'Hobbit' skull found in Indonesia is not human, say scientists

'Hobbit' skull found in Indonesia is not human, say scientists

www.dailymail.co.uk

Scientists analysing a 'hobbit'-sized skull found five years ago have claimed that it is not human.

The fossil was discovered in Indonesia and named Homo floresiensis, or 'hobbit', but its species was not known.

Now researchers at the Department of Anatomical Sciences at Stony Brook University claim the shape of skull is consistent with a scaled-down human ancestor but not with modern humans, Science Daily reports.

They used 3-D shape analysis to study the size, shape and asymmetry of the cranium.

They compared it with other extinct homini species as well as with modern humans and apes.

Karen Baab said: 'The overall shape of the skull, particularly the part that surrounds the brain looks similar to fossils more than 1.5 million years older from Africa and Eurasia, rather than modern humans, even though Homo floresiensis is documented from 17,000 to 95,000 years ago.'

The researchers believe their findings counter one scientific theory that says the creature was a diminutive human that had suffered microcephaly, which leads to a smaller cranium.

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Yet another finding that will contradict other Accepted theories. As time goes by we find that most of the things we know about our creation are not correct. It will not be long till scientists will come and say the theory of evolution is not entirely correct and will come up with something else. After all the only thing we have are just theories.

www.dailymail.co.uk
(visit the link for the full news article)

I highly suggest the book Lucy: The Beginning of Humankind.

It's a scientific, paleoanthropological that does question some interpretations of evolution. It also pretty much counters creationism. It's a really great book and proves that there are better explanations for all of this as time goes on.

I also suggest Humankind by Peter Farb.

[edit on 1/21/2009 by ravenshadow13]

reply to post by rattan1


Regarding your comments about the theory of evolution. Yes, you are technically correct, that's what is wonderful about science, it allows for new evidence to change the status-quo and theories to be revised. May have it's flaws, but it's better than anything else.

Anyway, yes it's an interesting find. Would suggest there's an increased chance of old species surviving in isolated pockets until relatively recently, perhaps into the present day?

reply to post by Venit

I agree with you. But something I have notice that today in schools when these theories are being taught, they are not being taught as theories but as being Fact and truth which I believe is totally wrong

Of course it's not a human skull. It is a Hobbit, after all.
Second line.

reply to post by rattan1


Well it's the truth as we know it to be at this moment in time, as far as the evidence suggests evolution is true. Therefore it would be within prudence to call it fact. It'd take a major discovery to significantly change that.

reply to post by rattan1


The fact is, most of this field is riddled with fraud and conjecture. Case in point

Piltdown man: Found in a gravel pit in Sussex England in 1912, this fossil was considered by some sources to be the second most important fossil proving the evolution of man—until it was found to be a complete forgery 41 years later. The skull was found to be of modern age. The fragments had been chemically stained to give the appearance of age, and the teeth had been filed down!


Nebraska man: A single tooth, discovered in Nebraska in 1922 grew an entire evolutionary link between man and monkey, until another identical tooth was found which was protruding from the jawbone of a wild pig.


Java man: Initially discovered by Dutchman Eugene Dubois in 1891, all that was found of this claimed originator of humans was a skullcap, three teeth and a femur. The femur was found 50 feet away from the original skullcap a full year later. For almost 30 years Dubois downplayed the Wadjak skulls (two undoubtedly human skulls found very close to his "missing link"). (source: Hank Hanegraaff, The Face That Demonstrates The Farce Of Evolution, [Word Publishing, Nashville, 1998], pp.50-52)


Orce man: Found in the southern Spanish town of Orce in 1982, and hailed as the oldest fossilized human remains ever found in Europe. One year later officials admitted the skull fragment was not human but probably came from a 4 month old donkey. Scientists had said the skull belonged to a 17 year old man who lived 900,000 to 1.6 million years ago, and even had very detail drawings done to represent what he would have looked like. (source: "Skull fragment may not be human", Knoxville News-Sentinel, 1983)


Neanderthal: Still synonymous with brutishness, the first Neanderthal remains were found in France in 1908. Considered to be ignorant, ape-like, stooped and knuckle-dragging, much of the evidence now suggests that Neanderthal was just as human as us, and his stooped appearance was because of arthritis and rickets. Neanderthals are now recognized as skilled hunters, believers in an after-life, and even skilled surgeons, as seen in one skeleton whose withered right arm had been amputated above the elbow. (source: "Upgrading Neanderthal Man", Time Magazine, May 17, 1971, Vol. 97, No. 20)

www.nwcreation.net...


