Missing link fossil unveiled today. Is this as big a deal as the story makes it out to be?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2009/ ... ssing-link
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Missing link fossil unveiled today. Is this as big a deal as the story makes it out to be?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2009/ ... ssing-link
It's a lovely fossil, all right, and an important new picture of very early primates. Most paleontologist go their whole career without making such a discovery.
Not that it'll change the minds of any creationists, of course. They already have to ignore a mountain of evidence; this is just one more bit.
This is going to generate so many people saying "But...but...but..." at the Creation Museum, it's going to sound like Sturgis out there.
Because it's so remarkably complete and at an interesting point in our evolutionary family tree, it's going to be pretty informative to study. It's not going to revolutionize anything as near as I can tell, though. It looks as though it'll just back up certain preexisting theories. We'll have a very good idea about this particular species and about the period of time shortly after our branch of primates split off from lemurs, essentially.
Cool fossil and find but as other have said, it won't change many minds.
Now on the science side, this is a great find and a great museum piece and anything that drags more kids to science museum is usually great.
Tabloid science aside, there never was any such thing as a "missing link."
No, but really detailed continued evidance for the thinking man's side is a good thing no matter what, and WhatExit is right, anything that generates interest in a museum is a good thing too.
Yep. My fundie students just looked at the picture, read the article and said "So what?"Quote:
Originally posted by Baldwin
Expanding further on that, I've seen this fossil referred to specifically as "the missing link between primates and other mammals." That is absolutely, utterly false. This is a fossil of the primate line after the split between prosimian primates (lemurs, tarsiers) and simian primates (monkeys, apes, us).Quote:
Originally posted by Q.E.D.
It links nothing and is simply another spot in a gradual progression. Trying to view things as a chain with each species as a link is a good way to not get evolution whatsoever.
Over at the other place's thread on this story, someone mentions humans being the top branch of a still growing evolutionary tree. Does anyone know what evolutionary stages have occured during the period of human history, and specifically the last 100 years? Are there any signs that evolution has slowed down or began to speed up at all?
While there have doubtless been genetic shifts in human traits to varying degrees over the course of human history, It is not possible to pick them out with great accuracy over the relatively short term. Evolutionary change only becomes really apparent over the course of many, many tens or even hundreds of thousands of years. All of written history only encompasses some 5,000 to 6,000 years or so; far too little for any significant evolutionary change.
Fossil Ida: extraordinary find is 'missing link' in human evolution.
Wow! I wonder if they have thought to compare her to the "hobbits" yet? I think it might be an interesting comparasion.Quote:
guardian.co.uk:
The top-level international research team, who have studied her in secret for the past two years, believe she is the most complete and best preserved primate fossil ever uncovered. The skeleton is 95% complete and thanks to the unique location where she died, it is possible to see individual hairs covering her body and even the make-up of her final meal – a last vegetarian snack.
:smack Edit: Please merge the topics then, mods? :emb:
[modhat:32isolbh]Merged as requested[/modhat:32isolbh]
Well, we are taller than the Victorians were, and longer lived. Part of that is our mothers getting adequate nutrition while carrying us, and another part is due to many people getting proper nutrition while growing. I don't know if they can say one way or the other if babies are being born larger solely due to a better understanding of prenatal care, or if it is also evolutionary. (As in, we are bigger because our parents were bigger.)
"We presume that our readers are too ignorant to appreciate the significance of an exceptionally well-preserved early primate fossil; so rather than waste time attempting to educate you all, we're just going to make up some shit featuring the terms 'evolution' and 'missing link,' and then use it as an excuse to commemorate the 200th birthday of Charles Darwin."
In fairness, what are the odds that a genuinely earth-shattering discovery regarding human evolution would be made during Darwin's bicentenary year? I guess you have to run with what you've got. Happy birthday, Chuck. In your honor, science has formally announced that monkeys and lemurs are related, which you already knew back in the 19th Century.
I guess maybe I'm a bit cynical about this stuff. It seems to me to be yet another transitional fossil. It was actually discovered 20 years ago, but recently purchased by a museum for almost $1 million dollars. And, suprise!, they are hyping it beyond belief, trying to drum up interest in order to pay off their investment.
When it comes to evolution, I found thinking in generations rather than years to be more useful. 100 years? It's like, five generations tops. It's nothing. We can start talking about genetic changes within, say, 100 generations. Sometimes less, but only when really strong selective pressure is present. Overall, genetically we are basically the same creatures since first cuneiform was scribbled.Quote:
Originally posted by Q.E.D.
Not really. Totally different time (less than 100k years for Homo Florensiensis, about 47M for that fossil), different place, actually nothing in common. About as interesting as comparing to any other extant or recently extinct primate.Quote:
Originally posted by Zabigail
They compare to modern humans though. So why not see how much changed in that time, and where? Someone has to look at how gradual or swift the changes were, and that does mean comparing.
That's a whole 'nother thread in and of itself.Quote:
Originally posted by ivan astikov
First, the idea that Homo sapiens is the top branch of any evolutionary tree is completely anthropocentric and otherwise laughable. Every extant species is the top branch of the evolutionary tree, because every extant species is currently adapted to its ecological niche well enough to survive. If you want to talk about success of a species as a deciding factor, we still lose out. Bacteria are far more populous, both in numbers and mass, and even Zea mays (corn) has more individuals per generation. They've even got a whole other species working to propagate it.
Second, the others are correct in saying that evolution takes a much larger chunk of time to become apparent than anything encompassed in human history. Off the top of my head, the last noticeable adaptations for Homo sapiens include lower melanin content in skin cells to allow more Vitamin D manufacture (probably when Eurasia was colonized, some 40-50,000 years ago), blue eyes (about 15,000 year ago, only in northern Europe), and lactose tolerance (when cattle were domesticated, some 10,000 years ago).
Anything else? Um, the prevalence of O+ blood type may be beneficial in populations exposed to the Black Death. There was an article today that shows the trisomy of chromosome 21 (the cause of Down's Syndrome) may have very strong anti-angiogenic characteristics, possibly explaining why the prevalence of cancer among those with Down's Syndrome is only 10% of the rest of the population. All these factors are currently only part of the variation half of evolution. There hasn't been enough time to see if these variations provide any sort of successful adaptation. Who knows, maybe in 100,000 years, the human race will be more successful if we all have Down's Syndrome, blue eyes, and lactose intolerance.
Modern humans have been around for far less than one million years - probably around 150,000 years.
I didn't mean "top branch" to imply any kind of superiority, but as the latest part to 'grow on the tree'*. We humans are among the latest things to have evolved, aren't we?
* So really, I should have said "latest branch".
Probably "among the shortest living branches" is the best way to put it. By any measure it's fair to say that Homo is an extremely recent branch, though that doesn't imply superiority or "most evolved" or any of the like.Quote:
Originally posted by ivan astikov
Sadly, it was too good to be true.
Ida has been debunked.
See, the supposed links between this fossil and humans are purely neurolinguistic programming falsehoods, except for those parts aren't, which are obvious because God made them for a reason. And scientists have funny accents.
And the fact the newscasters used the term 'holy grail' to describe the fossil proves atheism is a religion.
To be honest, I started browsing elsewhere after the first couple of minutes and just listened to him in the background, so if he whips his dick out at the end, I apologize for not warning you.