Hello, and welcome to Episode 7 of Foundations Restored, a Catholic perspective on origins.
I'm your host, Keith Jones.
Part 1 and Part 2 of this episode reveal that there are no viable evolutionary sequences
leading from an ape-like ancestor to modern man.
In fact, all claimed evolutionary sequences are strongly refuted by the scientific literature.
What emerges from this realization is the harmony between the real scientific evidence
and the genesis account of special creation.
How tragic it is, then, that millions of Catholic youth are fed the lie, even in Catholic schools
and seminaries, that they evolved from an ape-like ancestor.
During our discussion of fossil evidence, it is important to note that we will adopt
evolutionists' published dates for various fossil finds, even though Episode 9 explains
that such dates are problematic and based on uniformitarian presuppositions.
By taking this approach, we will demonstrate that, even if one accepted the dates tabled
for mankind's supposed ancestors, the fossils themselves refute claims of human evolution.
The story of human evolution is often told through illustrations showing the rise of
increasingly human-like species from an ape-like creature.
Illustrations such as this are probably the most recognized of all Darwinian icons since
most people were exposed to such images since their youth, even as other Darwinian claims
have been increasingly abandoned, the defense of this icon has continued and intensified.
In fact, according to the National Academy of Sciences, it is no longer possible to sustain
scientifically the view that the human species was not produced by the same evolutionary
mechanisms that apply to the rest of the living world.
Likewise, leading evolutionist Kenneth Miller states,
For all the fuss and concern that surround the idea of human evolution, the detailed
fossil evidence of our ancestry is remarkably powerful.
Unfortunately, all that is required for millions of adults and students, including those in
Catholic schools and seminaries, to be led astray by such claims is for them to wrongly
assume that evolutionists are forthright about the evidence and free from philosophical bias.
But now, let's examine the detailed fossil evidence for human evolution contained in
the scientific literature to see if the evidence is really remarkable powerful as Miller and
the NAS claims.
As we begin, it is important to introduce a few definitions.
Our topic falls within the general area of study called paleoanthropology, which refers
to the study of humans and human evolution.
Note that in this episode, we will generally refer to scientists who were involved in such
studies as paleoanthropologists, even though their specific degree may be in paleontology
or anthropology.
The scientific name of modern humans is Homo sapiens, wherein sapiens is the species name
and Homo is the genus, which is defined as a group of closely related species.
We will also discuss other genera, such as Australopithecus and Ardipithecus, which are
often claimed to be on the evolutionary pathway leading to Homo.
Note that to make the discussion easier to follow, we will sometimes state only the species
name and we will often abbreviate the genus in our displays, such as H. sapiens instead
of Homo sapiens or A. ophorensis instead of Australopithecus ophorensis.
The so-called transitional forms that are most closely related to modern man than other
existing species are generally referred to as hominins, although the term hominids was
previously used in the same manner.
Cranial capacity is stated in cubic centimeters or cc and is a proxy for the size of the brain.
The average cranial capacity of humans is approximately 1350 cc.
Finally, when referring to the dates assigned to hominin fossils, we will use the acronyms
MYA and YA that stand for millions of years ago and years ago, respectively.
Looking now at claimed evolutionary sequences in more detail, we advance to a rather busy
timeline that reflects the approximate duration of various claimed hominins, although there
is some variation in claimed durations found among estimates in the scientific literature.
These species are claimed to have lived as long as 2.3 or even 2.5 million years ago,
as indicated in the timescale at the middle of the graph.
We will initially focus on the key transitional forms Homo erectus, Homo habilis, and Homo
rudolfensis.
Going back further, the claim is that fossils dating to approximately 6 million years ago
document the evolution of hominins from a small ape-like creature that walked on all
fours to an upright, bipedal species that habitually walked on two feet and became increasingly
human-like in size and bone shape or morphology.
We will initially focus on the highlighted species that are commonly nicknamed the Tong
Child or Australopithecus africanus, Lucy or Australopithecus afarensis, and Artie or
Ardipithecus ramidus.
We begin by discussing Homo erectus, who is portrayed as the immediate predecessor of
modern man.
In many timelines, he is shown to have existed from around 1.8 million years ago to around
200,000 years ago or slightly more recently, although finds in 2017 dating Homo sapiens
at 300,000 years ago suggests timeline revisions may be appropriate.
The history of Homo erectus dates to the 1891 find of the so-called Java Man by Eugene Dubois
on the island of Java, where he found a tooth, a primitive-looking skull cap, and a modern-looking
left femur or thigh bone.
Since he considered the skull to be ape-like and the femur to be modern-looking, he named
the combined fossils Pythocanthropus erectus, meaning erect ape, but the name was later
changed to Homo erectus.
National Geographic stated in May of 1997 that his work was one of the greatest success
stories in the history of science.
Subsequent erectus fossils were discovered in Africa, Asia, Australia, and Europe.
The species had a smaller average cranial capacity than Homo sapiens, and evolutionists
who, making free use of artist renderings, claim that erectus had a primitive morphology.
But when these claims are critically evaluated against the detailed fossil evidence in the
scientific literature, the entire story of Homo erectus is called into question.
First, it is becoming increasingly clear that Homo erectus had a morphology that largely
falls within the normal range of variation seen in Homo sapiens, and multiple studies
indicate his anatomy would have functioned the same as ours.
This means that unless the fossils are to be classified according to preconceived evolutionary
expectations, most Homo erectus fossils can easily be classified as Homo sapiens.
To summarize recent findings in the scientific literature…
Regarding the shoulder or clavicle, a 2015 article in the Journal of Human Evolution
concluded,
"...all Homo erectus fossil clavicles fall within the normal range of modern human variation.
Studies support reconstructing the Homo erectus shoulder as modern human-like, and suggest
that the capacity for high-speed throwing dates back nearly 2 million years."
Regarding the foot morphology and locomotion, a 2009 article in Science concluded,
"...by 1.5 million years ago, hominins had evolved an essentially modern human foot function
and bipedal locomotion."
Moreover, a 2011 article in the Journal of Human Evolution concluded,
"...endurance running may have been possible from a thermoregulatory viewpoint for Homo
erectus."
Also, from the American Journal of Physical Anthropology, specialists concluded,
"...changes in locomotor anatomy from Homo erectus to modern man were relatively minor,
and by earliest Homo erectus times, body size was essentially modern."
