What do greys look like?
Joseph Abbott
If life evolved on another planet, maybe even in another
galaxy, then why would they look so much like people?
I mean, they have two eyes, two ears, a nose with two nostals,
on a head all placed in approximatly the same places. They
have two arm with shoulders, and elbows and hands with fingers,
they have a torso like us with two legs attatched, they stand
up right they even build machines and have language and
do experiments on other animals to learn about them-
JUST LIKE US! These aliens that people always see
look more like people than chimps do. And chimp's DNA
is about 99% indentical to ours!
How could life from another planet look more human
than any other life form on our own planet?
Brian Hosler
Maybe we're nothing more than an experiment in genetics for the greys?
Maybe most advanced life requires an environment similar to that on
Earth. It could be that on a planet like Earth, bipedal, upright
beings with stereoscopic vision and a large brain are required for
advanced technological development.
I've read in many astronomy books that for life to start up and be
able to develope into advanced forms it needs the following.
1. Terrestrial planet (not Jovian Gaseous)
2. Placed in orbit of a G type star close enough for heat
3. Placed in orbit of a G type star far away enough to avoid excessive
radiation.
4. Hot core and plaűte techtonics for atmospheric rejuvination.
Incidently, without plate techtonics all our carbon dioxide would
be eventually washed out of the atmosphere and we would end up like
mars.
5. No asteroid belts intersecting planets orbit.
It seems that life needs a planet similar to earth doesn't it.
So why not have advanced creatures who look like man?
I personally like the alien genetic experiment theory more---more drama.
--
Joseph Abbott
Or maybe the reason "Aliens" look like little people
with big eyes is because they are scarier that way.
A distortion of the human form is more frightening than
just a shape-less green blob. In many stories throughout
the world there are little green men. They might be goblins
or demons or whatever. I thing the reason this form of
alien is so appealing is because it is draws on our own
fears. The whole alien myth is about our fears. They are a superior
race with deformed human bodies and big black eyes, they kidnap
people and do scientific experiments on them, and the
Government is covering it all up! This makes for some
really good (and some not so good) movies and TV shows.
There is even a newsgroup about it right?
Maybe the reason people always claim to see this kind
ofalien is because they have little or no imagination
or their minds draw on subconscious thoughts and fears
so they think they see "aliens". Maybe their is no
such thing as an alien. Maybe people just create
them in there imaginations.
*Joe*
Jeremy Konopka
>If life evolved on another planet, maybe even in another
>galaxy, then why would they look so much like people?
Lack of imagination on the part of the people making this stuff up?
There are some (IMO bogus) arguments that intelligent life that travels
would have to look like us, but given a sample size of 1 that is nothing
more than conjecture. Even if it is couched with probabilities etc.
[...]
--
Jeremy Konopka | opinions mine |
Choushizenteki na imeiji
Of course it would make sense for us to believe that in order for there to
be life an environment must form in the same manner in which our own has
formed. This type of thinking is far to close-minded and limiting, the
same as a person in one country saying "people always do this and
that....."etc. not considering that people outside his race, in other
countries, of other cultures NEVER do this or that....
Those parameters may apply for life as WE know it to fluorish
, but to say that they are necessary for life all inclusive.....
Perhaps it is the goal of creater of life, beit nature or God or what have
you, to produce a being with the maximum possible thinking power and the
most efficient physical form to carry out whatever that mind imagined....
(The human body is an unbelievable machine, if in perfect health and I
assure you none of us are.....but that would be another post....book
rather....)
Ed Cannon
(Brian Hosler) writes:
>Date: Thu, 20 Jan 1994 19:34:48 GMT
>
>In a previous article, abb...@unixg.ubc.ca (Joseph Abbott) says:
>>
>>If life evolved on another planet, maybe even in another
>>galaxy, then why would they look so much like people?
>>I mean, they have two eyes, two ears, a nose with two nostals,
>>on a head all placed in approximatly the same places. They
>>have two arm with shoulders, and elbows and hands with fingers,
>>they have a torso like us with two legs attatched, they stand
>>up right they even build machines and have language and
>>do experiments on other animals to learn about them-
>>JUST LIKE US! These aliens that people always see
>>look more like people than chimps do. And chimp's DNA
>>is about 99% indentical to ours!
>>
>>How could life from another planet look more human
>>than any other life form on our own planet?
Joseph, IMHO this is a good question, although I tend to think the general
features (of a highly technological species) would almost have to be
similar -- similar senses, endo-skeleton, "hands" (to develop and manipulate
technology), upright posture (an animal that walks on all fours [or sixes!]
will be less likely to develop hands), probably terrestrial species (sea
creatures are either intertebrate or don't develop hands; flying species
don't have hands -- flightless birds might evolve from wings to hands in
a conducive environment). They'd have to be social animals to develop
complex culture. Obviously complex communication ability is required, also.
I have wondered from time to time what raccoons, squirrels, bears, "bush
babies" (those cute little animals in southern Africa that are social,
stand upright, and apparently have fairly flexible front paws), other
primates and other types of animals with "hand" potential would have
developed into if we had not got there first. What would they look like?
How large would they be? (Intelligent life and culture might require long
lifespan, and small animals don't live very long -- except birds.) Etc.
The only exceptions I can think of to "generally similar to humanoid"
are either species that could develop an advanced "psychokinetic technology"
(if such were possible, but I think not), or species (or maybe pairs of
symbiotic species) which develop highly specialized and variant individuals,
some of whom could develop and manipulate technology. (Besides termites,
ants, bees & wasps, only naked mole rats, as far as I know, have anything
like this possibility.)
More on planetary necessities below, in response to Brian.
>Maybe we're nothing more than an experiment in genetics for the greys?
>
>Maybe most advanced life requires an environment similar to that on
>Earth. It could be that on a planet like Earth, bipedal, upright
>beings with stereoscopic vision and a large brain are required for
>advanced technological development.
>
>I've read in many astronomy books that for life to start up and be
>able to develope into advanced forms it needs the following.
>
>1. Terrestrial planet (not Jovian Gaseous)
>2. Placed in orbit of a G type star close enough for heat
>3. Placed in orbit of a G type star far away enough to avoid excessive
> radiation.
