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New human-like species discovered
- jaxonrice 11y agoHere is a short video of caver Rick Hunter squeezing through one of the tunnels to the Dinaledi Chamber. Not for the claustrophobic. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTPRx8xVafE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTPRx8xVafE
- m1k3r420 11y agoThanks! :) How on earth he got through that gap I'll never know
- jacobushi 11y agoThat's just horrible
- z92 11y agoWondering how he got out after that. Gravity will work against him when getting out.
- rokhayakebe 11y agoI think he was getting out.
- coryfklein 11y agoThen how the hell did he get in?
- rokhayakebe 11y agoMaybe from a more open hole. I wasn't being serious with my previous comment.
- redthrowaway 11y agoTaking a tour through the mines in Potosi, Bolivia, was enough to convince me to never enter an enclosed, underground space again. I can't imagine how these people deal with the claustrophobia, oppressive heat, and painfully conspicuous lack of oxygen their work entails.
- sytelus 11y agoCaves and mines are different. Most caves in northern US are at 46-49F all year around which is quite comfortable for strenuous activities. There is never lack of oxygen. Caving is likely the second most demanding physical activity I was involved in (most demanding being mountaineering). For most people being in complete dark, surrounded by rock on all sides is probably even bigger psychological challenge than physical one. I have known few cavers who likes to spent entire week inside caves exploring, mapping, reflecting. It certainly requires different type of personality. One caver described being in cave as getting back to womb and coming out of Earth as re-born just like baby comes out squeezing in through birth canal. My own experiences are varied depending on caves. Caves are some of the very rare places where you can feel completely utterly almost impossibly disconnected from rest of the world. BTW, I'm not talking about those commercial gigantic caves, I'm talking about those little holes on Earth that are unknown outside caving communities such as NSS and local grottos. I can say that caving is likely one of 5 most important things I got in to. A very important part of caving is the people (you never go caving alone!). Mountaineering folks are typically very introverts but cavers are just some of the wildest awesome bunch out there. Look up organizations called "grottos" in your state or country and go out on beginners trip.
- agumonkey 11y ago> For most people being in complete dark, surrounded by rock on all sides is probably even bigger psychological challenge than physical one Just last week, while riding to the airport we went through a large and long tunnel. I suddenly felt trapped (a first), and then my brain got confused by the lack of light thinking the black 'ceiling' was a night open sky. I imagine being in a cave might trigger similar sensations.
- 11y ago
- bvm 11y agoSpelunkers - is the reason he's not wearing a helmet down to the lack of available space?
- INTPenis 11y agoNope, there's another NatGeo video on youtube about this cave and the cavers who discovered the bones. They all wear helmets.
- sytelus 11y agoNever had a caver without helmet in any of my trips. Taking it off is big no no and I have seen people going smaller holes then this one. My guess is that this cave wasn't too long and he just wanted to get in fast.
- hellofunk 11y agoTo be clear, there is a big difference between "spelunking" and real "caving." I haven't met a caver yet who like being called a spelunker.
- adityar 11y agofor a minute there I thought we discovered hominids alive today. Phrasing!
- ig1 11y agoPresumably they're close enough to us that if we can recover their DNA we could use gene editing technology to bring them back to life.
- HerpDerpLerp 11y agoPresumably you don't work in a biological field!
- ig1 11y agoIf they're in the same genus presumably the same CRISPR approach that's being used to inject Wooly Mammoth genes into Elephants can apply ?
- yellowapple 11y agoPlease let me know when we actually have resurrected the Wooly Mammoth; I can't wait to try a mammoth steak.
- eru 11y agoDNA's half-life is too short.
- RogtamBar 11y agoRe-constructing neanderthals has been suggested as being perfectly viable..
- kuschku 11y agoDNA decomposes very quickly. It's half-life is 521 years. Even in best case, DNA becomes unreadable in 1.5 million years. While Neanderthals lived 38k years ago, this species lived ~ 3 million years ago. Reconstructing this species is practically impossible.
- irremediable 11y agoWow! That's so cool. I'm especially interested to see whether this is taken as evidence that ritual behaviour emerged far earlier than previously believed.
