New Poll From Gallup on Human Origins

Gallup has released a new poll on what people think about human evolution.  Here is their takeaway blurb:

Forty percent of U.S. adults ascribe to a strictly creationist view of human origins, believing that God created them in their present form within roughly the past 10,000 years. However, more Americans continue to think that humans evolved over millions of years -- either with God's guidance (33%) or, increasingly, without God's involvement at all (22%).

Beyond this are details in the numbers.The poll was conducted from June 3-16 and contained a random sample of 1015 adults.  Some of this is not new and has changed little since the last poll.  There is a high correlation between those with a college education and those who accept human evolution.  The correlation is also high between those who have no religious affiliation and those who accept human evolution.

Other interesting tidbits from the attached PDF:

• Acceptance of God-guided human evolution does not seem to change with political party affiliation, gender or ethnic background
•  Acceptance of God-guided human evolution rises only slightly with age
• The idea that God created humans in their present form drops substantially from 55% (Republican) to 34% (independent and Democrat) as well as ideology (54% Republican, 29% democrat)

There are more observations buried in the data. Have a look.

Chris Stringer: Meet the Relatives

Chris Stringer has a post in the Financial Times titled Meet the Relatives.  It is sort of a whirlwind tour through the evolution of the genus Homo.    He writes:

The discoveries of Homo floresiensis, Homo luzonensis, Denisovans and Homo naledi in the past 15 years remind us that the fossil record of humans is still very patchy — stone tools are scattered across much of Africa as a witness to widespread human occupation, yet fossil evidence has been recovered from less than 10 per cent of that continent’s area.

The percentage coverage for Asia is hardly any better: there is, for example, currently only one significant human fossil from the whole of the Indian subcontinent. The discoveries of the past few years underline just how much evolutionary history remains unknown, with other extinct lineages no doubt still to be revealed.

Many of the new finds challenge how we classify fossils in relation to Homo sapiens today. I continue to call the Neanderthals a different species from us, based on their distinctive skeletons and skulls; others feel that the recent evidence of interbreeding and increasing evidence of sophisticated behaviour mean that we should merge them, and the Denisovans, into our species.

I think that the discovery of the Xuchang hominins indicates that there has been considerable population mixing for several hundred thousand years.  As I wrote at the time:

These two Chinese skulls stand at the crossroads of these population movements. While showing clear Neandertal characteristics, they also express modern traits, possibly reflecting mixing with the late, modern human arrivals represented by the recent modern human finds at Daoxian. Yet they also express a clear link to ancient East Asian populations. The implications of these skulls are stark: there has been widespread population mixing and regional continuity in Europe and Asia for at least 400 thousand years. Not only did the Neandertals feel enough cultural kinship to mate and have children with these East Asian people, the early modern humans coming out of Africa did, as well. As Chris Davis of China Daily News put it: “One big happy family.”

Whether this represents such behavior at the peripheries of different species or that of one polytypic species is, as yet, unclear.  It is very clear that our understanding of how these populations interacted is rudimentary, at best. 

Earliest Art Made By Humans?

Artnet News has a post on a discovery in Henan Province, China that purports to be the oldest indications of consciously-created art.  From Sarah Gascone:

Abstract patterns carved on bone fragments discovered in China could be the oldest art ever made, dating back to between 105,000 and 125,000 years ago.

The marks on two bones were found at a site in Henan Province thought to be populated by Denisovans, an extinct species or subspecies of ancient humans, according to a new study in the Cambridge University Press journal Antiquity. The markings on the weathered rib bones contain traces of ochre on one specimen, the earliest evidence of pigment’s use for decorative purposes.

The newly discovered artworks pre-date even the 73,000-year-old markings—thought by some to be abstract drawings—found last year on a rock excavated from a South African cave, and previously thought to be the earliest-known example of human artistic activity.

Here is an image of the markings:

Photo Credit: Francesco d’Errico and Luc Doyon.

There seems to be a persistent thought that people of this age simply could not make art of this kind. I think it more stems from the fact that this kind of representation rarely survives in the fossil record. We know that as far back as 300k, there was division of labor and that there was quite a bit of population mixing this far back.  There is also a record of Neandertal cave paintings at 65k.  It is nice to find this kind of artistic expression but it ought not to surprise us. 

