Ancient human species made ‘last stand’ 100,000 years ago on Indonesian island

[GenesisNemesis]

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2019/12/...MFOzgbdOTk

When seafaring modern humans ventured onto the island of Java some 40,000 years ago, they found a rainforest-covered land teeming with life—but they weren’t the first humans to call the island home. Their distant ancestor, Homo erectus, had traveled to Java when it was connected to the mainland via land bridges and lived there for approximately 1.5 million years. These people made their last stand on the island about 100,000 years ago, long after they had gone extinct elsewhere in the world, according a new study assigning reliable dates to previously found H. erectus fossils. The finding suggests a trace of H. erectus DNA could live on in modern Southeast Asian populations, thanks to complex intermingling among the diverse humans who have lived in the region.

The newly dated fossils also bookend the existence of a remarkably long-lived human species, says Patrick Roberts, an archaeologist at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History in Jena, Germany, who wasn’t involved with the study. “With this date, the duration of Homo erectus occupation in Southeast Asia is nearly three times as long as our [own] species has been on the planet,” he says. “There is no doubt it was successful.”

Puts things in perspective. Also it's somewhat reassuring that there was another species of human that lasted longer than we did.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

"...longer than we DID"???

[GenesisNemesis]

"...longer than we DID"???

I don't think humanity has much time left. Compared to how long Homo erectus existed, anyway.

Would be very surprised if Homo sapiens survives that long. Although space travel could potentially increase the chances of humanity's long term survival, of course.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Can we wait until the body stops twitching before we bury us?

[c172]

No.

[Mark]

"...longer than we DID"???

I don't think humanity has much time left. Compared to how long Homo erectus existed, anyway.

Would be very surprised if Homo sapiens survives that long. Although space travel could potentially increase the chances of humanity's long term survival, of course.

Of course our direct ancestors would have lived right along side all the other homos.  So we've already survived as long, albeit not in our current form.  Then again I doubt Homo erectus remained unchanged for 1.5 million years either.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

"...longer than we DID"???

I don't think humanity has much time left. Compared to how long Homo erectus existed, anyway.

Would be very surprised if Homo sapiens survives that long. Although space travel could potentially increase the chances of humanity's long term survival, of course.

Of course our direct ancestors would have lived right along side all the other homos.  So we've already survived as long, albeit not in our current form.  Then again I doubt Homo erectus remained unchanged for 1.5 million years either.

Lee Berger describes human evolution as a "braided stream", branching and coming back together.


"So it was a surprise in 2017, when a study in eLife reported the specimens entered the cave between 236,000 and 335,000 years ago. H. sapiens existed in Africa by this time, so it’s conceivable that our ancestors encountered H. naledi. We can’t say if they interbred, however, because no DNA has been extracted from H. naledi bones."

https://www.discovermagazine.com/planet-...man-cousin

[Minimalist]

Of course our direct ancestors would have lived right along side all the other homos.

Just the thought of that will drive Mike Pence crazy!

[Mark]

I don't think humanity has much time left. Compared to how long Homo erectus existed, anyway.

Would be very surprised if Homo sapiens survives that long. Although space travel could potentially increase the chances of humanity's long term survival, of course.

Of course our direct ancestors would have lived right along side all the other homos.  So we've already survived as long, albeit not in our current form.  Then again I doubt Homo erectus remained unchanged for 1.5 million years either.

Lee Berger describes human evolution as a "braided stream", branching and coming back together.

So pretty much like my New Hampshire relatives and your family then, I suppose.  

[Minimalist]

WE may never get a definitive answer because finding an intact HE dna strand will require a stroke of luck of astronomical proportions.  And scholars can look at the evidence we have and argue till the cows come home.

http://johnhawks.net/weblog/topics/moder...frica.html

Under the Multiregional evolution hypothesis, the first humans to leave Africa 1.8 million years ago never divided into different species. Instead, these populations always exchanged genes with each other through recurrent gene flow. Today, we are part of this same species, which has evolved greatly over time to a very different morphology and behavior from the first humans.