Regarding the cranium base, a 2003 article in Science announced the first ever Homo erectus
fossil that allowed analysis of this feature, and concluded that the erectus cranium base
was unexpectedly modern in anatomy.
This find erased the previous view of erectus as having a stooped over posture due, in part,
to the incorrect assumption that the spinal column of erectus entered the base of the
skull further back than was actually the case.
Further, Homo erectus was comparable in height and weight to Homo sapiens.
A 2015 study in Journal of Human Evolution of a near-complete Homo erectus specimen,
nicknamed Nariokotome Boy, estimated this individual would have grown to approximately
5'10'' and weighed about 180 pounds had he lived to maturity.
Regarding the average cranial capacity of 1,016 cc for Homo erectus, it is true that
this average is below the average for Homo sapiens, 1,355 cc, but it is well within the
range of 800 cc or lower to 2,200 cc commonly cited for Homo sapiens.
We will have more to say about whether the difference in average cranial capacity between
erectus and Homo sapiens justifies a separate species classification.
These descriptions begin to build a case for classifying Homo erectus fossils as Homo
sapiens, and in fact, there is a minority but accomplished group of evolutionists who
propose eliminating or sinking the Homo erectus classification into Homo sapiens.
This group includes prominent anthropologist Milford Wolpoff, author of the leading college
textbook on human evolution, Paleoanthropology.
He explains,
We regard the species distinction between Homo erectus and Homo sapiens as being problematic
due to the difficulty in clearly distinguishing an actual boundary between Homo erectus and
Homo sapiens.
We should either admit that the boundary is arbitrary or Homo erectus should be sunk.
Sinking Homo erectus would carry the advantages of explicitly recognizing the arbitrariness
of the boundary.
More importantly, it would eliminate the necessity of relying on dates to determine which species
a number of specimens belong to.
The proposed sinking of Homo erectus has been a topic of discussion in the scientific literature
for more than 50 years.
In 1963, an article by anthropologist William Laughlin appeared in Science Magazine and
discussed the variation among the Homo sapiens' Aleutian populations during the last 5,000
years.
He documented dramatic changes in skull morphology over this short period.
He also compared the Homo sapiens' Aleutian skulls with that of Peking Man and noted that
some traits that led to Peking Man's classification as Homo erectus are found in modern Aleutian
and Eskimo skulls.
Due to this similarity and the variation observed among the Aleutian skulls during the past
5,000 years, Laughlin concluded,
When we find that significant differences have developed over a short time span between
closely related and contiguous peoples as in Alaska and Greenland, and when we consider
the vast differences that exist between remote groups such as Eskimos and Bushmen, who are
known to belong within the single species of Homo sapiens, it seems justifiable to conclude
that Peking Man, now Homo erectus, belongs within this same diverse species.
The case for syncing Homo erectus grew stronger in the early 1970s when it was acknowledged
in Nature that Homo sapiens' morphology can resemble the classic erectus shape as
the result of many non-evolutionary factors, including
1.
Inbred communities 2.
Nutritional problems 3.
Low-grade anemia 4.
Genetic factors 5.
Endocrinal factors 6.
Pathological conditions 7.
Natural variation in bone thickness that provides a better chance of being preserved, leading
to the false conclusion that the whole population was thick-boned and of a different species.
Somehow, this information has never made its way into the biology textbooks.
Additional arguments for eliminating Homo erectus as a valid classification involve
some curious dating issues.
First, despite the timeline drawings aimed at the uninitiated, fossils having Homo erectus
morphology date to very recent times.
This has been known since the 1972 announcement in Nature.
Human remains from Cow Swamp suggest the survival of Homo erectus in Australia until as recently
as 10,000 years ago.
Similarly, a more recent redating of a number of Javan fossils announced in Science concluded
Homo erectus was still alive in Java, Indonesia as recently as 27,000 to 53,000 years ago.
If so, Homo erectus, a species that first appeared about 2 million years ago, would
have been alive when modern humans and Neanderthals roamed the Earth.
This is problematic because it raises questions of how Homo erectus survived so recently if
it was locked in a prolonged struggle for survival with a superior species, Homo sapiens.
Very likely, the two classifications are not necessary and Homo erectus fossils can be
placed into Homo sapiens.
A much more problematic dating issue is introduced by returning to a discussion of Javaman and
to the widely held evolutionary claim that Homo sapiens arose from Homo erectus only
300,000 years ago or even more recently.
It turns out that from the start, there was doubt that the Javaman femur and skull were
both from man's evolutionary ancestor because the femur was immediately recognized as indistinguishable
from Homo sapiens.
Anatomist and anthropologist Emil Haus examined the fossils and he challenged Dubois' classification
of the femur as anything but Homo sapiens simply because of the estimated age.
He explained,
I refuse to let myself be influenced by considerations concerning the sediment or age.
A bone which shows all the characteristics of a human bone must be considered as such,
and after determining this, it is said that the bone could have belonged to an intermediate
species.
One is abandoning the domain of facts without any plausible reason.
More recent analyses confirm that the femur is completely modern and should be classified
as Homo sapiens.
One study concluded,
No feature or combination of features justify Dubois' assertion of its distinctiveness
from modern man.
Note that if the femur is properly classified as Homo sapiens and dates to approximately
1.5 million years ago, the fossil creates what is called a contemporary status problem.
How could Homo erectus have gradually evolved into Homo sapiens some 300,000 years ago if
Homo sapiens lived alongside Homo erectus more than 1 million years ago?
The most logical solution would be to recognize that Homo sapiens dates well before 300,000
years ago and varies widely enough to include fossils currently classified as Homo erectus.
The contemporary status problem has been known but not acknowledged to the general public
ever since the late 1800s.
In fact, when Dubois returned to Europe from Java, he also had in his possession two nearly
complete skulls that he dated to the same period as his prized Java man fossils.
These fossils are the Wajak 1 and 2 skulls.
But rather than introduce these skulls to the scientists of the day, Dubois hid them
under the floorboards of his home for the next 26 years.
Why?
Because these two skulls, which he considered to be the same age as Java man and which were
modern in morphology and size at 1550 cc and 1650 cc, would have raised the obvious question
of how Java man evolved into Homo sapiens over the ensuing 1 million years if the evidence
showed that Homo sapiens lived alongside Java man.
Sir Arthur Keith expressed the problem this way.
There can be no doubt that if on his return in 1894 he had placed before the anthropologists
of the time the ape-like skull from Java side by side with the great brain skulls from Wajak,
both fossilized, both from the same region of Java, he would have given them a meal beyond
the powers of their mental digestion.
