Admin writes:
First the split was 5-7 million years ago (and who knows what it was before that), then it was 4 million years ago, then it was 5 million years ago, now it's 8 million years ago. Aren't these guys just making it up as they go along?
That's one of the problems with science journalism. Science is a process -- and a messy one at that. But journalists need to report events. So they report on each new study as if the investigators had found the Holy Grail.
In time, a consensus will probably emerge. More fossils will be found. Statistical models will be improved or abandoned. Molecular clocks will be better calibrated. Personally, I'd trust the fossils over the statistical models and molecular clocks.
In the meantime, 4-8 million years ago is not such an imprecise estimate when measured on a geologic timescale.
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