The original Out-of-Africa hypothesis claimed that modern humans (us) arose in Africa and colonized the entire world without ever interbreeding with what it considered primitive forms.  The sequencing of the Neanderthal genome has proven that to be wrong.  There was interbreeding.  So either our entire concept of a species is wrong and interbreeding and fertility is possible or we are wrong to claim that these other assorted homos were a separate species at all.  Take your pick and argue away!

[JimBones]

WE may never get a definitive answer because finding an intact HE dna strand will require a stroke of luck of astronomical proportions.  And scholars can look at the evidence we have and argue till the cows come home.

http://johnhawks.net/weblog/topics/moder...frica.html

Under the Multiregional evolution hypothesis, the first humans to leave Africa 1.8 million years ago never divided into different species. Instead, these populations always exchanged genes with each other through recurrent gene flow. Today, we are part of this same species, which has evolved greatly over time to a very different morphology and behavior from the first humans.

The original Out-of-Africa hypothesis claimed that modern humans (us) arose in Africa and colonized the entire world without ever interbreeding with what it considered primitive forms.  The sequencing of the Neanderthal genome has proven that to be wrong.  There was interbreeding.  So either our entire concept of a species is wrong and interbreeding and fertility is possible or we are wrong to claim that these other assorted homos were a separate species at all.  Take your pick and argue away!

No argument here. Not many people know neanderthal DNA is non-existent inside Africa. Perhaps that's why a multi-regional theory on the evolution of pleistocene H. erectus is gaining ground.

[Minimalist]

Yeah, Jim.

As you can probably guess from the earlier comment I think the term species is mis-used or mis-defined.... or incorrect.  Humans who managed to isolate themselves from the rest of humanity interbred and replicated localized traits.  Hence you end up with Pygmies in the Congo, Inuit in the Arctic, Watusi in East Africa, and numerous other tribes scattered about the world.  But they are all human and all capable of interbreeding and it is only isolation ( and social custom ) which stops them. 

We know that HE spread from Africa and had reached Dmanisi in Georgia in the Caucusus some 1.8 million years ago.  The way that the earliest HE specimens evolved over an immense span of time, as noted above far longer than HSS has been around, leads to the possibility that we ARE the descendants of HE who were, for various reasons, isolated into separate groups which led to Heidelbergensis, Neanderthal, Denisovan, Pekinensis, [i]Homo erectus erectus (Java man) [/i]and so on simply evolved in pirvate?

The Dmanisi skull noted here is causing much controversy which is always good in scientific study.

https://www.nature.com/news/skull-sugges...ne-1.13972

One of the most complete early human skulls yet found suggests that what scientists thought were three hominin species may in fact be one.

This controversial claim comes from a comparison between the anatomical features of a 1.8-million-year-old fossil skull with those of four other skulls from the same excavation site at Dmanisi, Georgia. The wide variability in their features suggests that Homo habilis, Homo rudolfensis and Homo erectus, the species so far identified as existing worldwide in that era, might represent a single species. The research is published in Science today

[JimBones]

Yeah, Jim.

As you can probably guess from the earlier comment I think the term species is mis-used or mis-defined.... or incorrect.  Humans who managed to isolate themselves from the rest of humanity interbred and replicated localized traits.  Hence you end up with Pygmies in the Congo, Inuit in the Arctic, Watusi in East Africa, and numerous other tribes scattered about the world.  But they are all human and all capable of interbreeding and it is only isolation ( and social custom ) which stops them. 

We know that HE spread from Africa and had reached Dmanisi in Georgia in the Caucusus some 1.8 million years ago.  The way that the earliest HE specimens evolved over an immense span of time, as noted above far longer than HSS has been around, leads to the possibility that we ARE the descendants of HE who were, for various reasons, isolated into separate groups which led to Heidelbergensis, Neanderthal, Denisovan, Pekinensis, [i]Homo erectus erectus (Java man) [/i]and so on simply evolved in pirvate?