>4. Hot core and plaūte techtonics for atmospheric rejuvination.
> Incidently, without plate techtonics all our carbon dioxide would
> be eventually washed out of the atmosphere and we would end up like
> mars.
>5. No asteroid belts intersecting planets orbit.
>
>It seems that life needs a planet similar to earth doesn't it.
>So why not have advanced creatures who look like man?
>I personally like the alien genetic experiment theory more---more drama.
>--
Brian, I agree with you and want to augment your list:
1b. Sufficient size to retain necessary atmosphere.
2&3a.Solitary stars only. [Stable orbits of such a form as to be conducive
to the development of life would be exceedingly improbable around
plural star systems, I would think.
2&3b.Orbit near enough to circular to avoid too extreme highs and lows
of stellar radiation.
3c. System far enough away from stellar neighbors so as to avoid being
blasted by a nova and/or supernova long enough for life to develop.
3d. Far enough away from planetary neighbors to have a stable orbit.
4b. [Speculative] A large enough satellite to induce significant tidal
variation at seashores. [To what extent does the moon also affect
significantly atmospheric circulation and even perhaps plate tectonics?]
5b. Limited number of large comets intersecting orbit so as to avoid too
frequent massive impacts. Note: very recently it has been suggested
that the presence of a Jovian planet might be required to divert
asteroids and/or comets from terran candidate planets.
6a. Rotate on axis, so that heat & cold are more evenly distributed over
whole surface of planet.
6b. Axis significantly out of plane of orbit, so whole surface of planet
subject to stellar light & warmth.
7. [Speculative] Have magnetic field that is stable enough so that most
of surface is shielded from certain types of excessively damaging
radiation & particles. [I believe this requires rotation, also.]
8. Have enough carbon, hydrogen, oxygen & nitrogen, etc. (or analogs, if
life based on other elements is possible).
It seems to me that the conditions necessary to the development of a species
that could and would produce a highly technological culture are so specific
and stringent that such species would in general terms resemble one another.
We could even ask to what extent the conditions necessary to produce DNA
would tend to produce DNA more similar to terran DNA than not....
I think that highly technological cultures must be rare in space and time.
(For example, before a certain point in the history of the universe the
necessary elements were either not present or not distributed in the
requisite amounts.) Thus, the likelihood of us encountering such a species
from another stellar system is very small, though not impossible.
Ed Cannon
stringent that
Ville V Walveranta
: Can someone who is familiar with the various theories of
: evolution explain why MAN (and WOMAN ;-) is the only
: intelligent species on the planet? I can understand
: that one species must be the most intelligent, but
: why are the other species seemingly so far behind?
: Why isn't some other species at least, say, 50% as
: smart as humans?
How do you know? The dolphins have a proportionally larger
cerebral cortex than we humans do. Maybe that's why the UFO's
are sometimes seen to plounge into the sea, or zooming
out from the water..
// Wil
--
*** Ville V. Walveranta Primary email...: w...@shell.portal.com *********
*** 96 Linda Ave., Apt. #5 Secondary email: w...@muncca.fi *******
*** Oakland, CA 94611-4838 Tel./Facsimile: +1 (510) 420-0729 *****
*** USA <faxes automatically recognized> ***
Clint.Laskowski
evolution explain why MAN (and WOMAN ;-) is the only
intelligent species on the planet? I can understand
that one species must be the most intelligent, but
why are the other species seemingly so far behind?
Why isn't some other species at least, say, 50% as
smart as humans?
(OK, I know my spelling, grammar, wording, etc.
doesn't add much to the "intelligent human" concept,
but please, just answer my question -- no flames
required :-)
Clint
--
* CLINT LASKOWSKI
* Internet: <clint.l...@mixcom.com>
Jeremy Konopka
>Can someone who is familiar with the various theories of
>evolution explain why MAN (and WOMAN ;-) is the only
>intelligent species on the planet? I can understand
>that one species must be the most intelligent, but
>why are the other species seemingly so far behind?
>Why isn't some other species at least, say, 50% as
>smart as humans?
You're ignoring the great apes. They are quite intelligent, but saying
50% as smart is meaningless. They live in a different world then we do.
The ones that have been brought up with humans (almost as humans) have
understood the concepts of a language, can communicate abstract ideas etc.
They are at least a smart as children, and are children 50% as smart as
adults?
Some new experiments have shown that seals can learn symbolic relationships
between objects. Dolphins are clever, even elephants have used tools in
a surprising variety of ways. It's all a matter of definition.
>(OK, I know my spelling, grammar, wording, etc.
>doesn't add much to the "intelligent human" concept,
>but please, just answer my question -- no flames
>required :-)
>
>Clint
>
>--
>* CLINT LASKOWSKI
>* Internet: <clint.l...@mixcom.com>
--
Jeremy Konopka | opinions mine |
"It is a profound and necessary truth that the deep things in science are
not found because they are useful; they are found because it was possible
to find them." - Robert Oppenheimer
Joseph Abbott
A few million years ago there were more than one
species of intelligent life on earth. There were
two types of austreopithicus (sp?). Robustus
was the biggest and had the biggest brain, Africanus
was smaller. Lucy was a Africanus. They both used
tools and were intelligent.
Anyways, it seems that the both started in africa and
moved out to Europe and Asia. But for some reason
Robustus died out. I don't think anyone knows why.
Possibly this planet is only big enough for
one intelligent race.
*joe*
Rich Payne
>Clint.Laskowski (Clint.L...@mixcom.mixcom.com) wrote:
>: Can someone who is familiar with the various theories of
>: evolution explain why MAN (and WOMAN ;-) is the only
>: intelligent species on the planet? I can understand
>: that one species must be the most intelligent, but
>: why are the other species seemingly so far behind?
>: Why isn't some other species at least, say, 50% as
>: smart as humans?
>
> How do you know? The dolphins have a proportionally larger
What is the significance of a "proportionally larger" brain? Have you
any evidence to show that this means anything? Studies on humans have
failed to show any correspondance. I'd say that intelligence is more
a function of the number of neurons and how well they are interconnected.