DNA Proteins Revealing Information About Human Evolution

Since the advent of population genetics and modern techniques to examine DNA, research has focused on, first, Mitochondrial DNA and then nuclear DNA.  Now we have another weapon in our arsenal.  Matthew Warren of Nature News relates new research done on palaeoproteomics.  This is the study of proteins found in fossilized human ancestors.  How is this possible, you ask?

Some time in the past 160,000 years or so, the remains of an ancient human ended up in a cave high on the Tibetan Plateau in China. Perhaps the individual died there, or parts were taken there by its kin or an animal scavenger. In just a few years, the flesh disappeared and the bones started to deteriorate. Then millennia dripped by. Glaciers retreated and then returned and retreated again, and all that was left behind was a bit of jawbone with some teeth. The bone gradually became coated in a mineral crust, and the DNA from this ancient ancestor was lost to time and weather. But some signal from the past persisted.

Deep in the hominin’s teeth, proteins lingered, degraded but still identifiable. When scientists analysed them earlier this year, they detected collagen, a structural support protein found in bone and other tissues. And in its chemical signature was a single amino-acid variant that isn’t present in the collagen of modern humans or Neanderthals — instead, it flagged the jawbone as belonging to a member of the mysterious hominin group called Denisovans. The discovery of a Denisovan in China was a major landmark. It was the first individual found outside Denisova Cave in Siberia, where all other remains of its kind had previously been identified. And the site’s location on the Tibetan Plateau — more than 3,000 metres above sea level — suggested that Denisovans had been able to live in very cold, low-oxygen environments.

As the author notes, this kind of research has opened many other doors that, up until now, have been shut to researchers. The realization that proteins have much longer staying power than DNA could radically reshape our understanding of human evolution:

Previously, scientists had recovered proteins from 1.8-million-year-old animal teeth and a 3.8-million-year-old eggshell. Now, they hope that palaeoproteomics could be used to provide insights about other ancient hominin fossils that have lost all traces of DNA — from Homo erectus, which roamed parts of the world from about 1.9 million to 140,000 years ago, to Homo floresiensis, the diminutive ‘hobbit’ species that lived in Indonesia as recently as 60,000 years ago. By looking at variations in these proteins, scientists hope to answer long-standing questions about the evolution of ancient human groups, such as which lineages were direct ancestors of Homo sapiens.

Whether that level of resolution will ever be possible remains to be seen, especially given that the modus operandi of modern palaeontology is focused on clade relationships. It will be interesting to see.

Patterns in the Fossil Record

Science Daily has a post on research about patterns in the fossil record that comes out of the Santa Fe Institute.  They write:

Throughout life's history on earth, biological diversity has gone through ebbs and flows -- periods of rapid evolution and of dramatic extinctions. We know this, at least in part, through the fossil record of marine invertebrates left behind since the Cambrian period. Remarkably, extreme events of diversification and extinction happen more frequently than a typical, Gaussian, distribution would predict. Instead of the typical bell-shaped curve, the fossil record shows a fat-tailed distribution, with extreme, outlier, events occurring with higher-than-expected probability.

While scientists have long known about this unusual pattern in the fossil record, they have struggled to explain it. 

Now, at last, there is something of an answer.

“Within a lineage of closely related organisms, there should be a conserved evolutionary dynamic. Between different lineages, that dynamic can change,” says [Andy] Rominger. “That is, within clades, related organisms tend to find an effective adaptive strategy and never stray too far. But between these clade-specific fitness peaks are valleys of metaphorically uninhabited space. It turns out, just invoking that simple idea, with some very simple mathematics, described the patterns in the fossil record very well.”

Sometimes, it just pays to rethink something from a different angle. This may open up doors to understanding other patterns in the fossil record.

Neandertals Occupying Open-Air Site in Israel

There is evidence of Neandertal occupation at an open-air site in northern Israel called Ein Qashish.  From the researchers:

Whereas many open-air settlements are thought to be short-lived and chosen for specialized tasks, 'Ein Qashish appears to be the site of repeated occupations each of which hosted a range of general activities, indicating a stable and consistent settlement system. The authors suggest that within a complex settlement system, open-air sites may have been more important for prehistoric humans than previously thought.

The vast majority of Neandertal sites in France and the Levant are cave sites so this represents a sharp contrast in societal behavioral patterns.  The site appears to have been repeatedly occupied by Neandertals from around 70 to possibly 54 thousand years ago, representing potentially an 18 thousand year span, although the span is probably 70-60 kya.  Although the hominin remains at the site are fragmentary,  a designation of Neandertal was made based on the morphology of a third molar and a complete femur. 

