Hobbit = new species of human

[Thom_Edwards]

Isn't it strange how Homo sapiens is the last of the Homo genus, making it sound like the Homo genus isn't that successful, and yet only the sapiens rule the world today. Wonder what happened?

And maybe it's a strange question, but why aren't caucasians, Africans, Asians and Native Americans considered different species? There are significant differences - the skin color, bone structure, stature, etc. And because we can inter-breed doesn't matter - dogs can breed inter-species fine for example...

Or maybe I got this all completely mixed up.

I'm no expert on this subject, but I have read that at one point in the not too distant past that the different races were, in fact, considered to be different species. Many whites used the species differentiation to propogate their racist agendas, and public opinion ended up changing the scientific community.

I tend to agree with you, but I believe many people still might consider that way of thinking to be racist even though it really isn't. And if dividing us into different species would divide us socially, it is a good thing we're all in the same species.

 

[Lord Blackadder]

the fact that there are transitional fossils. things that look like hydrids between two Homo types.
The mtDNA analysis done on the neanderthal remains by Krings et al 1996, was not the best quality, there were many areas in their methods that do not stand up to modern standard of working with aDNA, the mtDNA they did recover was very fragmented and they created a nearly complete strand by overlapping the repeating fragments. in each instance they did this there were up to 9 base pair sustitutions between the various clones , so which strand is the true strand?
Secondly there has not been any reliable aDNA study done on the Eastern European Neanderthals , which are very intermediate looking between Neanderthals and moderns, their technology level was higher than that of the classic neanderthals , and there is evidence for a 5,000 overlap between the Neaderthal population and the moderns.

New work being done in Siberia is offering startling finds , tool technology complexes that dont jive with the european/middle east models

Another thing is why are there archaic Homo sapiens populations in China before they are in Europe? ( Dr S. Keates as yet unpublished )

the current theory holds that hominids arose from tree dwelling primates ,
why could this not have happened in Asia as well?

I am not a racist , but I find that there is too much evidence against each hypotheses to fully support either one. That is why this find of the 'Hobbit' skeloton is so interestingm the mtDNA work done on it could completely contradict the out of africa hypothesis if a new species, albeit unsuccessful one, arose on it own...

You bring up some good points, and there are some very intriguing results from the mtDNA work. It is true that during the "Age of Apes" a great many anthropoids of dizzying variety flourishes in SE Asia/India.

We may never know for sure, but so far the evidence strongly suggests that hominids evolved from apes in Africa - our earliest fossils are all found there, such as A. Ramidus and O. Tugenesis (though the latter is questionable). Now, the migration of populations can take place very rapidly - for example, under favorable conditions it is perfectly possible for early hominids to have spread from Africa as far as SE Asia in as few as 2-3 generations. This period of time is so short that the fossil record is essentially useless in detecting it.

Occam's razor favors the out of Africa hypothesis due to its simplicity over other more complex postulations. The jury is still out on how decisive mtDNA work can be; it is certainly a very useful tool but I think we need to develop better tecniques for obtaining samples that are less fragmentary (or just get lucky and find an extremely well preserved specimen in context with dateable carbon and diagnostic tools...). I'm in favor of the out of Africa hypothesis but the fair answer is that we don't have enough data to really do anything more than speculate at this time.

It is important to remember (and far too many scientists forget this I think) that there is a great deal of variation among individuals (Chris Rock, Yao Ming, Indira Ghandi, Yasser Arafat, Josef Stalin, Shaq, and even George W. Bush and Bill Clinton are all members of the same species). All too often scientists are eager to speciate a new find in order to make headlines. just because Janet Reno looks VERY different from Biggy Smalls deosn't mean they're different species. In many cases (though not all) a single specimen cannot provide enough info to announce a new species, yet it is done. This is irrisponsible.

I'm no expert on this subject, but I have read that at one point in the not too distant past that the different races were, in fact, considered to be different species. Many whites used the species differentiation to propogate their racist agendas, and public opinion ended up changing the scientific community..

I heartily recommend Steven Jay Gould's book The Mismeasure of Man for a nice discussion of the history behind this sort of classification. He discusses how certain agendas or popular ideas effected scientific thought, touching on topics like craniometrics, I.Q. tests and more. Right now I'm plowing through his magnum opus, the massive Structure of Evolutionary Theory. If you try to read it too fast, it does to your brain what too much fudge will do to your digestive system.

Congrats on the new career Sayhey, I think you'll find that archeology is a pleasant change from the 9-5 drudge routine the rest of the world follows.