Since this is pretty well constrained by genetic code and basic
physiology and problems of feeding the brain, brain size seems to be
a more usefull measure. A fly, for example, has a small brain, whatever
the proportions may be (by whatever measure is used), and it would seem
unlikely to have enough neurons for intelligence. (I can just imagine
a far-side cartoon with flys in a strategy meeting working out ways to
be as annoying as possible)
As I recall, dolphins brains are about as large as human brains.
Come to think of it, dolphins are supported by water, and do not need
to waste structure and energy fighting gravity. I would expect that
the difference on proportion could be explained by the dolphins
enviornment.
> cerebral cortex than we humans do. Maybe that's why the UFO's
> are sometimes seen to plounge into the sea, or zooming
> out from the water..
>
> // Wil
>--
>*** Ville V. Walveranta Primary email...: w...@shell.portal.com *********
> *** 96 Linda Ave., Apt. #5 Secondary email: w...@muncca.fi *******
> *** Oakland, CA 94611-4838 Tel./Facsimile: +1 (510) 420-0729 *****
> *** USA <faxes automatically recognized> ***
Rich
--
Matthew Williams
JOKING SPECULATION:
Maybey they were peace based intelligent life forms. We with our more
aggresive nature, probably killed them, and they probably let us!
The fact that we are here today is because we have stamped out all
opposition as you say.
ENDS
Were these species related to humans? I only know about the more common
ancestors such as Cro Magnon etc...? Please explain.
-- Via DLG Pro v1.0
Matthew Williams
Rich Payne
>In article <Matthew_Wi...@empyr.dircon.co.uk> Matthew_...@empyr.dircon.co.uk (Matthew Williams) writes:
>>
>>>A few million years ago there were more than one
>>>species of intelligent life on earth. There were
>>>two types of austreopithicus (sp?). Robustus
>>>was the biggest and had the biggest brain, Africanus
>>>was smaller. Lucy was a Africanus. They both used
>>>tools and were intelligent.
>>>
>>>Anyways, it seems that the both started in africa and
>>>moved out to Europe and Asia. But for some reason
>>>Robustus died out. I don't think anyone knows why.
>>>Possibly this planet is only big enough for
>>>one intelligent race.
>>>
>>>*joe*
>>
>>JOKING SPECULATION:
>>Maybey they were peace based intelligent life forms. We with our more
>>aggresive nature, probably killed them, and they probably let us!
>>
>>The fact that we are here today is because we have stamped out all
>>opposition as you say.
>>
>>ENDS
>
>are not). From what I recall, they did not have the same range as our
>ancestors, but I will check when I get home.
It seems that all three of the Australopithecus species lived in open
woodlands and grasslands, and there is some overlap in the periods during
which A africanus (the smallest and earliest) and A robustus and A boisei
lived. But political extraoplation about the peace-loving robustus seems
a bit extreme given the few skulls, partial skeletons and tools found.
Also, it would seem that if the above speculation were true, then any
"peace-loving" species would be at an evolutionary disadvantage.
I am appending the long but informative Groliers article on prehistoric
man, just in case anyone cares for more information. Apologies for the
length, this is 32K (before format conversion).
>>Were these species related to humans? I only know about the more common
>>ancestors such as Cro Magnon etc...? Please explain.
see below
>>-- Via DLG Pro v1.0
>Rich
>pay...@netcom.com
----
|Copyright - 1992 Grolier Electronic Publishing, Inc.
|
|prehistoric humans
|
| Prehistoric humans may be defined as the prehistoric populations
| of the living human species, Homo sapiens, together with other,
| ancestral species of the genus Homo. The origins, evolution, and
| cultural development of early humankind comprise the subject
| matter of paleoanthropology. Paleoanthropologists are concerned
| with reconstructing the evolutionary history and ways of life of
| prehistoric Homo sapiens and of the extinct human species HOMO
| ERECTUS and HOMO HABILIS. They seek the origin of the genus Homo
| among the early hominids, or prehumans, and attempt to trace the
| origin of the hominids among still earlier hominoid, or apelike,
| PRIMATES.
|
| HISTORY, AIMS, AND METHODS OF PALEOANTHROPOLOGY
|
| Paleoanthropology originated with the recognition that the oddly
| shaped stones found in the 18th and 19th centuries in certain
| ancient river gravels of Europe were in fact artifacts--tools
| made by humans--rather than natural phenomena. In the early days
| of paleoanthropology, during the 18th century, a literal
| interpretation of the Bible was generally accepted. Theologians
| calculated that the Earth was created about 6,000 years ago, and
| geological features such as ancient gravels were interpreted as
| evidence for Noah's flood. Some interpreted the stone artifacts
| as the work of antediluvian (pre-flood) humans.
|
| With the growth of scientific GEOLOGY in the 19th century, most
| biologists came to accept a time scale of earth history running
| into millions of years. Along with this theory grew the notion
| of a stage in human history, before the invention of
| metalworking, when stone tools alone were used. The discovery by
| the Western world of "stone age" peoples still living in places
| such as Australia reinforced the idea that human society and
| technology had developed, or evolved, through a series of
| stages. The idea, however, that the human species had itself
| evolved physically from a nonhuman species was not generally
| accepted until the last quarter of the 19th century. Human
| fossils discovered before this time were usually dismissed as the
| distorted remains of freaks or cripples.
|
| This outlook changed as biologists began to accept the
| evolutionary theories of Charles Darwin (see EVOLUTION). Darwin
| and his colleagues Thomas Henry Huxley and Ernst Haeckel showed
| that humans share many anatomical features with chimpanzees,
| gorillas, and orangutans, and they argued that Homo sapiens
| probably evolved from a more primitive species that resembled
| these apes in many respects. Naturalists were stimulated by this
| work to search for the fossil remains of physically intermediate
| creatures that would demonstrate the reality of human evolution
| by "linking" humans to apelike ancestors. Despite the
| scientists' protests that no single intermediate form was likely
| to have existed, this search became, in the popular imagination,
| a hunt for "the missing link" that would prove Darwin correct.