The Dmanisi skull noted here is causing much controversy which is always good in scientific study.

https://www.nature.com/news/skull-sugges...ne-1.13972

One of the most complete early human skulls yet found suggests that what scientists thought were three hominin species may in fact be one.

This controversial claim comes from a comparison between the anatomical features of a 1.8-million-year-old fossil skull with those of four other skulls from the same excavation site at Dmanisi, Georgia. The wide variability in their features suggests that Homo habilis, Homo rudolfensis and Homo erectus, the species so far identified as existing worldwide in that era, might represent a single species. The research is published in Science today

The distribution patterns of our ancestors has become the topic of new ideas and discussion, and for good reason, previously held theories are getting harder to justify. The find in your article and many more are telling us that migration and overlapping territories paint a very different picture than a single distribution event. There was a recent find in San Diego showing evidence of human activities 130kya. This is not proof of H. erectus in N America but can't be ignored either. The fossil gap between H. erectus and H. heidelbergensis, some say, eliminates HH as a direct ancestor but something had been walking around eurasia and N America a lot earlier than previously proposed human distribution theory. If H eructus or another variety dating to 200kya or older is found in the Americas, multi-regional distribution theory will become the new standard. This will surely get more interesting as more finds are made. Thanks for the article.

[Minimalist]

The conditions needed to fossilize anything are so stern that we should be immensely grateful that we have any fossils at all.  So someone bitching about a "gap" is really laughable.  All that a gap means is that no one has been lucky enough to find anything..... yet.  As archaeologists note "the next shovel in the ground can overturn an entire hypothesis."

Like you I am also fascinated by the glimmers of human activity in North America - particularly on the Pacific Coast - which date back.

And then there is Hueyetlaco!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hueyatlaco

Biostratigraphic researcher Sam VanLandingham has published two peer-reviewed analyses that confirm the earlier findings of ca. 250,000ybp for the tool-bearing strata at Hueyatlaco. His 2004 analysis found that Hueyatlaco samples could be dated to the Sangamonian Stage (ca. 80,000 to 220,000ybp) by the presence of multiple diatom species, one of which first appeared during this era and others that became extinct by the era's end.[9] VanLandingham's 2006 paper[10] refined and re-confirmed his 2004 findings.

It's an interesting battle between orthodoxy and radicalism.  As the observation goes "science advances one funeral at a time."

[JimBones]

The conditions needed to fossilize anything are so stern that we should be immensely grateful that we have any fossils at all.  So someone bitching about a "gap" is really laughable.  All that a gap means is that no one has been lucky enough to find anything..... yet.  As archaeologists note "the next shovel in the ground can overturn an entire hypothesis."

Like you I am also fascinated by the glimmers of human activity in North America - particularly on the Pacific Coast - which date back.

And then there is Hueyetlaco!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hueyatlaco

Biostratigraphic researcher Sam VanLandingham has published two peer-reviewed analyses that confirm the earlier findings of ca. 250,000ybp for the tool-bearing strata at Hueyatlaco. His 2004 analysis found that Hueyatlaco samples could be dated to the Sangamonian Stage (ca. 80,000 to 220,000ybp) by the presence of multiple diatom species, one of which first appeared during this era and others that became extinct by the era's end.[9] VanLandingham's 2006 paper[10] refined and re-confirmed his 2004 findings.

It's an interesting battle between orthodoxy and radicalism.  As the observation goes "science advances one funeral at a time."

I'm hoping something good is found in North America.

It's nice to read about new finds in Europe and elsewhere but we have some idea what's there. I would like to see more digs in North America but I know these projects are expensive and rewards await those who find stuff while an unsuccessful dig brings no glory and empty bank accounts. 

Maybe train miners and road workers (doing blasting) to recognize fossils and offer rewards for finds. Or anyone moving dirt around. 

Question? Is there a way to track a thread so an alert is given when new post is made?

