The Ape Man: Truth or Fiction?

Hi, Nothing!About Nebraska Man, it's pretty much just as Asgara described. While there was a lot of excitement about it in the popular press for a period after its discovery, it was never embraced by scientists, it was identified as a pig tooth in relatively short order, and it certainly is not in any modern textbooks as a human precursor.About Piltdown Man, this was a purposeful fraud found in 1916 that wasn't positively identified as such until 1953, but was suspected to be a fraud from the beginning. Even so, it was consistent with what scientists were expecting to find in the fossil record (a large braincase), and so it found acceptance in many paleontological corners. This hindered proper interpretation of the larger fossil record for many years. For example, the Taung child discovered in 1923 wasn't assigned the significance it deserved at the time because, having a small braincase, it wasn't consistent with Piltdown.The lesson of Piltdown is that scientists are vulnerable to accepting evidence and making interpretations that are consistent with their preconceptions.About Lucy being a modern human with rickets, you're confusing Australopithicus afarensis with Neandertals. When Neandertal fossils were first discovered, one of the early interpreters insisted it was merely a modern human with rickets or arthritis. This interpretation was soon proven wrong as more and more Neandertal bones were uncovered with precisely the same bone configuration.There is an extremely large hominid fossil collection worldwide, and the progression from primitive hominid to modern human is well documented. But even with all this evidence, there is little agreement on the details of the progression, or on which fossils lie on the path to modern man and which are side branches and detours.--PercyThis message has been edited by Percy, 08-10-2004 10:44 AM

You're not attacking the foundation, though. Modern theories on human origins do not include Nebraska Man or Piltdown Man. I'm glad to hear your standards are so high. I assume this means that you deplore your recent dabbling with plagiarism. All human endeavors are affected by human frailities, and science is a human endeavor. If scientific frauds invalidate science, then what do religious frauds, such as those of Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggert, to mention just two famous religious con-artists, do to religion? If the planting of fake fossils in a dig invalidates evolution, then does fraud in the name of Jesus invalidate Christianity?The answer on both counts is "Of course not!" You need to find more objective criteria for judging theories on human origins.Current theories about man's origins are not based upon Nebraska Man or Piltdown Man, and even Piltdown Man has had no influence for more than half a century. When the Piltdown fossils were finally submitted to chemical analysis several years after Woodward's death, scientists were pretty certain what they would find. No other hominid fossils were ever found in Great Britain after 1916, and all other fossil finds had small, not large, braincases. Woodward, the scientist responsible for the Piltdown fossils, kept them locked up for years and would not often permit them to be examined. By the time Piltdown Man was proved to be a fraud, it had already been suspected a fraud for a considerable time, because among all hominid fossil finds it was the odd man out, both geographically and morphologically. The background assumption for all discussions at EvC Forum is that viewpoints on both sides are biased, and that the only an objective review of the evidence can lead to valid conclusions.I'm not going to reply to the rest of your objections about human fossils because it turns out that they, too, are plagiarized, this time from http://www.clarifyingchristianity.com/ape_men.shtml. Please write something in your own words next time.--Percy

I think you're trying to paint a picture of confusion where it doesn't exist.If you were to ask if all scientists agree on everything, the answer would be no, of course they don't all agree on everything, and human origins is an area where there is far more than the average number of disagreements. This field seems to attract scientists who prefer the limelight and have a tendency toward the showman.Nonetheless, regarding Nebraska Man, some scientists may have withheld judgment longer than others, but no scientist accepted it. Regarding Piltdown Man, some accepted it as genuine, some didn't, some withheld judgment, and by the time it was proven a fraud it had almost no supporters at all because of the mass of contrary fossil evidence that had been amassed in the years since 1916.Given the huge accumulation of human fossil data now in the hands of scientists, trying to prove that we only accept human evolution because of fraudulent evidence seems pointless. Are you proposing something like secret factories in the Midwest churning out fake human fossils that scientists can plant at digs before they "discover" them? I don't accept human evolution because of Homo heidelbergensis. I never even heard of it, so I had to look it up on the Internet. Sounds like a European variant of Homo erectus. I have no opinion on the fossil itself. My opinion about human origins is that, just as one would expect given all the fossils discovered of predecessors of other living species, the fossil record also includes antecedent species of Homo sapiens, and that as time goes on paleontologists will gradually build a more accurate and detailed picture.This means I have no idea, nor do I particularly care, whether Homo heidelbergensis is more closely related to Homo erectus or Homo neanderthalensis. Its place in the human panoply may or may not eventually be settled, and it is enough for me to know that theories of human evolution are supported by a wealth of evidence.--Percy

