Oldest member of human family found

[Talius Brute]

New-found skull could sink our current ideas about human evolution.

After a decade of digging through the sand dunes of northern Chad, Michel Brunet found a skull 6-7 million years old. He named it Toumaï.
Toumaï is thought to be the oldest fossil from a member of the human family. It's a dispatch from the time when humans and chimpanzee were going their separate evolutionary ways. A thrilling, but confusing dispatch
Sahelanthropus tchadensis - Toumaï's scientific name - was probably one of many similar species living in Africa at that time. "There must have been a group of apes knocking around between 5 and 8 million years ago for which there's a very poor fossil record," says anthropologist Bernard Wood of George Washington University in Washington DC.
Toumaï is the tip of that iceberg - one that could sink our current ideas about human evolution. "Anybody who thinks this isn't going to get more complex isn't learning from history," says Wood.
"When I went to medical school in 1963, human evolution looked like a ladder," he says. The ladder stepped from monkey to man through a progression of intermediates, each slightly less ape-like than the last.
Now human evolution looks like a bush. We have a menagerie of fossil hominids - the group containing everything thought more closely related to humans than chimps. How they are related to each other and which, if any of them, are human forebears is still debated.
Most members of the group are less than three million years old. After Toumaï, the next-oldest hominid is the 6-million-year old Orrorin tugenensis. But Orrorin is known only from a few teeth and bone scraps, and its evolutionary allegiances are controversial.
Our knowledge of Toumaï's period is "at the 1963 stage", says Wood.

"When I first saw the skull I thought: 'Gee, it's a chimp'," says anthropologist Daniel Lieberman of Harvard University. Toumaï's brain, for example, was roughly chimp-sized. A closer look "blew my socks off", he recalls.
Sahelanthropus has many traits that shout 'hominid'. These include smaller canines, and thicker tooth enamel than apes. And the point at the back of skull where neck muscles attach suggests that Toumaï walked upright.
Many of Toumaï's advanced features are missing from later fossils such as Australopithecus, but reappear in still later species that are classified as Homo.

Based on this, we might have to question some species' place in the hominid club. If Australopithecus looks more ape-like than a much older fossil, how can it belong to the human family? "Anything with a more primitive face has to have its membership reviewed," says Wood.
No groups will be expelled on the evidence so far. The real lesson, says Wood, is that appearances are a bad guide to evolutionary relations. Hominid and ape species probably mixed and matched from a set of features, he says, with the same traits evolving independently on multiple lineages.
Toumaï has other features that are just strange. "It's got a massive brow ridge, the size of a large male gorilla, and yet it's just a little hominid," says Lieberman. This heavy brow leads many to believe that Toumaï was male.

Where then does Toumaï fit on the family tree? He could belong on the chimp or hominid lines, or he could be part of a different branch of the family, more distant from both chimps and humans that either is from the other.
Palaeoanthropologist Tim White of the University of California, Berkeley, agrees. He thinks that Toumaï might belong to Ardipithecus, a group defined by fossils dating from about 5.5-4.5 million years ago.

But Wood takes a different view. "My guess is that it's neither a chimp nor a human ancestor - it's a creature that was living at the same time."
To solve the mystery we need more fossils from the same period. Unfortunately our relatives' habits may be against us. The forests favoured by chimps, and apparently by early hominids, are not conducive to fossil formation. Chimps, for example, have no fossil record.
On the bright side, Toumaï's discovery suggests that, even if they were rarely fossilized, ancient apes and hominids roamed right across Africa. "Finding hominids in the Sahara was a bit of a long shot," says Wood. So far, most fossil hominids have turned up in the east, with a few further south.

But desert-bound palaeontologists be warned: "There are brutal field conditions," says Lieberman.


References
1.Brunet, M. et al. A new hominid from the Upper Miocene of Chad, Central Africa. Nature, 418, 145 - 151, (2002).
2.Vignaud, P. et al. Geology and palaeontology of the Upper Miocene Toros-Menalla hominid locality, Chad. Nature, 418, 152 - 155, (2002).

