Archaeology fossil teeth discovery in Germany could re-write human history

[Eveningforest]

I'm not listening to any sensationalizing of any mayor or whatnot. I find it fascinating that they found something where they didn't think they would, and that is way outside the current understood timeline for homo sapien evolution.

It is a big deal and the negative comments seen here stem from lack of education on the subject. Physical anthropology is not among the most popular college electives for some reason. It should be a requirement, imo.

[cubby]

It is a big deal and the negative comments seen here stem from lack of education on the subject. Physical anthropology is not among the most popular college electives for some reason. It should be a requirement, imo.

The number of classes that should be required in formatting an "educated" student are numerous. I definitely agree with you.

[Player Twelve]

In a way, they still can. That's basically my point, if one actually strives to reach such a conclusion, the 'out of Africa'-model is more helpful to that cause than not. There seems to be little logic in attempting to bend the facts something fierce, in order to reach a conclusion which could easily be made (with the proper 'incentives' of course) even based on the actual facts of the matter - even if perhaps not to quite as high a degree. Perhaps I just don't fully understand the reasoning ('proper' racism might just be more complex than one would initially imagine, I suppose), and the origins is too important...to me, it seems to be rather enough to argue that the rest of humanity is simply more advanced, than Africans. Or something along those lines.

Africans didn't evolve and are the original, those who left evolved beyond africans and are an improved version? That's what people could claim I guess.

[cubby]

I think this is a case of the news going nuts for headlines.

Ever since news was required to be profitable we've been driving down the slippery slope to hell.

(great 'toon btw)

[TheWorkingTitle]

This is incredible. Completely shatters the migration hypothesis out of Africa and its whole "cradle of life" nonsense. So now Germany is the cradle of life. Makes sense.

[Ripster42]

I'm not listening to any sensationalizing of any mayor or whatnot. I find it fascinating that they found something where they didn't think they would, and that is way outside the current understood timeline for homo sapien evolution.

I agree - and I'm also not saying one way or another, until more information is in. Just interesting so far.

It's not though, since there's no definitive evidence they were ancestors of homo sapiens. This is what I'm trying to convey. Apes in europe isn't outside of currently held theory.

[Deleted]

I'm going to go ahead and go with the SCIENTIST that was quoted in the article rather than some random forum poster who can't be bothered to produce evidence to back his claims. Hope that doesn't bother you too much.

From the article:



So, yeah - might indeed be a big deal.

And, again, it has absolutely nothing to do with the Homo Sapiens "Out of Africa" theory that the OP was trying to discredit. Just that there were apes in Europe with first hominid-like teeth.

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It is a big deal and the negative comments seen here stem from lack of education on the subject. Physical anthropology is not among the most popular college electives for some reason. It should be a requirement, imo.

Deconstruction the implicity of racial BS behind the OP's post is a negative comment?

[Ripster42]

EDIT: is the yes/no re "out of africa" theory a racial thing or an evolution thing or a nothing?

It's a study of genetic drift in populations. It's "theory" in the same way that plate tectonics is a theory.

Mutations in non-coding regions of DNA happen and aren't selectively selected for (Edit here: I realize 'selectively selected for' sounds stupid, but it's not. Being 'not selectively selected for' means there was no evolutionary selecting pressure which caused it to be the gene which was selected (since there are still 2 possible gene genotypes at each gene location for each parent, genes are still selected for no matter what) during reproduction for the next generation). Which means you can map migration patterns given a large enough database that includes mutations and where they're located (of currently living people). They also happen at a relatively regular rate, which means not only can you tell where things migrated out of and to, but have a relatively accurate way to pinpoint when those migrations happened.

The reliable part about the science is when separations occur and how many have occurred, so it works really well in conjunction with fossil evidence. This evidence doesn't dispute the theory in the slightest.

Given what we know about OP's post history, we know what he really meant was, "I'm not from africa, I swear," which is what's being refuted when we mention the out of africa theory.

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This is incredible. Completely shatters the migration hypothesis out of Africa and its whole "cradle of life" nonsense. So now Germany is the cradle of life. Makes sense.

No, it doesn't.

[cubby]

It's not though, since there's no definitive evidence they were ancestors of homo sapiens. This is what I'm trying to convey. Apes in europe isn't outside of currently held theory.