Object to it? Why? It was hilarious! Where do you get your material, Comedy Central? I wonder if someone is pulling your leg. Marc Roberts is the Britisher who streaked the Superbowl earlier this year.Let me spend a couple of minutes with Google and see if I can find where you got that stuff...Ah, you meant "Mark Roberts", not "Marc Roberts". Getting the spelling right enabled Google to find it. Somewhat hairy? He finds two teeth and a chin bone and can tell the specimen is somewhat hairy? This quote is a rather transparent fake. Where did you get it?The other quotes are likely fake, too. Hominid paleontologists would not likely be describing a human ancestor as "truly human". These other hominids have classifications that are not Homo sapien, which means that they are of other species, and therefore not "truly human". Homo habilis is a hominid species, not a particular skeleton like Lucy. Perhaps someone here knows what are the most complete Homo habilis skeletons. You're making a mistake if you think you can get an accurate picture of how hominid paleontologists view human ancestry from the caricatures that appear at Creationist sources.I think it would be better to inquire about the degree of similarity or difference that any human predecessor has across a variety of characteristics. The further back you go, the greater the differences will be. But no human predecessor can be considered "truly human". Were that the case, they would not be classified as different species.--Percy

I can only respond to what you posted. In the case of the Roberts quote, I can only guess he was responding to a naive question about whether or not Homo heidelbergensis was stoop shouldered.You would be better served to read serious books on human origins instead of mainstream media or Creationist videos. Some of the mainstream stuff available on the Discovery channel and the like are fine, such as Walter Cronkite's program on human evolution or National Geographic's on Leakey, to name just two, but there's probably a lot of garbage out there, too. Where did you get your video? If you can't find the views represented in your video in books in the public library then I suggest you consider it skeptically. Your video, not the library. The title of this thread, The Ape Man: Truth or Fiction?, reflects the same naivete. In scientific terms there was never any such thing as an "Ape man". This term sprang from the popular press, not from scientists.What you find when you examine the fossil record is that in general the older the fossil the more different from modern man. It isn't possible to say that fossils older than a certain age are ape while those younger are hominids because the transition is gradual. Any firm set of criteria drawing a line of demarcation will be arbitrary. This is the same naive question you asked before. Most hypothesized human ancestors are represented by many fossils from multiple sites. Jar said there are over twenty Homo habilis fossils, but I don't know how many individuals that represents, or what parts of the skeleton they represent, but most are probably skull and teeth since they survive better than other parts of the skeleton.I can answer the question posed by your thread title. The "ape man" is a fiction created by the popular press. Scientifically, he doesn't exist.--Percy

Whether genuine or not, I don't think either quote has any scientific merit. To me the quotes seem either made up, or they derive from extreme oversimplifications, to the point of being wrong or at least misleading. While Homo erectus is our closest known relative in the fossil record, the differences in morphology (as represented by fossil remains) and behavior (as interpreted from artifacts found at Homo erectus sites) leads scientists to give them a different species designation.What led me to conclude that the quotes were possible fakes is that the one from Roberts had him concluding Homo heidelbergensis was "somewhat hairy" based upon a couple teeth and a chin bone. If the Homo erectus quotes you're focusing on derive from the same source then I'd consider them very suspect.That being said, perhaps the quotes were responses to a question about what Homo erectus looked like. The concensus opinion is that they wouldn't have stood out in a crowd of modern humans, perhaps a bit taller and more gracile on average, and with a brow ridge that nonetheless is within human norms.If Nothing is seeking a hominid that has the appearance of something midway between a human and a modern ape such as a gorilla or chimp, then Homo erectus isn't it. I don't he's going to find anything in science that will fit his imagination.--Percy

Reconstructions of the external appearance of extinct hominids involves much speculation. Regarding the amount, location and coloration of body hair, since it doesn't fossilize, we can only surmise that perhaps our evolutionary ancesters had less than chimps and more than us, with a gradual progression toward less and less over time. Walter Cronkite's program on evolution was 90% interviews with paleontologists, the rest being interspersals of explanations and some graphics. The program was a platform for current paleontological views, not Walter Cronkite's. He's not a paleontologist, so a program on his views of human origins wouldn't merit any attention. Did you feel you needed to demonstrate this because you thought that evolutionists accept the popular Ape Man myth? Most Americans can't find Europe on a globe, so don't put much stock in what is commonly accepted. Don't you think there's something wrong with the picture of a paleontologist who doesn't accept the theory of evolution? Don't you think that would be rather like a priest who didn't accept Christ? What makes you believe that there are people out there entering fields of study which they believe are bunk? Where did you say you got this video? Oh, that's right, you didn't say. Yes, what you've been told doesn't add up. I know the unearthing of Lucy was a complicated task, and it's a bit too late for me start familiarizing myself with the details. Perhaps someone else will take this on.--Percy

