Guest guest Posted October 29, 2004 Report Share Posted October 29, 2004 >From BBC news website: Eton or the zoo? (extract of article) By Desmond Morris The discovery of a new species of human poses exciting questions about who we are. How would we treat this close relative if one were found alive today? Every time an intrepid anthropologist discovers an old tooth or part of a jawbone that might possibly have come from one of our ancient ancestors, there is a flurry of excitement. Before long a whole skull, then a whole body and finally a whole human society has been deduced from this tiny fragment. A male Homo floresiensis may have looked something like this (Image: National Geographic) We are so desperate to know where we came from that this game of inventing the past has been played over and over again. The truth, if we are honest, is that there still remains a huge gap in our knowledge of what happened between the time of our remote ancestors and our more recent ones. What occurred in that "great gap", several million years ago, is anybody's guess - and guesses there have been aplenty. But the new discovery of a tiny, 3ft tall, flat-faced, bipedal "ape-man" on the Indonesian island of Flores is rather different. Here, the skeletal remains are not only much more detailed, but they are found in caves along with delicate stone tools and evidence of fire-making and the hunting of large game. What is more, these hunters existed as recently as 12,000 years ago and, who knows, living groups of them may still be lingering on in odd corners even today. This is shattering news and will create fascinating problems for both political and religious leaders. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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