The case for sinking Homo erectus into Homo sapiens grows when one realizes that fossils
described as indistinguishable from Homo sapiens and artifacts best assigned to Homo sapiens
are not only contemporary with Homo erectus, they actually predate Homo erectus by a very
long time.
Two examples follow.
In 1965, Harvard's Brian Patterson discovered a partial humerus upper arm bone fossil, now
designated KP-271, which dates to 4.4 million years ago.
He described it as a well-preserved distal end of a left humerus.
Following comparative tests between human and chimpanzee humeri, Patterson concluded,
In these diagnostic measurements, KP-271 is strikingly close to the means of the human
sample.
William Howells studied the fossil with Patterson and reported,
The humeral fragment, with a date of about 4.4 million, could not be distinguished from
Homo sapiens morphologically or by multivariate analysis by Patterson and myself in 1967 or
by much more analysis by others since then.
We suggested that it might represent Australopithecus because at that time allocation to Homo seemed
preposterous, although it would be the correct one without the time element.
Likewise, anthropologist Henry McHenry concluded,
The canapoi specimen, which is 4 to 4.5 million years old, is indistinguishable from modern
Homo sapiens.
Anonymous Charles Oxnard found that KP-271,
A fragment of arm bone perhaps 4 or more million years old has already been shown to be very
similar to that of modern man and some of our demonstrations clearly support that contention.
Why then was KP-271 not classified as Homo and even Homo sapiens?
Because the fossil did not fit expected evolutionary sequences and so it was classified as Australopithecine
and studies arguing for this classification were soon forthcoming.
In 1995, KP-271 was claimed by the team announcing Australopithecus anamensis to be part of their
new species and KP-271 was used to argue that anamensis was an upright walker.
Just how far-fetched this assignment was became evident in 2019 when a near-complete skull
of Australopithecus anamensis was announced in Nature as having a small cranial capacity
of approximately 365 cc and a morphology so ape-like that it was compared to the robust
Australopithecines that even evolutionists admit are not on the pathway to Homo sapiens.
Another evidence for the ancient presence of Homo sapiens involves the Laetoli footprints.
In 1979, Mary Leakey reported on three footprint trails found in Tanzania that date to 3.6
million years ago.
She stated,
We have found hominid footprints that are remarkably similar to those of modern man.
The form of his foot was exactly the same as ours.
Further description stated,
The longitudinal arch of the foot is well-developed and resembles that of modern man, and the
great toe is parallel to the other toes.
It is immediately evident that the Pliocene hominids at Laetoli had achieved a fully upright
bipedal and free-striding gait.
Others on the team explained,
Make no mistake, they are like modern human footprints.
The external morphology is the same.
There is a well-shaped modern heel with a strong arch and a good ball of the foot in
front of it.
The big toe is straight in line.
It doesn't stick out to the side like an ape toe or like the big toe in so many drawings
you see of australopithecines in books.
At Leakey's request, specialist Russell Tuttle conducted a detailed comparison of the footprints
with those of Peruvian Machiginga Indians who live barefoot.
He reported,
In discernible features, the Laetoli g-prints are indistinguishable from those of habitually
barefoot Homo sapiens.
Scientists dismissed such findings because they could not accept that Homo was so ancient.
Instead, they attributed the trails to Lucy, or Australopithecus afarensis, who will be
discussed in more detail later.
Objecting to this assignment, Tuttle responded,
The trails were portrayed as remarkably human, yet they were presumed to have been created
by Australopithecus afarensis.
My problem in accepting this was that the Hadar beasts had ape-like features, notably
down-curved toes.
The proportions of Laetoli g-1 and g-3 prints are well within the range found among the
Machiginga Indians.
Both exhibit strong heel, ball, and first toe impressions and a well-developed medial
longitudinal arch, which is the hallmark of human feet.
The 3.5 million-year-old footprint trails resemble those of habitually unshod modern
humans.
None of their features suggest that the Laetoli hominids were less capable bipeds than we
are.
Elsewhere, he commented on the
remarkable humanness of Laetoli hominid feet in all detectable morphological features.
Per Contra, the toes of Australopithecus afarensis are intermediate in length between those of
humans and apes, and they are curved like those of apes.
Also, in one of the most detailed assessments of afarensis ever published, a 40-page report
in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology reported, after an evaluation of the afarensis
toes, that the animal had the ability to abduct the hallux, meaning that it could move its
big toe out of line with the others and use it as an opposable toe.
The study also concluded that afarensis also had ankles with non-human features that characterizes
primates with divergent halluses, referring again an opposable big toe that is suited
for movement in the trees but is not compatible with the shape of the Laetoli footprints.
In 2017, a report in the Journal of Human Evolution described additional footprints
found at Laetoli Site S and described the human-like bipedal biomechanics seen in the tracks.
The report also commented on the original Site G prints and agreed with Tuttle's overall
assessment by noting,
The Site G prints at Laetoli exhibit proportional toe depths more similar to extended limb walking
in humans, and the Site T prints were generated by a biped walking with extended human-like
mechanics.
It should also be noted that the larger footprints of the recently discovered tracks at Laetoli
were more than 10 inches in length and would have required a size 10.5 men's shoe.
In sum, Australopithecus afarensis is a very questionable candidate for the Laetoli footprints.
The most logical assignment of the footprints is to Homo sapiens unless classifications
are to be made based on preconceived evolutionary sequences, which happens repeatedly.
But again, if artifacts dated to 3.6 million years ago or even 4.4 million years ago are
best assigned to Homo sapiens, how could the Australopithecines or another Homo species
have been our predecessor?
Further, even though Homo erectus is dated only to approximately 2 million years ago,
there is increasing evidence that an adept toolmaker was present as far back as 3.3 million
years ago.
For example, the Gona site in Ethiopia, which dates to at least 2.5 million years ago, has
produced some 3,000 sophisticated artifacts made by
a species that was technologically adept.
Most scientists doubt that Australopithecus had the mental acuity or manual dexterity
to create tools for cutting and chopping.
More recently, a 2015 article in Nature reported on flints, hammers, and anvils in Kenya dating
to 3.3 million years ago.
Homo sapiens is a viable candidate to have made these tools since fossils and artifacts
indistinguishable from or best attributable to Homo sapiens predate this time period.
