Researcher: Evidence for early man in Asia half a million years earlier than thought

_{Denyse O'Leary

September 20, 2019

Human evolution}

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The hypothesis is based on a 2013 find in Jordan:

Scardia and his colleagues, having analyzed these artifacts, argue that they are rudimentary tools used by early humans, crafted and discarded around 2.5 million years ago. If they are right, we may need to rethink which hominin species made the first forays out of the African cradle—and when.
The general consensus for decades has been that Homo erectus—an upright, long-legged species—was among the first hominins (or species closely related to modern humans) to leave Africa. Scientists presume members of this species traveled through the natural corridor of the Levant, a region along the eastern edge of the Mediterranean, around 2 million years ago.
Scardia’s study, published in the September issue of Quaternary Science Reviews, suggests a far earlier exit. It proposes that hominins capable of tool creation may have been on the doorstep of Asia some 500,000 years earlier. That claim helps explain the puzzling evolution of a hominin species found in Indonesia, as well as a contentious group of skulls found in Georgia.

Richard Kemeny, “Should the Story of Homo’s Dispersal Out of Africa Be Rewritten?” at Sapiens

One question mark is whether the stones are really tools. It’s hard to tell, especially because there are so few. A classic design inference problem.

Paper. (paywall)

See also: Ancient human group as a cold case nearly half a million years ago

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Comments

Unbelievable. Communications can be readily assembled into bits. Computer programs and genes- readily assembled into bits. Read Shannon's work. That would be a start.ET_{September 22, 2019
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ET writes, "What part of FSCO/I says that it is applicable to objects not readily made into bits?" What does "not readily made into bits mean?" What kind of things is "readily made into bits" as opposed to one that isn't"?hazel_{September 22, 2019
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hazel:
And, as a mathematician, I really don’t see any reasonable way this could be done.
You could figure out how the artifact was made and put it in a procedure. The minimal instructions it takes to make it. Then do the math using that procedure. That said FSCO/I is NOT the only methodology to detect design.ET_{September 22, 2019
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rhampton7:
I too would like to see an attempt at calculating the bits of information these possible tools show versus stones that do not show any evidence of being worked by Man.
What part of FSCO/I says that it is applicable to objects not readily made into bits? Why aren't tried and true design detection techniques enough for hypothetical artifacts?ET_{September 22, 2019
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Seversky:
Calculate the FSCO/I of these objects in order to prove whether or not they were designed.
Total stupidity. FSCO/I is only used on things that are readily changed into bits. With objects there are other design detection techniques to be used, duh.ET_{September 22, 2019
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What I would be interested in seeing is an actual calculation. I can't imagine what reasonable numbers one could attache to the putative tools vs similar stones. For those of you who claim that somehow some quantity for whatever you call it (functional information in the long thread going on right now) can be calculated, could you even sketch a procedure to accomplish this. I highly agree with Sev at #1 on this. And, as a mathematician, I really don't see any reasonable way this could be done.hazel_{September 21, 2019
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I too would like to see an attempt at calculating the bits of information these possible tools show versus stones that do not show any evidence of being worked by Man. I doubt it’s anywhere close to 500, but it has to be above 0, right?rhampton7_{September 21, 2019
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It's interesting to me that the enterprise of ID does not seem to have really come to grips with the reality of the human evolutionary process (as opposed to special creation). It seems to tiptoe around the issue, beyond repeatedly pointing out the continuing explanatory failures of the various sciences involved – paleontology, anthropology, genetics and so on. Especially highlighting the continuing situation of the existence of many apparent “missing links” in the process leading up to Homo sapiens, despite many new fossil discoveries. This situation emphasizes a major disconnect that seems to exist. This is between the quite certain bankruptcy of new synthesis Neodarwinism when it comes to explaining macroevolution in really "deep time", that is episodes like the origin of animal body plans in the Cambrian Explosion more than 500 million years ago and the origin of the major animal classes, families and orders. And the continuing failure of OOL research in explaining the origin of life itself in the approximate 3.8 billion year region. But it seems to have some