This is more evidence that Neandertal society and life-styles were much more complex and advanced than most researchers have allowed.

Here is a link to the open-access PLoS ONE paper, Persistent Neanderthal occupation of the open-air site of ‘Ein Qashish, Israel.

The Ancient History of Neanderthals in Europe

The Max Planck Society has a post in PhysOrg, a highly-regarded science site, on the history of Neandertals (they have used the old spelling). 

Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, have retrieved nuclear genome sequences from the femur of a male Neanderthal discovered in 1937 in Hohlenstein-Stadel Cave, Germany, and from the maxillary bone of a Neanderthal girl found in 1993 in Scladina Cave, Belgium. Both Neanderthals lived around 120,000 years ago, and therefore predate most of the Neanderthals whose genomes have been sequenced to date.

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the research was how much evolution within Neandertals was revealed:

Intriguingly, unlike the nuclear genome, the mitochondrial genome of the Neanderthal from Hohlenstein-Stadel Cave in Germany is quite different from that of later Neanderthals—a previous report showed that more than 70 mutations distinguish it from the mitochondrial genomes of other Neanderthals. The researchers suggest that early European Neanderthals may have inherited DNA from a yet undescribed population.

As with what is going on in human fossil research in China, it seems as though there is a tangled web of relationships between human populations extending through both time and space.  Whatever complexity we envision for these groups, it is probably far more so.  As I wrote about the Chinese material:

The implications of these skulls are stark: there has been widespread population mixing and regional continuity in Europe and Asia for at least 400 thousand years. Not only did the Neandertals feel enough cultural kinship to mate and have children with these East Asian people, the early modern humans coming out of Africa did, as well.  As Chris Davis of China Daily News put it: “One big happy family.”

It is becoming increasingly clear that our simplistic notions of population replacement and regional continuity are probably wrong. Is evolution occurring in these human groups? It absolutely is. Just how these puzzle pieces relate to each other is the question.

Paul Braterman: Why Historical Sciences Are More Useful Than "Rule-Seeking" Sciences

Paul Braterman has a post that comes in response to what can only be called a Usenet forum on young earth creationism.  His post outlines the value of historical sciences.  Ken Ham has been highly critical of historical sciences with his patented “Were you there?” shtick. Braterman counters this nicely.  He writes:

What about reproducibility, prediction-making, and testing against observation, traditional hallmarks of good science?

All we need to be able to reproduce is our observations, not necessarily the event that caused them. We cannot duplicate the asteroid impact that killed the dinosaurs, but we can duplicate the observations from which we infer that it occurred. We cannot duplicate the formation of the Cretaceous limestones of Europe and North America, but we can repeatedly confirm that they contain similar microfossils, showing them to be of the same age. And when we speak of prediction-making in science, we are using the word “prediction” rather loosely, to include relevant information about the past. Thus when William Halley used Newton’s physics to work out the trajectory of the comet that bears his name, he “predicted” that the comet would have appeared previously around 1531 and 1607, in accord with recorded observation.

While some of the examples he gives could be solidified a bit, they are instructive on why historical sciences are very bit as useful and rigorous as observational science.  He also invites comments.

Ark Encounter Suffers Serious Rain Damage, Insurance Refuses to Pay

The Ark Encounter suffered serious rain damage...let that one sink in for a second...and the insurance company is refusing to pay out to cover it.  From the Christian Post:

The Young Earth creationism museum Ark Encounter in Kentucky filed a lawsuit against an insurance company for refusing to cover $1 million in repairs that were needed following damage caused by heavy rainfall.

Filed last week in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky, Northern Division at Covington, the suit is leveled against the Allied World Assurance Company.

According to the suit, Allied World refused to cover the $1 million cost in road repairs that had to be done in response to about two years of heavy rainfall that damaged the Ark Encounter property.

“Defendants continue to contend that Plaintiffs’ loss is not covered because the physical damage was caused by faulty design or workmanship, even though the Defendants have already conceded that the policy language provides coverage for damage resulting from faulty design or workmanship,” stated the lawsuit in part.

The story, unfortunately, does not include the insurance company's (Allied World) response to the charges, which are stated in the harshest words by Ark Encounter: 

“At all times relevant hereto, Defendants acted with oppression, fraud, and malice toward the Plaintiffs, entitling Plaintiffs to an award of punitive damages.”