And with what evidence are you conveying this opinion? I'm seeing a scientist say the discovery is a mystery and I'm noting the upcoming articles that might be generated. But I'm not seeing anything on the other side of this discussion.

[derpkitteh]

if only we could see into the history of an object to know about it.

i love these discoveries though. always so interesting.

[Deleted]

And with what evidence are you conveying this opinion? I'm seeing a scientist say the discovery is a mystery and I'm noting the upcoming articles that might be generated. But I'm not seeing anything on the other side of this discussion.

The German finding is about some ape before the hominid ancestor. The "Out of Africa" theory is about the origins of the Homo Sapiens, we know that some other hominids had other origins.

[Ripster42]

And with what evidence are you conveying this opinion? I'm seeing a scientist say the discovery is a mystery and I'm noting the upcoming articles that might be generated. But I'm not seeing anything on the other side of this discussion.

He's saying that this specific type of tooth hadn't been found there before and it resembles one found in africa millions of years later. That's all that's being claimed by the scientist. Him saying it's a "mystery" is him sensationalizing it, and there's nothing in there where the scientists claims that it belongs to a human ancestor.

Edit: It should be noted, the out of africa bottleneck/migration was only 2mya. This fossil being 6myo literally means it can't disprove the out of africa theory.

[cubby]

It's a study of genetic drift in populations. It's "theory" in the same way that plate tectonics is a theory.

Mutations in non-coding regions of DNA happen and aren't selectively selected for. Which means you can map migration patterns given a large enough database that includes mutations and where they're located (of currently living people). They also happen at a relatively regular rate, which means not only can you tell where things migrated out of and to, but have a relatively accurate way to pinpoint when those migrations happened.

The reliable part about the science is when separations occur and how many have occurred, so it works really well in conjunction with fossil evidence. This evidence doesn't dispute the theory in the slightest.

Why doesn't it add to the theory, at least? Wouldn't this need to be studied and taken into account? I don't give a rats ass where I came from, I always assumed it was Africa. I'm just curious about how this changes our evolutionary story.

Given what we know about OP's post history, we know what he really meant was, "I'm not from africa, I swear," which is what's being refuted when we mention the out of africa theory.

I didn't realize that was an issue with him at all - I'm not familiar with him. Definitely not trying to bolster his . . . opinion? I guess? Just looking at the science.

[Tijuana]

A 9.7-million-year-old discovery has left a team of German scientists scratching their heads. The teeth seem to belong to a species only known to have appeared in Africa several million years later.
Natural History Museum of Mainz photo of one of the 9.7 million year old teeth (picture-alliance/dpa/Naturhistorischen Museum Mainz)

A team of German archaeologists discovered a puzzling set of teeth in the former riverbed of the Rhine, the Museum of Natural History in Mainz announced on Wednesday.

The teeth don't appear to belong to any species discovered in Europe or Asia. They most closely resemble those belonging to the early hominin skeletons of Lucy (Australopithecus afarensis) and Ardi (Ardipithecus ramidus), famously discovered in Ethiopia.

But these new teeth, found in the western German town of Eppelsheim near Mainz, are at least 4 million years older than the African skeletons, which has scientists so puzzled they held off publishing for a year.

A specialist team will be carrying out further tests on the teeth.

Read more: Unearthing the mysteries of the 'battle that created Germany'

'Great mystery'
Photo of the other old tooth (picture-alliance/dpa/Naturhistorischen Museum Mainz)

The teeth are similar to the famous skeletons of Lucy and Ardi, but predate them by several million years

"They are clearly ape-teeth," head of the team Herbert Lutz was quoted as saying by local online news outlet Merkurist (link in German) . "Their characteristics resemble African finds that are four to five million years younger than the fossils excavated in Eppelsheim. This is a tremendous stroke of luck, but also a great mystery."

In the press conference announcing the find, Mainz Mayor Michael Ebling claimed the find would force scientists to reconsider the history of early mankind.

"I don't want to over-dramatize it, but I would hypothesize that we shall have to start rewriting the history of mankind after today," Ebling was quoted as saying.