[Orion]

TB... you maybe related to a monkey... but I'm not.

[Talius Brute]

yes you are

[Orion]

Admit it ... we are of two species...

[Talius Brute]

split personality?

[Enigma]

why do humans degrade themselves to animal level?
we are a special speices, the only that can think, Allah's precious humans who he put on earth to worship him and make something of this beautiful world.
why can't scientists accept that?

[Talius Brute]

We are special and evolution takes nothing away from this, it is only those who are unable to conceptualise time that would think this way

as an egg and sperm becomes a baby becomes an adult
so we have developed over millions of years from primitive beginnings.

In my eyes it shows how amazing life is and how great God is.

[FaHaD]

everyone thinks that he is animal , he has the freedom to say that...

i just wonder how come the most developed ape does not have some of human complicated strucureslike amygliod body, the amazng cortex and gyrae, the hypocappos and parahypocampous body...etc,,,
or did these structures just appeared from ape to human in one single generation... like 2 leopard met and produces one cat....
amazing laa.

[Kamakazy]

if humans were evolved from apes, then why aren’t we evolving to something else now?

why aren't the other animals evolving to humans, aliens, etc???

the first human on earth was Adam (pbuh) he was not evolved from anything, he was created by god, which shows us his greatness...

if you believe in evolution, then go and live with monkeys...

[Talius Brute]

Quiet simply we are evolving, we all stand more upright and are taller than we were, but evolution takes millions of years and only happens through necessity (which is the mother of all invention) so when climates change or food becomes scarce or competitors move in to an area or desease hits, only those best able to survive will survive and so, when they mate, those succesfull traits are passed down to the next generation and so on. The best example of this in modern times is the adaptability of rodents/insects and bacteria etc to pesticides and poisons, after only twenty years or so, they have become immune to what once once deadly to them, because only those that, through a minute genetic difference, were naturally immune did survive.
Also the same has happened with dogs, witness all the different breeds and how different they are, from very tiny furry things to massive ugly beast, all caused through specific breeding (in this case deliberatley caused by man) over only 500 years or so, now think of what changes could be made over 1 million years. And then think that this hominid described above, is 5-8 million years old.

[Wanderer]

Originally posted by FaHaD
everyone thinks that he is animal , he has the freedom to say that...

Thanks. That and the fact that it is the truth.


Originally posted by FaHaD

i just wonder how come the most developed ape does not have some of human complicated strucureslike amygliod body, the amazng cortex and gyrae, the hypocappos and parahypocampous body...etc,,,
or did these structures just appeared from ape to human in one single generation...

Fahad, are you sure about your statement re: unique human brain structures - Amygdala, Hippocampus, Parahippocampus, etc. ? Perhaps a day for you to review and modify your statement is in order.

[FaHaD]

Originally posted by Kamakazy

if you believe in evolution, then go and live with monkeys...

well said kamkazy,,,
wanderer could u give me the anatomy of ape's brain...
r u should do it by ur own , cmpare it to ur bain anatomy..

[Wanderer]

Fahad,

Not sure if you are trying to insult me and not entirely sure why you would do such a thing.

I'm just giving you a chance to review your statement regarding certain brain structures being unique to humans. I'm investigating it to see if it's factual. I'm suggesting we both do so.

You should be familiar with the concept of "peer review". :rolleyes:

[FaHaD]

LoooooooooooL... wanderer , pls don't misunderstand me.. sorry if u feel it like an insult..
but i will try to look for it... but i don't have biology books at home and i am in a holiday..
i will try to go to the library to find out the inique structure plus function..

[Talius Brute]

Look simple people:


the point of evolution is that species evolve

they change, some kep some characteristics, others lose them

if we were the same as apes we wouldn't have evolved.

