Becoming Human

Long overlooked fresh water shells lying in a museum drawer for more than a century have yielded the earliest evidence of symbolic behavior, according to an article in Nature this week..

The article is entitled “Homo erectus at Trinil on Java used shells for tool production and engraving“, by Josephine C. A. Joordens et al. The abstract of the article states:

Lucy, the three million year old fossil skeleton, turns 40 today. On November 24, 1974 a young paleoanthropologist named Donald Johanson was returning to camp. He glanced over his shoulder and something caught his eye. A bit of bone protruding from the sloping ground.

Human residence at high altitude for prolonged periods is confirmed in a Podcast issued by the journal Science this week.

The finding of the oldest human genetic material is reported this week. A femoral shaft (thigh bone without ends to fit with hip and knee)was found in Siberia and dated to 45,000 years ago.

On the tenth anniversary of the announcement of a close human relative, Homo floresiensis, nicknamed The Hobbit, noted paleoanthropologist Chris Stringer revisits the find in an article in Nature this week.

Donald Johanson, discoverer of the famous fossil "Lucy" and narrator of the Documentary Becoming Human on this website,can now be followed on Twitter.

Neanderthals were capable of abstract expression, according  to a paper published this week by European archeologists in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (PNAS).

Recent recalculation of dates associated with bone and artifacts found at 40 Neanderthal sites has determined the last Neanderthals became extinct between 39,000 and 41,000 years ago.

The authors of a paper in Nature this week  conclude a modification of a haplotype found in the Denisovan genome apparently has given modern Tibetans (and their ancestors) an adaptation to high altitude, thus avoiding the hypoxia thinner air causes in individuals lacking this genetic combination.

In Science Magazine for July 18 there appears a review of a provocative new book. In Darwin Deleted author Peter Bowler argues our understanding of evolutionary processes would be greatly altered had Charles Darwin not introduced his thinking to the world in 1859 with the publication of On the Origin of Species.