Ethiopian hits the news stand!

[Daisy]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33110809/ns ... e-science/

This older skeleton reverses the common wisdom of human evolution, said anthropologist C. Owen Lovejoy of Kent State University.

Rather than humans evolving from an ancient chimplike creature, the new find provides evidence that chimps and humans evolved from some long-ago common ancestor — but each evolved and changed separately along the way.

“This is not that common ancestor, but it’s the closest we have ever been able to come,” said Tim White, director of the Human Evolution Research Center at the University of California, Berkeley

An interesting discovery although the bolded part is misinformed as that has always been the proposed relationship between chimps and humans.

[TrackDaddy]

Just curious...what does this sentence mean?

"This older skeleton reverses the common wisdom of human evolution"

[Daisy]

Just curious...what does this sentence mean?

"This older skeleton reverses the common wisdom of human evolution"

I have no idea.

Here is a link with an interesting video discussing this find.
http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/co ... 009/1001/1

I think it comes down to the fact that they are surprised by the feet and the last common ancestor is older than expected. Hardly a reversal. The scientists might well be trying to address the old misconceptions of evolution that have always existed. That we evolved from Monkeys.

[STL_Runner]

Just curious...what does this sentence mean?

"This older skeleton reverses the common wisdom of human evolution"

The very next sentence in the article states this:

"Rather than humans evolving from an ancient chimplike creature, the new find provides evidence that chimps and humans evolved from some long-ago common ancestor — but each evolved and changed separately along the way."

Here's another good read:

http://www.newsweek.com/id/216140

[TrackDaddy]

Yes, I saw that.

What struck me though were some of the terms used in the two sentences:

"Reverses common wisdom; rather than humans evolving from an ancient chimplike creature; and new find."

Really there's no getting around this quote:

This older skeleton reverses the common wisdom of human evolution, said anthropologist C. Owen Lovejoy of Kent State University.

An obvious acknowledgement that they no longer believe what they did prior to this find. Interesting.

I see that it theorizes that both humans and chimps evolved from the same common ancestor developing different characteristics along the way. Also very interesting.

[STL_Runner]

An obvious acknowledgement that they no longer believe what they did prior to this find. Interesting.

That's the great thing about science and scientists. Finding new evidence is exciting.

[Davidokun]

I anticipate that I'm writing in vain, but before you draw any premature conclusions, nota bene the absence of quotation marks around the statement attributed to Dr. Lovejoy. These words you have highlighted were probably written by a journalist interpreting the statements of a scientist. Caveat emptor.

[Pego]

I anticipate that I'm writing in vain, but before you draw any premature conclusions, nota bene the absence of quotation marks around the statement attributed to Dr. Lovejoy. These words you have highlighted were probably written by a journalist interpreting the statements of a scientist. Caveat emptor.

This is highly likely. Otherwise Dr.Lovejoy would be quite careless in his choice of words.

[Marlow]

These words you have highlighted were probably written by a journalist interpreting the statements of a scientist. Caveat emptor.

EX-zackly. No current evolutionary scientist would have said that. OF COURSE apes continued to evolve after the 'split'. The proto-ape was just that - not an ape as we understand them now. Track Daddy, you are severely misperceiving evolution if you think we literally descended from apes. But literal meanings seem to be your blind spot.

[TrackDaddy]

I anticipate that I'm writing in vain, but before you draw any premature conclusions, nota bene the absence of quotation marks around the statement attributed to Dr. Lovejoy. These words you have highlighted were probably written by a journalist interpreting the statements of a scientist. Caveat emptor.

This is highly likely. Otherwise Dr.Lovejoy would be quite careless in his choice of words.

Lets try these :-) :

This whole collection of data "gives us information we have never had before about human evolution," said paleoanthropologist C. Owen Lovejoy of Kent State University, one of the primary authors of the papers. "The whole savanna theory goes out the window in terms of it being the explanation for upright walking. . . . And the idea that we evolved from something like a chimpanzee also goes out the window."

The finds "are turning evolution on its head," Lovejoy said.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld ... ?track=rss

[TrackDaddy]

These words you have highlighted were probably written by a journalist interpreting the statements of a scientist. Caveat emptor.

EX-zackly. No current evolutionary scientist would have said that. OF COURSE apes continued to evolve after the 'split'. The proto-ape was just that - not an ape as we understand them now. Track Daddy, you are severely misperceiving evolution if you think we literally descended from apes. But literal meanings seem to be your blind spot.

Why would you be defensive? Why the attack on me? I've only asked questions about information from the article.

Let's keep this civil friend and appreciate the science for what it is.

[Marlow]

TD, it seems you are WILLFULLY misinterpreting what was published. Evolution, as scientific 'fact' is irreproachable. What still is up in the air are the details, and we are far from uncovering all those. NOT to get into any religious discussion, but wouldn't a firm believer in a Christian God, such as yourself, be able to see that God, in His infinite wisdom, has evolution as His 'intelligent design'? You say animals evolve, so obviously God is not averse to the idea.

[Daisy]

TD, it seems you are WILLFULLY misinterpreting what was published.

Marlow don't be too harsh on Trackdaddy. The comments by Lovejoy are strange indeed.

The finds "are turning evolution on its head," Lovejoy said.

I need to read his actual paper to get context but some of them seem to be plain wrong from a scientific perspective. Or he is trying to sensationalise his resarch. It would not be the first time a scientist had done that.

[Davidokun]

The final three paragraphs of the Mr. Maugh's article in the Los Angeles Times:

The most controversial aspects of the papers involve the authors' -- particularly Lovejoy's -- interpretations of what the fossils say about behavior. Of particular importance, he said, is that the sizes of males and females were about the same, and that the specimens do not have large, sharp canine teeth. Both findings suggest that the fierce, often violent competition among males for females in heat that characterizes gorillas and chimpanzees was absent in Ardipithecus.

That implies, Lovejoy concluded, that the males were beginning to enter into monogamous relationships with females and devoted a greater proportion of their time to caring for their young than did earlier ancestors.

"This is a restatement of Owen Lovejoy's ideas going back almost three decades, which I found unpersuasive then and still do," Pilbeam said. Hill was more blunt, calling Lovejoy's speculation "patent nonsense."

[TrackDaddy]

That, of course, has little to nothing to do with the crux of the archeologocal find or the substance of the article.

Behavior is a different issue altogether.

Nice try.

Why are we trying to discredit Dr. Lovejoy here? He seems to be a respected member of the scientific community.

And be nice, Marlow. :-)