[Seham]

Another NON-CONCLUSIVE discovery that raised questions rather than answers!!!!

[Talius Brute]

Isn't that the point though: to ask questions in order to find the answer

instead of being dumb, unthinking and ignorant

[Seham]

Can u watch ur language TB!! What r u having a hangover?!!
It is so easy to raise questions .... the intellegence comes from answering them ....

[Talius Brute]

I meant 'dumb' as in 'unthinking' not as an insult

but I guess you can be forgiven for thinking otherwise given some of my other posts this happy morning!


I agree, they need answers, but answers are hard to find and one needs to ask more and more questions to even get a hope of getting near the right answer.

I am unclear as to what I really think about evolution, I agree with it to an extent, although I do not follow Darwin's theory completely, I think there is more to it than that.



My point of view is that when God created the universe, he still needed a method to do it by, and that this is evolution. The same as babies need to grow to become adults etc.

[Seham]

I would agree with you that we constantly evolve in the sence that people become more intellegent ..... the bugs run away from you once "Pif-Paf" can enters the room before even getting sprayed.... but turning into a humanbeing from an animal .... I think is like saying an insect would become a bird one day!!

[Talius Brute]

I know it seems strange, but as I said above, think how much can change in a few hundred years, and then think how long 8 million years are (back to this hominid) add another 10 million back to apes and another 3.8 BILLION years plus, back to the first life on Earth

3,8 billion is :

3,800,000,000 years

[FaHaD]

well great if people believe that human come from apes...
so the next question what is the next species after human ...
what will we call them and how they will look like.. what advantages they will have??

[Talius Brute]

interesting question,

I suppose there are so many factors to consider like desease (AIDS etc) polution, nuclear war.

Also our increases in technology, changes in lifestyle which have already lead to changes in our bodies.

Then there is the terrible factor of genetic engineering that some idiots in the west want to press ahead with.

doesn't look like we're going to get any cleverer!



Many evolutions on nature are caused by things such as climate
for instance imagine if in the wild suddenly all the short plants died, only the tall animals or tree climbers etc would survive, maybe it would be that only the tall horses survived, they would breed and all horses would be tall, but they would eat all the higher up leaves etc, and next time a similar situation happened
all the even taller horses would survive, so on and so on until maybe the giraffe etc. Also anything that ate the small horses would either die, or adapt and so evolve itself.

But our lives seem to be getting easier and it is no longer natural physical ability that ensures survival. Who can say what will be the definnig factors in the event of a catastrophe.

[FaHaD]

TB are u talking about mutation or evolutions...

[Talius Brute]

They are part of the same process, mutations cause differences, it is then the survival of the fittest, and sometimes those will be the mutations.

[FaHaD]

u mean major mutation by AIDS , nuclear energy...

so what is the next species ... superman..:gap:

[Talius Brute]

no that's not what I mean

but if aids spreads even further, then onlty those naturaly imune will survive.

Also, imagine if there was a nuclear war and due to winds carrying radiation the only people to survive lived at the tip of argentina or some such, the human race would still continue, but would be changed for ever. No longer would there be black or oriental or european people etc, and we all have very diferent characteristics.

[FaHaD]

soo not evolution:)

[Talius Brute]

surely that is part of evolution?

simply put, evolution is the survival of the most suited, sometimes this will just be luck, or be caused by an extreme event.
In this case however we were going to evolve would be rapidly changed. Different factors would come into play. These exaples are actually quite good, because if they happened then man would once again return to being a country dweller and would lose the impact of modern technology/lifestyle.
I cannot say how that would affect us in the long term, maybe when the people from Argentina (the only survivers!) who are adapted to cold climates eventually spread and dispersed back round the world and had other catastropges, other cross-rpads on the way, they would adapt in unforeseen ways. I can guarantee that if this happened a human from 2 thousand years in the future would look very diferent from a human who lived 2000 years without the catastrophe.

