Multi-Regional Continuity: The Fossil Evidence
With regards to the multi-regional continuity model of human evolution, there is without a doubt a preponderance of fossil data that supports the diverse origins of Homo sapiens in different regions of the globe. Skulls displaying a wide variety of mixed modern and archaic features have been found in every corner of the world. The mere existence of these fossils is evidence enough to prove that human evolution was far less cut-and-dried a process than the advocates of the replacement model of human evolution would like to suggest, and, in fact, rather astonishingly complex.
It is useful before discussing the individual fossil specimens to to preface with what exactly is meant by the terms “modern'; and “archaic'; in reference to skull morphology. “Modern'; features in skull morphology as the word is used here include thin cranial walls, small supraorbital ridges, small teeth, small eye sockets, broad, flat foreheads, large cranial volume (above 1200 cc.), low prognathism in the area of the lower face, and a high, vaulted shape in the area of the cranium. “Archaic'; features in skull morphology include thick cranial walls, heavy supraorbital ridges, large teeth, large eye sockets, sloping foreheads, low cranial volume (below 1200 cc.), high prognathism in the area of the lower face, and a small, football-shaped cranium. The presence of various mixtures of these modern and archaic traits forms the basis for identifying a fossil as transitional modern/archaic in accordance with the multi-regional continuity model of human evolution.
As an example of transitional fossils found outside of Africa and in accordance with the multi-regional model of human evolution, the remains found in the Ngangdong beds of the Solo River in Indonesia are an excellent beginning. Dating from roughly 250,000 years ago, the skulls of the thirteen individual recovered lack faces, but the crania are markedly archaic, football-shaped and flattened in general contour (Poirier 1987: 222). Other archaic features include heavy supraorbital ridges and thick cranial walls (222). Their archaic features put the Solo remains in the classification of Homo erectus, but the skulls display at least one distinctive modern tra...
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...he replacement modelers might argue, the examples given for the multi-regional model are isolated freaks. This claim, too, however, is easily disproved by examples of transitionals from outside Africa for which large fossil sample populations exist, as in the case of the Solo River and Arago Cave examples detailed earlier. What becomes clear in the process of examining the many-and-varied fossil examples of transitions between modern and archaic features is that human evolution was more of a tangled, convoluted web than it is the neatly pruned tree that many textbooks are so fond of depicting in illustration. Not all of those specimens detailed here could be the ancestors of modern humans...their odd mixture of features is testament enough to that. But that human evolution was an unfocused, even chaotic process seems less-and-less an overstatement, the more evidence is reviewed. The definition of what are commonly referred to as “modern'; and “archaic'; features may be the results finally of no more than luck of the evolutionary draw, as it were.
Works Cited
Poirier, Frank E.
1987 Understanding Human Evolution. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, Prentice-Hall, Inc.
The skull analysis of Neanderthals and Homo sapiens are usually considered more accurate if the entire skull is examined, rather than certain ... ... middle of paper ... ... ated form” (IBT, 1). To figure things like this out and prove it, regions of genomes are compared with entire genomes. Before we are able to judge the human origins model, we need to be able to understand the coding of genes for traits of being human, etc.
Australopithecus afarensis who existed 3.5 million years ago and a 4.4 million year old skeleton of an Ardipithecus ramidus are the closest science has come to discovering the human lineage. Shattered Ancestry an article written by Katherine Harmon discusses the remains of two hominids found within Ethiopia. These skeletal remains have created a huge controversy within the topic of evolution questioning many assumptions that have been made referencing the human lineage. The skeleton of the Australopithecus afarensis was named Lucy and was discovered in 1974. The evidence of her walking upright on her two feet essentially guaranteed her a spot in the human lineage line. Lucy was a chimplike ape that was said to walk upright making scientists believe the human ancestry was simple. The complete skeleton found in Ethiopia of an Ardipithecus ramidus named Ardi completely changed all assumptions made from scientists about the complexity of the human lineage. These remains have encouraged researches that the human line is not the only lineage to have evolved but the chimpanzee line has undergone drastic changes as well. There are many traits that researchers have always directly linked to the human lineage however since these discoveries occurred researchers are reconsidering. The recent discoveries that have shattered what has always suggested what linked a species to the human lineage have changed the certainty of whether it is possible to confidently identify the human’s last common ancestor. Majority of scientist had forgotten that there would have been many hominid species living together at one time. New theories have been suggested since scientists revealed that the foot of a hominid found called the Burtele site was found ju...