While I sympathize with Ark Encounter in trying to recoup the losses from an insurance company, the idea that the Ark Encounter suffered rain damage...the jokes write themselves.

Bill Nye, the Non-Science Guy

Alex Berezow, of the American Council on Science and Health, writes that Bill Nye is a terrible spokesman for science.  He writes:

It was clear that something was amiss a few years ago when, amid Nye's renewed celebrity status, it came to light that he aired an episode of Eyes of Nye that perpetuated anti-GMO propaganda. Nye was subsequently criticized by the scientific and (especially) science writing communities. Not long thereafter, Nye had a change of heart.

Good! Better late than never. But was this "conversion" based on a new understanding of biotechnology or simply a calculated marketing move? Evidence points toward the latter. As late as 2015, Nye was still pushing anti-GMO nonsense. That year, he published a book called Undeniable, which promoted evolution over creationism. The book entirely lacked references (quite bizarre for a science book)...

Yes, it was bizarre. I read the book. It was awful, filled with vague arguments, invective and special pleading. Probably the low point for Nye, however, has to be a complete 180° turn around on sex and gender.  In the original show, he had a segment on people that were XY and people that were XX and he described them accurately as men and women and argued that you couldn't change that.  Now, with Bill Nye 2.0 we get “My Sex Junk” (warning: do not watch if you do not have a strong stomach).  Berezow continues:

Ultimately, it seems that Bill Nye just panders to whatever he thinks the audience wants to hear. He thought (incorrectly) that they wanted to hear why GMOs were bad, so he altered his message when he got pushback. He won't get pushback for exaggerating climate change, so it's likely he'll keep this up for a while.

I don't think Nye actually believes the climate hysteria. Because if he did, Nye would support whatever means necessary to stop it, like nuclear power. After all, he's a mechanical engineer. But lo and behold, Nye is opposed to nuclear power. Big surprise. Audiences don't like nuclear power.

Nye is disdainful and contemptuous of young-earth creationism, yet employs exactly the same shtick that they do: pontificate in areas of which they have knowledge.  Unfortunately, now, people will remember Nye for the new show and not the informative old one, where he seemed to know his limitations. 

William Reville: Science Should Not Antagonize Religion

William Reville, writing for the Irish Times, argues that the strategy that many of the outspoken atheists have of trying to promote science over religion is not working:

Associating science with secularism exposes science to collateral damage when secularism is resisted and Harrison summarises: “The thesis that science causes secularisation simply fails the empirical test and enlisting science as an instrument of secularisation turns out to be poor strategy.”

Why then do prominent scientists such as Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris (“Science must destroy religion”), and the late Stephen Hawking (“Science will win because it works”) still campaign to replace religion with science? Firstly, it seems to me that if these scientists knew their history they would realise that they are supporting a failed strategy. Secondly, the specific factors that motivate these scientists, and understandably so, such as fundamentalist terrorism and creationism, are also vigorously opposed by mainstream religion. Yet they campaign against all religion, the mainstream as well as the extreme fringes.

Dawkins has a history of using this strategy, to the point of arguing that bringing kids up in a religious home is tantamount to child abuse. That doesn't wear very well.It is a short read but worth it.  Readers of this blog know that I am a Christian but oppose young-earth creationism because I believe it to be scientifically groundless, theologically suspect and a millstone around some believers' necks who are struggling with the data. 

Bat-Winged Dinosaurs in the Jurassic

“From there to here, from here to there, funny things are everywhere.” —Dr. Seuss

A new discovery in China (natch) indicates that, during the Jurassic, there were flying dinosaurs that, effectively, used the same sort of propulsion system used by modern bats.  From Science Magazine:

A number of tiny, bat-winged dinosaurs flew the Jurassic skies, according to the strongest evidence yet for such creatures—a well-preserved fossil of a starling-size fluffball that may have looked a little like a flying squirrel. The find, recovered near a farming village in northeastern China, suggests dinosaurs were experimenting with several methods of flight during this period, but many were an evolutionary dead end.

“This fossil seals the deal—there really were bat-winged dinosaurs,” says Stephen Brusatte, a paleontologist at the University of Edinburgh who was not involved with the study.