Not as different as apes and man, but if you add on another 8 millino years of small changes, occasional famines/deseases/climate change. loss of one food, gain of another etc etc.

[Wanderer]

Originally posted by Talius Brute

if we were the same as apes we wouldn't have evolved.

?

Apes have evolved too.

We just happen to share a (relatively recent) common ancestor with the Bonobo, Chimp, Gorilla, and Orangutang. But those apes have changed too.

[Wanderer]

Originally posted by FaHaD
well great if people believe that human come from apes...

Comparative anatomy, Fahad. You need to review the structural similarities between apes and humans - skeletal, organs, bio-chemistry, and neurological. You will find startling similarties. I think you have and will avoid delving into those matters, though.


Originally posted by FaHaD

so the next question what is the next species after human ...
what will we call them and how they will look like.. what advantages they will have??

There may not be any more species derived from Homo Sapiens - it may dead-end literally (we die off), it may dead end phisologically - like sharks (which have changed very little over the past 100 million years), or we may blossom into a variety of sub-species and then diverge enough that we become seperate species.

Current technology and trade keep populations from being too isolated, so it is now unlikely that we will become a group of sub-species. But look at the different "races" to see how specialization and speciation may occur. Left alone for another 100,000 years, the "racial" populations we commonly recognize might have truely speciated - no longer able (or willing) to inter-breed and produce viable offspring.

[FaHaD]

i still wnat to search about the similarity,,, man i ma not talking about biochemsitry and physiology....i will tryt o find simillarity in the brain structure and the unique brain function to see wether evolution as u think take place from apes to human...

sooo wanderer u do believe that human can not further develop or gp under evolution... is in it against that theory of evolution...

[Wanderer]

Originally posted by FaHaD
sooo wanderer u do believe that human can not further develop or gp under evolution... is in it against that theory of evolution...

Not saying that at all. It's just that we are a very homogeneous group - there's very little variation in our species. And it is variation within species, usually associated with isolation and different habitats, that often provides the "winning" phenotype/genotype when stressors are applied - habitat changes, new predator is introduced, etc.

So one thing that comes to mind as a meaningful variation in humans is Melanin - dark skin. One should note that all people basically have the same number of melanocytes - cells that can produce melanin, no matter what their skin color.

Peoples with high levels of melanin are found clustered around equatorial regions - the Ghanian bloke living in London doesn't count being a recent immigrant. Those with very high levels of melanin have added restance to UV rays (the trade-off being that these people have reduced ability to synthesize Vitamin D when living in low UV regions - and eating a diet poor in Vit D.).

Should the "doom and gloom" environmental activists be correct, and the amount of UV rays reaching the Earth increase considerably, the quantity of melanin may become a critical factor in the survival of various peoples. Two obvious methods - a) quickly, the UV rays kill before or early in the reproductive years, and b) there is a negative financial/cultural impact as UV rays kill off a reduced melanin group while not as seriously impacting a more protected group. Which culture/group would you expect to win ?

Another problem in our development as a species is very physical. Our greatest recent change has been in brain size (we've been bi-pedal a long time). A related factor to brain size obviously is skull size. Any future growth in human skull/brain size is going to be negatively impacted by our pelvic structure and birth canal size. We can no longer continue to give our brains a "headstart" during fetal development - because these babies are not going to make it out (without surgical intervention). Though it could be interesting to see if we develop a disposible woman (that is, all women will die giving birth - not socially as Talius might imagine).

Anyway, we as a species are capable of negating or mitigating many of the factors that are often associated with evolving. We may well become a stagnent, homogeneous species.

Like the Dodo once was.

[Talius Brute]

Change doesn't happen unless something causes it to, in evolutions case this is usually due to enviromental factors that either cause changes in breeding or forced survival of those that can.

Evolution, as far as I am concerned, doesn't carry inertia.

[Wanderer]

Originally posted by Talius Brute
Change doesn't happen unless something causes it to ...

