Ethiopia unveils 3.3 million-year-old girl fossil

Wanderer · Post by **Wanderer** » 2006-09-20 02:16pm

"Hammers another nail into the Creationism coffin"

1 hour, 29 minutes ago

ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) - Ethiopian scientists unveiled on Wednesday a 3.3 million-year-old fossil of a girl, which they believe is the most complete skeleton ever found.

The fossil including an entire skull, torso, shoulder blade and various limbs was discovered at Dikaka, some 400 kms northeast of the capital Addis Ababa near the Awash river in the Rift Valley.

"The finding is the most complete hominid skeleton ever found in the world," Zeresenay Alemseged, head of the Paleoanthropological Research Team, told a news conference.

He said the fossil was older than the 3.2 million year old remains of "Lucy" discovered in 1974, and described by scientists as one of the world's greatest archaeological finds.

"The new bones belong to a three year old girl who lived 3.3 million years ago -- 150,000 years before Lucy," Zeresenay said.

"Evidence indicates that she probably died in a flood from the nearby Awash river," he added.

The fossil has been named "Selam," which means peace in Ethiopia's official Amharic language.

Zeresenay said she belonged to the Australopithecus afarnesis species, which includes Lucy, and is thought to be an ancestor to modern humans.

"We now have for the first time the hard evidence for a clear picture of what early child human ancestors looked like," he added.

Over the last 50 years, Ethiopia has been a hotbed for archaeological discoveries.

The discovery of Lucy -- an almost complete hominid skeleton -- was a landmark in the search for the origins of humanity.

While a hominid skull thought to be between 200,000-500,000 years old was found in January, in a discovery one scientist said could fill the gap in the search for the origins of the human race.

On the shores of what was formerly a lake in 1967, two Homo sapiens skulls dating back 195,000 years were unearthed. The find pushed back the known date of mankind, suggesting that modern man and his older precursor existed side by side.

That a pretty good skull after 3.3 million years.

Fuzzy · Post by **Fuzzy** » 2006-09-20 02:21pm

That's pretty impressive.

It's just too bad that no matter what science finds, people will ignore it.

Yoda · Post by **Yoda** » 2006-09-20 02:23pm

If she died in a flood, perhaps there are others in the surrounding area.

It will be interesting to see what the fundies have to say about this.

darthkommandant · Post by **darthkommandant** » 2006-09-20 02:28pm

In a fundie preacher voice: "Well she was one of the sinful ones who were wiped out in the flood. More proof in the infallibility of the bible."

At least thats what the I think the reaction will be if any at all since they might just ignore it altogether.

Post by **K. A. Pital** » 2006-09-20 03:16pm

Fundies: "Close Ears, Eyes. Worship God. If does not help, repeat the procedure".

Dooey Jo · Post by **Dooey Jo** » 2006-09-20 03:24pm

Yoda wrote:It will be interesting to see what the fundies have to say about this.

They will say that it's a chimp, just like they do with Lucy. To them, the fossil record is just a collection of extinct species which have no connections to each other.

Wanderer · Post by **Wanderer** » 2006-09-20 03:56pm

If possible they should compare DNA between this fossil, Lucy, the primate family, and humans to see what the differences and similarities are.

So lets hope they can extract DNA from it.

CaptJodan · Post by **CaptJodan** » 2006-09-20 03:58pm

Yoda wrote: It will be interesting to see what the fundies have to say about this.

No, it won't really be interesting in the slightest. Interesting would require something original and new. They don't have such an ability.

They'll say it isn't 3.3 million years old, and it isn't human. Nothing interesting about that.

King Kong · Post by **King Kong** » 2006-09-20 04:09pm

Another article hightlighting what this discovery means for anthropology:

MSNBC wrote:Baby fossil adds to debate over our origins
3.3 million-year-old juvenile skeleton came from same species as ‘Lucy’

NEW YORK - Scientists have discovered a remarkably complete skeleton of a 3-year-old female from the hominid species represented by “Lucy.”

The discovery should fuel a contentious debate about whether this species, which walked upright, also climbed and moved through trees easily like an ape.

The remains are 3.3 million years old, making them the oldest known skeleton of such a youthful human ancestor.

“It’s pretty unbelievable” to find such a complete fossil from that long ago, said scientist Fred Spoor. “It’s a once-in-a-lifetime find.”

Spoor, professor of evolutionary anatomy at University College London, describes the fossil in Thursday’s issue of the journal Nature with Zeresenay Alemseged of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, and other scientists.

The skeleton was discovered in 2000 in northeastern Ethiopia. Scientists have spent five painstaking years removing the bones from sandstone, and the job will take years more to complete.

Judging by how well it was preserved, the skeleton may have come from a body that was quickly buried by sediment in a flood, the researchers said.

The skeleton has been nicknamed “Selam,” which means means “peace” in several Ethiopian languages.

