Unknown human species remains in China?

[Kitsunegari]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17378498

Researchers have discovered human skulls and bones from southern China which were of people that looked look quite different to us.
Researchers are divided over whether the skulls, which date back more than 11,000 years, could constitute a completely new species of human.

Interesting how recent this seems to be in the context of evolution and migration, it seems like SE Asia was a major corridor of early human migrations.

[MrHenry]

Whoa whoa! That's something quite interesting, I've always been fascinated with evolution so that's something great Great find.

[hekk]

Just 11,000 years ago? Wow.

[Phier]

I'm just saying don't get too excited about some morphological differences quite yet.

Many scientists would rather err on the side of 'new species' because thats sexy and gets them papers.

[John I Tzimisces]

I'm personally on the side of "previously undiscovered/identified human species" myself.

The skull's zygomatic arches are flared considerably more than what's seen in Homo erectus or anatomically modern humans, it's teeth display taurodontism (something observed in Neanderthals, where the pulpy part of the tooth is enlarged at the expense of the roots), it's supraorbital toruses are robust (like Erectus and Neanderthals), but it's face is flatter than either of those extinct species...

Very curious. Not sure if I'd make the connection that it's related to whatever's at denisova. Just eyeballing it it's morphology resembles Homo Erectus.

[Phier]

I'm personally on the side of "previously undiscovered/identified human species" myself.

The skull's zygomatic arches are flared considerably more than what's seen in Homo erectus or anatomically modern humans, it's teeth display taurodontism (something observed in Neanderthals, where the pulpy part of the tooth is enlarged at the expense of the roots), it's supraorbital toruses are robust (like Erectus and Neanderthals), but it's face is flatter than either of those extinct species...

Very curious. Not sure if I'd make the connection that it's related to whatever's at denisova. Just eyeballing it it's morphology resembles Homo Erectus.

I'm just saying a healthy dose of skepticism is needed. They only have one partial skull from what I can tell, and the lower jaw of another.

Imagine if they just found this...



Added Australian Aborigines do have more flared zygomatic arches than other populations. Not as much as that skull but its possible this was a sub population from that original human expansion that for whatever reason be it founder effect or sexual selection increased that trait.

Taurodontia is still in the human population as well and alone isn't a smoking gun.

Being they seem to have intact teeth the next step is obvious.

[Kitsunegari]

Interesting, i wonder how this thing will turn out.

[sumskilz]

The zygomatic arches on a couple of these look similar to me:

[John I Tzimisces]

I'm just saying a healthy dose of skepticism is needed. They only have one partial skull from what I can tell, and the lower jaw of another.

Imagine if they just found this...



Added Australian Aborigines do have more flared zygomatic arches than other populations. Not as much as that skull but its possible this was a sub population from that original human expansion that for whatever reason be it founder effect or sexual selection increased that trait.

Taurodontia is still in the human population as well and alone isn't a smoking gun.

Being they seem to have intact teeth the next step is obvious.

Well, skepticism is appropriate, but I'm still, er, skeptical. The paper (link: http://www.plosone.org/article/info:...l.pone.0031918) seems to be taking into account things like post-mortem deformation of the bone remains.

The taurodontism is interesting simply because it's found universally in Neanderthals.

Like you say it's possible the red deer cave people are just a genetically isolated population of modern humans. Genetic tests seem to be on the way, hopefully then we can get some useful information.

And perhaps in a less extreme example (and perhaps only tangentially related, but interesting nevertheless) than the head-binding example you have there, archaeologists sometimes struggle with the issue of variable morphology between something as simple as the different sexes of a single species. Certainly, in anatomically modern humans, the difference is there, but not as great as in extant and extinct primates. If we find a skeleton with features we'd define as robust in association with one that'd we'd call gracile, are they two different species, or are they a single species, but one happens to be male and one happens to be female? Is one a juvenile and one an adult? Some would rush to the conclusion they're different species, others might be more cautious.

[Phier]

The zygomatic arches on a couple of these look similar to me:

I found that same picture last night and the one on the far right looks very similar but still not quite so flared.

Well, skepticism is appropriate, but I'm still, er, skeptical. The paper (link: http://www.plosone.org/article/info:...l.pone.0031918) seems to be taking into account things like post-mortem deformation of the bone remains.

The taurodontism is interesting simply because it's found universally in Neanderthals.

Like you say it's possible the red deer cave people are just a genetically isolated population of modern humans. Genetic tests seem to be on the way, hopefully then we can get some useful information.

I do get a little nervous about human remains in Asia because there seems to be some lingering clinging to the idea that humans developed independently across the globe. I forget the name of the theory, but as recently as a few years ago an article about it was on WIRED, out of China, which convinced some of my engineer friends. It also reminded me why basic intelligence alone is not enough to combat quackery.

I get a bit defensive wondering if there may be a bit of bias in their thinking.

I am not convinced it is a new sub-species, nor am I convinced that it is not. Genetic testing in a situation like this, with limited fossil data is about the only way to resolve it.