Offspring are the mix and match of their parent's genetics. Occasianally, the apple falls a little further from the tree than one might expect.

The Ugly gene appears to be a persistant bugger.

[FaHaD]

Actually I was looking for structural similarities between human and apes brain,, but books are not discussing those things they just concentrated on skeletal anatomies(skull, teeth), locomotion, blood proteins , biochemistry and they give the difference and similarity..
But I used my reasoning, why I have to look for anatomical and physiological difference and it is so clear like water,,,
Are apes able to read , judge, think , create , invent, rationalize like human.,,,
Plus the modern ape , I mean the most improved ape, got very huge temporal lobe for smell , … so how come suddenly apes developed to human, like one generation lead to human,,, and by the way fossils studies has no proof for this…

Cos it is known that human fossil records ,like that of all other organisms , is said to lack transitional forms …. .. the alleged absence of transional forms of fossil records can alone disprove the human evolution theory,,, cos the entire nation of evolution depend on transition ,,, if transitional forms between ourselves ( human) and other creatures are lacking , evolution has not occurred

Paleoanthropologists, scientists who study fossils, foud three species which they think there are the sister of human ( homo sapiens): they are Sinanthropus pekinensis ( homo erectus) , Pithecanthropus ( homo erectus,) , and Australopithecus….which are merely monkeys or apes happen to show human triats…

Thus they make some people believe on Darwin theory, but all those
Paleoanthropologists theory were rejected cos of no direct transition,, they lack it…

U will notice that most animals got a similar skeletal , specially skull which paleoanthropologist are concerned..
What is the difference between hoarse , camel, cheetah, cow, dinasour skull… there are some simillaities. Right
Also look at embryos ,, most of animals got a similar looking embryo shape .. but as embryo grows it differentiate….
That does not mean that human originated from apes just because there are some skeletal similarities between them…
The pcture below shows how similar is human embryo to dog embryo ,, I also have the similarity with turtle and chicken embryo.. ( sorry the picture was very big in size thus it was not able to show)

Another Darwin theory which has been rejected is the perfection,,
Every organism improves with time to be more perfect… if that is te case why the oldest organism is still living.. why bacteria and amoebia are still living.. actually argument about perfection theory is sooo long..

[MoonChild]

Originally posted by Wanderer

Though it could be interesting to see if we develop a disposible woman (that is, all women will die giving birth - not socially as Talius might imagine).


can't happen, mathematically. your population would shrink (1/2 every generation), with no mechanism for increase.

1 man + 10 women can populate the world.
1 womam +10 men = extinction.

[MoonChild]

Originally posted by Seham
but turning into a humanbeing from an animal .... I think is like saying an insect would become a bird one day!!

or possibly claiming that a dinosaur would become a bird one day??

Absurd!!!

:D

[MoonChild]

Originally posted by FaHaD

But I used my reasoning, why I have to look for anatomical and physiological difference and it is so clear like water,,,
Are apes able to read , judge, think , create , invent, rationalize like human.,,,

Fahad, you actually appear to be claiming that the facts are irrelevent since they don't support your belief.

I thought you were a scientist?

When 'reasoning' discards fact it is known as 'rationalization'. As for the results of said 'reasonng', your arguments are too full of logical errors and errors in critical thinking to address while i type one-handed with a baby on my lap... but i'll try to show them to you later. you've a fine mind, i hate to see it mis-used like that...

[Enigma]

here guys I want you to check out this linkhttp://www.ancient-astronaut.com/evolution.htm

[FaHaD]

well moonchild,, do u wnat me to reply same as u replied...
i used logic and it is clear pus i gave u scientific evidence if u can't read...
and regarding my belief , yeap this is what we believe .. so what .. critism also found ...

[Talius Brute]

"Are apes able to read , judge, think , create , invent, rationalize like human.,,, "

well actually they are, not a fully grown and educated human being who has a language, but they are no different in ability to a child without language.