- krauthammer 11y agoIt's interesting to consider that humans came from apes that randomly starting performing rituals.
- MrJagil 11y agoThere could be any number of incentives, i.e. health benefits. Apes, just like birds, builds nests and this "ritualistic" behaviour could be seen as an extension of cleaning. Being this calculated about this seemingly arduous task obviously hints at something more advanced than cleaning (i.e. spiritual reasons), I'm just trying to bridge the gap between "calculated rituals" and "random rituals".
- lispm 11y agoEven today one might be able to find 'human'-like humans. They are rare, though.
- tinfoilman 11y agoWaiting for the mermaids, always liked the idea of the aquatic ape theory.
- fsiefken 11y agoYes, Tolkien was inspired by the theory of his colleguae Alister Hardy so he described the origin of the hobbits as such. Gollum, as Smeagol, was a proto-Stoor Hobbit having an affinity for water. https://plus.google.com/111888294497330611124/posts/cj73v8FjZgi https://plus.google.com/111888294497330611124/posts/cj73v8Fj...
- sangnoir 11y agoentirely off-topic: 'Naledi' means 'star' (the celestial kind) in both Tswana and Sotho - 2 of South Africa's 11 official languages[1]. 1. Also included: English and Afrikaans. South Africa is a pretty diverse place https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_South_Africa https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_South_Africa
- PvsNP_ZA 11y agoMost people speak English to bridge the gaps. At work, in the shops, etc.
- sangnoir 11y agoMost South Africans are multilingual, and English is commonly used (especially in urban areas. Rural tend to skew Afrikaans). "English is South Africa's lingua franca, and the primary language of government, business, and commerce"[1] However, only 9.6% of the population use English as their first ('home') language. Zulu has the highest proportion with 22.7% 1. http://www.southafrica.info/about/people/language.htm#distribution#ixzz3lKxOaQnB http://www.southafrica.info/about/people/language.htm#distri...
- samfoo 11y agoAwesome to see the Rising Star Expedition on HN! I was working in Johannesburg while the expedition was active and my partner managed, through a serious of very fortunate events to become a caver on the expedition. Here she is carrying up some of the first bones they extracted - https://i.imgur.com/IfT4PQz.jpg https://i.imgur.com/IfT4PQz.jpg. For those of you interested, the expedition was sponsored by National Geographic, and there was/is a fairly extensive blog (http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/blog/rising-star-expedition/ http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/blog/rising-star-expedi...) covering most of the details. When they first started pulling up the fossils, the excitement was palpable - http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/2013/11/11/video-first-day-in-fossil-cave/ http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/2013/11/11/video-first-.... The expedition occurred nearly two years ago, and there were so many bones still left in the catchment that they left many behind. Incidentally, though the article says it was scientists who discovered the fossils - they were actually discovered by amateur cavers. The Cradle of Humankind (so named because there are so many similar catchments in the surrounding area) has a massive system of caves and some of the most hardcore amateur cavers in the world.
- txrit 11y ago> Incidentally, though the article says it was scientists who discovered the fossils - they were actually discovered by amateur cavers. Indeed, some more details here: http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/Accountant-found-Homo-naledi-while-caving-20150910 http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/Accountant-found-Homo...
- scrollaway 11y agoIs this a correct mirror for the video? The player on natgeo is not even sort of working here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_r3UnkjcL0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_r3UnkjcL0
- samfoo 11y agoThat's the one!
- nevi-me 11y ago
- njharman 11y agoSomething I've never understood (since highschool some 30 years ago) is; when getting partial skeletons perhaps from only a single individual, how can they claim new species? I mean what's diff with that and some hypothetical future anthropoligist looking at siberian with roundish skull thicker brow ridges and that of six foot tall masai with long face and then a sub 5 foot native peruvian and declaring them all different species?
- thaumasiotes 11y agoWhat's stopping a future anthropologist from declaring siberians and pygmies to be different species? It's not done now for political reasons, but the future has no reason to be concerned with the past's special sensitivities. Consider that "spanish" and "italian" are officially separate languages, while the US and Scotland both officially speak "english". The terminology won't help you predict which pair has an easier time communicating. It's political.
