Op dinsdag 5 juli 2005 om 13:59:33 UTC+2 schreef John Roth:
"JAE" <j...@ucdavis.edu> wrote in message news:1120548410.5...@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com...
People left traces of their presence in the sediments of a shoreline
Human settlers made it to the Americas 30,000 years earlier than
previously thought, according to new evidence.
British scientists came to this controversial conclusion by dating human >> footprints preserved by volcanic ash in an abandoned quarry in Mexico.
They say the first Americans may have arrived by sea, rather than by
foot. ...
Ms Gonzalez says the tracks show that the first colonies may have arrived >> on water.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4650307.stm
It's always a little disturbing when something like this gets reported
in popular press before anything reviewed gets out. I've no way to
really judge if there's anything remotely worthwhile in their study or
not, though the various news stories indicate that the prints were
dated by a mammoth tooth in a nearby deposit. Again, this sort of
report doesn't really tell me if the dates are worth anything. It's
curious though that if the 40kybp date is for real, people stayed more
or less completely invisible in the archaeological record for thousands
of years afterwards. Much skepticism is still warranted.
The news report I've seen:
http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn7627
was quite specific on the kinds of dating used over the two year
time period they did the study.
A good deal of skepticism is indeed warrented - skepticism of
people who jump to conclusions based on their preconceptions
without checking to see whether there are other information sources availible.
BTW Marc - the idea that they followed the coast is pure guesswork
at this point. The fact is nobody has any idea of how they got there. Following the coast is a reasonably guess, but there is no support
whatsoever that I've heard. John Roth
Biology. We've always followed coasts + rivers. Humans need aquatic nutrients. At least 8 *independent* facts show Pleistocene H.erectus were semi-aquatic: • Archaic Homo's atypical tooth-wear was caused by "sand and oral processing of marine mollusks", Towle cs 2022
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ajpa.24500
• H.erectus s.s. typically?always fossilized in coastal sediments, e.g. Mojokerto: barnacles + corals, Trinil: Pseudodon + Elongaria (edible shellfish), Sangiran-17: "brackish marsh near the coast".
• Stephen Munro discovered sea-shell engravings made by H.erectus, Joordens cs 2015 Nature 518:228–231
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25470048/
• Ear exostoses (H.erectus & H.neand.) develop after years of cold(er) water irrigation
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5696936/
• Pachy-osteo-sclerosis is only seen in slow+shallow-diving tetrapods (de Buffrénil cs 2010 J.Mamm.Evol.17:101-120), e.g. erectus’ parietal bone is 2x as thick as in gorillas.
• Brain size in erectus (2x apes/australopiths) is facilitated by aquatic food, e.g. DHA docosahexaenoic acid in shellfish… cf. Odontocetes, Pinnipedia.
• Late-Pleistocene descendants or relatives colonized islands far oversea (fossils Flores 100–50 ka, Luzon 67 ka)
https://www.academia.edu/36193382/Coastal_Dispersal_of_Pleistocene_Homo_2018
• Homo’s stone tool use & dexterity is typical for molluscivores, e.g. sea-otters.
BTW, it's time the "old" anthropologists (African savanna believers) stop boycotting & refusing our MSs on Homo's waterside evolution.
Human DNA (absence of African retroviral DNA) shows our Pliocene ancestors were not in Africa: IMO they were following S-Asian oasts --> Java Mojokerto etc.
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