More Fossil Evidence From 'Hobbit' Island

[Gunit_Sangh]

Tiny Ancestors of Modern Humans May Have Lived in Indonesia Just 12,000 Years Ago

By Guy Gugliotta
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, October 12, 2005; Page A03

Scientists sifting through artifacts and skeletal remains in a damp cave on a remote Indonesian island have found new evidence that a race of tiny, primitive "Hobbit"-like human ancestors lived there as recently as 12,000 years ago.

The Australian-led team unearthed a lower jawbone and other bones from as many as nine individuals at the Liang Bua cave on the island of Flores. All the bones are from human ancestors who stood 3 feet tall and lived between 18,000 and 12,000 years ago.

The skull of Homo floresiensis, found on the Indonesian island of Flores, is much smaller than that of a modern human.

The controversial Flores site, first reported a year ago, has left paleontologists puzzling over how such ostensibly primitive beings -- with 25-cubic-inch brains similar in size to those of human ancestors 3 million years old -- could make sophisticated tools, master fire, and kill, butcher and cook small elephants with the skill of modern humans.

Rest of story
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/11/AR2005101101548.html

[ClintonTyree]

1. Well god must have put two of those little guys on the ark too....

because we all know the earth is only 6,000 years old and god DID put two of every creature on the ark when, like a spoiled child, he destroyed all life remaining on earth.
I'm sure it will all be covered at the new museum. http://onlinejournal.com/TheocracyAlert/html/100105seesholtz.html

I wonder why the little guys didn't make it? It must have been god's plan I guess and we can NEVER hope to know god's secret plan for all of us. Of course the devil might have planted those fossils to confuse us, I hear that happens a lot. But we're not to be tempted into believing these false "sciences", no sir. Intelligent design is all I ever need to know about the earth and all of god's creatures.

If you couldn't tell: :sarcasm:

[Dogmudgeon]

4. Hey, it's from Mel Seesholtz!

Local boy -- teaches at Penn State, or at least used to.

A very cool guy. I met him over a decade ago, and occasionally wondered what became of him.

--p!

[malmapus]

2. Wow then its true..its all true

Frodo failed and Bush got the ring

EDIT That is fascinating, I remember when they first found the remains they didn't figure on much intelligence based on the skull size. But now that they found out more, that is very interesting about their development.

[Jackpine Radical]

3. I kinda think it would be more accurate to say "tiny relatives"

rather than "tiny ancestors." No competent physical anthropologist is likely to imagine that these little guys were actually in our direct line of descent, and I don't see any point in confusing the Fundies any worse than they already are about what evolutionary theory actually says.

[greyl]

5. Sharp point. nt

[rodeodance]

6. short people get no respect.

.....Evidence of sophisticated toolmaking and the ability to hunt and prepare game soon earned the original fossil -- of a 30-year-old woman -- the nickname Hobbit, after the tiny but able characters in the J.R.R. Tolkien fantasies.

At first researchers suggested that the diminutive hunters were the products of "island dwarfing": the tendency of large creatures living on isolated islands with few predators to grow smaller to adapt to limited resources, while small animals grow larger to be able to compete.

Ancient Flores also had pygmy elephants as well as large Komodo dragon lizards and giant rats. The Morwood team suggested that the Hobbit was a reduced-size evolutionary adaptation of Homo erectus , an early human ancestor that arrived on Flores about 800,000 years ago.

Still, "no erectus ever made the tools" from Liang Bua, Phillips said in a telephone interview. In fact, paleontologists agreed that no species apart from modern Homo sapiens -- with an 85-cubic-inch braincase -- was capable of making the blade tools and points found with the Hobbit remains. This gave rise to the theory that the Hobbit was a modern human with dwarfism.