Somebody believed :-DDD that the paper below contradicted my hypothesis that E.Afr. & S.Afr.apiths evolved in parallel from late-Pliocene "gracile" to early-Pleist."robust: (IMO, in resp. the northern- vs the southern E-Afr.Rift?):
E.Afr.afarensis-->boisei // S.Afr.africanus->robustus.

For my view on the "new" apith fossils sediba & naledi, google e.g.
"Not Homo, but Pan or Australopithecus naledi?" &
"Ape and Human evolution 2018 Verhaegen".

"An updated analysis of hominin phylogeny with an emphasis on re-evaluating the phylogenetic relationships of Australopithecus sediba"
JHE 2023 doi org/10.1016/j.jhevol.2022.103311
The discovery & description of Au.sediba has re-ignited the debate over the evol.history of the australopiths & the genus Homo. It has been suggested that sediba may be an ancestor of Homo, because it possesses a mosaic of derived Homo- & primitive
australopith-like traits.
But an alternative hypothesis proposes: most purported Homo-like cranio-dental characters can be attributed to the juvenile status of the type spm, MH1.
We conducted an independent character assessment of the cranio-dental morphology of sediba, esp.: did the ontogenetic status of MH1 affect its purported Homo-like characteristics?
We have also expanded fossil hypodigms to incorporate the new Au.anamensis cranium from Woranso-Mille MRD-VP-1/1 & recently described Par.robustus cranial remains from Drimolen DNH 7 & DNH 155.
Morphological character data were analyzed, using standard parsimony & Bayesian techniques,
we conducted a series of Bayesian analyses constrained to evaluate the hypothesis that Au.africanus & sediba are sister taxa.
Based on the results of the parsimony & Bayesian analyses, we could not reject the hypothesis that sediba shares its closest phylogenetic affinities with the genus Homo:
based on currently available craniodental evidence, we conclude: sediba is plausibly the terminal end of a lineage that shared a common ancestor with the earliest representatives of Homo,
but we caution: the discovery of new sediba fossils preserving adult cranial morphology or the inclusion of post-crania may ultimately necessitate a re-evaluation.

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