The third dating puzzle that causes one to look differently at Homo erectus involves
the recent determination that Homo erectus dates as early as 1.85 million years ago and
reveals that Eurasia was probably occupied before Homo erectus appears in the East African
fossil record.
This is a further challenge to the common view that a primitive Homo erectus was evolving
from an ape-like ancestor for millions of years before venturing out of Africa.
Given these three dating issues, it is apparent why some prominent evolutionists are calling
for the sinking of Homo erectus and why leading evolutionist Curtis Stringer explained regarding
Homo erectus.
Everything now is in flux, it's all a mess and we don't have a clue as to what migrated
from Africa, when it emerged, or even where Homo erectus itself originated.
The mess begins to clear with the elimination of Homo erectus.
When the sinking of Homo erectus occurs, it immediately raises the question of how more
recent fossils including Homo ergaster, Homo antecessor, and Homo heidelbergensis can be
the ancestor of Homo sapiens.
They cannot.
Many evolutionists reject Homo ergaster and simply classify these African fossils as Homo
erectus.
For example, a 1995 article in Nature states,
We do not consider that the African Pleistocene fossils sometimes termed Homo ergaster represent
a distinct biological species given the known ranges of variation.
Similarly, Alan Walker notes that when establishing the species, the originators did not attempt
to make a differential diagnosis between this specimen and those attributed to Homo erectus.
Such views have become widely held due to the announcement of the Daka fossils, which
are Homo erectus fossils that share characteristics with Asian and African fossils.
Tim White, who co-authored the Daka announcement, explained,
This African fossil is so similar to its Asian contemporaries that it's clear Homo erectus
was a truly successful widespread species, and concluded that recognition of a lineage
with the separate species name Homo ergaster is therefore doubtfully necessary or useful.
Homo heidelbergensis is also called archaic Homo sapiens and is thought by some to be
the predecessor of the Neanderthals.
As its name suggests, the species displays many Homo sapiens traits and can easily be
so classified based on morphology and a cranial capacity of approximately 1230 cc, which is
close to that of Homo sapiens.
As stated in Science, the species is
something of a wastebasket taxa that includes widely varying African and European fossils.
Homo antecessor, which is linked to the Grandolina site in Spain, is also a questionable classification.
As one evolutionist associated with the find stated,
This hominid had the face of a sapiens, a mandible approaching heidelbergensis and premolars
like ergaster.
What to call such an hombre?
If you say it's not heidelbergensis, it has to be a new species.
And if you don't name it, someone else will.
Considering that the species is described as having a totally modern face and that the
classifications he resembles can be placed into Homo sapiens, Homo antecessor can also
be assigned.
This brings us to Neanderthal man, who was also eliminated as a transitional form due
to a number of fossils that display both Neanderthal and Homo sapiens morphology.
In recent years, the suggestion that the Neanderthals interbred with Homo sapiens has been strongly
supported by DNA studies indicating that the Neanderthals were at least 99.7% identical
to Homo sapiens.
The myth that Neanderthals were deserving of a separate classification dates to the
reconstruction of early Neanderthal fossils by paleontologist Marcelin Boulle, under whom
Teilhard de Chardin studied.
For 50 years, Boulle's reconstruction was never questioned, but when the Neanderthal
fossils were studied again, it became clear that Boulle's study was grossly misleading.
The article exposing Boulle's faulty work concluded,
There is thus no valid reason for the assumption that the posture of Neanderthal man differed
significantly from that of present-day men.
There is nothing to justify the common assumption that Neanderthal man was other than a fully
erect biped.
If he could be reincarnated and placed in a New York subway, provided that he were bathed,
shaved, and dressed in modern clothing, it is doubtful whether he would attract any more
attention than some of its other citizens.
Note that Neanderthal man had an average cranial capacity of more than 200 cc above Homo sapiens,
even though it is known that he had an essentially modern DNA and could interbreed with Homo
sapiens.
This tells us that the average cranial capacities should be viewed with caution before creating
a new species designation, and suggests that the size difference between Homo sapiens and
Homo erectus may not justify a separate species designation, especially when all other features
of erectus appear essentially human.
Moreover, recalling the earlier discussion from Nature that differences in morphology
can result from inbreeding and pathological conditions, a viable explanation emerges as
to why Neanderthals and Homo erectus may have differed from Homo sapiens morphology.
This possibility is strongly endorsed in Contested Bones by Ph.D. geneticist John Sanford and
Christopher Rupp, who explain.
Many paleoanthropologists acknowledge that populations such as Neanderthal and Erectus
would have existed in very small isolated populations where inbreeding and genetic drift
would result in genetic decline and genetic pathologies.
Depending on the extent of inbreeding, such a population may range from only slightly
compromised to being on the verge of extinction.
Another claimed Homo species is Homo floresiensis, which dates to only 12,000 years ago.
Dubbed the Hobbit, these Indonesian fossils are puzzling due to the small estimated weight
or body mass of 16-41 kg in small cranial capacity 417-426 cc.
Among the theories tabled, some evolutionists believe it to be a type of early Homo that
somehow survived very late, while others believe that the individuals were Homo sapiens but
suffered from insular dwarfism or another condition related to the island rule in which
certain species may experience a reduction in body size on islands perhaps due to energetic
constraints or changes in predation rates.
As we have mentioned with Erectus and Neanderthal, the small size of the Hobbit can also be directly
related to inbreeding and the genetic decline of small populations.
While this debate will no doubt continue, given the very recent date for Homo floresiensis,
the outcome is not crucial for the discussion of possible transitional forms leading to
modern man.
An assignment to Homo sapiens is in line with the conclusions of many scientists as well
as with the inbreeding of small populations explanation.
All of this means that the most widely publicized ancestors of Homo sapiens disappear back to
Homo habilis who was discovered in Tanzania by Louis and Mary Leakey.
Leakey described it as a distinct type of early hominid in nature in 1961.
Interestingly, Leakey announced a year earlier that a different species, nicknamed Zing or
Nutcracker Man, was the earliest man ever found and quite obviously human.
National Geographic even included an artist rendering showing Zing with a well-trimmed
beard and a contemplative look worthy of an Ivy League school graduate.
But Zing was suddenly sent back to the trees with Leakey's announcement of Homo habilis,
which dates to approximately 2 million years ago.
Today, Homo habilis remains the most widely cited transitional form in high school textbooks
and so one would think that the evidence for this transitional form must be strong.
In truth, Homo habilis fails badly as a viable transitional form and here is why.
