New Species of Homo Discovered: Homo naledi

So these are all the results of "rapid phenotypic variation" of humans? (But don't call it evolution, that's a bad word.)

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Does this look human to you?

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Agnostic: " No... it seems to be a creationist or an atheist..."

This is an extremely interesting topic and this bit is nuts: Could any of you wedge yourself into an unknown cavern just to hopefully see some bones? Who the hell "takes a rest" by hopping down a hole in a cave? The find is worth it, so I applaud the ballsy, advernterous SOB for doing it. And here I sit, on my ass in my office, mucking about with a computer. Get outside man! I always thought of Archaeology like a bunch of people slowly chipping away tiny bits of earth, inches at a time. This is a great sounding adventure though. So is a timeline the only thing separating certain species from other similar species? If this creature existed a mere 30 thousand years ago, that would put it well outside of our ancestry due to what we already know about H.Sapiens existence during that time? However, if it is found to be 3 million years old, it is more likely to be within our evolutionary timeline? This was the first question I had as well. I assumed they were simply curious, then fell and died. That is probably due to anthropomorphising them, though, since that is precisely what our human counterparts were doing. I imagine more basal beings would be more keen on survival than adventure and any remains found would be deliberate. Especially with such limited brain capacity. So would that make this one very small group of a species that lived there for a short period of time? How long does a typical mammalian animal family occupy a certain area? If it were a regular burial site with no other disturbance, wouldn't there be more than 15 bodies? It's a cave, so little would have disturbed it. Think of a tract of land considered to be "bear country" (Alaskan riverbanks full of salmon, for example). How long is it a place known to be frequented by bears? Would there not be a particular spot that had more than 15 bodies if it were a place frequented by the dead of that animal?Why is dating the specimens not critical?I had hoped that a yearlong hiatus would return more fruitful results in the form of more in depth discussions, but I see not a damn thing has changed. Excellent submission choice nonetheless, Percy.Edited by hooah212002, : No reason given.

Funny, I read Homo naledi as Homo nailed.....

aka biological evolution. It is the same thing. What you mention is one form of biological evolution i.e. the isolation of genetic traits in the form of phenotypic variation. Biological evolution is genetic change over time (sometimes rapid, sometimes not depending on what is driving this change). The real question is what drives this change (phenotypic variation) and what happens when this genetic variation is so great that organisms are not able to mate with each other (speciation).Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.

I originally initiated this thread just to post some recent news. Discussions aren't usually held in the Creation/Evolution In The News forum, but now that a discussion is taking place this thread should probably be moved to the Biological Evolution forum, even though it hasn't gone through the normal vetting process over at Proposed New Topics. If no one posts any objections over the next 24 hours then I'll go ahead and move this thread over to Biological Evolution.

That should cover it, I guess.So God created "wildly different versions" of human beings before the Flood, narrowed it down to a few individuals of one specific variation with the Flood, then post-Flood conditions created "rapid phenotypic variation" which had time to develop extensive phenotypic variations that would flourish, disappear and fossilize. All of this in 6000 years.Am I with you so far?Edited by Omnivorous, : clarity

Thanks for the technical paper link, Percy. All I had see to date was a video on facebook that showed the difficulty of navigating the cave.The page link is: This Face Changes the Human Story. But How?

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The bones were superbly preserved, and from the duplication of body parts, it soon became clear that there was not one skeleton in the cave, but two, then three, then five ... then so many it was hard to keep a clear count. ...

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There were some 1,550 specimens in all, representing at least 15 individuals. Skulls. Jaws. Ribs. Dozens of teeth. A nearly complete foot. A hand, virtually every bone intact, arranged as in life. Minuscule bones of the inner ear. Elderly adults. Juveniles. Infants, identified by their thimble-size vertebrae. Parts of the skeletons looked astonishingly modern. But others were just as astonishingly primitivein some cases, even more apelike than the australopithecines. We’ve found a most remarkable creature, Berger said. His grin went nearly to his ears.

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... But these teeth weren’t like anything the scientists in the tooth booth had ever seen. Some features were astonishingly humanlikethe molar crowns were small, for instance, with five cusps like ours. But the premolar roots were weirdly primitive. ...

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The same schizoid pattern was popping up at the other tables. A fully modern hand sported wackily curved fingers, fit for a creature climbing trees. The shoulders were apish too, and the widely flaring blades of the pelvis were as primitive as Lucy’sbut the bottom of the same pelvis looked like a modern human’s. The leg bones started out shaped like an australopithecine’s but gathered modernity as they descended toward the ground. The feet were virtually indistinguishable from our own.

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When you read the articles and see repeated references to the fossils showing a mixture of primitive and derived characteristics, you can see the evolution of traits found in our skeletons ... and when you go to the technical paper these aspects are laid out in detail.You'll have to page down to the video. It also says, "The NOVA/National Geographic Special, Dawn of Humanity, premieres Sept. 16, 2015, at 9 p.m. ET/8 p.m. CT on PBS in the United States and is streaming online now.Another good source is: South African Cave Yields Strange Bones Of Early Human-Like Species

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He notes that only a small section of the cave chamber has been excavated, and it looks like many more bones are down there.

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"There is the potential for thousands of specimens in that cave," says Wood. "Intellectually, it's a real puzzle. And I think it's going to take scientists quite a time to get their heads around what the real significance of these discoveries is."

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So ... watch this space, more to come ...The combination of derived modern traits with primitive ancestral traits is what shows this to be a transitional species, fitting between Australopithicus and Homosapien fossils. It will be interesting to see how they date this find.EnjoyEdited by RAZD, : added comment

There are only a few problems with your post Faith; the fact that neither of the Biblical floods ever happened and that the genetics from humans thousands of years before they supposed dates of the flood show the people as far back as when the imaginary Adam character would have lived show the same genomes as people living today.

Not entirely. I was figuring that very different types like Neanderthal had to be antediluvian, and all those died in the Flood. About 4300 years ago. All THOSE fossilized. But living things including human beings that were preserved on the ark are what spread out after the Flood, rapidly developing the new phenotypes or new races and breeds, that make up today's range of creatures.

All I'm saying here is that there is variation built into the human genome, a lot of variation, but it will never produce anything but a recognizable human being. Same with the genome of every other creature. Lots of variation but recognizably same creature. You will not get an ape-like human. That artist's concept is ridiculous. If the bones suggest that kind of physiognomy it's not a human being.Speciation is just a point in the microevolution where genetic differences caused by the reduction in genetic variability make breeding impossible. It's still the same creature. The idea that it's a new species is completely bogus, just an assumption based on the theory.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

And what about the ones that did not fossilize? The bones in this cave are not fossilized ...How can some bones fossilize and some bones not fossilize when they are all subjected to the same flood condition that you claim universally causes (somehow) the fossilization.Enjoy

So, again, are these all "recognisable human beings"? If not, please recognize the ones that are. I hardly know what to say, except to direct you to the definitions of "species" and "speciation".

I don't think A is a human being.

Talking snakes are funnier.