[Vagn]

I found that same picture last night and the one on the far right looks very similar but still not quite so flared.



I do get a little nervous about human remains in Asia because there seems to be some lingering clinging to the idea that humans developed independently across the globe. I forget the name of the theory, but as recently as a few years ago an article about it was on WIRED, out of China, which convinced some of my engineer friends. It also reminded me why basic intelligence alone is not enough to combat quackery.

I get a bit defensive wondering if there may be a bit of bias in their thinking.

I am not convinced it is a new sub-species, nor am I convinced that it is not. Genetic testing in a situation like this, with limited fossil data is about the only way to resolve it.

There's a good reason RationalWiki has an entry on 'Engineers and Woo'

[Phier]

There's a good reason RationalWiki has an entry on 'Engineers and Woo'

Good article. I never heard of the RationalWiki and in my brief scanning it seems that while its a useful site, it does tend to promote the more 'PC' science side without a lot of depth in their articles. For example their article on Eugenics is that 'Eugenics are bad' but it uses more strawman arguments than scientific ones.

After reading their article on the Pseudoscience of Chiropractic "medicine" I think their problem is that they just don't have enough authors. The article is far to short for the subject matter.

[John I Tzimisces]

I do get a little nervous about human remains in Asia because there seems to be some lingering clinging to the idea that humans developed independently across the globe.

Multiregionalism. Basically the discredited and non-darwinian idea that Humans (or rather, races) developed independently across the old world and "evolved" toward a common form because of "gene flow" between neighboring groups.

[StealthFox]

Wasn't there some controversy in the past surrounding faked bones being found in/near China? If I remember correctly someone was caught making and planting fake bones for himself and others to find. I could be thinking of something else entirely though.

[Macedon1an]

This is quite interesting... Although I'm not convinced this is a new human species.. but further research will give us the answer... I hope i'm wrong

Btw, while we are talking about different human species that lived to very recently, an interesting one is Homo Floresiensis from Indonesia... they were really short, 1.5 meters max... officially they lived until 12 000 years ago, but some theories suggest that they survived to the 19 century !!! The legend of Orang Pendek may have its origins in Homo Floresiensis...

[Aanker]

This is quite interesting... Although I'm not convinced this is a new human species.. but further research will give us the answer... I hope i'm wrong

Btw, while we are talking about different human species that lived to very recently, an interesting one is Homo Floresiensis from Indonesia... they were really short, 1.5 meters max... officially they lived until 12 000 years ago, but some theories suggest that they survived to the 19 century !!! The legend of Orang Pendek may have its origins in Homo Floresiensis...

Skepticism applies here as well though: it could have been a human with some form of growth deficiency resulting in dwarfism.

But as for cryptozoology, I am rather confident that in most of the cases it is a last attempt by the local population to raise tourist interest. The stories are always the same, e.g. no videos, no pictures, tales (and more tales), eyewitness accounts that offer different descriptions, etc. The idea that this species would have lived into the 19th century is rather sensational, and is based on the presumption that any of the tales actually are truthful, rather than just fabrications.

[Macedon1an]

Skepticism applies here as well though: it could have been a human with some form of growth deficiency resulting in dwarfism.

But as for cryptozoology, I am rather confident that in most of the cases it is a last attempt by the local population to raise tourist interest. The stories are always the same, e.g. no videos, no pictures, tales (and more tales), eyewitness accounts that offer different descriptions, etc. The idea that this species would have lived into the 19th century is rather sensational, and is based on the presumption that any of the tales actually are truthful, rather than just fabrications.

Although there is the possibility that Homo Floresiensis was a human with a growth deficiency, studies of their anatomy show that they are most likely a new species...

The stories about HF surviving to the 19 century are based on legends of the indigenous people, in the time of the 16 century during the arrival of the Portuguese, about small hairy people who lived in deep tropical jungle... There is the possibility that a handful of HF survived but then got extinct in the future... For the modern stories I agree that they are made to attract tourists but have their origins in the old legends...

If we are looking for a different human species, I think that HF is our best bet !

<< head reconstruction of a female HF

[John I Tzimisces]

Floresiensis is probably an offshoot of Erectus which underwent Island Dwarfism.

As for the faked bones in east asia, off the top of my head I'm not sure. The only thing that comes to mind is piltdown man, but that was in England (basically a medieval cranium with a chimpanzee's jaw). It ended up influencing ideas about human evolution in that it lead some people to think human evolution started with leaps and bounds in the brain rather than physical changes followed/accompanied by cognitive changes. This idea is rather shaky nowadays given evidence that the earliest obligate bipeds who were our ancestors had cranial capacity and body size similar to chimps.

I do know early discoveries of homo erectus in china were lost during the japanese invasion in world war 2, but in that case, casts of the skulls were saved. that could be what you're thinking of, stealthfox?

[Sphere]

We still get to kill the Jews though right?

[The Noble Lord]

Some deformed individuals that lived long time ago, that's all it is!