Don't forget Fahad, that without language we would not think in the way that we do now, we use language as a labeleling system, our brains can only deal with 7 things at one time, by using words that signify 100 details we can actually play with 1000s of ideas in one sentence and our level or judgement, thought, creativity, invention and reason jumps up a 1000 times.
Imagine trying to problem solve without language.

[FaHaD]

good TB i posted a topic about thinking and having language , see teh link below..
language and thinking (http://www.englishsabla.com/forum/showthread.php?threadid=7005)

soo do apes i mean the most omproved,developed, ape has speech..

[Wanderer]

I can't help but notice, "scientist" Fahad, that you have moved quickly away from anatomical (skeletal and brain) similarities/comparisons and sought refuge in comparisons of only the most advanced human characteristics.

Being unwilling/unable to discuss said anatomical similarities and provide any indication that you understand current evolutional theory, "scientist", I'd like to verify that you DO have a college degree in biological sciences. Do you ?

And if you do, "scientist", is the diploma large enough that it could be put to good use - perhaps in the kitchen where you could wrap fish with it or dry your hands on it.

Because that's all it's worth, "scientist".

[Wanderer]

Originally posted by runnin' around
here guys I want you to check out this linkhttp://www.ancient-astronaut.com/evolution.htm

Interesting site. Though the author does use a bit of circular reasoning and flawed logic.

Evolution by Alien "intelligent design". OK, let's look for evidence.

That is, after all, how all of this science stuff is supposed to work.

Apparently, if you find any evidence that you don't care for, give it to "scientist" Fahad. He will hide it somewhere so that it doesn't bother you too much.

[Talius Brute]

hmmm

[Wanderer]

I'm rotten, eh?

[Talius Brute]

No, of course not, Wandy, I am sure you are as pure as the driven snow.



This esteemed article is fairly straightforward, however there are certain statements I should take issue with, for instance:

<b>Biologically as we have said, humans are weak, on the flip side, creatively we are masters.

The question therefore is why did humans not become extinct and what possible cause could there be for this so called "creativity"? If creativity is part of the evolutionary process, why have no other animals displayed this same kind of creativity and utilised it in the same way we have? Rather than running faster, or growing fangs or the ability to see in the dark?

</b>

[FaHaD]

what is teh wrong is going to the wnaderer...
first of all i never said that i am a scientist ok... i studied basic science and happy to use my knowledge ... and whatever i say i have my refrence to books ... and my career is not biology it is medicine .. and i think u know that...

and regarding the anatomical similarity ,, i did not find books regarding thsoe things and if u r a biologist why u don't suggest us books to read....

seem whatever i said above ,u saw them by ur eyes and took them out through ur ears....i gave two well known critisms about darwin theory ,, and i did not invent tem hey are written in books..

if u r not happy about them u can say ur comment and u r free to discuss...
insead of talking non sense...

[MoonChild]

Originally posted by FaHaD
Actually I was looking for structural similarities between human and apes brain,, but books are not discussing those things they just concentrated on skeletal anatomies(skull, teeth), locomotion, blood proteins , biochemistry and they give the difference and similarity..
But I used my reasoning, why I have to look for anatomical and physiological difference and it is so clear like water,,,

I agree that it's not easy to find a short answer to the question of similar brain structures among primates. however, the internet is rich with resources and i was able to compare different sources of info and determine that Wanderer is correct that there are no NEW structures in the human brain, the only difference is in degree of development which is entirely expected.

however, it's your second paragraph that caught my attention, you say 'why should i bother looking at physical evidence when the answer SEEMS clear'. THAT is the bad science part.


Are apes able to read , judge, think , create , invent, rationalize like human.,,,

there is no argument anywhere that other primates have human capabilities to the extent humans do! however, that doesn't mean that the basic anatomical structures aren't there in rudimentary form. Besides, compare an ape or chimpanzee society to a group of babies, or even some jungle tribes of South America... in fact MOST humans have not created/invented to any great extent, cannot read, and spend very little time thinking about philosophy. Most of us are taught to use tools we don't understand, which chimps can do too at a child's level.

so... how big is the difference really?