Was this confirmation communicated to the other lab? I guess the larger question is, when labs are in stiff competition where none wants to give any advantage to the other, not even so minor a thing as a hint that their findings have been confirmed, how is successful replication communicated. Or is silence the confirmation?--Percy

Hi, Nothing!You can't really use evidence available only to yourself. It's kind of you to offer to send people copies of the video, but you need to avail yourself of evidence that is widely available so that everyone can participate. The Internet *does* have its crazies, and people should be discouraged from providing personal information such as snailmail addresses to people they know only through an Internet discussion board.--Percy

Yes, he's probably had insufficient exposure to irrationality and ignorance. Probably one of those academic types. Who do these people think they are anyway, thinking that just because they've studied a topic in depth and can discuss it clearly and rationally that other people should pay any attention to what they say? The nerve!--Percy

While man has a very specific anatomy since man is a single species, apes do not have a single specific anatomy because the group includes not only man, but also gorillas, chimps and orangutans. I think the point Jar was making was that if you have a fossil sufficiently similar to both man and ape that both would claim it as a predecessor, then you have an intermediate. You opened a double quote that you never closed, followed by an open parenthesis that you never closed, but I think I get the gist. There is no conclusive evidence that says Lucy is on a direct line to man. There is also no conclusive evidence that says she isn't. What we do know is that she was definitely bipedal and upright, and that she was an evolutionary relative. Man and ape share a common ancestor some millions of years ago. Australopithicus afarensis is more similar to us than both this common ancestor and modern apes.--Percy

Hi Nothing,I think there's a semantic issue getting in the way here. You're defining "Ape Man" as man's evolutionay ancestor, which you don't believe exists. Whether or not you're right, there's no way to conclusively establish an ancient hominid as being on a direct evolutionary path to humans. The rest of us are defining "Ape Man" as a creature that shares features with both ape and man. As an aside, and as has been stated before, this term has no scientific standing.Assuming for the sake of discussion that the Peter Schmid comments you provided are accurate, his observations are exactly what I would expect of an "Ape Man". It has characteristics that are ape-like, such as the ribs and rib cage that he describes, and it has characteristics that are human-like, such as the pelvis, the knees and feet, and the angle and position at which the spine meets the skull.--Percy

Hi Nothing, Are you going to tell us how you define an Ape-Man, so that we at least know what you're looking for? We need to have a better definition than, "An Ape-Man is not a creature sharing characteristics of modern apes and humans, and an Ape-Man is not a Lucy-like creature." What is your definition of an Ape-Man?Quoting Johanson you say: If you're going to cite this quote to support your view then you have to accept all of it, including the part where he says about bias, "Everybody has it." That includes you. Lucy is not a case of evolutionists being biased and Creationists being objective. Working toward objectivity would include defining your terms, starting with Ape-Man. On the contrary, you're closing your eyes to differences. Austalopithicus afarensis has some very distinct non-ape characteristics, like the pelvis, knee, foot and junction between spine and skull. Focusing on one other characteristic, you've called Lucy a knuckle walker, yet her arms are clearly shorter than an apes. You've denied that she's intermediate, yet her arms are shorter than an ape's and longer than a human's. Here's a picture I posted in another thread (Lucy's on the left, a Lucy reconstruction is in the middle, and a human female is on the right):One can reasonably argue about intepretations of the differences between afarensis, apes and humans, but one can't deny the differences. Afarensis is clearly not the same as apes and just as clearly not the same as humans. Saying, "Lucy is just an ape like any other ape," is mere words denying reality.--Percy

Hmmm. Why don't you try this similar argument out: Doesn't quite add up as a valid argument does it, but you're making the equivalent argument. In fact, most of the words are yours.Or try this argument on for size: Doesn't sound very scientific, does it.Scientifically, you must define your terms. We can't have a discussion if we don't know what the terms we're using mean. If you don't like our definition of an Ape-Man, then provide us your definition, and then we will exmaine whether or not anything matching it exists.--Percy

Hi Nothing,Just trying to stick to the topic of your thread, there's not much here I can reply to. I still think you have to define your terms, "Ape Man" in this case. Chiroptera has constructed an excellent presentation of examples of how the rest of us think of transitionals in Message 158, and I suggest you respond to that. There are other threads where we could discuss your other issues about common descent and mutations and so forth.If your only point is that common characteristics do not prove evolutionary relatedness, I agree with you. But evolutionary theory predicts we should find shared characteristics in the fossil record had evolution happened. Since that's what we do find, it increases our confidence in the theory.--Percy