New Species of Homo Discovered: Homo naledi

Oh they probably provided evidence to each other but the average person had to be content with their artistic renderings in museums and popular science magazines.

Oh I could assemble a skeleton myself. Only the parts to that one don't match each other.

Hi there DA, long time no see you at EvC. Oh you betcha, because those scientists are all under the spell of a false theory and read it into everything they see.I don't know any religious extremists personally, but I do trust Gpd.

Indeed. Snakes and donkeys have a physical presence and can vocalize a bit. It's easy to imagine them speaking. Once you swallow the concept of an unseeable, unheard Sky Guy existing, you can even more easily accept walking, talking serpents.

I saw "Lucy's" actual fossils in Houston, and I have the t-shirt to prove it.

Couldn't believe Shrek. It was Donkey's claims, and Dragon, I had trouble with. Once you believe Shrek is real all of it falls into place. Certainly no problem with flying lizards and talking Donkeys once you know Shrek is real.--Percy

Yeah, "Lucy" is a case of an extreme paucity of actual bones. But the scientific imagination has no problem with that.

No, not really. If you want a case of extreme paucity, try counting all the talking snakes you've ever met.

Who told you that?And how do you know just how many bones, or how many of any particular bones, are needed to make some judgements regarding the nature of the individual?Are you listening to creationists or following creationist websites?It certainly doesn't seem like you have followed the scientific literature regarding Lucy and other finds of the same general age.How about looking up a few of the real scientific studies regarding Lucy and her kin and see what they say? This will definitely involve studying scientific journals, but any good university library should have a lot of those, or maybe they'll have on-line subscriptions to most of those them. At any rate, any good university library will have enough material on hand to get you started.But you won't to that, will you? You'll just continue to make unfounded statements based on beliefs that you are afraid to examine in much detail for fear of finding them wanting.But that's OK. You help make this site entertaining. It would be a lot less interesting for a lot of us if you actually looked at and realized the validity of the evidence we keep showing you.

Faith,You can see differences between these two sets skelatons by just looking at these photos. I am not a trained paleontologist but I can see very evident differences i.e. bone size, shape, curvature, etc. Just by a cursory glance (granted I have studied human anatomy pretty extensively in pre-med). This has nothing to do with one's faith (no pun intended), and everything to do with the acknowledgment of the evidence staring at you in your face. Yet you would rather blind and bind yourself by making the unsubstantiated argument that evolution could never occur. You have yet to provide any evidence that bolsters your claim, none.

Why make an issue of talking snakes when the Bible also has water turned to wine, people raised from the dead, Jesus raised from the dead, walking through walls, ascending straight up into heaven, Elijah taken straight to heaven in a chariot, an army of angels revealed surrounding Israel, angels appearing to various prophets, sun standing still or moving backward, dew on fleece when intended to show God's will, not on fleece next day for the same reason, pillar of smoke by day and fire by night to lead the Israelites across the wilderness, manna from heaven, millions of quail dropped on them when they complained about the manna, etc etc etc. And you make a big deal out of a talking snake?Lucy has more bones than I remembered but still a pathetic excuse for a skeleton.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

The thing is, and this should be obvious, if you compared the skeletons of a few dozen people randomly chosen today they would all be of different sizes, bone density etc. People from a hundred or more years ago tended to be smaller than people today, in England anyway as I understand it, women rarely being taller than five feet for instance. Or, compare the skeleton of a Scandinavian with a small Asian, a tall African with a pygmy. Facial features also differ widely, size and shape of skull, cheekbones, eye sockets, size of mouth, set of teeth, all differ, etc etc etc.There is something really nave about the way these supposed humanish fossils are presented given the normal differences between people. They don't even bother to give measurements, how tall a person the skeletaon would have represented.

Talk to any forensic scientist, they do not need an entire skelaton to identify a person. Of course the more complete a skeleton, the easier it is. Good think about most animal bodies is that they are symmetrical. Only one side is really required. In addition, ligaments, muscles and even facial estimations can be conducted on the skull and other skelatal remains. Estimates of facial features are conducted frequently in forensic science to identify the remains of John and Jane Does.

It is not the size that matters, it is the shape of the various bones. Shape differences are often determined by measurements and multivariate statistics. I did some of that in grad school--I was able to find similarities and differences among groups while including both males and females in my sample! That shows that size and sex-related differences can be factored out in favor of other morphological differences.And you really should stop opining on osteology and paleontology as it is very clear you don't have a clue. Why continue to make yourself look foolish, and make your cause look weak and incompetent?Edit to add: I have probably analyzed upwards of a thousand skeletons, and regularly help the local County Coroners on bone cases.Edited by Coyote, : Addition

Whole arrays of skulls are often presented as if to prove differences between some ancient type of human and today's, but they all just look like normal variations on skulls you see walking down the street every day.