apparent successes in clarifying at least some of the microevolutionary processes in the hominins leading directly to Homo Sapiens. This inevitably leads to the mysteries of how the many uniquely human characteristics actually came about, like the true origins of language, art, culture, primitive to advanced spiritual understandings, etc. Were these advances somehow through a version of Darwinistic processes (not tenable), or "cultural evolution" of some sort, or (most likely to me) a combination of cultural evolution and introduction of ideas and traits from outside the system. If modern humans are basically spiritual creatures inhabiting human bodies (as believed by many proponents of religious and spiritual belief systems, and also paranormal advocates), then there must have been some sort of point of transition from animal to human. The transition problem is the mystery of exactly when and how this occurred in the increasingly detailed history of the hominids and hominins that is now being revealed by science. It seems to me this quandary may be leading to some sort of cognitive dissonance between spiritual belief systems and acceptance of some form of human evolution as evidenced by (among other things) the fossil record.doubter_{September 21, 2019
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Bornagain77 @ 2 "The study also adds fuel to a larger discussion in the field over the paradigm of Africa being the cradle of all Homo species. " Well, YEAH. If there were humans living in Jordan in 2 million BC, then it really don't matter when homo erectus first appeared in Southern Africa. Some years back I saw articles about similarly confusing "tool" finds in South America, which would have forced MAJOR adjustments to the estimated date for humans arriving in North America from Asia. Several competent experts concluded the "tools" were just NATURALLY chipped rocks. I'm not sure how that all worked out. But the search goes on, and open debate is the best way to arrive at Truth.vmahuna_{September 20, 2019
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from the article:
Robin Dennell, a Paleolithic archaeologist from Sheffield University, says the dating looks sound, though he isn’t convinced that the stones are tools. “The last place that I would want to search for early stone artifacts would be a high-energy … fluvial deposit,” he explains. The stones, he notes, may have simply chipped as they were thrown around in the water over time. To rule out this possibility, Scardia and his colleagues discounted any tools they thought may have chipped naturally, only selecting those that showed repetitive, unidirectional marks that would suggest deliberate hominin shaping. Dennell suggests a way to strengthen the case for the Zarqa pieces would have been to “record every single stone in the excavations where artifacts were claimed and record the size, weight, flake scars, etc., in the same way.” He says, “Overall, I am not convinced.”
Also from the article, they admit to having far more questions than answers about exactly where human evolution supposedly occurred:
The study also adds fuel to a larger discussion in the field over the paradigm of Africa being the cradle of all Homo species. Scardia and his colleagues suspect that a pre–H. erectus hominin could have traveled to Asia and there evolved into new species such as H. floresiensis or the equally mysterious Denisovans found in Siberia (and more recently, in Tibet). The team points to the finding of H. habilis–like skulls in the Caucasus Mountains in Georgia, nearly 1.8 million years in age, as evidence for this migration and subsequent evolution. “Africa created H. habilis, and H. habilis then existed in Asia. What did it do there? Produce other species,” Scardia says, supporting the idea that Asia was another pivotal cradle of human evolution.
Perhaps instead of just questioning where human evolution might have happened on the face of the earth, perhaps they should question a little deeper and question their unquestioned presupposition of whether evolution even happened at all?
Since Darwinists have ZERO substantiating evidence for their grandiose claim, (that all life arise via the mindless processes of Darwinian evolution), Darwinists, in grade school textbooks, use misleading evidence, and/or straight out deceptive evidence, to try to indoctrinate children into believing that Darwinian evolution is true. https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/a-cry-from-grievance-culture-she-never-learned-darwinism-in-school/#comment-684155 A few problems with the supposed scientific evidence that humans evolved from a common ancestor that we supposedly shared with chimpanzees about 6 million years ago. https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/a-cry-from-grievance-culture-she-never-learned-darwinism-in-school/#comment-684158
bornagain77_{September 20, 2019
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One question mark is whether the stones are really tools. It’s hard to tell, especially because there are so few. A classic design inference problem.
A chance, surely, for ID to prove its worth. Calculate the FSCO/I of these objects in order to prove whether or not they were designedSeversky_{September 20, 2019
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