As archeological discoveries of bone fragments and fossils continue to support the existence of homo-sapiens
Three incomplete skulls of Homo sapiens were discovered in 1997. Bruce Bower’s article “African Legacy: Fossils plug gap in human origins” discusses the fossils. These findings are important because according to the discoverers, they are the oldest known fossils of modern people. The skulls were found in Herto, Ethiopian located in eastern Africa. The fossils are dated between 154,000 and 160,000 years ago.i[1] The fossils were dated radioisotopically.ii[2] Since the fossils are the oldest known fossils of modern people, it is probable that these hominids represent the immediate ancestors of humans that are anatomically modern. Tim D. White’s (et al) article “Pleistocene Homo sapiens from Middle Awash, Ethiopia” describes the discovery of the Herto fossils and the research of the artifacts in great detail.
Rheumatoid arthritis is a chronic inflammatory and an autoimmune disease that occurs when the immune system mistakenly attacks the body’s tissue (Rheumatoid arthritis, 2017). This disease affects the entire body, which is called a systemic (means entire body) disease. Arthritis is derived from the word part arthr-, which means “joint,” and -itis, which means “inflammation,” so altogether it means “inflammation of the joints.” It creates inflammation that causes the tissue that lines the inside of joints (synovium) to thicken. About 1.5 million people in the U.S. are affected. It affects all races, but it affects three times as many women than men (What is Rheumatoid Arthritis, n.d.). Overtime, rheumatoid arthritis causes painful swelling that can potentially result in bone erosion or joint deformity, which leads up to physical disabilities. RA can affect more than just your joints, but can spread to body systems, skin, eyes, lungs, heart, blood vessels, e.t.c (Rheumatoid arthritis, 2017).
Australopithecus afarensis existed between 3.9 and 3.0 million years ago. The distinctive characteristics of A. afarensis were: a low forehead, a bony ridge over the eyes, a flat nose, no chin, more humanlike teeth, pelvis and leg bones resembled those of modern man. Females were smaller than males. Their sexual dimorphism was males:females; 1.5. A. afarensis was not as sexually dimorphic as gorillas, but more sexually dimorphic than humans or chimpanzees. A lot of scientists think that Australopithecus afarensis was partially adapted to climbing the trees, because the fingers and toe bones of the species were curved and longer than the ones of the modern human.
The world is filled with many ambitious people looking to make a product to help the world and make a living for themselves and their families. These people are known as entrepreneurs. An entrepreneur is someone who organizes and operates a business or businesses while running the risk of losing everything to make money. One might ask why there is a risk ...
Arthritis is a general term for approximately 100 diseases that produce either INFLAMMATION of connective tissues, particularly in joints, or noninflammatory degeneration of these tissues. The word means "joint inflammation," but because other structures are also affected, the diseases are often called connective tissue diseases. The terms rheumatism and rheumatic diseases are also used. Besides conditions so named, the diseases include gout, lupus erythematosus, ankylosing spondylitis, degenerative joint disease, and many others, among them the more recently identified LYME DISEASE.