|
| During the past century numerous human, prehuman, and hominoid
| fossils were discovered that in a general way linked the modern
| human species to its apelike ancestors. At the same time, ideas
| of human cultural evolution also became more refined. Excavations
| and discoveries enabled archaeologists to recognize additional
| stages in human PREHISTORY. The "stone age" was subdivided into
| the PALEOLITHIC PERIOD, or Old Stone Age, preceding the invention
| of agriculture, and the NEOLITHIC PERIOD, or New Stone Age, that
| succeeded it. The Paleolithic was subdivided into lower, middle,
| and upper divisions, defined by the invention of new techniques
| of stone working, mainly in Europe. Again using evidence mainly
| from Europe, the later stages of prehistory were distinguished as
| the BRONZE AGE and the IRON AGE. As archaeological research has
| been applied to regions outside Europe, some of these stages have
| been found to be inappropriate (Africa, for instance, had no
| Bronze Age), and modern archaeologists are more concerned with
| local sequences of cultural evolution than with universal stages.
| Nevertheless, they still emphasize the importance of advances in
| technology to human cultural evolution.
|
| A modern project in paleoanthropology is typically a combined
| operation, pooling the skills of various specialists. Central to
| the operation are paleontologists and archaeologists.
| Paleontologists are concerned with the collection, description,
| and interpretation of fossils, including those of prehistoric
| humans (see PALEONTOLOGY). They use their knowledge of
| comparative anatomy to deduce the evolutionary relationships and
| ways of life of the species whose fossil remains they discover.
| Archaeologists use careful excavation to recover the physical
| evidence of human activities in the past (see ARCHAEOLOGY). The
| evidence includes tools, buildings, and other artifacts and
| refuse such as cooked bones and even feces. It is used to
| reconstruct a picture of the way of life of the people who lived
| on the site, from their eating habits and the way they made their
| tools, to the size and composition of the group in which they
| lived.
|
| Important additional evidence is provided by specialists in other
| fields. Geologists help to interpret the rock layers in which
| fossils are found and to relate them to a time scale of Earth
| history. Palynologists reconstruct the vegetation of the habitat
| from fossil pollen. Taphonomists attempt to reconstruct the story
| of bones from death to fossilization. A significant advance of
| recent decades has been the development by geophysicists of
| techniques of absolute dating--assigning an age in years directly
| to a fossil, artifact, or layer of rock. For the anthropologist
| the most important of these methods have been carbon-14 and
| potassium-argon dating (see RADIOMETRIC AGE-DATING), although
| recently some carbon-14 dates have been called into question.
| Both methods rely on the fact that radioactive elements decay, or
| change their chemical nature, at a constant rate. The carbon-14
| method can be used to date organic substances, such as wood,
| bone, and shell, up to about 50,000 years old. The
| potassium-argon method can be used to tell the approximate age of
| volcanic rocks more than half a million years old. Many sites
| are unsuitable for absolute dating, however, and in these cases
| the anthropologist relies on other methods--such as comparing the
| animals they contain with those found in absolutely dated sites.
|
| THE PLEISTOCENE SETTING OF HUMAN EVOLUTION
|
| Fossil evidence indicates that the earliest true humans (members
| of the genus Homo) appeared close to the end of the Pliocene
| Epoch, about two to three million years ago. Most of human
| evolution therefore occurred during the Pleistocene Epoch, which
| stretches from about 2.5 million years ago to the present. The
| Pleistocene has been a time of unusually great environmental
| variation when compared to most of the history of the Earth.
| Comparatively short warm periods have alternated with periods of
| glaciation, when the climate cooled and ice sheets spread from
| the poles (see ICE AGES).
|
| The fluctuating climate of the Pleistocene is the culmination of
| a trend that began many millions of years ago. Until about 40
| million years ago warm climates extended to the Arctic. By about
| 14 million years ago Antarctica and Greenland bore ice caps; by
| the time of the appearance of Homo, glaciers had formed on the
| higher mountains in mid-latitudes. During the past 2.5 million
| years, the cooling trend culminated in continental glaciations,
| in which sheets of ice, hundreds of feet thick, blanketed much of
| Europe and North America. During glacial episodes plants and
| animals adapted to warm climates were replaced by arctic plants
| and animals such as the reindeer. Although the climate was
| harsh, the plains of glacial Europe and North America supported
| large herds of game and were therefore rich hunting grounds for
| any human populations hardy enough to inhabit them.
|
| Glacial episodes alternated with interglacials, when warmer
| conditions returned. Until recently, geologists recognized only
| four or five glacial advances, separated by long interglacials.
| However, new evidence from deep-sea cores, in which a very
| complete record of climatic fluctuation is preserved, documents a
| more complex picture. Many more than five glaciations occurred
| in a wildly fluctuating manner, and interglacials were quite
| short--lasting only about 10,000 years.
|
| Climatic variation during the Pleistocene also occurred in the
| tropics. Evidence exists, especially in Africa, that cool, moist
| periods, when forests spread, alternated with drier intervals,
| when forests retreated before dry grasslands and desert. The
| relationship between rainy periods in the tropics and glaciations
| in mid-latitudes is not clear.
|
| An important side effect of glaciation was to alter the level of
| the oceans. With much of the Earth's water frozen, the oceans
| shrank, exposing much of the continental shelves and providing
| new dry-land corridors, notably between Asia and North America by
| way of Siberia and Alaska (see BERING LAND BRIDGE).
|
| Climatic fluctuation in the Pleistocene was probably an important
| factor in human evolution. Not only did it open up new territory
| for colonization, by creating dry-land bridges; the rapid changes
| and often rigorous climates were also important in providing the
| environmental challenge that spurred human physical and cultural
| adaptation.
|
| HUMAN ORIGINS
|
| The human species is a member of the mammalian order Primates. It
| is related, in descending order of closeness, to apes, monkeys,
| tarsiers, and lemurs. The early part of human evolutionary
| history, therefore, is the story of the emergence of the
| ancestors of these groups. The earliest traces of fossil
| primates are found in rocks about 70 million years old, which
| also contain the remains of the last dinosaurs. Within a few
| million years the dinosaurs had disappeared, and mammals,
| including primates, became much more common. The remains of
| these very early primates, which are quite common in fossil sites
| of the American West and Western Europe, indicate that they were
| a diverse group of small, ratlike animals, some already adapted
| to life in the trees.
