Op zondag 26 november 2023 om 03:42:13 UTC+1 schreef JTEM is so reasonable:
Marc Verhaegen wrote:
1) bipedal = hominin
This may be true but, if so, they have to redraw it's significance.
I use "hominid" for HPG + fossil relatives, and "pongid" for orangs + fossil relatives:
the terms "hominin/Hominini/Homininae..." are too confusing IMO.
Yes, early-Miocene Hominoidea were already "bipedal": google "aquarboreal":
- humans & gibbons are still "bipedal"...
- chimp//gorilla//orang became knuckle//fist-walkers in parallel
(Pan & Gorilla knuckle-walkings differ).
2) out of Africa
Certainly after Toba. But, you're right, the African population that
left after Toba was descended from an Asian group.
I don't know. Wiki:
Toba (vulkaan) laatste uitbarsting 70-75 ka (Sumatra, barst c 1/400 ky jaar uit)
= de grootste vulkaan-uitbarsting op aarde van de laatste 2 Ma?
I meant: our Pliocene ancestors were in S-Asia
(we have no Pliocene Afr.reroviral DNA, Yohn cs 2005).
3) apiths Lucy... = human ancestors
The funny thing is that, for the longest time, mainstream paleo
anthropology said that lucy was a side branch.
In a sense, yes: I don't doubt (e.g. my Hum.Evol.papers):
Lucy was an early relative of Gorilla.
4) savanna evolution
I sincerely doubt that the majority buy into the savanna idiocy.
It's just something they have to pay lip service to in order to
keep getting paid by the university.
:-D
5) hunting evolution
An emergent trait?
Few people hunt... but others like it very much.
1) early-Miocene Hominoidea were already "bipedal", google "aquarboreal"
Mid, for sure. But I do like your model. Apes really do follow
bipedalism.
In a sense, humans & hylobatids are still BP (vertical trunk).
2) humans have no African Pliocene retroviral DNA (Yohn cs 2005)
It was probably, in a sense, 1 species from Africa to Sundaland,
but the retrovirus either wiped out the African group or so thinned
them out that they were absorbed into the Pan side.
IMO, Homo & Pan split 6-5 Ma, when the Red Sea opened into the Gulf/Aden:
the rest is simple: Homo turned left, Pan turned right:
--Pliocene Homo -> S.Asian coastal forests -> Java H.erectus early-Pleist.erectus etc.
--Pliocene Pan -> E.Afr.coastal forests -> Transvaal late-Pliocene africanus etc.
3) E/S.Afr.apiths = fossil Gorilla/Pan, google "GondwanaTalks Verhaegen"
Not so sure. It's entirely possible. But they had to be physically
separated from Homo. At least until interbreeding was no longer
possible. If the Red Sea was open -- they couldn't cross -- at the
time of the retrovirus, that may have been enough... more than
enough.
Detailed comparisons leave no doubt IMO, see my 1994 & 1996 Hum.Evol.papers:
Table 1 - Some quotations on ape-like features in australopith crania
• “The evolution of the australopithecine crania was the antithesis of the Homo line. Instead of becoming less ape-like, as in Homo, they become more ‘ape-like’. Cranial proportions and ectocranial features that were thought to be unique among
pongids evolved separately [?? --mv] in the australopithecines parallel [together --mv] with the great apes. The features of KNM-WT 17000, therefore, are not as ‘primitive’ as they look. The robust Australopithecus did not evolve from a big-toothed
pongid ancestor with large cranial superstructures, but from a small-toothed hominid with a rounder, smoother ectocranium, like A. africanus”. Ferguson, 1989b.
• “Plio-Pleistocene hominids had markedly abbreviated [enamel] growth periods relative to modern man, similar to those of the modern great apes”. Bromage & Dean, 1985.
• “Enamel thickness has been secondarily reduced in the African apes and also, although at a different rate and extent, in the orang-utan. Thick enamel, previously the most important characteristic in arguments about the earliest hominid, does not
therefore identify a hominid”. Martin, 1985.
• In the S.African fossils incl. Taung, “sulcal patterns of 7 australopithecine endocasts appear to be ape-like rather than human-like”. Falk, 1987.
• “Cranial capacity, the relationship between endocast and skull, sulcal pattern, brain shape and cranial venous sinuses, all of these features appear to be consistent with an ape-like external cortical morphology in Hadar early hominids”. Falk,
1985.
• In the type specimen of afarensis, “the lower third premolar of ‘A.africanus afarensis’ LH-4 is completely apelike”. Ferguson, 1987b.
• “afarensis is much more similar cranially to the modern African apes than to modern humans”. Schoenemann, 1989.
• “Olson's assertion that the lateral inflation of the A.L.333-45 mastoids is greater than in any extant ape is incorrect if the fossil is compared to P.troglodytes males or some Gorilla males and females. Moreover, the pattern of pneumatization in A.
afarensis is also found only in the extant apes among other hominoids”. Kimbel et al., 1984.
• “Prior to the identification of A.afarensis the asterionic notch was thought to characterize only the apes among hominoids. Kimbel and Rak relate this asterionic sutural figuration to the pattern of cranial cresting and temporal bone pneumatization
shared by A.afarensis and the extant apes”. Kimbel et al., 1984.