According to rationalwiki,“Multiregionalism or the Multiregional Evolution (MRE) hypothesis is a model of Pleistocene human evolution, which argues the human species emerged in Africa 2 million years ago, and developed their modern forms in every area of the Old World.” This specific theory states that modern humans came from different ancestors that were descendants of a more common ancestor, Homo erectus. According to this theory, Neanderthals are only an ancestor of some Homo sapiens today, around the Europe area, and not the ancestors of Homo sapiens from other parts of the globe. The evidence for this, explained by American Institute of Biological Science, are facts such as that after each region 's common ancestor, there was a lot of interbreeding that caused the one Homo sapien species today. That being said, the excess of interbreeding this theory suggests, assumes that that is the primary causation for why modern day Homo sapiens don’t look different from each other despite having different
It is necessary to look at the development of artificial intelligence in order to put this idea into context. The concept of intelligent and aware constructs began to emerge in the 1950s and 60s as several scientists in many fields came together to discuss the possibilities of advanced computer research. The first major step was a scientific conference at Dartmouth College in 1956. Here, the general concepts and possible paths of research for a.i. were fleshed out. As described in Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach, this conference was “the birth of artificial intelligence.” This was mostly a theoretical stage yet attending experts predicted that with a huge investment, working technology could be available in a generation (16). After being officially established, a.i. research and discovery exploded. Computer programs, a brand new idea, were already conquering algebra problems and speech recognition. Some could even reproduce English (18). It was clear that artificial intelligence research was going to be at the fo...
...e single origin perspective but not the multiregional perspective (1988). For example, the first appearance of Homo sapiens raises problems. The newest fossils of Homo sapiens were discovered in Africa while Europe, the Far East and Australia have the oldest fossils (Stringer & Andrew 1988). If there was one linearly evolving species we should see the oldest fossils in Africa. Also, Although Europe and southwest Asia have the most complete fossil record there is an absence of Neanderthal and modern Homo sapiens transitional fossils, which goes against the idea that species evolved together (Stringer & Andrew, 1988). The fossils better describe the single origin perspective.
The human archaeological record is a long and undefined story that may be the most complex question researched today. One of the big questions in human history is the disappearance of the Neanderthal people from the archaeological record around 30,000 BP. While for thousands of years Neanderthals and Anatomically modern humans crossed paths and perhaps lived in close relations, we have yet to really understand the degree to which they lived together. My hypothesis is that these two hominids, Neanderthals and Anatomically Modern Humans, interbred exchanging genes after Modern Humans dispersed from Africa and creating like cultures and material remains. The differences between Neanderthal and Modern humans are not only physical but also genetically evolved and this research will determine an estimated amount of admixture between the two groups.
“Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is an autoimmune disease in which your body’s immune system – which protects your health by attacking foreign substances like bacteria and viruses – mistakenly attacks your joints. The abnormal immune response causes inflammation that can damage joints and organs, such as the heart. Early diagnosis and prompt treatment is the key to preventing joint destruction and organ damage.”(Rheumatoid Arthritis). This is the definition I found but when most people read this they think it is too complex and hard to understand. So, I began asking questions like is it hereditary, are the medicines she will take be harmful, and can it be prevented? So my big question is, is this disease going to limit my grandmother from doing her normal activities and will she still be able to have a...
Rheumatoid arthritis is a disease that has direct involvement with the immune system. This disease is considered to be degenerative and currently the only thing that can be done is manage the painful symptoms and suppress the self targeting actions by using immune suppressing drugs. The cause of rheumatoid arthritis is mostly unknown but there is a high amount of evidence that there are genetic predispositions for the disease. This being said however there are also environmental factors to asses these include, bacteria, viruses, fungi and other environmental factors. Doctors primarily use a physical examination to first suspect R.A. then send for blood work to confirm. There are many aspects to this disease and many questions left unanswered, the treatments available now are only temporarily and can in some cases cause more problems than benefits. Lab experiments and clinical trials are currently showing some great results and could within our lifetimes cure many autoimmune diseases including R.A..
Arthritis occurs when the body incorrectly identifies its own tissue as foreign matter and attacks it. Arthritis includes a set of more than eighty autoimmune diseases. Arthritis attacks connective tissues and joints. It causes stiffness, pain, inflammation, and swelling of the joints. Some kinds are crippling, but rarely leads to death. There are many different kinds of arthritis, the main ones being Osteoarthritis and Rheumatoid arthritis; others include gout and ankylosing spodylitis.