Her name is Ardi and, while she may not have been much of a looker by modern standards, she had one remarkable skill. She walked upright. This find in Ethiopa pushed our evolutionary traces about a million years earlier than the famed Lucy found in 1974.
Lucy can be forgiven for being a bit peeved by the displacement by a younger woman or at least a younger Hominid. Ardi was 4 feet tall and walked upright a million years earlier.
Ardi (known more formally as Ardipithecus ramidus) reinforces the view that humans and chimpanzees evolved separately but from a common ancestor — a central concept of evolution of the human species.
Project co-director Tim White, a paleontologist at the University of California, Berkeley, had a “I Can’t Believe Its Not Human” human moment, stating “This is not an ordinary fossil. It’s not a chimp. It’s not a human. It shows us what we used to be.”
Ardi was found in Aramis, Ethiopia. This suggests that we are all a bit Ethiopian. I just cannot understand why I can’t finish a marathon worth a damn.
Of course, none of this is particularly credible given the fact that the Earth is only 10,000 years old, according to many of our political leaders (here and here). This makes Ardi a chimp with a talent, here. The picture on the right shows the accurate record for scientists to base further research.
However, I have to disagree with both the scientists and the creationists. This leading scientific study shows precisely how homer sapiens evolved:
For the full story, click here.
Re: knuckle draggers,
So…, they kind of do prove their own theory that they DIDN’T evolve;)
Seamus:
how are the “Pampered Peckers” doing?
See also http://richarddawkins.net/article,738,Carl-Sagans-Cosmos-for-Rednecks,Family-Guy (Carl Sagan’s History of the Universe, Edited for Rednecks)
On a some what serious note, it seems to me that every nuckle-dragging creationist I’ve run into is comepletely in favor of a purely Darwinian/ anti-Christian survival-of-the-fitest strategy when it comes to health care and the economy in general.
Xenu out.
Enjoy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NaEj3g5GOYA&feature=related
End communication.
billy
Your post included this line. “…Most of the differences between apes and monkeys are the result of major anthropomorphic trends, toward an even greater reliance on vision in place of smell, toward greater size, a more upright body posture….”
I’ve long been curious about our species’ declining use of smell as a keenly developed sense even though its been proven to trigger the most accurate memory response of any of the senses. You seem to know or you might have access to some good information on the subject. Can you offer any suggested sources for me to pursue my curiosity?
BTW, I’m in San Diego. It’s a beautiful day for the zoo.
All this talk about primitive man and non-human primates makes me want to take a jaunt down to the San Diego zoo.
I wish Doctor Grover Krantz were still alive to observe the discoveries that continue to take place, I have a feeling he already “knows” all about it..
The more strata we tap, the more primates we unearth. The term anthropiod simply means “man-like” and is a relfection of the observation that apes are in many ways more like “people” than they are “monkeys”. In at least one respect, they outdo our own species “Homo sapien sapien”, since aberrant individuals with small tails are apparently even rarer among apes than among humans. Most of the differences between apes and monkeys are the result of major anthropomorphic trends, toward an even greater reliance on vision in place of smell, toward greater size, a more upright body posture, toward having fewer offspring which take longer to mature and develop fully as well as living lives with more readily available “resources”. Go to your local zoo or bestiary, you will notice all of the apes see extrememly well and have less pronounced muzzles than do the “monkeys’, (not the sixties rock band), and yet they retain relatively powerful jaws. As a result, they have very human faces(even Bigfoot does), this is especially true of the three great ape genera.The tendency towards a more upright body posture among the apes, is primarily because they hang or swing under branches, which has resulted in the development of a pelvis, that supports sheets of muscles, which in turn support the weight of the organs in the lower part of the body cavity. Hence, all ape skeletons can be recognized by their supportive pelvises.
Buddha and AY,
Did either of you catch that article about two weeks ago? They found some bones in Europe that strongly suggest that humans migrated to Europe and then back to Africa at least once before becoming Homo Sappien.
Between this story and the Texas judge striking done that state’s gay marriage ban, there must be fundamentalists’ heads exploding all over the country.
Jill,
The universe is mostly gaps in matter. Heck even matter is mostly gaps in matter, the God of the Gaps still has plenty of room to stretch her legs…
Stel,
That comment gets a big god-inspired cheer from me!
Damn, that “missing fossil” gap proving creationism just keeps shrinking.
Ardi could do, 4 million years ago, what some in Congress can’t achieve even today. Walk upright.
I have it on good authority the Pope just called Ray Kirzweil.
It is really interesting news though.
I’m planning to call some of my fundie relatives today to see if they’ve caught fire yet. I’m predicting 75% will be ablaze with denial.
This is very exciting to the scientific world and I’m sure the religious camp is spun up and has ther eyes shut and thier hands over thier ears shouting ” ICAN’T HEAR YOU, I CAN’T HEAR YOU”. The facts will never convince the irrational.
I see this as progress indeed. Usually the creationists talk about the world being 6,000 years old and so it seems we’ve pushed them back to 10,000. At this rate we might reach agreement in some 10,000 or so years.
I had read that Ethiopia was the birth place of Human Kind. Makes a white man shiver. Oh, I said that. duh, I guess it was a blond moment.
This is very interesting.