Regional archaeologist in the state of Rhineland-Palatinate Axel von Berg told news outlets that he was sure the the finds would receive a lot of attention. "This will amaze experts," he told a daily for the Rhine and Main river regions

The first paper on the find will be uploaded to Researchgate in a week's time. The teeth are still being examined in detail, but from the end of October they will be displayed at the Rhineland-Palatinate state exhibition "vorZEITEN" (link in German), after which they will go on display at the Museum of Natural History in Mainz, according to Die Welt (link in German).

The teeth were found by scientists sifting through gravel and sand in the bed of the Ur-Rhine, the former course of the river Rhine. The area has been a hotbed of fossil remains since 1820, when the first ape fossils were found. Since 2001, 25 new species have been discovered.

The teeth were found next to the remains of an extinct genus of horse, which helped them date the teeth.

http://www.dw.com/en/archaeology-fos...ory/a-41028029

Interesting find. Wonder what this means to us humans.

Pretty interesting. But I would note that if historians would put aside their pride, we would be re-writing human history all the time. We will never stop learning more that we didn't know before, but we will never stop forgetting history faster than we can re-learn it.

[Deleted]

Pretty interesting. But I would note that if historians would put aside their pride, we would be re-writing human history all the time. We will never stop learning more that we didn't know before, but we will never stop forgetting history faster than we can re-learn it.

Except this finding doesn't change human history in form. Because first, it's not related to Homo Sapiens, and second, it's million years before the Neolithic (starting of human history).

Science and history isn't about pride or feeling, it's about hard cold facts and provable data.

[cubby]

He's saying that this specific type of tooth hadn't been found there before and it resembles one found in africa millions of years later. That's all that's being claimed by the scientist. Him saying it's a "mystery" is him sensationalizing it, and there's nothing in there where the scientists claims that it belongs to a human ancestor.

Ok, I'm reading your stuff out of order, so apologies for the randomness. I see what you're saying and I get the sentimentalization possibility. Good point about nothing being clearly related to a human ancestor. But don't they need to analyse that first? To be clear/sure?

[Techno-Druid]

This is incredible. Completely shatters the migration hypothesis out of Africa and its whole "cradle of life" nonsense. So now Germany is the cradle of life. Makes sense.

I'm not sure if this is genuine or sarcasm.

Our origins in Africa are more than a hypothesis, it's traceable through mutations in our Mitochondrial DNA.


These fossil findings as well as those of Graecopithecus uncovered do not, I repeat do not give insight into the migration patterns of anatomically modern, Homo sapiens sapiens. The latter species may a distant, indirect ancestor, but that's irrelevant to the fact that modern humans originate from East Africa.

[Ripster42]

Why doesn't it add to the theory, at least? Wouldn't this need to be studied and taken into account? I don't give a rats ass where I came from, I always assumed it was Africa. I'm just curious about how this changes our evolutionary story.




I didn't realize that was an issue with him at all - I'm not familiar with him. Definitely not trying to bolster his . . . opinion? I guess? Just looking at the science.

The out of africa theory only really talks to where the modern human evolved. And everyone's ancestors, at one time, lived in africa. Before they lived there, they might have lived elsewhere. But before their ancestors lived there, they weren't what we call homo sapiens.

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Ok, I'm reading your stuff out of order, so apologies for the randomness. I see what you're saying and I get the sentimentalization possibility. Good point about nothing being clearly related to a human ancestor. But don't they need to analyse that first? To be clear/sure?

I mean, they are looking at it. But it's not some big "rewriting of history." It's just archaeology (or, if you prefer, accepted grave robbing).

[Tijuana]

Except this finding doesn't change human history in form. Because first, it's not related to Homo Sapiens, and second, it's million years before the Neolithic (starting of human history).

Science and history isn't about pride or feeling, it's about hard cold facts and provable data.

ROFL

Yeah, you left out the biggest ingredient: EGO. Historians are NOTORIOUS for not wanting to admit their prior conclusions are invalidated by new data. Give me a break...

[Deleted]

ROFL

Yeah, you left out the biggest ingredient: EGO. Historians are NOTORIOUS for not wanting to admit their prior conclusions are invalidated by new data. Give me a break...

It seems that you missed that part that Historians don't do Anthropology. So, why the hell are you even talking about History? No, really, why are you mixing up two heavely distinct sciences?