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"Out of Africa" Theory Called Into Question By Originator
Amiga Trombone writes "Christopher Stringer is one of the world's foremost paleoanthropologists. He is a founder and most powerful advocate of the leading theory concerning our evolution: Recent African Origin or 'Out of Africa.' He now calls the theory into question: 'I'm thinking a lot about species concepts as applied to humans, about the "Out of Africa" model, and also looking back into Africa itself. I think the idea that modern humans originated in Africa is still a sound concept. Behaviorally and physically, we began our story there, but I've come around to thinking that it wasn't a simple origin. Twenty years ago, I would have argued that our species evolved in one place, maybe in East Africa or South Africa. There was a period of time in just one place where a small population of humans became modern, physically and behaviourally. Isolated and perhaps stressed by climate change, this drove a rapid and punctuational origin for our species. Now I don't think it was that simple, either within or outside of Africa.'"
I don't care what they say. It was a good movie.
From TFA:
But we're having to re-evaluate [the Out-of-Africa model] now because genetic data suggest that the modern humans who came out of Africa about 60,000 years ago probably interbred with Neanderthals, first of all, and then some of them later on interbred with another group of people called the Denisovans, over in south eastern Asia.
Nice to see some theory re-evaluation in practice. It is the only way to reach the truth.
The problem with pinpointing human origins is we keep digging where 1) human remains are close to the surface, making them easy to dig up, with yearly rains washing away more and more making it even easier, and 2) the conditions for fossilization are highly salient. We very well could have come from environs where fossilization processes are nearly impossible, leaving no trace of our ancestors.
We also like to dig where early humans leave behind stone tools. We don't dig where humans uses wood tools, because they fossilize way less often. It's hard to study what's not left behind! However, it's probable more humans used wood tools earlier and longer.
"Love heals scars love left." -- Henry Rollins
Reality is more complex than humans just appearing in one location in Africa? That doesn't really question ANYTHING about the theory, but instead just suggests a refinement. This is essentially a non-story that only acts as fuel for dumb creationists who don't read more than a headline.
Like every other part of science and history, no matter how simple the subject appears at first the more you dig into it the more complex it gets?
This Space Intentionally Left Blank
on humans and it showed them coming in on space ships.
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
For someone to publicly challenge their own theories takes considerable stature.
Pro tip:
Phrases like "the earth is trying defend itself" and "starving the earth of resources" put you in the crazies column.
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
This is one of the reasons I hated Biology as a subject. The best definition I ever got for 'species' was a set of organisms that could interbreed and produce fertile offspring. This guy reminds us "remember, that's not always the case". So, if that's not the definition of species, what is? Poke and prod any Zoology professor long enough and he'll finally say "that's just the way it is, so just memorize it". There's no logical process defined for assigning organisms a place in our taxonomy. The only answer is "They guy credited with finding these arbitrarily decided that it belonged in this phylum, genus, etc" (I forgot the orders because, like I said, it's all arbitrary anyway). There is no sure-fire way to decide whether 2 organisms belong to the same species (much less any more generic taxon) because the reproduce with fertile offspring test is not necessarily the answer. It then comes down to "Well, they look different and they act different enough that I now officially say so". Bah. Is anything that arbitrary truly a science?
A species is rarely singular, like a line or even like a river. It's more as if there was a continuum, like a flooded plain, and what we see is mainly determined by our own narrow views of organisms (or their remains) in spatial, temporal or cognitive terms. Simple things like the fact that wolves and coyotes are so close genetically that they should be called one species. Or many large cats. Or earlier subspecies of humans.
Paleontologists only see the world as if it was lit up by small flashbulbs every now and then. Yes we've seen a lot of snapshots but how much is that compared to billions of years of evolution all over the Earth?
thegodmovie.com - watch it
Pro tip:
Phrases like "the earth is trying defend itself" and "starving the earth of resources" put you in the crazies column.
But you'd still be qualified to be Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.
Huh?
I think your tinfoil hat is too tight, restricting blood flow to your brain.
thegodmovie.com - watch it
Everyone knows climate change has been going on since the big bang. Doesn't mean that it isn't influenced by humans and it certainly doesn't dispute the fact that it is of concern to modern society. If anything the fact that we have been victims of climate change for millenia reinforces the idea that we should do all we can to research its causes and possible ways to mitigate or adapt to it.
They believe all of humanity came from Adam and Eve, a couple of thousand years ago.
And that the Garden of Eden is somewhere north of Amarillo.
Right, that's Miss Eden's cathouse just off the interstate about 5 miles north of Armadillo.
Well mangling "theory" and "fact" in your first sentence shows that you're not too familiar with the scientific method. I should have stopped reading at that point.
thegodmovie.com - watch it
Why has the out of africa THEORY been presented as fact despite the growing evidence against it? Why have all other theories been so violently opposed?
Simple reason!
...
My mod points just expired. Can someone mod this guy and all children down (including my own post).
To mitigate the poster's obvious paranoia I would like to offer the following explanation as to why his post is misleading and inaccurate and should be modded down in the interests of keeping facts at the forefront of discussion and leaving knee-jerk dogmatism and prejudice to the thousands of other websites dedicated to them.