More like ape or human?
The creature was a member of Australopithecus afarensis, which lived in Africa between about 4 million and 3 million years ago. The most famous representative of the species is Lucy, discovered in Ethiopia in 1974, which lived about 100,000 years after the newfound specimen.

Most scientists believe A. afarensis stood upright and walked on two feet, but they argue about whether it had apelike agility in trees.

That climbing ability would require anatomical equipment like long arms, and A. afarensis had arms that dangled down to just above the knees. The question is whether such features indicate climbing ability or just evolutionary baggage.

So far, analysis of the new fossil hasn’t settled the argument but does seem to indicate some climbing ability, Spoor said.

While the lower body is very humanlike, he said, the upper body is apelike:

-The shoulder blades resemble those of a gorilla rather than a modern human.

-The neck seems short and thick like a great ape’s, rather than the more slender version humans have to keep the head stable while running.

-The organ of balance in the inner ear is more apelike than human.

-The fingers are very curved, which could indicate climbing ability, “but I’m cautious about that,” Spoor said. Curved fingers have been noted for afarensis before, but their significance is in dispute.

A big question is what the foot bones will show when their sandstone casing is removed, he said. Will there be a grasping big toe like the opposable thumb of a human hand? Such a chimplike feature would argue for climbing ability, he said.

Yet, to resolve the debate, scientists may have to find a way to inspect vanishingly small details of such old bones, to get clues to how those bones were used in life, he said.

Debate will continue
Bernard Wood of George Washington University, who didn’t participate in the discovery, said in an interview that the fossil provides strong evidence of climbing ability. But he also agreed that it won’t settle the debate among scientists, which he said “makes the Middle East look like a picnic.”

Overall, he wrote in a Nature commentary, the discovery provides “a veritable mine of information about a crucial stage in human evolutionary history.”

The fossil revealed just the second hyoid bone to be recovered from any human ancestor. This tiny bone, which attaches to the tongue muscles, is very chimplike in the new specimen, Spoor said.

While that doesn’t directly reveal anything about language, it does suggest that whatever sounds the creature made “would appeal more to a chimpanzee mother than a human mother,” Spoor said.

The fossil find includes the complete skull, including an impression of the brain and the lower jaw, all the vertebrae from the neck to just below the torso, all the ribs, both shoulder blades and both collarbones, the right elbow and part of a hand, both knees and much of both shin and thigh bones. One foot is almost complete, providing the first time scientists have found an A. afarensis foot with the bones still positioned as they were in life, Spoor said.

The work was funded by the National Geographic Society, the Institute of Human Origins at Arizona State University, the Leakey Foundation and the Planck institute.

Wyrm · Post by **Wyrm** » 2006-09-20 08:25pm

Why, it's... it's... A TRANSITIONAL FORM!!

FREDDY THE FUNDIE: "LIAH! It's an ape! AN APE!! BECAUSE THE JEEEEEBUZZZZ BOOK TELLS US ADAM AND EVE EXISTED!!!!! It was proven by YOUR OWN SAI-YANCE, TOO! PRAISE THE LAWRD, JEEEE--" *WHACKO!*

The problem has been dealt with.

Erik von Nein · Post by **Erik von Nein** » 2006-09-20 08:29pm

Okay, this is a touch off-topic, but is anyone else becoming tired of the whole "mock fundy" posts people make? I mean, yeah, they're dumb, they'll say stupid shit, but is the whole using Southern Baptist-esque accent like Wyrm's directly above me funny anymore? Isn't it just hideiously repetitive since every topic even remotely about fundies, evolution, or astronomy have at least five posts exactly like that?

Maraxus · Post by **Maraxus** » 2006-09-20 10:43pm

No. You're not the only one. It, just lke people posting extreme punishment for various offenses, gets repetitive, lame, and tiring after a while.

Superman · Post by **Superman** » 2006-09-20 10:46pm

Erik von Nein wrote:Okay, this is a touch off-topic, but is anyone else becoming tired of the whole "mock fundy" posts people make? I mean, yeah, they're dumb, they'll say stupid shit, but is the whole using Southern Baptist-esque accent like Wyrm's directly above me funny anymore? Isn't it just hideiously repetitive since every topic even remotely about fundies, evolution, or astronomy have at least five posts exactly like that?

No. It never gets old. Why?

RedImperator · Post by **RedImperator** » 2006-09-20 11:13pm

The only jokes that never gets old are "your mom" jokes. I think the Fake Fundie, while not as irritating as the Internet Sadist (before we oppressed it), has run his course.

defanatic · Post by **defanatic** » 2006-09-21 05:45am

Was anyone ever insulted by your mother jokes?

Fundies are wack.

wautd · Post by **wautd** » 2006-09-21 08:25am

Pretty awesome news

LordShaithis · Post by **LordShaithis** » 2006-09-21 09:13am

Wyrm wrote:Why, it's... it's... A TRANSITIONAL FORM!!