Scientists were already confident that a number of dinosaurs could fly. There are birds, of course, which are technically dinosaurs and appeared during the Jurassic period, at least 150 million years ago. Other dinosaurs sported feathers on their hind- and forelimbs, effectively giving them four birdlike wings.

Evidently, most of these creatures were very small, some the size of a starling.  It seems that the idea of flight was much more common during this period than was originally thought.  Here is an artist's reconstruction.

The more we discover, the stranger it gets.

Large Denisovan Fossil Discovered

Nature News is reporting on a jaw fragment that has been discovered on the Tibetan Plateau that is close to 160,000 years old. From the story:

The research marks the first time an ancient human has been identified solely through the analysis of proteins. With no usable DNA, scientists examined proteins in the specimen’s teeth, raising hopes that more fossils could be identified even when DNA is not preserved...

Until now, everything scientists have learnt about Denisovans has come from a handful of teeth and bone fragments from Denisova Cave in Russia’s Altai Mountains. DNA from these remains revealed that the Denisovans were a sister group to Neanderthals, both descending from a population that split away from modern humans about 550,00–765,000 years ago. And at Denisova Cave, the two groups seem to have met and interbred: a bone fragment described last year belonged an ancient-human hybrid individual who had a Denisovan father and Neanderthal mother.

One of the most important aspects of the study is that it opens the door to answering questions of other fossils through protein analysis:

Previous research identified Neanderthal remains using both proteins and DNA — but the success of the latest study could lead to a greater emphasis on getting ancient proteins out of fossils that haven’t yielded DNA, says Chris Stringer, a palaeoanthropologist at the Natural History Museum in London. The method could prove particularly useful for older samples or those from southeast Asia and other warm climates, where DNA degrades quickest.

Let the Fireworks Begin

Pat Robertson didn't exactly call Ken Ham an idiot, but he came close. And Ken Ham didn't exactly call Pat Robertson un-Christian, but he came close.  Christian News is reporting on a story in which Pat Robertson called young earth creationism ‘nonsense,’ and ‘embarrassing.’  On recent 700 Club airing, Robertson said the following:

“Well, the truth is the dinosaurs were extinct maybe … about 50 billion years ago [ed: Robertson misspoke here], and this planet has been [around] much longer than that,” Robertson asserted. “And there was a course that they were trying to hustle around called creation science that was just nonsense, and it was so embarrassing, so we wanted to make sure we told the truth.”

“You know, this universe that we live in is about 14 billion years old and there’s no question about it,” Robertson claimed. “And we have tremendous geological records and all the rest of it. And that 6,000-year stuff just doesn’t compute. But we, as Christians, we need to know the truth.”

Ham was quick to respond:

“It’s not those of us who take God at His word who are ’embarrassing’ — it’s the other way around!” he wrote on Friday. “Those like Pat Robertson who adopt man’s pagan religion, which includes elements like evolutionary geology based on naturalism (atheism), and add that to God’s word are destructive to the church. This compromise undermines the authority of the infallible word.”

Ham said that buying into the world’s Godless teaching is “a major reason why there’s been (and continues to be) an exodus from the church of the younger generations.”

I think that there are quite a few reasons why young people are falling away from the church. I, personally, think that the biggest reason is theodicy, which is an incredibly thorny issue.  It is hard to explain to kids why their prayers often go unanswered.  I am not remotely convinced that it is because people are being educated by “Godless teaching.”

Robertson is correct that the evidence overwhelmingly supports a universe that is almost 14 billion years old.  It is is also quite true that the people who reject this position do so for religious reasons.

Is it nonsense?

One of the characteristics of the home school curriculum that my youngest daughter has is that she uses Bob Jones University science textbooks.  You have to read these things to believe them.  Her most recent subject was glacier formation.  The information about that was pretty straightforward but then it delved into the differences between the standard geological column view and the creationist (referred to in the book as creationary) view.

In the geological column, there is evidence of at least twenty major glaciations dating back hundreds of millions of years, culminating in the cryogenean period of the Pre-Cambrian.  The creationary view wants to compress all of these into a single glaciation between 700 and 1300 A.D.

That's

Nonsense.

While it is quite true that there was a “mini” ice age around 1100 A.D., it is categorically nothing like that recorded in the geological record.  The last big glaciation, the Younger Dryas, is recorded as having happened some 13 thousand years ago and its cause is still unknown.