|
| By about 45 million years ago a side branch of this primitive
| ancestral group had given rise to more advanced primates that
| were quite similar to modern lemurs. Among this group can be
| seen characteristics that are distinctive of modern primates:
| relatively large brains, a well-developed visual sense, and nails
| rather than claws. All of these characteristics were evidently
| adapted for life in the trees.
|
| Early Ancestral Forms
|
| About 35 million years ago appeared the first evidence of
| primitive monkeylike primates. The largest and best known of
| these, Propliopithecus (see AEGYPTOPITHECUS), was about the size
| of a cat and is believed to be in the ancestral line of apes and
| humans. Although still primitive in some respects, primates of
| this period constitute a link between the earlier, lemurlike
| primates and the true monkeys and apes that first appeared about
| 22 million years ago, at the beginning of the long geological
| epoch known as the Miocene. From rocks of this age have been
| found the earliest fossils representing the primates of
| sub-Saharan Africa, the home of many living monkeys and apes and
| the probable place of origin of the human family.
|
| Early Miocene apes and monkeys probably behaved and looked not
| unlike their living relatives. Among the apes was the group
| called DRYOPITHECUS, believed to include the evolutionary
| ancestor of both hominids and later apes such as the chimpanzee
| and gorilla. For most of the Miocene, Dryopithecus was
| widespread and successful. However, as the climate grew drier
| during the later part of the period, Dryopithecus disappeared
| from the fossil record. Presumably, it retreated with the
| forests to the tropical regions where the great apes still
| survive.
|
| For many years anthropologists assumed that the origin of
| hominids as a group separate from apes must have occurred in
| Europe between 14 and 10 million years ago. Most anthropologists
| now believe that the split occurred much later and that it
| occurred in Africa. OREOPITHECUS, an apelike primate that lived
| in Europe about 10 million years ago was proposed as the first
| hominid, but it is now believed that this primate died out
| completely without leaving descendants. Likewise, RAMAPITHECUS
| and its close relative Sivapithecus were once championed as the
| first hominids. It was argued that Ramapithecus, in common with
| the hominids, had adapted to life outside the forest and lived
| off the hard, tough vegetable foods of the grasslands. It is,
| however, highly unlikely that Ramapithecus walked upright or used
| tools more than living apes. Moreover, most anthropologists now
| feel that its early origin rules out the possibility that it was
| a hominid. Pointing to the remarkable similarity in blood
| chemistry and genetics between chimpanzees and humans, they
| maintain that the earliest hominids originated from an apelike
| stock no more than 8 million years ago. In this case, the
| earliest true hominid is probably AUSTRALOPITHECUS.
|
| Australopithecus
|
| The genus Australopithecus, first described on the basis of a
| single skull from South Africa, is now represented by many
| fossils from several areas of the African continent. Important
| sites include OLDUVAI GORGE, Tanzania; Lake Rudolf (Turkana),
| Kenya; and Hadar, Ethiopia. The genus appears to have been
| confined to Africa, where it existed during the time range
| between 5.5 and 1 million years ago.
|
| Although primitive in some respects, Australopithecus is
| classified within the human family, Hominidae, because it shares
| with humans certain significant advances over earlier forms. In
| particular, its leg bones show that it walked upright; its
| brain, although still within the ape range, was relatively larger
| than that of most apes; and neither sex had the projecting
| canine teeth (fangs) that are used by apes in fighting.
| Presumably, Australopithecus used simple clubs or threw stones,
| instead of biting, to defend itself. Australopithecus varied
| considerably in size--from less than 1.2 m (4 ft) to about the
| size of a modern human.
|
| Three species are generally distinguished (although some
| classification schemes list five): Australopithecus africanus,
| the smallest and earliest, which may have been ancestral both to
| humans and to later Australopithecus, and two larger, more
| specialized and robust species (Australopithecus robustus and
| Australopithecus boisei), which overlap in time with early
| members of the genus Homo and which evidently became extinct. An
| australopithecine fossil known as the "black skull," similar to
| A. bosei is thought by some to represent a new species.
|
| All species of Australopithecus lived in open woodland and
| grassland rather than in forests as had the apes, and the ways in
| which they differ physically from apes can be seen as adaptations
| to the new habitat. Whereas their front teeth were quite small,
| their back, grinding teeth (molars and premolars) were
| huge--evidently an adaptation to hard chewing. Studies of minute
| scratches on their dental enamel suggest that their diet
| consisted largely of hard, chewy seeds and berries. Although
| Australopithecus probably ate small animals, as do chimpanzees,
| most scientists consider it unlikely that Australopithecus was a
| systematic hunter, or "killer ape," as this species used to be
| depicted.
|
| Whether Australopithecus regularly made and used tools is a
| matter of debate. Some paleoanthropologists have suggested that
| the broken bones and tusks of antelopes and other animals found
| at MAKAPANSGAT, South Africa, and at other Australopithecus cave
| sites may have been used as tools and weapons; other
| paleoanthropologists consider it more likely that the broken
| animal bones were the leavings of leopards and hyenas that also
| frequented the caves. Although some sites with Australopithecus
| fossils have also yielded well-made stone tools, these tools are
| more likely to be the handiwork of early, true humans, whose
| remains are also found at these sites. If, as seems probable at
| present, Australopithecus was no more of a hunter and tool maker
| than the modern chimpanzee, why did it, unlike the apes, develop
| two-legged locomotion, or bipedalism?
|
| The reasons for this development, too, are debated. One theory
| is that Australopithecus babies were more helpless and had to be
| carried in the arms of their mothers. Another emphasizes the
| importance of free hands to an animal that had no large fangs to
| defend itself. Yet another sees the advantage of bipedalism as
| freeing the hands to gather the small, scattered vegetable foods
| on which Australopithecus usually fed. These ideas are not
| mutually exclusive. The brain of Australopithecus, although less
| than half the size of a modern human's, was relatively larger
| than that of an ape. Brain expansion may have been favored by a
| more complex social organization, perhaps one in which "families"
| of one adult male and one or more females and their young
| clustered in troops for protection.
