Oldest stone tools found at 3.3 mya

Here's a nice photo: http://www.sciencetimes.com/articles/5768/20150419/worlds-oldest-stone-tools-discovered-kenya.htm There are instances where purported "stone tools" are controversial, but this one does look knapped. There have been efforts to try to date stone based on rock varnish, but it seems that the technique is problematic: http://www.geopor.pt/GPnov/gsc.html -Q Querius

I don't actually think natural forces have the combinatorial resources to produce "any shape". As for traces of humanoids... you mean the artifacts in question? Or do you mean fossilized remains? Depending on population size (and myriad other conditions), the latter may be unlikely. bloodymurderlive

Paleoarchaeologists cannot date stone tools. They can only date the strata in which they were found. I seem to remember reading about something like this discovery occurring in Mexico, except that it conflicted with the current narrative, destroying the careers of the people who found the artifacts. Lessee, here's a link that I found that has the basic information along with photographs: http://beforeitsnews.com/beyond-science/2012/10/hueyatlaco-250000-year-old-settlement-in-mexico-found-under-volcanic-ash-2439498.html Notice how everything that found was immediately disputed, unlike the contemporary finds in Africa. There are some interesting quotes in the article, including this one:

On March 30, 1981, Steen-McIntyre wrote to Estella Leopold, the associate editor of Quaternary Research: “The problem as I see it is much bigger than Hueyatlaco. It concerns the manipulation of scientific thought through the suppression of ‘Enigmatic Data,’ data that challenges the prevailing mode of thinking. Hueyatlaco certainly does that! Not being an anthropologist, I didn’t realize the full significance of our dates back in 1973, nor how deeply woven into our thought the current theory of human evolution had become. Our work at Hueyatlaco has been rejected by most archaeologists because it contradicts that theory, period.”

So, apparently there are some important lessons to be learned here about how science works. -Q Querius

In the multiverse, there are so many universes that there will be some in which stone tools are produced by chance. Jim Smith

“The cores and flakes we recovered are clearly knapped and are not the result of accidental or natural rock fracture,”  But how can you say this? Where is the evidence that this is not an accident? We can see no traces of humanoids near these supposed tools yet we are to believe as if by magic some being purposefully designed these as tools? That is ridiculous. After all, everyone knows after millions of years rocks can virtually change into any shape or pattern in a purposeless and random accidental way. Dr JDD

Young Earth Creationism? Mung