It was immediately suggested in the scientific literature that Leakey mixed Homo erectus
fossils with australopithecine fossils found in 2 strata, designated as Bed 1 and Bed 2,
and then declared the resulting mix of fossils to be an intermediate form.
A study published in Nature in 1965 explained.
It must be remembered that two groups of specimens are involved, one from Bed 1 and the other
from Bed 2.
It is therefore by no means clear that the Bed 1 and Bed 2 groups of specimens necessarily
belong to the same species.
It would seem that there is more reason for associating the Bed 1 group of specimens with
australopithecus and the Bed 2 group with Homo erectus than there is for associating
the Bed 1 and 2 groups with each other.
A difficulty with Homo habilis was that postcranial fossils in clear association with the skull
would be lacking for another 20 years.
Meanwhile, evolutionists theorized that as an intermediate link between Australopithecus
afarensis and Homo erectus, Homo habilis would have been intermediate in height, weight,
and morphology.
Finally, in 1986, new finds revealed that Homo habilis not only resembled Australopithecus
afarensis in morphology, but it was just over 3 feet tall, even smaller than Lucy, its supposed
ancestor.
This constituted an enormous evolutionary U-turn, suggesting that the fossils were being
illegitimately forced into an evolutionary sequence.
In recent years, much additional criticism of the classification has appeared in the
scientific literature.
A 1999 article in Science called for eliminating Homo habilis and the reassignment of the smaller
fossils to the Australopithecines due to 1.
the small brain size, 2.
the resemblance to the Australopithecines, 3.
the estimated body mass of 34 kg, which is well below that of Homo erectus, and 4.
the hand bones and long arms suggesting that Homo habilis was capable of proficient climbing.
In 2003, an article in Science Magazine concluded,
The smaller-brained, small-toothed hominids that have been placed in Homo habilis may
be thought of as a form of Australopithecine.
Further evidence against the Homo habilis classification emerged in 2007, when it was
announced in Nature that due to a prolonged contemporary status or coexistence of Homo
erectus and Homo habilis at a single site for half a million years, this makes it less
likely that Homo erectus was a direct descendant of Homo habilis.
In other words, even leading evolutionists conceded that a prolonged contemporary status
has doomed the long-held evolutionary sequence involving Homo habilis.
More recently, a 2011 article in Science concluded,
In the past decade, the handyman status has been undermined.
Newer analytical methods suggested that Homo habilis matured and moved less like a human
and more like an Australopithecine.
Now a report in the Journal of Human Evolution finds that Homo habilis' dietary range was
also more like Lucy's than that of Homo erectus.
In a separate commentary this week in the PNAS, paleoanthropologist Bernard Wood writes
that today, if one considers all the evidence, there are grounds for excluding Homo habilis
from Homo.
In addition, the dates for Homo habilis are actually more recent than Homo erectus fossils
that, as has been said, can be placed in Homo sapiens.
Milford Wolpoff states in his college textbook that Homo sapiens appears at about 2 million
years ago and pre-sees the earliest appearance of Homo habilis.
So how can Homo habilis be the evolutionary ancestor of Homo sapiens?
He cannot, and his only claim to fame is that he is an invalid Texan who, even though
he never existed, continues to deceive millions of high school students and teachers in public
schools and also in Catholic schools and seminaries.
This takes us to the oldest claimed transitional form in the Homo genus, Homo rudolfensis,
who was discovered in 1972 in northern Kenya by Richard Leakey, the son of Louis Leakey.
The important early finds included the skulls designated KNMER 1470 and 1590, as well as
the KNMER 1481 and 1472 leg bones.
Since Homo rudolfensis dates to between 2.3 and 2.5 million years ago, someone looking
at the standard evolutionary timelines would expect the fossils to be more ape-like than
Homo habilis and much more primitive than Homo sapiens.
Yet, in comparative descriptions, the Homo rudolfensis fossils are commonly compared
to Homo sapiens in terms of their morphology and size.
For example, the 1470 skull had a very flat face and was described by Richard Leakey as
remarkably reminiscent of modern man, lacking the heavy and protruding eyebrow ridges and
thick bone characteristics of Homo erectus.
Another study of the interior of the cranium concluded that the external morphology appeared
normal and that the human in question had probably been capable of speech.
The KNMER 1470 skull was estimated to be between 752 and 775 cc.
The KNMER 1590 was similar in size even though the individual likely died at approximately
age 8.
In 2012, new Homo rudolfensis fossils were described by Meave Leakey and confirmed that
the species had a flat face, as was seen in the early finds, which differs markedly from
the facial morphology of Australopithecus.
Regarding the KNMER 1481 and 1472 leg bones, an article in Nature concluded,
When the femur is compared with modern African bones, there are marked similarities in features
that are widely considered characteristic of modern Homo sapiens.
The fragments of tibia and fibula resemble Homo sapiens.
Also from Nature magazine, the leg fossils have a later Homo-like morphology.
The estimated stature-body-weight relationships are in line with modern human and archaic
Homo sapiens relationships.
Similar descriptions for other rudolfensis fossils suggest that they can be classified
as Homo sapiens.
This is a logical placement and is based on the reasoning of Emile House when the Java
man fossils were first examined.
Recall his words,
I refuse to let myself be influenced by considerations concerning the sediment or age.
A bone which shows all the characteristics of a human bone must be considered as such.
When after determining this, it is said that the bone could have belonged to an intermediate
species one is abandoning the domain of facts without any plausible reason.
If this common sense rule is not followed, the study of man's history loses all credibility
And this is what has happened.
But it is clear that the rudolfensis fossils are not intermediary between Lucy and Homo
habilis.
They are not intermediary at all.
The discussion of Homo ends with a recent find called Homo naledi, which generated much
fanfare when announced in 2015 by a Lee Berger team.
The find occurred in a South African cave that had an opening so narrow that Berger
had to recruit thin female scientists to perform the excavations.
The announcement of naledi raised eyebrows as Berger claimed that the naledi specimens
underwent ritual burial.
This was surprising due to the small entrance opening and because the bones could have simply
been swept into the cave by floodwaters.
Certainly, random flood disposition seemed consistent with the accumulation in one square
meter of more than 1,500 fragments that were assigned to 15 specimens, yet only four skulls
were part of the initial finds.
Nevertheless, in 2017, the Berger team announced a second chamber containing naledi fossils
and argued that this gave added credence to their ritual burial hypothesis.