• “... the fact that two presumed Paranthropus [robustus] skulls were furnished with high sagittal crests implied that they had also possessed powerful occipital crests and ape-like planum nuchale... Nuchal crests which are no more prominent - and
indeed some less prominent - will be found in many adult apes”. Zuckerman, 1954b.
• In Sts.5, MLD-37/38, SK-47, SK-48, SK-83, Taung, KNM-ER 406, O.H.24 & O.H.5, “craniometric analysis showed that they had marked similarities to those of extant pongids. These basicranial similarities between Plio-Pleistocene hominids and extant
apes suggest that the upper respiratory systems of these groups were also apelike in appearance... Markedly flexed basicrania [are] found only in modern humans after the 2nd year...”. Laitman & Heimbuch, 1982.
• “The total morphological pattern with regard to the nasal region of Australopithecus can be characterized by a flat, non-protruding nasal skeleton which does not differ qualitatively from the extant non-human hominoid pattern, one which is in
marked contrast to the protruding nasal skeleton of modern H.sapiens”. Franciscus & Trinkaus, 1988.
Table 2 - Quotations on gorilla-like features in large East-African australopith crania
• “Incisal dental microwear in A.afarensis is most similar to that observed in Gorilla”. Ryan & Johanson, 1989.
• The composite skull reconstructed mostly from A.L.333 specimens “looked very much like a small female gorilla”. Johanson & Edey, 1981, p. 351.
• “Other primitive [advanced gorilla-like! --mv] features found in KNM-WT 17000, but not know or much discussed for A.afarensis, are: very small cranial capacity; low posterior profile of the calvaria; nasals extended far above the frontomaxillar
suture and well onto an uninflated glabella; and extremely convex inferolateral margins of the orbits such as found in some gorillas”. Walker et al., 1986.
• As for the maximum parietal breadth and the biauriculare in O.H.5 & KNM-ER 406 “the robust australopithecines have values near the Gorilla mean: both the pongids and the robust australopithecines have highly pneumatized bases”. Kennedy, 1991.
• In O.H.5, “the curious and characteristic features of the Paranthropus skull... parallel some of those of the gorilla”. Robinson, 1960.
• The boisei “lineage has been characterized by sexual dimorphism of the degree seen in modern Gorilla for the length of its known history”. Leakey & Walker, 1988.
• boisei teeth showed “a relative absence of prism decussation”; among extant hominoids, “Gorilla enamel showed relatively little decussation ...”. Beynon & Wood, 1986.
Table 3 - Quotations on chimp-like features in South-African australopith crania
• “Alan [Walker] has analysed a number of Australopithecus robustus teeth and they fall into the fruit-eating category. More precisely, their teeth patterns look like those of chimpanzees... Then, when be looked at some Homo erectus teeth, he found
that the pattern changed”. Leakey, 1981, pp. 74-75.
• “The ‘keystone’ nasal bone arrangement suggested as a derived diagnostic of [robustus] is found in an appreciable number of pongids, particularly clearly in some chimpanzees”. Eckhardt, 1987.
• “P.paniscus provides a suitable comparison for Australopithecus [Sts.5]; they are similar in body size, postcranial dimensions and... even in cranial and facial features”. Zihlman et al., 1978.
• “A.africanus Sts.5, which... falls well within the range of Pan troglodytes, is markedly prognathous or hyperprognathous”". Ferguson, 1989a.
• In Taung, “I see nothing in the orbits, nasal bones, and canine teeth definitely nearer to the human condition than the corresponding parts of the skull of a modern young chimpanzee”. Woodward, 1925.
• “The Taung juvenile seems to resemble a young chimpanzee more closely than it resembles L338y-6”, a juvenile boisei. Rak & Howell, 1978.
• “In addition to similarities in facial remodeling it appears that Taung and Australopithecus in general, had maturation periods similar to those of the extant chimpanzee”. Bromage, 1985.
• “I estimate an adult capacity for Taung ranging from 404-420 cm2, with a mean of 412 cm2. Application of Passingham’s curve for brain development in Pan is preferable to that for humans because (a) brain size of early hominids approximates that
of chimpanzees, and (b) the curves for brain volume relative to body weight are essentially parallel in pongids and australopithecines, leading Hofman to conclude that ‘as with pongids, the australopithecines probably differed only in size, not in
design’”. Falk, 1987.
• In Taung, “pneumatization has also extended into the zygoma and hard palate. This is intriguing because an intrapalatal extension of the maxillary sinus has only been reported in chimpanzees and robust australopithecines among higher primates”.
Bromage & Dean, 1985.
• “That the fossil ape [Taung] ‘is distinguished from all living apes by the... unfused nasal bones…’ as claimed by Dart (1940), cannot be maintained in view of the very considerable number of cases of separate nasal bones among orang-utans and
chimpanzees of ages corresponding to that of Australopithecus”. Schultz, 1941.
Falk, Schultz & +-all early PAs noticed the detailed resemblances of E.Afr.apiths=Gorilla & S.Afr.apiths=Pan.
My 1994 paper contains quotes of more >29 yrs ago:
if somebody has more recent infm on ape/apiths comparisons, please let me know...
:-)
5) early-Pleist.H.erectus = molluscivore:
Probably began long before that.
"Began" yes, but frequent shallow-diving (pachy-osteo-sclerosis, larger brain...) is AFAWK only early-Pleist.?
--marc
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