[Cavebear]

WE may never get a definitive answer because finding an intact HE dna strand will require a stroke of luck of astronomical proportions.  And scholars can look at the evidence we have and argue till the cows come home.

http://johnhawks.net/weblog/topics/moder...frica.html

Under the Multiregional evolution hypothesis, the first humans to leave Africa 1.8 million years ago never divided into different species. Instead, these populations always exchanged genes with each other through recurrent gene flow. Today, we are part of this same species, which has evolved greatly over time to a very different morphology and behavior from the first humans.

The original Out-of-Africa hypothesis claimed that modern humans (us) arose in Africa and colonized the entire world without ever interbreeding with what it considered primitive forms.  The sequencing of the Neanderthal genome has proven that to be wrong.  There was interbreeding.  So either our entire concept of a species is wrong and interbreeding and fertility is possible or we are wrong to claim that these other assorted homos were a separate species at all.  Take your pick and argue away!

I have always been a multi-regionalist. Where ever any homo species met, they interbred by interest or force. Shared genes, shared advantages from those genes, and spread them geographically back and forth across their entire range. Some isolated populations like Homo floresiensis may have changed (island mammals get smaller; island reptiles get bigger) , but everyone tends to interbreed. Oh what a tangled family tree we have...

[Finite Monkeys]

... 

Question? Is there a way to track a thread so an alert is given when new post is made?

When you reply to a thread there are options to subscribe and receive notifications of new replies just below the reply text box.

[JimBones]

... 

Question? Is there a way to track a thread so an alert is given when new post is made?

When you reply to a thread there are options to subscribe and receive notifications of new replies just below the reply text box.

Thanks for your help, hard to see those on my phone so never bothered to read them. How lazy of me.

[Minimalist]

Buy a desk top with a big freakin' monitor.  Cell phones are an example of evolution going in reverse!

[Cavebear]

Buy a desk top with a big freakin' monitor.  Cell phones are an example of evolution going in reverse!

Never have had a cell or smart phone. I squint at my 19" monitor when not wearing my reading glasses. A little 4x4" display would make me blind in a year.

[JimBones]

Buy a desk top with a big freakin' monitor.  Cell phones are an example of evolution going in reverse!

Yeah, I miss my laptop. When the time is right I'll get another one. For now, make due with what I have.

[Thumpalumpacus]

I never surf forums on my phone, my eyes are going to shit as it is. Laptop only, for me.

[mordant]

Buy a desk top with a big freakin' monitor.  Cell phones are an example of evolution going in reverse!

I stopped evolving when my monitor size hit 30" quite a few years ago. I've learned to get by with 27 inches and multiple desktops for my official workday, and a 13" laptop for everything else, but I draw the line at phones for serious reading and writing.

Some of my colleagues, though ... 3 monitors, with the center one 30" and curved ... that's all the rage for software development, even of smartphone apps. So I'm pretty tame really. But I'm with you that phones are just not the right tool for most jobs. I use mine for little more than phone calls, camera, and in a pinch, reading my main Twitter feed. A few ancillary tools once in a great while, like a compass or flashlight. They are handy things, but looking at the world through a peep-hole 100% of the time would drive me nuts.

Apologies to people who have nothing else. I feel your pain. And we're not even discussing the typical shit Internet service in this country.

[Minimalist]

I found that as my eyes got older my monitor got bigger.

[skyking]

@JimBones
"Maybe train miners and road workers (doing blasting) to recognize fossils and offer rewards for finds. Or anyone moving dirt around. "
I have been digging up things since 1980, and we all notice unusual stuff and stop to check it out. It is the human thing to do, to be curious
I have worked on jobs with known early tribal presence, and had some training to be aware of what we might find. The most recent one was at the site of Fort Nisqually near Dupont, Washington.
We had onsite archaeologists, and stopped for any middens or even arrowheads that we would find. Even from the seat of a huge excavator, you notice the smallest things sometimes.
We did come across some Native American remains, and had a ceremony re-interring them by the tribe overseeing the project. We also uncovered shallow coffins of fort settlers.