77,000-Year-Old Evidence for 'Bedding' and Use of Medicinal Plants Uncovered at South African Rock

An international team of archaeologists is reporting 77,000-year-old evidence for preserved plant bedding and the use of insect-repelling plants in a rock shelter in South Africa. This discovery is 50,000 years older than earlier reports of preserved bedding and provides a fascinating insight into the behavioural practices of early modern humans in southern Africa.

www.physorg.com...

Interesting article that sheds even more light on the self preserving & intuitive nature of the human species.Our ancestors amaze me with what they were able to create,either through intuitive means or creativity alone...Which leads me to my next train of thought and questioning.

A particular thought has continued to nag at me recently is this...Are we truly looking at the beginning of mankind,homo sapiens historical origins when we look back in the past? or are we possibly looking at the remnants of those who survived the last great catastrophe Mother Earth experienced?

Could it be that so called modern man is not so modern after all? Either way,it is an intriguing theory and sparks my interest whenever looking back into our past.

What do you think about this particular discovery? and while I'm at it I may as well ask if anyone would be interested in giving their personal opinion on the idea I previously alluded to...Is it possible that Man is much older than we have been led to believe or from what is presently known?

Could the instantaneous arrival of 'homo sapiens sapiens' out of no where honestly & truly be mere survivors of some long lost and forgotten catastrophe?

Radio-carbon dating is fallible in my opinion and I do not believe I am alone in that belief ,so do you think it is possible?

It seems like we are finding out more & more that our ancestors were a lot more capable and increasingly more intelligent than we have once thought.

I believe there is more to it all than what we have been led to believe,maybe not mislead on purpose by the scholars but because they do not know the complete truth themselves,only the comfort held within their theories.

sound, as doesnt 77K years ago coincide with the most common date agreed upon

by which humans were already beginning to migrate out of Africa by?

Originally posted by ignant
sound, as doesnt 77K years ago coincide with the most common date agreed upon

by which humans were already beginning to migrate out of Africa by?

Such finds suggest that Asia's earliest human ancestors may be older by hundreds of thousands of years than previously believed, the scientists say.Robin Dennell, of the University of Sheffield in England, and Wil Roebroeks, of Leiden University in the Netherlands, describe their ideas in the December 22, 2005 issue of Nature.

The fossil and archaeological finds characteristic of early modern humans are represented at various sites in East and South Africa, which date between 160,000 and 77,000 years ago.

Source

The replacement model of Christopher Stringer and Peter Andrews proposes that modern humans evolved from archaic humans 200,000-150,000 years ago only in Africa and then some of them migrated into the rest of the Old World replacing all of the Neanderthals and other late archaic humans beginning around 60,000-40,000 years ago.

If this interpretation of the fossil record is correct, all people today share a relatively modern African ancestry. All other lines of humans that had descended from Homo erectus presumably became extinct. From this view, the regional anatomical differences that we now see among humans are recent developments--evolving mostly in the last 40,000 years. This hypothesis is also referred to as the "out of Africa", "Noah's ark", and "African replacement" model

Source

although there are those that would say there is evidence that pushes back the date further towards 70-100,000 years,I guess take your pick,depending on who you ask,your belief and opinion of course.

General consensus mainstream I believe is 50-60,000 years,give or take.(correct me if I'm wrong,not sure)

what has been debated interestingly is the reasons why the sudden departure from Africa..I just came across an article with a very thought provoking theory for the reason of departure from Africa and a unique origin for ADHD ( attention deficit hyperactive disorder) -

Researchers are beginning to play with the idea that our culture could be influencing evolution, says Robert Moyzis of the University of California, Irvine. He has shown that 7R arose as a rare mutation 40,000 to 50,000 years ago, after we left Africa, then spread rapidly in human populations.

The 2R allele is a modified version that arose in Asia less than 10,000 years ago. He has also shown that people diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder are twice as likely to have the 7R allele. He thinks some of what we consider ADHD symptoms, like rapidly shifting focus and quick movements, are actually survival traits that were selected for during our migration out of Africa.

www.newscientist.com...