Plus the modern ape , I mean the most improved ape, got very huge temporal lobe for smell ,

specialized development of common structures to imcrease survival potential in THEIR ecological niche. they NEED smell, they don't need vocal speech. Humans evolved using speech as a survival mechanism instead.


… so how come suddenly apes developed to human, like one generation lead to human,,, and by the way fossils studies has no proof for this…

where did 'one generation' come from? no one ever claimed this so why throw it in the mix? the whole point is that species development is a very SLOW process (although natural selection can occur in a single generation due to catastrophic events, it is a mechanism that 'chooses' the variety of characteristics best suited to survive that particular catastrophe - it does NOT cause variation).
of course thter is no fossil proof of one generation from ape to man, you should know that's just silly.


Cos it is known that human fossil records ,like that of all other organisms , is said to lack transitional forms …. .. the alleged absence of transional forms of fossil records can alone disprove the human evolution theory,,, cos the entire nation of evolution depend on transition ,,, if transitional forms between ourselves ( human) and other creatures are lacking , evolution has not occurred

i disagree that transitional forms are lacking entirely, in fact you quote some of the possibilities below. but people can 'say' anything they want.
in your next statement, your reasoning breaks down altogether... ABSENCE OF EVIDENCE never disproved anything!!! come'on, you HAVE to realize that simple axiom of scientific thought!!! 100 years ago there was no evidence of electrons, but they certainly existed. it takes special ecological conditions to create fossils, then they get buried over the millenia, THEN someone has to dig in jut the right spot to find it. only a few people have been looking for <100 years, is it any wonder only a few fossils have been found?
Do some reading on Popper's philosophy of science - it takes a mountain of evidence to 'proove' something, only ONE piece of evidence to disprove something, but NO evidence means 'we don't know the answer'. and we DON'T know the whole lineage of man... but we have a few pieces of an intriguiging puzzle.

to recap- even if it were true that no transitional forms had been found, that doesn't mean that those creatures never existed.

here's an example that should illustrate the concept in no uncertain terms. Where is the original Quran? Using your logic, since we can't find it today, it never existed, therfore Islam is disproved.



...which are merely monkeys or apes happen to show human triats…

? and how did you come to this conclusion? how does a 'monkey with human traits' differ from a 'transitional form'? Prove to me that it is one and not the other.


That does not mean that human originated from apes just because there are some skeletal similarities between them…


it's true that all mammals share similar skeletal, biochemical, etc characteristics. we happen, cladistically, to belong to the primate branch of Mammalia. The genetic relationship is even closer. and if you've read anything about it you know that the evidence points to a common ancestor with apes & chimps, not descent from the modern apes and chimps.


Another Darwin theory which has been rejected is the perfection,,

agreed. we now know that Darwin's perception of Man as the 'perfection' or end of some evolutionary 'goal' was incorrect. His genius lay in perceiving the basis of natural selection thru observation and inferring the mechanism of genetic mutation before there was the means to identify genes or the process of mutation. those concepts remain valid after scientific testing, although the theory has been refined and expanded.
don't 'throw out the baby with the bathwater'!

[Wanderer]

Well, we certainly DO want to keep Medicine seperate from biology !?

To make things easier - humans have the same bones in their skeletal anatomy as the apes.

The brain regions you mentioned as seperating human from animal earlier in this thread are found in apes, primates, and some lower mammals.

There ARE transitional forms. let's look at some whales first :

http://www.indiana.edu/~ensiweb/lessons/wh.disc3.pdf

Section A. 3 - vestigal hind leg bones in whales. Why would whales have hind leg bones ?

[MoonChild]

Originally posted by FaHaD
well moonchild,, do u wnat me to reply same as u replied...
i used logic and it is clear pus i gave u scientific evidence if u can't read...
and regarding my belief , yeap this is what we believe .. so what .. critism also found ...