Reading the young-earth arguments, one gets the impression that the author is struggling to fit the known evidence into a model that is just untenable.  It is like reading The Genesis Flood by Morris and Whitcomb, with all of the “must have,” “could have,” and “probably” phrases.The notion that this model must be right because “the Bible says so” permeates the text.  Unless students go to conservative Christian colleges which teach the same thing, they are going to encounter standard geologic and astronomic information in their courses.  Telling people that “the Bible says so” when their eyeballs tell them otherwise is not a good strategy for winning the souls and minds of the millenial generation. 

New Ark Encounter Film Out

Film Threat has a review of a new film out about the Ark Encounter, the Ken Ham-inspired theme park in Petersburg, Kentucky.  The film, by Clayton Brown and Monica Long Ross, is called We Believe in Dinosaurs.  Alan Ng gets right to it:

The film brings in two of its experts for a testimonial. First is geologist Dan Phelps, who (you guessed it) is not a creationist. His big beef is the lies and misstatements of facts presented by Ham and AiG, particularly those in his field of expertise and how this monstrosity of a museum does nothing but tarnish the reputation of the people of Kentucky.

Next, is a former creationist, David MacMillan. As a young Christian, MacMillan was a fervent apologist for creationism. He was a lifetime member of the original Creation Museum and a volunteer “ready to give an answer” about evolution. He wrote blog posts until he did some deep soul and fact searching and came around to finding faults in what he believed. Now, cast aside by the church, who once hailed him as an expert, MacMillan shares his new revelations about Ham and company on sites like the Huffington Post.

Ng does note that the creators of the film do not blast Christianity, per se, and do try to portray Ham in a fair light. That does not change the fact that his site spreads deception and misinformation on a regular basis. I have not see this film yet but plan to as soon as I can.

On the Heels of the Discovery of Homo luzonensis...

A new study from the journal Cell suggests that there were multiple migrations of individuals into Southeast Asia with the Denisovan genome.  Here is the summary from Cell.

Genome sequences are known for two archaic hominins—Neanderthals and Denisovans—which interbred with anatomically modern humans as they dispersed out of Africa. We identified high-confidence archaic haplotypes in 161 new genomes spanning 14 island groups in Island Southeast Asia and New Guinea and found large stretches of DNA that are inconsistent with a single introgressing Denisovan origin. Instead, modern Papuans carry hundreds of gene variants from two deeply divergent Denisovan lineages that separated over 350 thousand years ago. Spatial and temporal structure among these lineages suggest that introgression from one of these Denisovan groups predominantly took place east of the Wallace line and continued until near the end of the Pleistocene. A third Denisovan lineage occurs in modern East Asians. This regional mosaic suggests considerable complexity in archaic contact, with modern humans interbreeding with multiple Denisovan groups that were geographically isolated from each other over deep evolutionary time.

These data, in combination with the new Luzon material further suggest that the population interrelationships in Southeast Asia were complex, with considerable mixing between Denisovans, archaic Homo sapiens, eastward-migrating Neandertals and who knows how many other groups. We know from the material in China that the fossil material of even 100 thousand years back exhibits multiple origins.  As I noted about the Xuchang hominins at the time:

These two Chinese skulls stand at the crossroads of these population movements. While showing clear Neandertal characteristics, they also express modern traits, possibly reflecting mixing with the late, modern human arrivals represented by the recent modern human finds at Daoxian. Yet they also express a clear link to ancient East Asian populations. The implications of these skulls are stark: there has been widespread population mixing and regional continuity in Europe and Asia for at least 400 thousand years. Not only did the Neandertals feel enough cultural kinship to mate and have children with these East Asian people, the early modern humans coming out of Africa did, as well. As Chris Davis of China Daily News put it: “One big happy family.”

The presence of the hominins in Luzon, as well as the new research reported here suggests that this complexity comprised all of East Asia.

New Species of Hominin Found in Phillipines

From a story in UPI:

At the completion of excavations on the island of Luzon, scientists had unearthed several teeth, part of a thigh bone, and a few hand and foot bones. The fossils comprise the "the earliest direct evidence of a human presence in the Philippines," according to the latest study.

The fossilized bones, dated to between 67,000 and 50,000 years ago, feature a mix of anatomical characteristics, some that recall more primitive hominins and others similar to those of more modern human species.

