Anatomically Modern Humans

In the Article “Redrawing Humanity’s Family Tree” by John Noble Wilford, describes how two different skulls challenge the theories of human origins and migrations. The Central African skull, that dates back to nearly 7 million years ago, was assigned to a whole new genus and species because of its apelike and evolved hominid species. The 1.75-million-year-old Georgian skull shows evidence that the first hominids may have been intercontinental travelers who set motion the migrations that occupied the whole planet. Finally a third skull was found that is the same age and shares a resemblance but, the size of the skull suggests that the brain was smaller than expected for H. erectus.

Homo floresiensis (“Man of Flores”) is the name for a possible new species in the genus Homo, remarkable for its small body, small brain, and survival until relatively recent times (www.en.wikipedia.org). Anthropologists Peter Brown of University of New England in South Wales, Australia, Michael Morwood and their colleagues have argued that a variety of features, both primitive and derived, identified LB1 (the first skeleton found in cave of Liang Bua) is that of a new species of hominin, Homo floresiensis. The first specimens were discovered by Thomas Sutikna and colleagues from the Indonesian Research Centre for Archaeology in Liang Bua cave of Flores, Indonesia in September of 2003

The lines between variations and what the different races mean is socially constructed. The fact that we consider races to be "social groups" is constructed. There are groups of people out there with blue eyes and brown eyes, but we don't consider them to be social groups, nor do we just a person's culture or make assumptions about a person based on eye color. We don't have to make race an important feature, but it seems like many people

Firstly, the idea of race is based off of the physical differences in humans, not differences in genetics. In fact, if you look into the research that has been done, humans of different races share at least 99.9% of the same genes. In the other 0.1% of differences, only 10% are actually impacted by different races. So in reality, only 0.01% of genes are changed depending on one’s race. That is, people who look very different from you have very few biological differences. People that look like you have the same amount of differences as people that don't. Even when you compare our species to other

Race is not a biological reality because there are no indications of some biological DNA that would have a certain outcomes of a race. The variation in skin tone comes from the mix of certain races. For example, the mix of black and white would result a skin color of Latino. However, the mix of white and yellow (Asians) will most likely result a child having more essential characteristics of white people. It is impossible to classify humans into races because human is making a new race every single moment from the combination of two people who come from different races. Light skin and dark skin have a lot to deal with the temperature, latitude and langtitude of the region. It could be characterized by a regions, instead of ethnic groups. Race

The Multiregional Continuity Model states that after Homo erectus left Africa and spread into other parts of the Old World, regional populations gradually evolved into modern humans. In contrast, the Out of Africa Model states that modern humans evolved fairly recently in Africa, migrated into Eurasia and replaced all

The discovery of the remains of an apparently miniature hominin species (catalogued as Lb1) on the island of Flores has sparked debate throughout the archaeological community. This species of hominin is unique in a number of aspects and appears contradictory to trends in archaeological evidence and theories about the development of modern humans in that area of the world.

Humans have been separated into biological races. Although all humans belong to the same species, there are minor genetic differences around the world that generate distinct physical appearances, such as variations in skin color. There was a time when religion, social status, and language were more important than physical appearances. The term race, with ambiguous meaning, has transformed over time. It is not solely based on genetics and how people look on the outside. It is simply a categorization created by the people of American society. Race is more of a contemporary idea that developed out of certain historical circumstances. The historical meaning of race is an immutable and distinct species,

On the island of Flores, Indonesia, a skull was extracted from a cave in 2003. This cave was known as Liang Bua and the specimen became known as Liang Bua 1 (LB1). When researchers first discovered this skull, they thought it belonged to a young child about three or four years old because it was so small (Baab 2012). As days went on, more of the cranium and mandible became exposed and they determined this skull did not belong to a small child. Eventually, arm bones along with leg, feet, and wrist bones were discovered for LB1. LB1 was very short, approximately 3’6”, which was similar to the other specimens found on this island (Baab 2012). LB1 is the specimen for the species Homo floresiensis, also known as the “Hobbit” (Baab and McNulty 2009, Dennell and Roebroeks 2005, Van Heteren 2013). Due to lack of evidence, the evolution of Homo floresiensis remains very controversial. At the very beginning, it was thought that the morphology of LB1 was due to island evolution (Aiello 2010). The isolation from being on an island was considered to be the reasoning for the short stature and dwarf-like characteristics and that this species was a descendent of a large-bodied hominin (Baab and McNulty 2009). The morphology of the cranium and mandible has presented many different interpretations of the evolution of H. floresiensis. As of now, there are two competing hypotheses to possibly explain this evolution. Initial evidence shows that Homo floresiensis was a diseased

A longstanding view of human evolution holds that the first hominids to leave Africa did so with the help of bigger brains, longer legs and fancier tools than those of their predecessors. That scenario suffered a major blow a couple of years ago, however, when paleontologists working in Dmanisi, Georgia unearthed the oldest human remains yet found outside of Africa---two 1.7-million-year-old skulls belonging to early members of our genus, Homo--and discovered primitive tools alongside them. Now a new finding may topple another pillar of the theory. According to a report in the current issue of the journal Science,researchers working at the same site have recovered a third skull--one that housed a surprisingly small brain.

The Homo floresiensis was discovered on the Island of Flores, Indonesia. According to the Australian Museum the human remains can range from being 100 000 to 60 000 years old. They also stated that the Homo floresiensis’s tools, which can date back from anywhere to 190 000 to 50 000 years ago, indicating that they lived alongside the Neanderthals, Denisovans and the Homo Sapiens. In addition it suggests that they lived at Liang Bua, a cave where the remans were found, during this time period. The Homo floresiensis was nicknamed “the hobbit” as they only stood around 3.5 feet and also had a tiny brain. The Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History proposed that these traits may have occurred due to the long-term isolation on a small island

Understanding human evolutions is important for identifying the stages of humanity and for understanding how our societies have developed. When most of us think about human

There are many traits and behaviors which can be used to define as early humans, such as big brains, language, and distinctive cultural or behavioral traits such as tool technology. One of the most fundamental human characteristic which distinguish early hominins from other apes is bipedalism. (Kottak) Walking upright on two legs is the trait that defines the hominin lineage. It took paleoanthropologists a long time to realize that bipedalism is the key difference between human and ape. They tended to believe large brains made hominins unique and it was a reasonable conclusion at that time because the only available hominin fossils were Neanderthals and Homo Erectus. However, with more and more earlier hominin fossils being found, paleoanthropologists

I agree that there are possibilities that different hominids evolved in different parts of the world before the migration of modern humans. DNA itself is a heavily accurate piece of evidence that could support this idea by examining the gene mutations from the different archaeological sites around the world thus comparing them to the gene mutations of Homo sapiens to find similarities or differences around the time of the migration. I agree that the weather may have been a major influence on the migration of humans because hunting and gathering was still the major way of finding food the changing seasons could’ve pushed humans to warmer areas when cold and vice versa.

The hominid also referred to as the upright man was discovered in various parts of the globe including Lake Turkana in Kenya, Spain, and Java in Indonesia among other places. They are estimated to have lived over 1.6 million years ago (Coolidge & Wynn, 2011).