Fossil Suggests Human, Ape Ancestor Hails From Asia
June 30, 2009 -- A new Myanmar fossil primate, Ganlea megacanina, suggests the common ancestor of humans, monkeys and apes evolved from large-toothed primates in Asia and not Africa, according to new research published in the latest Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
If Myanmar, formerly called Burma, is confirmed as being the ancestral homeland of higher primates, or close to it, the discovery points to a circuitous migration route for some early primates, which must have gone to Africa and then come back to Asia. . . . Beard still believes modern humans descended from an African population that lived around 200,000 years ago. "But," he said, "some extinct species of humans, such as the 'hobbit' Homo floresiensis, almost certainly evolved in Asia." (Read the article thing here.)
This is interesting on a couple of levels, the first is that it shows the idea of evolution as a scientific theory is almost a joke. The whole thing can be turned on its head. At the very least it still evolving. The admittance that Homo floresiensis "almost certainly evolved in Asia" has huge implications. One of the big holes in the Vedic narative was India being the center of everything, when genetic evidence seemed to indicate that people migrated out of Africa. But it looks like the same evidence could also be used to show that people migrated to Africa from Asia. This is important for anyone who accepts the Vedic paradigm, whether we except the Vedas literally or whether we accept some type of guided theistic evolution.
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4 comments:
nice GKD. thanks for posting this. I was always uncertain of this aspect of our philosophy. It seemed non-different than other religions which place particular regions of the world as the center of life. It is clear through this example that finding "evidence" is often an exericse is futility.
I think you are drawing the wrong conclusion.
First the history of evolutionary change (i.e., which species evolved where) is incomplete and will be revised. Not surprising since it is like seeing the picture of a jigsaw puzzle when most of the pieces are missing.
This post conflates three different time periods.
1. This new fossil is about 38 million years old. This is old and before many of the modern families of primates had arisen (i.e., no Old World monkeys or apes [and humans are an ape] but instead animals that were ancestors of both groups). This fossil seems to be a close relation of these common ancestors.
There are three possibilities here (actually more than three). One that these ancestors started in Africa but spread elsewhere including Asia. Two these ancestors started in this part of Asia but spread elsewhere. Three these ancestors started somewhere else (e.g., mid-East) and spread both to Asia and to African.
2. For the timeframe of 1.4 million years ago to 6 million years ago the fossil evidence points to the direct human ancestors as having lived in Africa. Finding hominid fossils in that timeframe in Asia might change views about human history.
3. Much later on (about 1.4 million years ago), Homo erectus proved to be very successful and spread out over Asia.
4. Modern humans seem to have arisen in Africa and then also spread to the rest of the world in the last 100,000 years or so.
5. Homo floresiensis is still being investigated. It might well have evolved from a Homo erectus population there while modern humans, Homo sapiens, evolved from a Homo erectus population in Africa.
As I mentioned this is a jigsaw and pieces will be rearranged as more pieces come in and the picture becomes clearer.
Second, having humans arise in Asia in no way changes scientists views on evolution as a mechanism for speciation only where the speciation took place.
Evolution is a huge topic, and I have about 60 seconds. The fossil record does not support darwinian evolution. You can read some of Stephen J. Gould's work on punctuated equilibrium for that.
There is actually also alot of evidence that flatly contradicts any kind of evolutionary theory, evidence of humans alive hundreds of millions of years ago. If you're interested I would recommend you check out Forbidden Archeology by Micheal Cremo and Richard Thompson.
There is also good evidence indicating that random mutation could not possibly produce speiciation, I would highly recomend you read Behe's most recent book "The Edge of Evolution."
That being said I am not dead set against the idea of any kind of evolution, it is an interesting topic.
hopefully more later.
Stephen Jay Gould was very much an evolutionist. The idea of punctuated equilibrium is an issue only against gradualism, not against evolution itself.
I have seen Forbidden Archaeology - it is a well-organized book but as expected from authors who are not professional archaeologists but believers in a version of Creationism they want to prove, the evidence and arguments they rely on are substandard - please see http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/mom/groves.html
Pls see http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/mom/groves.html
While Behe's "The Edge of evolution" can be discussed at length, the relevant point here is that Behe's book does not dispute the evolution of humans in Africa from apes (the claim you are disputing). Thus, it does not help your case here to cite Behe. He supports common descent like evolutionists but believes the mechanism of random mutations and natural selection is not sufficient.
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