The morphology of the naledi fossils is curious and raises the possibility that different
species could have been mistakenly combined.
One team member stated you could almost draw a line through the hips, primitive above,
modern below.
If you'd found the foot by itself, you'd think some bushman had died.
This contrasts with the very small cranial capacity of naledi that is estimated to range
from 465cc to 610cc.
While the small cranial capacity suggested, at first glance, that the fossils may have
been a mixture of australopithecine and homo fossils, the emerging view that the morphology
of the hands, feet, and other regions have a morphology resembling homo sapiens suggests
that the small cranial capacity and stature is the result of pathological conditions related
to genetic inbreeding, as was the case for other so-called transitional species.
Sanford and Rupp explain in Contested Bones.
Why did naledi, erectus, and hobbit all have abnormally small brain cases and other genetic
anomalies?
All hunter-gathering people live in small tribes, typically of fewer than 100 people.
If such tribes are isolated and do not interbreed with other tribes, over time they must always
undergo genetic inbreeding.
In such cases, genetic drift will cause many bad mutations to arise.
The inbreeding hypothesis can explain why, in early human history, tribes were diverse,
often very strange, and often genetically deformed.
Another unusual aspect about the find was that no fossil dates were initially provided,
even though there was much speculation that the finds were at least 2 million years old.
However, in 2017, dating results indicated that the fossils were only 226,000 to 335,000
years old.
The dating results strongly support the view that the small size of naledi, as with floresiensis
and erectus, was the result of inbreeding that occurred in small Homo sapiens communities.
Considering all available evidence, and while acknowledging that more studies are needed
to resolve many questions surrounding Homo naledi, it is clear that the naledi fossils
are too recent to be a direct human ancestor.
Summarizing our analysis thus far, it is clear that some pruning of our family tree may be
in order.
Namely, Homo erectus and Homo rudolfensis can be assigned to Homo sapiens.
The Homo habilis fossils can be divided into Homo sapiens or Australopithecus.
The Homo classifications intermediate between Homo erectus and Homo sapiens can also be
sunk.
This is so because they can be considered to have characteristics that can arise as
the result of small community inbreeding.
When these assignments are made, the fossil record starts to look as expected.
The genesis account of creation is true.
Now, viewers may expect that no evolutionist would approve of this sort of pruning, but
it is important to be aware of conclusions forced by recent finds in the country of Georgia.
Between 2000 and 2013, 5 skulls at the same site were recovered and dated to 1.85 million
years ago.
All 5 have been attributed to Homo erectus by the discovery team, yet the fossils show
enormous variability and depending on the skull can be described as resembling Homo
habilis, Homo rudolfensis, or Homo erectus.
Considering the variation among the skulls, the discovery team made several logical conclusions
in the October 18, 2013 issue of Science Magazine.
The team acknowledged that there is
growing evidence that variation in fossil hominids tends to be misinterpreted as species
diversity especially when single fossil specimens from different localities are compared.
Extending this conclusion to African fossils, the article stated
Morphological diversity in the African fossil Homo record around 1.8 million years ago probably
reflects variation between a single evolving lineage which is appropriately named Homo
erectus and concluded that most probably Homo habilis and Homo rudolfensis belong to a single
evolving Homo lineage.
While the article names the single lineage to be Homo erectus, it has been explained
that there is ample reason for sinking Homo erectus into Homo sapiens and many evolutionists
support this move.
Others may be wondering, how could someone agreeing to such drastic trimming of man's
family tree still be an evolutionist?
It is largely due to the continued faith in the supposed transitional forms leading to
the Homo genus that include the two Australopithecus members Africanus and Afarensis as well as
the earlier Ardipithecus ramidus.
We will now examine these claimed ancestors.
In 1924, Raymond Dart discovered the Tong child in South Africa and he soon designated
a new genus name of Australopithecus meaning southern ape.
The species was named Africanus and it had a cranial capacity of 440 cubic centimeters.
Some have proposed that it gave rise to early Homo around 2 million years ago.
In most evolutionary timelines, Africanus is preceded by Afarensis which is nicknamed
Lucy.
The story of Lucy begins with her 1974 discovery in Ethiopia by Donald Johanson.
This species is claimed to have lived 3 to 3.6 million years ago, was approximately 3.5
feet tall and had a cranial capacity of less than 400 cc.
Team member Owen Lovejoy claimed that based primarily on Lucy's reconstructed pelvis,
Australopithecus afarensis was bipedal and Lucy's hips and the muscular arrangement
of her pelvis would have made it as hard for her to climb trees as it is for modern humans.
Do these two Australopithecines fit into a human evolutionary sequence?
Starting with A. africanus which is dated to as recent as 2 million years ago, it is
clear that this species is not a viable human ancestor given its ape-like morphology at
2 million years while Homo rudolfensis resembled Homo sapiens at 2.3 million years ago.
Also recall that Homo sapiens is dated to 2 million years ago by Wolpof and so if Africanus
evolved into something, Homo sapiens would have been there to see it happen.
We now know that Australopithecus africanus was a small chimp-like animal with a divergent
toe that likely spent most of its time in the trees.
As stated in Science Magazine, Africanus possessed an ape-like great toe that diverged from the
other toes.
Its foot has departed to only a small degree from that of a chimpanzee.
There is also a huge problem in viewing Africanus as a descendant from Lucy's kind, its supposed
ancestor, because it was even more ape-like than Afarensis.
For example, Science Magazine explains,
The body proportions of Africanus were actually more ape-like, and perhaps more suited to
a life in the trees than those of Afarensis, its presumed ancestor.
From the Journal of Human Evolution,
Africanus was extremely ape-like in its morphology and possibly arboreally adapted.
No single feature can be used to separate its tibia unequivocally from that of a chimpanzee.
It is difficult to reconcile with the interpretation that Australopithecus afarensis was ancestral
to Australopithecus africanus.
The bottom line is that Africanus has nothing to do with human evolution and it did not
descend from Lucy.
It is a primate that simply went extinct.
We now discuss Australopithecus afarensis to whom it is recalled the Lytole tracts were
falsely attributed to and caused Owen Lovejoy to conclude that it would have been as hard
for Lucy to climb a tree as for modern humans.
The truth is that, while Lucy is displayed in museums as an upright biped, this is an
extremely dubious conclusion that is largely based on the Lytole footprints, which are
best assigned to Homo.
In the scientific literature, many studies conclude that Lucy was an extinct primate
that spent much time in the trees.