|
| EARLY HUMANS
|
| From deposits dating from about 2 million years ago have emerged
| the first direct evidence of behavior that decisively separates
| the species Homo from other animals. This behavior includes the
| regular use of stone tools and other artifacts and the life-style
| called hunting and gathering. In contrast to the foraging of
| nonhuman primates, the hunting and gathering of the first humans
| involved a division of labor. Some group members (probably
| males) hunted animals for meat, whereas the rest searched for
| small game and wild vegetable foods. All shared the food they
| collected. This cooperative way of life strongly favored the
| evolution of technology (cutting tools and containers,
| especially). Additionally, there is evidence that these early
| humans meticulously planned their hunts. So the human capacity
| for abstract thought, foresight, and adaptation to local
| conditions of life also apparently improved. The evidence for
| these changes is seen in the gradually increasing size of the
| brain, the development of increasingly complex technology
| (represented by stone working), and the rapid geographical spread
| of the human species.
|
| Homo Habilis
|
| After the extinction of Australopithecus, no more than one
| hominid species existed at any time. However, the single human
| species is given different names at different stages of its
| evolution. The earliest humans are known as Homo habilis.
| Physically, they were much like Australopithecus, apart from the
| larger size of their brains. Most Homo habilis fossils have been
| discovered in East Africa. They are often found with simple
| OLDOWAN tools, including stone choppers, cores, and sharp-edged
| flakes. At some sites evidence exists that animals up to
| hippopotamus size were butchered and eaten, but whether the meat
| was obtained by hunting or by scavenging the carcasses of dead
| animals has not been determined.
|
| Homo Erectus
|
| As well as favoring the evolution of the brain, the early
| development of technology and culture also affected the evolution
| of the teeth and jaws. As tools (and later fire) were used to
| prepare and soften food, the teeth of early humans became smaller
| and the jaws less robust. By about 1.6 million years ago, these
| trends had produced a mentally and physically more advanced
| population called Homo erectus. At about the same time, the hand
| ax, a finely chipped, versatile, two-edged stone implement first
| appeared. Hand axes typify the ACHEULEAN tool industry, which
| also included a variety of pounders and flakes.
|
| Although first recognized in Asia (see JAVA MAN and PEKING MAN),
| Homo erectus populations also lived throughout the warmer parts
| of the Old World. In Europe the jaw of HEIDELBERG MAN and many
| scattered hand axes attest to their presence (although some
| researchers consider this fossil to belong to an archaic Homo
| Sapiens). In Africa both fossil remains and habitation sites
| have been found throughout the length of the continent, from
| Algeria to South Africa. On the whole, Homo erectus seems to
| have preferred open or lightly wooded country, where game would
| have been most plentiful. Many sites attest to the skill of
| these people in hunting big game--elephants, antelope, and even
| giant baboons--as well as gathering small game and vegetable
| foods. Although the colder regions of the far north were not
| inhabited, Homo erectus was sufficiently adaptable to survive in
| a variety of habitats, from tropical Africa to chilly central
| China. Undoubtedly, the more rigorous climate of the north
| stimulated technological inventions. One of the most important
| of these was the use of fire, in cooking, for warmth, and in the
| hunt. This vital step probably occurred about 500,000 years ago.
|
| Archaic Homo Sapiens and the Neanderthalers
|
| By about 250,000 years ago humans had become sufficiently
| advanced to be assigned to Homo sapiens. However, until about
| 40,000 years ago, they were not identical to modern humans. They
| retained many ancestral features recalling Homo erectus: a large
| face with big teeth and a low skull with heavy brow ridges and
| little or no forehead. In brain size, however, they were within
| the modern range, which distinguishes them from the small-brained
| Homo erectus. Fossils of these archaic humans have been found at
| many sites: among the best-known early specimens are the skulls
| from Steinheim, Germany (see STEINHEIM MAN); Swanscombe, England
| (see SWANSCOMBE MAN); and Broken Hill, Zambia (see BROKEN HILL
| MAN).
|
| An important sign of technological advance was the invention,
| about 100,000 years ago, of the Levallois technique of stone
| working, in which a large thin flake is struck from a core and
| used as a blank for making more specialized tools such as knives
| and scrapers (see LEVALLOISIAN). As human populations began to
| exploit a wider variety of habitats, new, local tool traditions
| appeared: the Fauresmith on the plains of South Africa, the
| Sangoan on the fringes of the African forest, and the MOUSTERIAN
| in the frigid plains of glacial Europe.
|
| The makers of the Mousterian tools were the NEANDERTHALERS (Homo
| sapiens neanderthalensis), who flourished between 100,000 and
| 40,000 years ago. Far from being the brutish, semierect "apemen"
| of popular imagination, the Neanderthalers were an advanced human
| group whose ingenuity enabled them to wrest a living from the
| most challenging habitat then occupied by humankind. Mousterian
| tools were adapted to a wide variety of tasks: cutting and
| preparing meat, scraping hides, working wood, and many others.
| Evidence of rituals--and careful burial of the dead--suggests the
| existence of religious beliefs. Some of the burials are of aged
| or handicapped people who must have been supported by the rest of
| the group, perhaps in return for the benefit of their wisdom and
| knowledge. Given the evidence for ritual and complex beliefs, it
| is likely that the brain of archaic Homo sapiens was sufficiently
| evolved to permit the use of true language. However,
| anthropologists are divided over whether the Neanderthalers'
| vocal chords were sufficiently developed to be capable of human
| speech.
|
| About 40,000 years ago humans of modern type replaced the archaic
| humans such as the Neanderthalers. Some anthropologists believe
| that only a very few archaic populations evolved directly into
| Homo sapiens sapiens (the taxonomic classification of fully
| modern humans), the rest being displaced as the moderns expanded
| their range. Others hold that archaic groups everywhere became
| "modern" by evolutionary change. Both ideas are probably to some
| extent correct; evolution of archaic populations into the modern
| human type probably occurred in many regions, but in other
| regions, such as western Europe, the archaics may have been
| absorbed and displaced by invading modern populations.
