Quote: "Just how this primitive, remnant species managed to hang on is unclear. Geologic evidence suggests a massive volcanic eruption sealed its fate some 12,000 years ago, along with other unusual species on the island." Jeezus. 12,000 years is absolutely nothing and if not for one big a$$ volcanic eruption these little dudes might have lasted at least into early modern history. Then they would have been enslaved. The species would have been kept alive through forced breeding for hundreds of years and used as house pets, "dumb" servants, entertainment, what have you. It possibly would have lasted into modern history. I'm sure by then the plight of the hobbits would have become a serious issue for groups wanting their freedom. Maybe a couple of hundred years ago, maybe a hundred, they would have been freed and a home would have been found for them as a nation. They would have depending on their "big brothers" to keep them alive as a species and would have to be allowed out into the world as free citizens in order to grow as a species. Their evolution would no doubt be sped up with the increased interaction with the bigger brained cousins on this planet. And who the fvck knows where it all would have gone from there. IMO the great apes, if left alone to grow in numbers and further evolve, could and would eventually turn a corner towards becoming more sentient than they already are. It is also IMO that they are "mildly" sentient as it is. Nah, God woulda said something a long time ago.
That's true. 12,000 years from Hobbit to Human? Someone's got a date wrong. That would take at least a couple million.
species would mean we are the same, they are questioning if we are part of the same genus, the 2nd most specific category.
Piltdown Man and similar hoaxes were exposed by the scientific process and for decades have had nothing whatsoever to do with our understandings of the Hominid fossil remains. Nor was Piltdown man ever uncontroversial. Science is a self-correcting process and Piltdown man is more an example of that than anything else. It's not being suggested by anybody I know of that these organisms represent a species that was a direct contributor to the ancestry of modern humans. Instead, the accepted hypothesis is that they were the product of a separate divergence from Homo erectus (which is a direct ancestor of ours) that existed in parallel with our direct line of ancestry but eventually died out.
Actually it's not proven that they are extinct, before these bones were found there were many people in Indonesia who reported sightings of "half human half animal" specites that were very tiny. They've already begun searches in the Indonesian forests to see if these "myths" are true, it's a famous local legend and the people who found the bones said that these "creatures" could still be living.
I don't know. BTW, do you think God made these creatures? If so, why aren't they mentioned in the Ark story? Or, do you think they evolved from one of homo sapiens' ancestors, like homo erectus*? *Yes, I realize how inherently funny "homo erectus" is.
Yeah but I've talked to Indonesians who reported seeing humans walking with pig's heads and ghostly young women with their guts hanging out of a hole in their back hunting for the unwary. Indonesians have a whole slew of hantu and other creatures they talk about and it's vastly more likely that you're talking about one of these. Plus, Flores is a relatively small, dry island with relatively little forest cover. It's not realistic for there to be undiscovered non-human Hominid populations on it.
It's not just Indonesians that have seen them, it's foreigners too. The most renouned and trusted is British zoologist John McKinnon who saw footprints of something he couldn't explain. In 1969, John McKinnon, who journeyed to Borneo to observe orangutans, came across some humanlike footprints. McKinnon asked his Malay boatman what made them. "Without a moment' a hesitation he replied 'Batutut,'" wrote McKinnon, "but when I asked him to describe the beast he said it was not an animal but a type of ghost. ... Batutut, he told me, is about four feet tall, walks upright like a man and has a long black mane. ... Like other spirits of the forest the creature is very shy of light and fire" (Green 1978, p. 134). In 1918, Mr. Van Heerwarden, a hunter, began finding tracks of the Sedapa in Sumatra. The footprints he saw were shaped like those of a small human being. Van Heervarden also heard reports about the Sedapa from natives. In October of 1923, he himself spotted one in a tree: "I discovered a dark and hairy creature on a branch. ... The sedapa was also hairy on the front of its body; the colour there was a little lighter than on the back. The very dark hair on its head fell to just below the shoulder-blades or even almost to the waist....Had it been standing, its arms would have reached to a little above its knees; they were therefore long, but its legs seemed to me rather short. About the BATUTUT The existence of the Batutut was first brought to the attention of the western world by renowned British zoologist John MacKinnon, after he discovered over 24 sets of small, squat, semi-humanoid footprints in a rainforest in the Malaysian state of Sabah, in 1970. MacKinnon, who later authored a book on his experiences titled “In Search of the Red Ape”, claimed that he was overwhelmed with an intense feeling of unease after discovering the tracks, and made a decidedly non-scientific point of avoiding the area during the remainder of his studies in the region. This animal has also been associated with the Vietnamese Hairy-Hominid, the NGUOI-RUNG. Other Zoologist John Mackinnon (in McNeely and Sochaezowski, 1995) once described finding short, broad, human-like but definitely non-human footprints of a creature locals call the batutut in the forests of Sabah. MacKinnon recounts seeing these footprints. "I was uneasy when I found them, and I didn't want to follow them and find out what was at the end of the trail. I knew that no animal we know about could make those tracks. Without deliberately avoiding the area I realize I never went back to that place in the following months of my studies."
No, not Piltdown and Nebraska. They weren't on the Ark. BTW, dave, thanks for changing the avatar. I can now safely hop on Bigsoccer at school without fear of someone looking over my shoulder and then not believing I was on a sports site.
Yes dearest Dave. I read it. Honestly, do you get out of bed each day wanting to quarrel with all of humanity? Here's the part I was alluding to ... "To others, the specimen's baffling combination of slight dimensions and coarse features bears almost no meaningful resemblance either to modern humans or to our large, archaic cousins. They suggest that Flores Man doesn't belong in the genus Homo at all, even if it was a recent contemporary. But they are unsure how to classify the species. "I don't think anybody can pigeonhole this into the very simple-minded theories of what is human," anthropologist Jeffery Schwartz of the University of Pittsburgh. "There is no biological reason to call it Homo. We have to rethink what it is." No need to explain, but thanks for your kind offer.
And here I was thinking we'd discover them in New Zealand, not indonesia. Can we possibly clone these little guys? They'd be much better at cleaning than my Bathroom Monkey [/SNL reference]
Is it possible that this was just a midget with big feet? Cause scientists have been known to confuse the tooth of an extinct pig and an old man with rickets with "the missing link".
Since it's possible (perhaps even likely) that this new species of hominid co-existed with modern man (Homo Sapiens), I wonder if someday we'll find some kinky cave paintings that represent pre-historic midget porn.
FWIW: Oct 28 4004 BC God creates Adam and Eve five days after the rest of the universe, according to Biblical calculations by Archbishop James Ussher. From www.dailyrotten.com