She was not bipedal.
Conclusions from the literature state that Afarensis had long and curved toes that imply
a gait that is not identical to modern Homo sapiens.
That the knee of Australopithecus afarensis is compatible with a significant degree of
arboreal tree locomotion.
That the animal slept, ate, and lived primarily in the trees.
That if the creature walked on two legs, it must have looked like a modern human walking
at the beach while wearing a pair of flippers.
That Lucy's wrist exhibits characteristics seen today only in the African apes.
These features are thought to be associated with knuckle walking.
That its inner ear chambers, which house organs that help us maintain our balance while standing
or moving, indicate that Australopithecus afarensis still tended to clamber in trees
rather than amble across the savannah.
And that its scapular displays several traits characteristic of suspensory apes, suggesting
that their locomotor repertoire included a substantial amount of climbing, which is consistent
with evidence purporting that Australopithecus afarensis' dental development was also ape-like.
Also recall that Sussman and Stern's in-depth analysis concluded that Afarensis was able
to abduct the hallux, meaning it could move its big toe out of line with the other digits
and use it as an opposable big toe.
Also, its ankle bones had non-human features that characterizes primates with divergent
halluses, meaning opposable big toes.
And that considering the toe and ankle bones together, Australopithecus afarensis retained
some ability to abduct the hallux.
Further, a 2006 announcement in Nature of Australopithecus afarensis fossils dubbed
Lucy's Child or Ceylon that date to 3.3 million years ago revealed that Australopithecus afarensis
had a morphology that is archaic in the sense that its brain case, jaws, and limb bones
are much more ape-like than those of later taxa that are rightly included in Homo.
Further, the foot and scapula and long and curved manual phalanges raise new questions
about the importance of arboreal behavior in the Australopithecus afarensis locomotor
repertoire.
In truth, these were not new questions.
It was clear from the initial announcement of Lucy that Afarensis was ape-like and not
a viable transitional form to Homo.
In fact, the announcement of Lucy in the March 25, 1976 issue of Nature also included
discussion of Homo fossils dated to the same general age as Lucy, which is why the article
abstract stated, Homo and Australopithecus coexisted as early as 3 million years ago.
In 1979, however, Donald Johanson and Tim White claimed that all of the fossils at Hadar,
those initially described as Homo and Australopithecine, plus those found at Laetoli, including those
named by Mary Leakey as Homo, were actually part of the same diverse species.
This claim was repeated in 1980 by Tim White in Science.
Note also that Johanson initially saw Lucy's hip as chimp-like, which meant that Lucy couldn't
possibly have walked like a modern human.
Later, however, as Johanson explains in the Nova documentary, In Search of Human Origins,
team member Owen Lovejoy speculated that the pelvis had been deformed during fossilization
and so he reshaped a mold of Lucy's hip with a power drill so that,
After taking the kink out of the pelvis, it all fit together perfectly.
As a result, the angle of the hip looks nothing like a chimp's, but a lot like ours.
The ape that stood up?
It was a revolutionary idea.
We needed Owen Lovejoy's expertise again, because the evidence wasn't quite adding up.
The knee looked human, but the shape of her hip didn't.
Superficially, her hip resembled a chimpanzee's, which meant that Lucy couldn't possibly have
walked like a modern human.
But Lovejoy noticed something odd about the way the bones had been fossilized.
When I put the two parts of the pelvis together that we had, this caused the two bones, in
fact, to fit together so well that they're in an anatomically impossible position.
The perfect fit was an illusion that made Lucy's hip bones seem to flare out like a
chimp's.
But all was not lost.
Lovejoy decided he could restore the pelvis to its natural shape.
He didn't want to tamper with the original, so he made a copy in plaster.
He cut the damaged pieces out and put them back together the way they were before Lucy
died.
It was a tricky job, but after taking the kink out of the pelvis, it all fit together
perfectly, like a three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle.
As a result, the angle of the hip looks nothing like a chimp's, but a lot like ours.
More generally now, all species of Australopithecines had a morphology inconsistent with being man's
evolutionary ancestor.
Physicist Charles Oxnard, described by Stephen Jay Gould as the leading expert on the quantitative
study of skeletons, writes in his textbook, The Order of Man.
Most of these Australopithecine fossil fragments are, in fact, uniquely different from both
man and man's nearest living genetic relatives, the chimpanzee and gorilla.
To the extent that resemblances exist with living forms, they tend to be with the orangutan.
The Australopithecines are not structurally closely similar to humans.
The Australopithecines are now irrevocably removed from a place in the evolution of human
bipedalism and certainly from any place in the direct human lineage.
Another important claimed transitional form is Ardipithecus ramidus, nicknamed Artie by
Tim White and his team.
The 2009 announcement of Artie took up nearly a full issue of Science Magazine, which named
Artie as the Breakthrough of the Year.
Artie was described as a biped able to walk upright but also able to maneuver well in
the trees.
This description was based on the hip, the presence of an opposable toe, hands and long
fingers that hung down past its knee, and a flexible hand likely used to support weight
and to aid in tree locomotion.
In 2015, the team described Artie as much better adapted to climbing trees than any
other hominid yet found, and its limb proportions not only differ from those of both humans
and chimpanzees, they are actually closest to those of most known Miocene apes.
Many questions have emerged about placing Artie on the line of human evolution.
First, the biped ability is being questioned, as stated in Science.
But not everyone agrees with the team's interpretations about how Ardipithecus ramidus
walked upright and what it reveals about our ancestors.
Researchers are focusing intently on the lower skeleton, where some of the anatomy
is so primitive that they are beginning to argue over just what it means to be bipedal.
The pelvis, for example, offers only circumstantial evidence for upright walking, says Walker.
Similarly, in a science-technical commentary that was very critical of the white team's
conclusions, Esteban Sarmiento of the Human Evolution Foundation explained,
Attempts to link Ardipithecus ramidus to an exclusive human lineage by pointing to suspected
bipedal characteristics in the foot are not convincing, as all the characteristics cited
also serve the mechanical requisites of quadrupedality, and in the case of Ardipithecus ramidus, find
their closest functional analog to those of gorillas.
Also, the 2009 announcement relied heavily on tooth morphology to argue that Artie was
on man's evolutionary path.
However, Sarmiento explains in Science that the evidence put forth does not indicate that
Ardipithecus is a hominid or ancestral to Australopithecus any more than other species
that are unrelated to man but that also share a human-like premolar canine complex.
