

http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-12-world-oldest-human-israel.html

My problem with that report of humans in Israel 400,000 years ago is that I'm not sure that those were modern human teeth. I of course am not qualified to say for sure, but there doesn't seem to be any evidence for moderns any where else at that date. We do know that there were moderns in Israel around 100,000 years ago, although they were apparently living pretty much the same lives as Neanderthals who also lived in the same area at around the same time. I am quite ready to believe that some of our pre-modern ancestors, such as possibly Heidelberg Man, could have been there.

Otherwise there are getting to be more reports of transitional forms from various sites in Africa between 250,000 and 100,000 years ago. And there are reports of sporadic modern behaviors between 100,000 and 50,000 years ago in various parts of Africa. I say sporadic because they have found evidence of modern behavior in strata that are below other strata where the evidence is that the occupants were not using anything in the way of modern behavior. They are still thinking about that.

Bill Gill

Orac.

Go figure.

now wouldn't that require human traits?

and intelligence is the most important human trait there is.

apes are supposed to be smart so can we really compare orac
with an ape?

even an ape wouldn't think that orac is smart , and when an
ape sees orac he must wonder why hes the one in the cage.

I'd be willing to bet they can be seen scratching their heads when orac is around.

LOL but when someone explained to him about the all powerful GOAT GOD then the ape would realize that he was indeed smarter than all humans because he doesn't need to get stressed about the existence or not of some imaginary being ... for the ape knew he existed because he existed and accepted that.


Only poor humans suffer the problem of wondering why they are here and invent a GOD to try and make sense of the world.

So APES are undeniably smarter than all humans yes including ORAC and that we can put down as a fact.

Thus ends the memo for today.

I must say I am disappointed I thought I was supposed to tremble and fear your posts guys ..... is that really the best you can do ... that's well limp wristed guys.

you do fear my post , and that is why you trash religion.

your lashing out in an attempt to
avoid a confrontation with logic.

you have no logic to use as a weapon , but you have loads of Bullshit, so you use the only real weapon that you have in your, arsenal.

Oh yeah I fear your post Paul ... I really fear them

Lets see I get to test my ability to invert arguments back on the poser and flog the hell out of your GOD for a bit of fun ... yeah I fear them alright.


Let me let you in on a small secret, see in my job Paul, I have lots of pimple smart arse graduates who think they know everything and really you can't tell them anything because they know it all they even have a paper document that says they do.

The usual way to teach them for want of a better word is to invert their argument back on themselves so they end up arguing against themselves they usually get the problem at that point.

You however are not quite in their league and I must confess it's not even really a challenge anymore to invert your posts back on you.

See let me show you the problem with you post above

Paul: you do fear my post .... Ok then I would run, get away etc

Paul: and that is why you trash religion .... hmmm ok


That Paul is called a "non sequitur" it is an illogical argument it's even funnier when you add in the next statement that I am confronted and have no logic to use.


I actually laughed a lot when I read your post it's almost classic "theatre of the absurd" which you will probably not be familiar with

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theatre_of_the_Absurd


So I don't even have to invert that post you managed to do it yourself.


Thank you for that I enjoy a good chuckle.

orac

you idiot , I have decided on my own to discontinue our dialog
mostly by request.

I cannot find the willpower to not call you names when I
reply to your post , so this will be our last communication.

you will continue to post your nonsense and rant
and rave about myself and about religion
because that, my idiot, is what I command you to do.

Wondered how long it would take.