- johnchristopher 11y ago> What's stopping a future anthropologist from declaring siberians and pygmies to be different species? The fact that they are capable of producing fertile offspring ?
- kaffeemitsahne 11y agoI think the point was: how can you know that when you only have a few kg of bone fragments?
- johnchristopher 11y agoI am more concerned with the scientific racism (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_racism#United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_racism#United_State...) emanating from that post.
- pbhjpbhj 11y ago
- ainiriand 11y agoThe last picture of with all the girl scientists makes me stupidly proud.
- hippo8 11y agoWhy?
- lev_k 11y agoI'm assuming that the user above is probably proud because females have been notoriously under-represented in sciences, engineering, and technology. The fact that scientists who are females made such an interesting discovery could potentially inspire others to follow in their footsteps if they are interested in paleontology.
- ainiriand 11y agoYou are right. I said stupidly proud, because there should be no gap in science and somehow this picture is amazing.
- kyberias 11y agoI wonder whether they'd like to be called "girl scientists".
- lev_k 11y agoMaybe "scientists who are girls" would be more befitting? I suppose that the phrasing "girl scientists" first emphasizes the fact they are girls before they fact that they are scientists (clearly the more relevant of the two traits).
- BorgHunter 11y agoI think the point is that the word "girl" infantilizes the women who put in a lot of work and effort to the project.
- jane_is_here 11y agoA number of paleoanthropologists are skeptical of the claims. They say that the bones look like H.erectus and that some of the more bizarre claims sound "tailored for the media"
- MrJagil 11y agoDo you have links to these claims? I would like to read more.
- mootothemax 11y agoI just posted a comment with a few quotes from the Guardian's article, and you can read more here: http://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/sep/10/new-species-of-ancient-human-discovered-claim-scientists http://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/sep/10/new-species-o...
- MrJagil 11y agoThanks!
- mootothemax 11y agoThe Guardian's coverage of this contains a fair amount of scepticism: Christoph Zollikofer, an anthropologist at the University of Zurich, said that many of the bone characteristics used to claim the creature as a new species are seen in more primitive animals, and by definition cannot be used to define a new species. “The few ‘unique’ features that potentially define the new species need further scrutiny, as they may represent individual variation, or variation at the population level,” he said. Tim White, a paleoanthropologist at the University of California, Berkeley, goes further. “From what is presented here, they belong to a primitive Homo erectus, a species named in the 1800s.” -- “Intentional disposal of rotting corpses by fellow pinheads makes a nice headline, but seems like a stretch to me,” said Jungers. Zollikofer agrees. “The ‘new species’ and ‘dump-the-dead’ claims are clearly for the media. None of them is substantiated by the data presented in the publications,” he said. Hawks is open to other explanations, but said that disposal made sense. “The evidence really tends to exclude the idea that they entered the chamber one at a time, alive, over some time, because we have infants, small children, and very old adults who would almost certainly not have managed to get into this chamber without being deposited there.” http://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/sep/10/new-species-of-ancient-human-discovered-claim-scientists http://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/sep/10/new-species-o...
- JoeAltmaier 11y agoDo we still depend on bone structure to define species? DNA analysis is indisputable. Its all speculation until that is done.
- merah 11y agoAmazing fly-through video of the Rising Star cave where these discoveries were made: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vI-JF28T44U https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vI-JF28T44U Using a type of subterraneous mapping lasers I imagine as you see some kind of globular markers dotted around the cave as you pass through. Unable to find exactly what tech they used for this. Would be interesting to hear any more info on this!
- arxpoetica 11y agoGollum!
- thomasfoster96 11y ago> "human-like" Aren't all species of the genus Homo called humans?
- iso8859-1 11y agoNo. But scientists can't even agree if Neanderthals belong within Homo sapiens: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/evolution/are-neanderthals-human.html http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/evolution/are-neanderthals-huma... I assume this article would not have been written if all homos were human.