Thus I take this new 'discovery' with extreme skepticism. It is not science, merely conjecture.

reply to post by Venit


And that is where education is going wrong.

Theory's should be taught as theories and not as facts. There really isn't any scientific evidence to say that it is the way we came about.

I'm not trying to argue and say evolution is wrong but there definitely is not enough there to teach it as fact.

Adaptation on the other hand can be taught as fact.

reply to post by Hastobemoretolife


Agreed. Natural selection is a fact and has been seen in the field. Evolution on the other hand presupposes that entire hyper-complex infrastructures occurred at random, with nary a transitional form.

In fact it was the lack of transitional forms that led to 'punctuated equilibrium' and other patches to the theory of evolution. It is amazing that almost every other branch of science has undergone a radical challenge of basic assumptions other than evolution. Evolution is too sacred to challenge since doing so might open a door for those nasty God believers. Thus evolution has now also become a religion.

Originally posted by rattan1


Yet another finding that will contradict other Accepted theories.

which accepted theories? that its a microcephelate? thats not widley accepted and generally used by creationists science as a whole accept its not

that its a pigmy human? that was one possability, we can throw that away now and see whats next and this only had limited support, florensis is still an homonid of the homo genus by deffinition of its bipedalism and has been tested to see if primates follow the 'island rule' of dwarfism which they do

so its a homonid that travelled to the island before or after its seperation from the mainland and followed the same pattern of dwarfism as any other naimal displays as shown here and by a number of other pepers it links

www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov...


this doesnt in anway contradict or disprove evolution, it just disproves the fact it was a microcephelate which has already been done and shows its origins may be further back in time, they still evolved from somthing its just a case of ruling out which ones are the wrong paths to leave us with the right one

the same goes for our evolution we have so many possable missing link species were trying to rule out some to see which is the right one, it may be we havnt even found our direct ancestors yet but again all the evidence shows we evolved

As time goes by we find that most of the things we know about our creation are not correct.

wrong branch on the tree yes the tree bieng wrong no, its a twin nested hierachy when its bieng proven correct from the bottom up and the top down chances are some branches will be rearranged but the tree its self wont be cut down and burnt by science

It will not be long till scientists will come and say the theory of evolution is not entirely correct and will come up with something else.

its NEVER been entirely corrct becasue its work in progress, we know things breed with variance and we know enviromental factors effect the chance of survival and everything dies thats all you really need to show evolution in action

its all the fun details were working out now which is why some hypothesis will be disguarded for better one until we remove the possibles and are left with the deffinates

After all the only thing we have are just theories.

yes but by theories you mean proven ideas backed up with substancial data and evidence with no evidence working against it so they are our best understanding at the moment able to be altered to fit new findings later

becasue some of the details may be wrong it doesnt make the whole thing wrong, if you write your life story out and make a spelling mistake or miss out an event it doesnt mean your life history is all wrong and didnt happen

reply to post by SevenThunders


I guess really what it comes down to is that people have a hard time admitting that they don't know.

It isn't to be frowned upon if you don't know how something happens. In the really big scheme of things the human race isn't even enough to garner significant interest.

Right now as it stands if 20 billion years from now and some other intelligent life form is teaching the history of the universe we would probably be lucky to even get a mention.

Originally posted by SevenThunders
Agreed. Natural selection is a fact and has been seen in the field. Evolution on the other hand presupposes that entire hyper-complex infrastructures occurred at random, with nary a transitional form.

not even in the slightest

natural selcetion is evolution, the only other thing you need is breeding with variance of genetics and weve seen that too

nothing happens by random, theres a random element to it but thats so strictly controlled by natural selection it becomes a driven process not a random one

theres plenty of transitional forms everything alive or has been is transitional its come from one thing that was similar but not exacty the same and unless it goes extinct will lead to somthing similar but not exactly the same as evolution predicts

In fact it was the lack of transitional forms that led to 'punctuated equilibrium' and other patches to the theory of evolution.

which of the thousands of transitional forms we have found shows the lack?