I hope my above post answers you more clearly. it took some time so i hope you read it and give it some thought.
yes, i can read. i have also studied logic and the philosophy of scientific reasoning and can recognize their absence in some of your statements. i'm not getting down on you, just trying to educate you a bit. i'm also willing to be educated by you--- or i wouldn't be here.

it's OK to have a belief. i don't care if you have beliefs that disagree with mine. but once you invoke the scientific method to argue for your belief, then those are the rules we are playing by.

[Wanderer]

Transitional forms.

Fahad, you claim to be a descendant of Adam - the first man.

Therefore there should be an unbroken line of descent from Adam to you.

I ask you, do you know the name of each ancestor, where each of your ancestors is buried, their living height and weight?

If you don't have this information about the "transitional forms" between Adam and you, we can only conclude that:

1) you don't exist, or

2) you are not a descendant of Adam

Or is it that some of the names, bones, and whereabouts of your family lineage has been lost over the past 6,000 - 7,000 years?

Just like Mankind's lineage over the past millions of years.

[FaHaD]

first of all wnadere, we are not talking about man to man evolution here we are talking are human developed from apes or not…so be in the tract pls.

Moonchild, thanx for the information but the theory of evolution and its criticism has not solved yet till the recent time.. and it remained as a non-proved theory .. and u can not say yes or no without evidence and I am with u when u said research are still going on but criticism also with them…and I am not a biologist to understand the depth of biology so I be able to agree do disagree…..
I don’t want to copy and paste but I will give u this site cos it showes how philosophy and science plays around Darwin theory.. plus some people say that Darwinism wasn't so much a scientific theory but as as a grand philosophy.. cos of no evidence..
There are many sites which give criticism and this one of them http://www.vision.net.au/~apaterson/science/darwin_critique1.htm

[MoonChild]

Hi Fahad, i agree that Darwin was highly speculative in some of his theory (by neccesity) - that's why i focus on the science of the lsat 150 years not what Darwin theorized per se.
the interesting thing about Darwin and history is that he WAS able to conceive of this brand new idea of evolution and was actually pretty close in the mechanism, all based on his low-tech observations. of course he couldn't get it all right without any evidence - but his ideas were so compelling that they spawned several new lines of scientific inquiry and were the driving force behind the inventions that gave us the ability to seek that evidence (for or against).

like Newton, Darwin was pretty close in many ways, wrong in some of the details, and refined by new information without invalidating the whole.

[Wanderer]

Originally posted by FaHaD
first of all wnadere, we are not talking about man to man evolution here we are talking are human developed from apes or not…so be in the tract pls.


Fahad, I was demonstrating that if it is near impossible for you to find each ancestor of yours from over only a 6,000 - 7,000 year period - the "transitional forms" of your family tree, imagine how difficult it must be to find the fossilized remains of the myriad ancestors in the animal kingdom.

The energy in my previous posts was because I sensed intellectual dishonesty in your answers - and lack of answers. You could have at least said that, no, you had no basis for claiming different skeletal or brain anatomies between humans and apes.

Shave an ape and a surgeon practiced with human surgeries would not even have to consult a book to perform just about any operation on the ape that the surgeon could perform on humans. I find that remarkable. Does it prove evolution ? No, it doesn't. Does the fossil record and all of the documented transitional forms prove evolution ? Again, No.

But no other theory accounts for, and continues to account for, all of the information we discover in fossils, anatomy, and DNA research.

One needn't believe in evolution, but anyone who took more than 1 or 2 biology courses in college should at least understand it.

Also, monkeys didn't turn into Humans. Rather, current thinking has it that each has, in the distant past, a common ancestor.

Are you familiar with Cladistics ?

[Talius Brute]

Humans share more than 98% of their DNA with chimps, which given the complexity of DNA is pretty darn similar.