Ardie is also extremely interesting from another perspective.
Given the claimed dates for the Ardipithecus genus of 4.4 million years ago to 5.8 million
years ago, the question arises as to why the white team's description of Ardie's morphology
differs so significantly from chimpanzee morphology, when the evolutionary establishment has for
decades held that the last common ancestor with a chimpanzee lived no more than 5-7 million
years ago and was very similar to the chimpanzee in form and function.
Since Ardie did not fit the long-held expectations about the last common ancestor, the white
team had two options.
They could have concluded that Ardipithecus ramidus was not closely related to humans
and chimpanzees and not on the evolutionary timeline of Homo sapiens.
However, this would have meant that after years of work, Ardie would be of little importance.
The alternative was to claim that the long-held view of the last common ancestor being chimp-like
and the presumed date of 5-7 million years ago for the common ancestor were an error.
White's team took the second option, but in setting forth their arguments, they exposed
as false the 50-year-old claim that based on the fossils, a chimpanzee and human common
ancestor lived 5-7 million years ago and that this date was independently confirmed by so-called
molecular clock studies.
The basics of molecular clock studies are illustrated in this figure, where it is seen
conceptually that if we know the genomes of two existing species, A and B, we can determine
the genetic differences between the species.
Then, based on an assumed average mutation rate and the underlying assumption that evolution
is true, we could project back in time and estimate point C, when the genomes would have
been identical.
In other words, how long ago the common ancestor lived.
Since the 1970s, such studies have concluded that the human and chimpanzee common ancestor
lived 5-7 million years ago.
Since these dates were also proposed from the fossils, evolutionists felt that the case
for human evolution was very sound.
Well, Arty has shown that this is not the case, and here's why.
Since the morphology of Arty did not fit the 5-7 million year date for the common ancestor,
the White team first explained that molecular clock studies are based on unproven and flawed
assumptions such as the existence of an average mutation rate.
Here it should be noted that the fallacy of an average mutation rate is recognized in
the scientific literature, and in practice the claimed average mutation rate is usually
a plug number adopted so that the fossil and genetic evidence are in general agreement.
Having dismissed the molecular evidence, White further argued that only the fossil evidence,
and in fact, only the fossils of Arty, can be trusted to establish the date for the common
ancestor.
White's team claimed their fossils imply a date for the chimp-human common ancestor
of 7-10 million years ago, or up to twice as long as the dates proclaimed as a scientific
fact for nearly the past 50 years.
This set off a controversy in the field that still rages, but in truth, all the Arty team
accomplished was to illustrate that the fossils assembled over the previous 100 years have
little predictive value, and that molecular clock studies of the past 50 years do not
provide independent verification of human evolution.
And so if the world's leading paleoanthropologist concludes that the fossil evidence has little
predictive value and molecular clock studies are unsound, how can anyone adopting this
same position be called ignorant of modern science?
In truth, it is those who have never gone beyond their high school biology textbook,
and this would include a great many Catholic apologists, teachers, and theologians who
are unaware of the real story behind evolutionary claims.
The last three episodes of this series will reveal just how damaging this mistake has
been outside and inside the Catholic Church.
To close out the discussion of the supposed evolutionary timeline, when we look at fossils
dated in the 6 million years ago range, we find species that are so small and ape-like
that only a blind faith in evolution theory would suggest that they have anything to do
with man's ancestry.
These fossils also create significant issues for those who claim that the fossils are human
ancestors.
For example, Solhellanthropus chidensis had a small cranial capacity of 320-380 cc, but
a very modern face that does not fit evolutionary predictions.
As Bernard Wood explained in Nature,
A hominid of this age should only just be beginning to show signs of being a hominid.
It certainly should not have the face of a hominid less than one-third of its geological
age.
Also, if it is accepted as a stem hominid, all creatures with more primitive faces, and
that is a very long list, would have to be excluded from the ancestry of modern humans.
Aurorantuginensis is rejected by many evolutionists as a human ancestor because it is so ape-like.
Owen Lovejoy believes that the femur resembles that of a chimpanzee, and that the animals
spent most of its time in trees.
Let us return to Darwin's last icon that portrays the steady evolution of mankind over
millions of years.
We can readily see that this is a deception by plotting the actual data for cranial capacity
and body mass.
As seen in the first graph, the change in cranial capacity is anything but a gradual
progression as evolutionists would have us believe.
A similar conclusion holds for the plot of body mass or weight.
To those who are open to the truth, it should be apparent that Darwin's last icon has
fallen and that there is no viable evolutionary sequence leading to modern man.
Interestingly, away from the biology textbooks that are used to deceive children and instructors,
the scientific literature now acknowledges that evolutionary models are collapsing.
An article in Science Magazine in 2002 commented,
"...into the trash, in fact, may go the very definition of what it means to be a hominid,
as there is now little agreement on what key traits identify an exclusively human ancestor.
Nor is there agreement on which species led to Homo, or even whether the fossils represent
different species or variation within a single species."
Another study by two leading evolutionists in the Proceedings of the National Academy
of Sciences that compared results from molecular clock studies and the fossil evidence concluded,
"...we found that evolutionary histories based on the fossil data were incompatible
with evolutionary histories based on molecular clock studies.
Little confidence can be placed in evolutionary histories generated solely from higher primate
fossil evidence.
The corollary of this is that the existing evolutionary hypotheses about human evolution
are unlikely to be reliable.
Accordingly, new approaches are required."
This is a staggering admission and suggests that, quite literally, the field of paleoanthropology
is in danger of becoming clueless.
At a minimum, it raises the question of whether or not the claims for human evolution that
have caused untold numbers to abandon the Christian faith remotely qualify as scientific,
and if the claims meet the standards set by Darwin's bulldog, Thomas Huxley.
"...every hypothesis is bound to explain, or at any rate, not be inconsistent with,
the whole of the facts which it professes to account for, and if there is a single one
of these facts which can be shown to be inconsistent with the hypothesis, the hypothesis falls
to the ground.
It is worth nothing."
Applying this criterion to the evidence we have covered in this episode, and to the evidence
discussed in Part 2, we conclude that claims for human evolution are worth nothing, and
that the entire field was accurately summarized by Sir Solly Zuckerman, who wrote,
"...students of fossil primates have not been distinguished for caution when working
within the logical constraints of their subject.
The record is so astonishing that it is legitimate to ask whether much science is yet to be found
in this field at all."