|
| Upper Paleolithic and Mesolithic Populations
|
| In Europe and elsewhere in the Old World the remains of the
| earliest physically modern humans occur with tools that attest to
| the invention of new techniques of manufacture, especially the
| production of long, narrow flake tools, called blades. These
| innovations define a new period of prehistory, the Upper
| Paleolithic. In the Old World this period began about 40,000
| years ago, in the middle of the last glaciation. In the Americas
| the comparable stage, the Paleo-Indian, began at least 20,000
| years ago with the migration of people across the Bering Strait
| from Siberia (see NORTH AMERICAN ARCHAEOLOGY).
|
| In both continents culture based on hunting and gathering reached
| its peak of development during this period. Hunters became more
| expert, devising sophisticated techniques that involved large
| numbers of people working in cooperation to kill whole herds of
| game. In areas such as West and Central Europe, where game was
| most plentiful, permanent communities sprang up, and the
| population rose in numbers and density. Besides the stone blade,
| which could be fashioned into any one of a variety of handy small
| tools, technical innovations included tools made of bone and
| ivory, clothing sewn together and decorated with beads, and among
| some groups a system of reckoning time by the Sun and Moon.
|
| Among the finest productions of the Upper Paleolithic are the
| paintings and engravings (mostly animal representations) executed
| on stone slabs or ivory or on the walls of caves. The quality of
| this art is such that for many years critics refused to believe
| that it could be the work of prehistoric peoples. Even today,
| when its authenticity is established, its function is still
| obscure but is thought to have involved hunting magic or a ritual
| use (see PREHISTORIC ART).
|
| About 10,000 years ago the ice sheets and tundra vegetation in
| the north gave way rapidly to coniferous and hardwood forest. The
| great herds of bison, horses, reindeer, and mammoths were
| replaced by more elusive, hard-to-hunt animals such as moose and
| elks. Human society and technology evolved in adaptation to the
| changing conditions. The resulting cultures are called
| Mesolithic in the Old World and Archaic in North America. New
| tools included microliths, tiny stone blades that were hafted in
| wood or antler handles. New weapons such as the bow and arrow
| enabled hunters to pursue the solitary game animals of the
| forest. Ingenious traps, snares, and nets enabled people to
| exploit resources such as wildfowl and fish that abounded in the
| lakes left by the retreating glaciers. Settlements became
| smaller, more dispersed, and less permanent (see MESOLITHIC
| PERIOD).
|
| Food Production and Urbanization
|
| In some areas humans adapted in a markedly different way to the
| end of the glaciation. Rather than diversifying their use of
| resources, as the Mesolithic people of the northern woodlands
| were doing, they focused their attention on a few reliable
| resources. The land to the east of the Mediterranean was one
| such area with evidence of this new orientation. Here some
| populations began to concentrate on exploiting wild sheep and
| goats and a few species of wild grasses that produced edible
| seeds. Gradually, as revealed in the archaeological record, a
| mutual dependence developed between the human populations and the
| animals and plants they exploited and protected. The favored
| species, breeding under human protection, became modified so that
| they could not have survived without it. The humans, in turn,
| living in permanent settlements near the resources they exploited
| and tended, could not easily revert to nomadic hunting. The
| people had become farmers, and the animals and plants,
| domesticates.
|
| Western Asia is the best-known, and perhaps the earliest, center
| of domestication, but several other early centers existed in
| various parts of the world. In Mexico an agriculture was
| developed on the basis of maize, beans, and squash. Other
| less-well-known centers of plant and animal domestication existed
| in Southeast Asia, China, and probably tropical Africa. In areas
| adjacent to some of these centers food production spread as
| hunters were displaced by farmers or acquired domesticates from
| their neighbors.
|
| Contrary to a common notion, prehistoric villagers did not live
| more easily than hunters. Villagers tended to eat a poorer diet,
| work harder, and suffer from more diseases. However, they also
| tended to produce more offspring and thus built up a much denser
| population. Moreover, primitive agriculture and herding often
| exhausted the soil in a few seasons, forcing the early farmers to
| move on and wrest new territory from the hunters. So powerful
| was this process that within a few thousand years most hunting
| and gathering peoples had been replaced by cultivators or herders
| in all continents except Australia.
|
| Along with their tendency to expand, food-producing societies are
| distinguished from hunter-gatherer societies by their emphasis on
| property. A hunter's principal assets are his weapon kit and his
| acquired skills. A farmer, by contrast, owns wealth in the form
| of land, herds, and the right to call on the labor of his friends
| and kinfolk. If he is lucky in these respects, or skillful in
| their management, he can both accumulate wealth and use it to buy
| the labor of others. By passing his wealth to his heirs, he can
| create a family of hereditary "notables" or headmen. In this way
| a stratified society emerges. Unmistakable indications of social
| stratification appeared within a few thousand years of the
| beginnings of agriculture. Within a few centuries more the
| process had culminated, in a few favored centers, in the
| appearance of complex societies in which specialist artisans and
| merchants plied their trades, a priestly elite presided over
| religious ceremonials, and a bureaucratic organization commanded
| the labor of the landless. And so, with the appearance of
| CIVILIZATION, ended two million years of human prehistory.
|
| Clifford Jolly
|
| Bibliography: Bishop, W. W., and Miller, J. A., eds.,
| Calibration of Hominoid Evolution (1972); Bordaz, Jacques, Tools
| of the Old and New Stone Age (1970); Butzer, K. W., Environment
| and Archaeology (1971); Butzer, K. W., and Isaac, G. L., eds.,
| After the Australopithecines (1975); Clark, W. E. Le Gros,
| Antecedents of Man, 2d ed. (1971); DeVore, Irven, and Eimerl,
| Sarel, The Primates (1969); Eiseley, Loren, Darwin's Century:
| Evolution and the Men Who Discovered It (1958); Fagan, Brian M.,
| The Great Journey (1987); Isaac, G. L., and McCown, Elizabeth,
| eds., Human Evolution: Louis Leakey and the East African
| Experience (1976); Isaac, G.L., Archaeology of Human Origins
| (1989); Jolly, C. J., and Plog, Fred, Physical Anthropology and
| Archeology, 2d ed. (1979); Leakey, R. E. F., and Lewin, Roger,
| Origins (1977) and People of the Lake (1979); MacNeish, R. S.,
| ed., Early Man in America (1973); Pilbeam, D. R., The Ascent of
| Man: an Introduction to Human Evolution (1972); Simons, E. L.,
| Primate Evolution: An Introduction to Man's Place in Nature
| (1972); Solecki, R. S., Shanidar: The First Flower People
| (1971); Struever, Stuart, ed., Prehistoric Agriculture (1971);
| Ucko, P. J., and Dimblebey, G. W., eds., The Domestication and
| Exploitation of Plants and Animals (1969); Watson, P. J., et
| al., Explanation in Archaeology (1971).
