australopithecine

Three-dimensional models of hominoid skulls used in the study - (a) Hylobates lar; (b) Pongo pygmaeus; (c) Pan troglodytes; (d) Gorilla gorilla; (e) Australopithecus africanus; (f ) Paranthropus boisei; (g) Homo sapiens. They have been scaled to the same surface area, and the colors denote areas of stress (blue = minimal stress, pink = high stress). From Wroe et al, 2010. It is all too easy to think of human evolution in linear terms. From our 21st century vantage point we can look back through Deep Time for the first glimmerings of the traits we see in ourselves, and despite what we have…

A diagram of how the skeletons of Australopithecus sediba came to be preserved in the Malapa cave deposit. From Dirks et al, 2010. A little less than two million years ago, in what is now South Africa, a torrential downpour washed the bodies of two humans into the deep recesses of a cave. Just how their remains came to be in the cave in the first place is a mystery. Perhaps they fell in through the gaping hole in the cave roof just as hyenas, saber-toothed cats, horses, and other animals had, but, however the humans entered the cave, their bones ultimately came to rest in a natural bowl…

According to multiple reports released yesterday, scientists will announce the discovery of a new species of two-million-year-old hominin this week. Do you know what that means? That's right; writers are breaking out the pop-sci boilerplate to tell us all about the new "missing link." To paraphrase what I have seen in the headlines alone, the find is the "missing link which will shed new light on human evolution and rewrite what we thought we knew about our history." I don't believe the hype, but I can only speculate on the actual significance of the specimens in question. According to the…

A comparison of three-dimensional scans of hominin footprints. Top) A footprint made by an experimental subject using a normal, "extended" gait. Middle) A footprint made by an experimental subject using a "bent-knee, bent-hip" gait. Bottom) A Laetoli footprints. From Raichlen et al., 2010. About 3.6 million years ago, at a spot now in Laetoli, Tanzania, a pair of hominins trudged through the ashfall dumped onto the landscape by a nearby volcano. We don't know for certain what they looked like (it is generally believed that they were Australopithecus afarensis from the presence of fossils…