FREDDY THE FUNDIE: "LIAH! It's an ape! AN APE!! BECAUSE THE JEEEEEBUZZZZ BOOK TELLS US ADAM AND EVE EXISTED!!!!! It was proven by YOUR OWN SAI-YANCE, TOO! PRAISE THE LAWRD, JEEEE--" *WHACKO!*

The problem has been dealt with.

Yeah, this joke was spectacularly not funny. A better joke would note that this thread was started by Wanderer, and ask for a transcript of the three-million year old skeleton's anti-Bush speech. At least I think so.

Magnetic · Post by **Magnetic** » 2006-09-21 10:24am

Erik von Nein wrote:Okay, this is a touch off-topic, but is anyone else becoming tired of the whole "mock fundy" posts people make? I mean, yeah, they're dumb, they'll say stupid shit, but is the whole using Southern Baptist-esque accent like Wyrm's directly above me funny anymore? Isn't it just hideiously repetitive since every topic even remotely about fundies, evolution, or astronomy have at least five posts exactly like that?

I have to agree with your post. It is an old joke, and not funny at all. They MAY say something along the lines that this new find is just an extinct primate (which it really is). The speculation that it is a possible link in our ansestory is just that, a speculation. Christians who take that side of the debate aren't being stupid. And as for "Adam and Eve", even though I see them as characters in an analogy, their literal existance is an ingrained doctrine and probably won't change.

As for the OP and topic, it is an interesting fine.

Magnetic · Post by **Magnetic** » 2006-09-21 10:25am

Ghetto Edit: ...an interesting FIND.

Wanderer · Post by **Wanderer** » 2006-09-21 12:28pm

LordShaithis wrote:
Yeah, this joke was spectacularly not funny. A better joke would note that this thread was started by Wanderer, and ask for a transcript of the three-million year old skeleton's anti-Bush speech. At least I think so.

Actually put it here because this is another link in our ancestry and should lay to rest any lingering doubt about evolution as the skeleton is whole.

DPDarkPrimus · Post by **DPDarkPrimus** » 2006-09-21 05:44pm

RedImperator wrote:The only jokes that never gets old are "your mom" jokes. I think the Fake Fundie, while not as irritating as the Internet Sadist (before we oppressed it), has run his course.

That's just what your mom says.

Darth Servo · Post by **Darth Servo** » 2006-09-21 08:13pm

Creationist apologist: the skeleton isn't complete. It isn't perfect. Therefore its more evidence of the conspiracy of science. All your evidence is worthless and fradulent.

King Kong · Post by **King Kong** » 2006-09-21 08:43pm

Wanderer wrote:Actually put it here because this is another link in our ancestry and should lay to rest any lingering doubt about evolution as the skeleton is whole.

Actually, this skeleton is incomplete; I don't believe a complete homonid skeleton as ever been found. They are very fragile and very rare. As you might expect, this image shows the parts of the skeleton that were found in brown.

Source: Scientific American

The article goes into a little bit more technical detail on the fossil and what its morphology may tell anthropology about the behavior of Australopithecus afarensis, if anyone is interested.

I also thought this was cool:

Nature article wrote:I am especially intrigued by the detailed morphology of the hyoid bone in the throat of the fossil. Does the open space in the body of the hyoid mean that A. afarensis had air sacs in its neck? In the absence of large canines, these air sacs might have been a way in which males established a dominance hierarchy, and females judged the quality of a potential mate.

The Nature article goes into even more technical detail (naturally), but this was the only new item of interest that hadn't been mentioned in other articles.

As for the fundies, who gives a fuck what they think about this? Their beliefs are only relevant to discussions on science education or policy, not on actual research and discovery. Fuck 'em.

Wyrm · Post by **Wyrm** » 2006-09-22 01:07am

Okay, due to the flat response, Freddy the Fundy is now officially retired.

The problem with fossils is that Nature recycles, which is why we're not living on a bonepile. With dinosaurs, enough of the buggers got a chance to live that we have found some complete skeletons, but other important lines are still incomplete. Still, we can tell a lot about a creature with very few specimens. Go science.

Of course, fundies will never be satisfied.

/me preemptively shoots Freddy the Fundie in the head before he pipes up again. Execution style.

Too bad they're all not so easily handled.

Nature article wrote:I am especially intrigued by the detailed morphology of the hyoid bone in the throat of the fossil. Does the open space in the body of the hyoid mean that A. afarensis had air sacs in its neck? In the absence of large canines, these air sacs might have been a way in which males established a dominance hierarchy, and females judged the quality of a potential mate.

Like a Frigate bird? That's wild! I suppose now we know the origin of males puffing up their chests as a sign of dominance.

Magnetic · Post by **Magnetic** » 2006-09-22 09:57am

This is one problem I have with things like this picture. They have several pieces of the remains, but then speculate on various aspects of it, such as the length of the arms. It's okay to speculate, just as long as they don't state that this is the way it looked.