40 Million Year Old Primate Fossils Found In Asia

sosaited writes "It has been widely believed that our ancestors originated out of Africa, but a paper published in Nature by Carnegie Museum of Natural History scientists puts this in doubt. The paper is based on the fossils of four primate species found in Asia which are 40 million years old, during which period Africa was thought to not have these species. The diversity and timing of the new anthropoids raises two scenarios. Anthropoids might simply have emerged in Africa much earlier than thought, and gone undiscovered by modern paleontologists. Or they could have crossed over from Asia, where evidence suggests that anthropoids lived 55 million years ago, flourishing and diversifying in the wide-open ecological niches of an anthropoid-free Africa."

Comments

Re:Could they really cross continents?

[MichaelSmith]

Looking at this map it seems that they may have been in contact.

Not found in Asia

[Vingborg]

The fossils were NOT found i Asia, but in Libya, which was and is a part of Africa. The point of the paper is, that the variety of fossils indicate a much deeper evolutionary history than the African fossil record accounts for, and that Asia is the likely candidate for the earliest primates.

Libya != Africa?

[shiznatix]

"The discovery of four ancient, lemur-like creatures in what is now Libya suggests the human family tree’s taproot is in the Middle East, not Africa."

Correct me if I am wrong but Libya is in Africa. Nowhere in the article does it mention any Asian country. It says that these were found in Libya which is Africa but then goes on about these animals crossing over from Asia to Africa. So, where exactly were these fossils found?

Re:Libya != Africa?

[MichaelSmith]

The diversity and timing of the new anthropoids raises two scenarios. Anthropoids might simply have emerged in Africa much earlier than thought, and gone undiscovered by modern paleontologists. Or they could have crossed over from Asia, where evidence suggests that anthropoids lived 55 million years ago, flourishing and diversifying in the wide-open ecological niches of an anthropoid-free Africa.

So the only older evidence of these animals is in Asia, suggesting they came from there originally.

Re:Libya != Africa?

[nomad-9]

The point is that these primate fossils show that they might have colonized Africa from somewhere else. Why? Because of the sudden appearance of such diversity while there is no earlier fossil evidence.

The most likely place would be Asia. Why? Probably because of the earlier findings of old fossils there and that one of the Libyan anthropoids resembled one found in Asia.

Better Article Here

[Jagen]

There in a link in the comments section to a much better article that explains why even though these fossils are from Africa they are being linked to primate origins in Asia.
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/10/where-did-all-these-primates-come-from-fossil-teeth-may-hint-at-an-asian-origin-for-anthropoid-primates/

Re:we weren't the first

[MichaelSmith]

Oh okay but lets assume our civilisation lasts a million years. We are going to be scattering material through the solar system for a lot of that time.

Re:Could they really cross continents?

[nephridium]

http://jan.ucc.nau.edu/~rcb7/35moll.jpg (taken from http://jan.ucc.nau.edu/~rcb7/mollglobe.html ) is probably the more accurate map of the period. Interestingly there seems to be a lot of (shallow?) water separating Africa and Asia.

According to these maps the land-bridge only developed later, when the Arabian peninsula emerged and connected both continents.

Re:Paleogeology

[c6gunner]

Here's one way. We know it's happened with various other species - assuming these "monkeys" of yours weren't too big, this method would fork quite well for them.

Re:we weren't the first

[Wyatt Earp]

Except some American Indians did inhabit the LA Basin.

http://www.tongva.com/links.htm
http://www.habitatauthority.org/pdf/native_american_history.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indigenous_peoples_of_California