1. The writer of the above post clearly didn't read the article (yes I know he is not the only one) and seems to have missed the fact that the author, and all other respected paleontologists, clearly believe that we are in fact all one species. It is referred to in the article as 'modern human'. The entire post hinges on the misguided idea that someone in the world who has studied the subject and knows what he is talking about believes that 'foreigners' are a different species from 'us'. This is not the case. 'Us' of course in this case meaning caucasian Europeans.
2. The post is in essence a diatribe against a world wide government conspiracy trying to achieve in his words 'the genocide of the European species'. When I talk about conspiracies that involve multiple world governments I generally get modded down on the grounds that world governments are't organised enough and hate each other too much to perpetrate real conspiracies together. While i disagree with that in general with regard to small groups of nations I think this particular theory has far less evidence and is far more unlikely than any I have suggested.
3. The main justification of the points of view put forward is that the phrase 'Out of Africa' is somehow a lie. As the leading expert in the article states modern humans did in fact originate in Africa, it is not a lie, it is not even disputed by any serious paleontologists (to my knowledge). The new modifications to the theory proposed here suggest no reason to change the name of the theory. What the article says is that our species interbred with other types of prehistoric humans, far in the past, and that traces of their DNA exist in ours to prove it. The slashdot headline might be partly to blame for the confusion here.
4. At the time of posting he has +1, I know the quality of slashdot has declined as the number of users has increased but as someone with mod points you have a small amount of control over this. Take a little pride in the site and make sure someone who posts personal opinions as uninformed and lazily researched as this are far from those gentle impressionable readers who come here for reliable information. If this poster is not trolling he as at least far enough from reality that a troll moderation is called for, especially given that there is no downmod for lies or misinformation.
Hey... dumb ass creationist.... you better hold onto something....I think the THEORY of gravity might be wrong.
Humans love to categorize. Square and round things go together. Things with four legs vs things with six legs go together. Same basic principle.
Of course, in practice, there is a continuum, stretching from specimen to specimen, and also back in time. But sometimes it's convenient to draw lines to limit your area of study.
I love how that crap is modded insightful.
To date, the evidence is growing for the Out of Africa theory. TFA is about the argument on whether humans have spread from Africa once and everywhere, essentially "already evolved", or whether they have spread in several different waves separated by intervals of tens of thousands of years (and possibly even hundreds), and then those waves had some parallel evolution and separately interbred with some other branches of Homo, and later reintegrated through migration, each bringing its own unique set of genes to our common pool.
Scientifically, the entire humanity today is a single species, regardless of whether there were multiple waves, or just one. Also, all evidence we have to date shows that all modern humans owe most their genome to hominids originating from in Africa.
As a biologist, I'd say you've hit the nail on the head. There's probably no such thing as a species as a discrete entity, and the reason we have about 57 different species concepts is that they're all differing models for categorically explaining a continuous phenomenon that otherwise defies enumeration. But like other models, they're fantastically useful in some respects, and we keep them around for those purposes. When species concepts start to break down, we start talking about things like gene trees, or population dynamics, depending on the level of precision required. Even those things are models, but models that are useful for the level of question we're asking.
At its root, the only things that really 'exist' are probably genes, which struggle for existence in communities of other genes, trying to replicate themselves as much as possible because the ones who don't aren't around anymore. But working purely with genes, and nothing else, needlessly complicates a great many things.
I thought about it a little more. The traditional species concept is probably a holdover from a pre-scientific era, basically a biblical concept.
If God did it, it's a species. If man did it or if it was observable how it came to be then it's not a species. Hence wolf and coyote are different species, while dobermann and chihuahua aren't.
thegodmovie.com - watch it
I don't have a problem with anthropomorphism. The way I figure it, we're primates that exhibit behaviors, social and anti-social, seen in many other species.
Observing reflections of ourselves throughout nature seems appropriate and accurate.
Eartj will remain for a lot longer than the human race will... we are merelly destroying ourselves, not the planet we live in
The ecosystem will simply find another way to live one, and florish once we are gone
"life is a joke, and someone is laughing at me"
look at the data you have and formulate a theory. Collect more data. Modify your theory. SCIENCE!!
Forgot your meds this morning?
Obviously, they have never heard that "Out of Africa" was coined by Scipio Africanus. Fortunately for the author his estate cannot collect damages. (Or was it a Trademark?)
Tracy Johnson
Old fashioned text games hosted below:
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BT
Pro tip:
Phrases like "the earth is trying defend itself" and "starving the earth of resources" put you in the crazies column.
Well, I just call it dumbing it down. Yes we know the earth isnt literally defending itself like a cute little soldier. But the consequence of us taking more than we put in is our own death one way or another, and only an idiot won't accept that.
Evidence suggests that today's modern humans did in fact evolve from a relatively small group of people (I've seen estimates in the 5-20,000 range)
Oh, sure, put the minimum at five! That handily dismisses the claims of those radical creationists who pose only two at the beginning! You see the bias, here, Slashdot?! Do you!?!? ;)
Your brain is not a computer.
In ancient times, the Conquering King said to the Conquered King "Look, my troops are burning your city to the ground!" The Conquered King retorted "Look, your troops are burning YOUR city to the ground!"
I think the original had Croesus (Mr "As rich as ...") playing Conquered, but the story is probably older than that.
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
would mod you up if i could, but since i made so many typo's in my post i hope no one else does it :)
"life is a joke, and someone is laughing at me"