Callao Cave is toward the northern tip of Luzon. The corresponding article from Nature seems to indicate that the fossil remains from this cave are “all over the map.”  The premolars indicate size and shape affinities to later Homo, while some of the characteristics are australopithecine (!).  This is also true of the hand elements. 

Although we have found human fossil remains in East Asia for some time (1896 on), there are large gaps in our knowledge, especially from the first appearance of Homo erectus to the advent of modern humans.  These fossils, while giving us more  information than we had, muddy the waters a bit.  Once upon a time, Grover Kranz (RIP) tried to convince me that australopithecines could be found in East Asia, but his evidence was based on a badly crushed occipital bone. 

It is clear from the presence of H. floresiensis and the current evidence that primitive traits were being retained in some groups but, as the authors point out, we need quite a bit more fossil material to make any definitive assessments. 

Neandertal Penny Whistle Discovered

Researchers working at the site of Vindija, in Croatia, have discovered what looks, to all appearances, like a penny whistle.  The find is located in layers that also contain Neandertal tools and fossil remains and is mostly complete.   Made of wood, the instrument has faint indentations between the holes that could be decorative, in nature.  Fred Smith, of Northern Illinois University states that this is the most advanced Neandertal object in existence and shows that these hominins were capable of complex, artistic expression.  More here from Nature. 

Genetic Data Suggests That Early Modern Humans Migrated From South to East Africa

Science Daily is running a story that supports the idea that modern humans migrated from South to East Africa before exiting the continent.  Up until recently, all of the evidence seemed to suggest that South Africa, while having evidence of modern humans at Klasies Rivers Mouth, Border Cave and other sites, did not contribute to the migration out of Africa.  That has changed.

The Huddersfield-Minho team of geneticists, led by Professor Martin Richards at Huddersfield and Dr Pedro Soares in Braga, along with the eminent Cambridge archaeologist Professor Sir Paul Mellars, have studied the maternally-inherited mitochondrial DNA from Africans in unprecedented detail, and have identified a clear signal of a small-scale migration from South Africa to East Africa that took place at just that time, around 65,000 years ago. The signal is only evident today in the mitochondrial DNA. In the rest of the genome, it seems to have been eroded away to nothing by recombination -- the reshuffling of chromosomal genes between parents every generation, which doesn't affect the mitochondrial DNA -- in the intervening millennia.

Before going further, it is worth noting that purveyors of the mtDNA evidence have been burned before by incorrectly using the programs to input the information. Originally, those results supported a hard-line Out-of-africa model of modern human origins (Stringer and Andrews 1988), a model we now know is incorrect. Onward.The paper is available through Scientific Reports, which is open-access.  What is missing from this hypothesis is good human fossil material from South Africa which is between 160 and 200 ky.  The most current remains we have are around 120k.  More work needs to be done on this.

More Information From Denisova

Nature News is reporting about some more evidence from Denisova, following up on the bombshell news last year that bones discovered there belonged to a person (who they named “Denny”) who's father was a Denisovan and mother a Neandertal. From the story:

In the years that followed the discovery of Denisovans, scientists used DNA sequencing to attribute a few molar teeth from the cave to the same group4. They have also found other remains that harboured Neanderthal DNA. The analysis of Denny fills in some important details about the two groups. “We knew that Denisovans and Neanderthals had been there. We just didn’t think they interacted this intimately,” says [Svante] Pääbo. “It was so amazing to find direct proof — to find these people in the act, almost, of mixing.”

Denny’s discovery has also convinced Pääbo and other scientists that the remains of similar individuals, with recent ancestry from two groups of hominin, will be found — perhaps also in Denisova Cave. Researchers who analysed Denny’s genome found signs that the chromosome set that was contributed by her father, although clearly Denisovan, harboured some Neanderthal ancestry, which hints at earlier encounters between the groups2. “We should be able to pick up these individuals,” says [Katerina] Douka.

The Denisova cave appears to have been occupied for several hundred thousand years, being originally settled by either Denisovans or Neandertals, no one is sure which. Subsequent to this, it is unclear how much interbreeding actually occurred. 

“It’s still a head scratcher,” adds Tom Higham, an archaeological scientist at the University of Oxford, UK, who works with Douka and Brown. “It’s either an incredible piece of luck, or interbreeding happens so frequently that we might expect to find these types of occurrence in the archaeological record.”

One thing becomes increasingly clear with each new discovery, however: the complete replacement model of modern human origins, as espoused by Stringer and Andrews, is dead.