|
| Picture Caption[s]
|
| This Paleolithic cave painting of a horse is among dozens of
| animal paintings that decorate the walls and ceilings of a cave
| at Altamira in northeast Spain. Discovered in 1879, the cave is
| one of several hundred sites of cave art, the majority of which
| are in France and Spain. (Ronald Sheridan Photo Library)
|
| This cave painting, believed to depict a wounded bison attacking
| a hunter, is from Lascaux in southwestern France and dates from
| 15,000-10,000 BC. The work is typical of the naturalistic cave
| art produced by the Cro- Magnon peoples in ice-age Europe.
| (Ronald Sheridan Photo Library)
|
| This small figurine of the Neolithic Period is believed to relate
| to some form of fertility cult centered on a mother goddess.
| Numerous figurines of this type dating from the 4th to the 2d
| millennium BC have been found at sites in eastern Europe and in
| the USSR. (Ronald Sheridan Photo Library)
|
| An artist's reconstruction depicts an encounter between early
| hominids on the plains of Africa. It is believed that early
| humans evolved from a common ape ancestor in East Africa several
| million years ago. (Topham Picture Library)
|
| This early hominid skull, dating from about 2 million years ago,
| was discovered near Lake Turkana (Lake Rudolf), Kenya. (Survival
| Anglia Ltd)
|
--
Rich Payne
>
>>species of intelligent life on earth. There were
>>two types of austreopithicus (sp?). Robustus
>>was the biggest and had the biggest brain, Africanus
>>was smaller. Lucy was a Africanus. They both used
>>tools and were intelligent.
>>
>>Anyways, it seems that the both started in africa and
>>moved out to Europe and Asia. But for some reason
>>Robustus died out. I don't think anyone knows why.
>>Possibly this planet is only big enough for
>>one intelligent race.
>>
>>*joe*
>
>JOKING SPECULATION:
>Maybey they were peace based intelligent life forms. We with our more
>aggresive nature, probably killed them, and they probably let us!
>
>The fact that we are here today is because we have stamped out all
>opposition as you say.
>
>ENDS
Politically correct speculation, modern man is EVIL (modern women however,
are not). From what I recall, they did not have the same range as our
ancestors, but I will check when I get home.
>Were these species related to humans? I only know about the more common
>ancestors such as Cro Magnon etc...? Please explain.
>
>-- Via DLG Pro v1.0
>
Rich
--
Dr. C. Scott Littleton
Joseph Abbott <abb...@unixg.ubc.ca> wrote:
>
> Lucy was a Africanus. They [she and A. robustus] both used
>tools and were intelligent.
>
No; that's incorrect. "Lucy," discovered by Don Johanson in 1974 in the
Afar region of southeast Ethiopia, is the holotype of Australopithecus
afarensis, the oldest genus & species of hominids (i.e., human beings, as
opposed to anthropoid apes, or "hominoids"). She and her kind lived about
three million years ago, in the late Pliocene. They did not make any
tools--or at least any that have been discovered. Around two million
years ago their descendants evolved into Homo habilis, the earliest
representatives of our genus, and began making and using simple stone
tools. The reason for this seems to be that the size of their brains,
especially their forebrains, increased significantly. Neither A.
africanus nor A. robustus had the capability of making tools (i.e., the
capacity for culture); they are also not our direct ancestors.
To be sure, it's now almost certain that the hominids evolved in Africa
and later spread throughout the world. Indeed, there seem to have been
several migrations out of Africa, the most recent of which, the spread of
anatomically modern hominids (i.e., Homo sapiens sapiens), probably began
around 200,000 years ago. All of this, IMHO, was eons before the first
ETs arrived, which I suspect was around twelve or thirteen thousand years
ago.
In short, while our alien "friends" have been studying us (actively as
well as passively) for a respectable amount of time, there is no evidence
that they had anything whatsoever to do with our physical evolution. By
the time they arrived, we had long since evolved in to the creatures we
are today--at least biologically. Our recent cultural evolution is
another matter; here, I think, they MAY have had some direct impact,
although to attribute the relatively sudden rise of civilization in the
Near East and elsewhere around five thousand years ago wholly to alien
interference is incorrect. It can explained far more efficiently as the
end result of the post-Pleistocene (i.e, Ice Age) cultural adaptations
that began around ten or eleven thousand years ago. The ETs closely
monitored all this, but, save, perhaps, for a few nudges here and there,
and a host of reflections in our myths and folktales, their overall impact
seems to have been relatively slight--thanks in large measure to what can
best be described as a policy analogous to Star Trek's "prime directive."
In any case, as an anthropologist, this is how I see it. I welcome comments,
etc.
--
Cheers, "I think we're property...."
Scott Littleton --Charles Fort
yok...@oxy.edu
Lad A. Jelen
In a previous article, Matthew_...@empyr.dircon.co.uk (Matthew Williams) says:
>
>>
>>Anyways, it seems that the both started in africa and
>>moved out to Europe and Asia. But for some reason
>>Robustus died out. I don't think anyone knows why.
>>Possibly this planet is only big enough for
>>one intelligent race.
>>
>>*joe*
>
>JOKING SPECULATION:
>Maybey they were peace based intelligent life forms. We with our more
>aggresive nature, probably killed them, and they probably let us!
>
>The fact that we are here today is because we have stamped out all
>opposition as you say.
>
>
This is beginning to sound like Li'l Abner and the Shmoos.
Maybe Al Capp was giving us a history lesson.
--
Lad Jelen, Mentor, Ohio, Home of President James A. Garfield
(No, he's not taking calls today.)
af...@cleveland.freenet.edu lad....@comstar.ncoast.org