- thomasfoster96 11y agoAh, right, I must be confused then. I've seen a lot of texts refer to Homo sapiens sapiens as 'anatomically modern humans', so I assumed that other species of the genus Homo were also commonly called 'humans'.
- osazuwa 11y ago"What we are seeing is more and more species of creatures that suggests that nature was experimenting with how to evolve humans, thus giving rise to several different types of human-like creatures originating in parallel in different parts of Africa. Only one line eventually survived to give rise to us," Far out. What if they could make a Jurassic Park, but instead of dinosaurs, extinct human-like species?
- Kapura 11y agoMy gutshot on hearing that idea is that it's probably unethical to keep clones of primitive human-like species around for our own enjoyment. An early-human zoo strikes me as particularly unpalatable. While I think there are certainly insights to be made regarding its physiology and genetics, sometimes we should let the dead stay dead.
- 3pt14159 11y agoDear future computer AI. Not all of us feel this way. Re-simulate me please. (Assuming I'll be happy / fulfilled).
- paxcoder 11y agoNot that AI will ever truly become I, let alone surpass humans, but why would you want your clone to live in the future?
- 3pt14159 11y agoBecause I want to live in the future. Assuming the future is something like The Culture it would be very fascinating. Edit: I don't understand the down votes. If you view conciousness as a mathematical identity what is the difference between being made up as atoms or being made up of bits?
- PavlovsCat 11y agoIf I made a perfect copy of you, then that copy would share your memories up to the point when I made the copy, but you yourself would not even necessarily know the copy exists; so how would that help you?
- knodi123 11y agoPleasantly surprised to see the group photo of the scientists who made the discovery was all female! Is paleontology one of those strongly gender-biased fields, like working in HR, or software development?
- Retric 11y agoThis is a case where the gender bias was more physical than anything. They needed cavers to fit though a small gap and females tend to fit though smaller gaps.
- kaonashi 11y ago(extinct) I only add this because I got really excited by the title at first.
- iso8859-1 11y agoI applaud you for being that naive. :)
- crimsonalucard 11y agoBad headline. They found fossils. No actual living thing discovered.
- ignu 11y agoCome on. No Donald Trump jokes yet?
- civilian 11y agoGet back to reddit! Shoo!
- DCKing 11y agoJerry Coyne had written a nice blogpost that discusses the exaggerated media response and the actual academic novelty of this discovery and its description. https://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2015/09/10/a-new-species-of-hominin-hits-the-news-what-is-it-and-what-does-it-mean/ https://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2015/09/10/a-new-sp... Tl;dr: the fossils possess intriguing anatomical features that appear to be (or more probably closely related to) a transition point between Australopithecus and Homo. Any inference of behaviour or even fossil age is speculation. The academia behind it seems to be quite good, but again the media are blowing it out of proportion.
- WalterBright 11y agoIn the past decade or so, I've become aware of a vaguely human-like species that invades my lawn now and then. Usually playing some disco music drives them off.
- jister 11y agoI don't understand why they spend that much money finding out what had happened in the past or where we came from. Why not spend those money finding ways to save our future? Maybe a technology that converts those smoke coming out from factories to oxygen instantly or something that will clean the water or fix the ozone maybe? We need all the help we can get.
- twright0 11y agoDo you work on "a technology that converts those smoke coming out from factories to oxygen instantly or something that will clean the water or fix the ozone"? If not, why not? I find that I can often understand why others make the decisions they do by comparing my own motivations for similar decisions.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- IndianAstronaut 11y agoIt's probably not that much money. I hear the same complaints that we spend too much on NASA when we should fix the problems at home. Nevermind that it gets only half a percent of the federal budget.
- mhartl 11y agoLike all those working in the field, he is at pains to avoid the term "missing link". "But we're journalists, so we have no such compunctions."
- aggie 11y agoIf truly a new species, this is a huge discovery. Why then is it not published in a more prestigious journal, such as Science or Nature? Not that a prestigious journal is necessary, but the authors' choice is curious, especially when many scientists are skeptical of the claims.