theres wholes we know and understand the how and why of that, but when we can predict where transitional forms will be found and can then go hunt for them in specific places like we did with whale intermediaries and tiktaalik the records full enough to be more then useful

punctuated equilibrium has nothing at all to do with wholes in the fossil record or a lack of transitional species

it explains why through graduaism somthing may appear to suddenly appear in the geological record but may sill have taken hundreds of thousands of years appear in real time

It is amazing that almost every other branch of science has undergone a radical challenge of basic assumptions other than evolution.

becasue few forms of science can be boiled down to 3 factors

everything dies
everything breeds with variance
animals unisuted to thier enviroment are more likley to die

so until things stop dying, natural selection stops working or Dna begins to copy its self with 100% accuracy the basic foundations(they are proven so not assumptions) wont be radically altered

the internals of evolutionary thoery have vastly changed with out understanding of genetics and heredity, so it has undergone similar major changes as other sciences but the basic frame work has stayed the same

Evolution is too sacred to challenge since doing so might open a door for those nasty God believers.

what like the 70% of evolutionary biologists that are nasty god believers?

parts of it can will and are bieng challenged constantly to wittle away and find whats really happening, you can challenge the whole thing if you like but to do it scientifically requires scientific research and accounting for ALL the evidence not just misrepresenting a few bits and declaring it doesnt fit my book of choice so must be wrong

which is why creation science isnt science, they simply cant or wont even try and do the ground work required and if they did they would probabily switch to theistic evolution and leave silly creationist everything made as is ideas behind

Thus evolution has now also become a religion.

nope based on evidence and study and testing so its still science, no belief in supernatural required which dictates a religeon

It's called teaching current scientific knowledge - the beauty of science is that it is inherently self-correcting.

It's like capitalism: it's the best we have. You wouldn't want them to bypass latest scientific research and start teaching the Bible, would you? Of course not, because that'd be gosh-darned silly.

Even the scientists who found Lucy aren't certain that she is the missing link. Even more puzzling is why they only ever found one of them. The missing link for an entire civillization should leave more than one skeleton.

Originally posted by Lazyninja
Even the scientists who found Lucy aren't certain that she is the missing link. Even more puzzling is why they only ever found one of them. The missing link for an entire civillization should leave more than one skeleton.

I think you mean culture, rather than civilization. It's unlikely the hobbits built great cities and monuments...

Originally posted by Lazyninja
Even the scientists who found Lucy aren't certain that she is the missing link. Even more puzzling is why they only ever found one of them.

they didnt a few miles away the found a family group of 13 astrolapithicus afarensis that appear to have died in a flash flood the way thier bodies were in situe, the site is known as site 333 and there are still others finds

to the best of my knowledge there are 18 individuals both adult and children that have been found either complete or partial finds

its not all that puzzaling why numbers are so low they lived in small family groups not mass herds so numbers were low, the enviroment they live isnt always conducive to fossalisation and homonid bones arnt very robust so tend to get destroyed

the fossil record for chimps is in far worse shape then our own because of the jungle enviroment destroys bones so well, thier lineage fossils from the common ancestor until recently consists of a couple of teeth

Originally posted by The Last Man on Earth

Originally posted by Lazyninja
Even the scientists who found Lucy aren't certain that she is the missing link. Even more puzzling is why they only ever found one of them. The missing link for an entire civillization should leave more than one skeleton.

I think you mean culture, rather than civilization. It's unlikely the hobbits built great cities and monuments...

Aha you're right.

Well I actually meant race(s) I guess.

Originally posted by rattan1


Yet another finding that will contradict other Accepted theories. As time goes by we find that most of the things we know about our creation are not correct. It will not be long till scientists will come and say the theory of evolution is not entirely correct and will come up with something else. After all the only thing we have are just theories.

www.dailymail.co.uk
(visit the link for the full news article)

Yep...


Please see the links in my signature for supporting documents of "only theories"

I hears someone say the other day "That's much more theoretical than ..."

Something is either theoretical or it's not..

total LOL

Originally posted by HunkaHunka

Yep...


Please see the links in my signature for supporting documents of "only theories"

but a scientific theory uses evidence and testing and predictions to validate it for it to become a theory so its always going to be partially right

I hears someone say the other day "That's much more theoretical than ..."

Something is either theoretical or it's not..

i agree thats absurd its theoretical until it becomes proven when it stops bieng theoretical

but somthing thats proven can still have theoretical aspects to it covering the what when and why to explain why what has been proven to happen happens

but theoretical and thoery have different meanings to each other within science