Kulindadromeus Zabaikalicus: A Cute Little Dinosaur

That incredibly cute critter is what Kulindadromeus zabaikalicus might look like: in an Arisa manga comic.

Maybe someone will write the heartwarming tale of a Kulindadromeus — named Kuddly Zeke??

Or maybe not.

Dinosaur Feathers

Until paleontologists found Kulindadromeus, a dinosaur that lived where Siberia is now, scientists knew that some dinosaurs had feathers: but had only found them on theropods.

Scientists are still pretty sure that Coelurosaurs, a particular sort of theropod, are the distant ancestors of birds. Oddly enough, though: theropods have lizard-like hips, or did.

Kulindaromeus is an Ornithischian: one of the 'bird-hipped' dinosaurs. It wasn't, the Lemming understands, just feathers that pegged theropods as the dinosaurs that eventually gave the birdseed industry a reason for existence: and that's another topic.

As far as the Lemming knows, there is no "Sir Richard Owen Zoological gardens." Not yet, anyway. Richard Owen did, however, give Mesozoic reptiles a name: Dinosauria. That was before other scientists realized that they weren't, or weren't quite, reptiles, and that's yet another topic.


(From Chris Masna, via Department of Earth Sciences, University of Bristol; used w/o permission.)
("Kulindadromeus zabaikalicus reconstruction by Chris Masna, non-threatening occupant of the Sir Richard Owen Zoological Gardens."
(Dept. of Earth Sciences, University of Bristol))

And no, to the best of the Lemming's knowledge: nobody has found Kulinda DNA, or grown a live dinosaur. Not yet.

Seriously, Though: That's a Cute Dinosaur

(From Andrey Atuchin, via Deptartment of Earth Sciences, University of Bristol; used w/o permission.)
(Kulindadromeus zabaikalicus in its lakeside environment.)

"Kulindadromeus, the feathered ornithischian
Department of Earth Sciences, University of Bristol

"The first ever example of a plant-eating dinosaur with feathers and scales was reported from Russia in 2014. Previously only flesh-eating dinosaurs were known to have had feathers so this new find indicates that all dinosaurs could have been feathered. This has important implications for our understanding of the biology and success of dinosaurs and for the evolution of bird characters.

"The new dinosaur, named Kulindadromeus zabaikalicus, meaning 'Kulinda runner from the Zabaikal region' as it comes from a site called Kulinda on the banks of the Olov River, in Zabaikal District, in Siberia, is described by Godefroit et al. (2014). Kulindadromeus shows epidermal scales on its tail and shins, and short bristles on its head and back. The most astonishing discovery, however, is that it also has complex, compound feathers associated with its arms and legs...."

The Lemming is pretty sure that an American would have written "...the evolution of bird characteristics...," or maybe the University of Bristol folks meant that the cute little ornithischian looks a bit like Tweety and The Road Runner. Then again, maybe not.

Not all scientists are sure that "Kulinda runner from the Zabaikal region" really had feathers. The stuff that apparently kept Kulindadromeus warm isn't shaped like bird feathers. Not the sort birds have these days, anyway.

Maybe the way scientists processed these Kulindadromeus fossils made the feathers look funny, or maybe feathers have changed in the last 150,000,000 years, or maybe some of Earth's critters grow hair or fur, some sprout feathers, and some kept warm with — something else.

If you haven't read enough about dinosaurs and all that yet, there's more:

• "Fishface! Ancient Fish with a Jaw, Cheekbones, and Beady Little Eyes"
  (September 27, 2013)
• "Snakes Don't Have Legs: There's an Explanation For That"
  (February 8, 2011)
• "Ecological Disaster - a Quarter of a Billion Years Ago"
  (December 14, 2010)
• "T. Rex Tail Made For Running, Maybe"
  (November 18, 2010)
• "Dinosaurs, Three Major Asteroid Impacts, and Massive Volcanic Eruptions"
  (August 29, 2010)

Fishface! Ancient Fish with a Jaw, Cheekbones, and Beady Little Eyes

"The earliest known species with what we would recognize as a face was an armored, beady-eyed prehistoric fish."

"First face? Prehistoric fish was a jawdropper"
Jennifer Viegas, Discovery News, via FoxNews.com (September 25, 2013)

"The earliest known species with what we would recognize as a face was an armored, beady-eyed prehistoric fish, according to a new paper in the journal Nature.

"The fish, entelognathus primordialis (meaning 'primordial complete jaw'), is the oldest known animal to have face-forming jaw and cheek bones comparable to those of today's bony fishes and most terrestrial animals, including us....

"...'Entelognathus had a rather unprepossessing face,' co-author Per Erik Ahlberg of Uppsala University told Discovery News. 'The mouth was wide, the forehead low and flat, and the small, close-set and almost immobile eyes pointed forwards like a pair of car headlights.'..."

The Lemming isn't sure that "primitive" is quite the right term for this piscine prodigy. That jaw was a revolutionary development in fish: and still standard equipment in most land animals that keep their skeleton on the inside. Which is dandy place for it, in the Lemming's opinion.

Sharks definitely aren't primitive, as Friedman points out in the article. Matt Friedman: the Lemming gathers that he does lectures about paleobiology at Oxford. The university, not the town: although Oxford U. is in Oxford, and that's another topic.

Sure, the skeletons of sharks are cartilage, not bone, but those fish are specialized and represent a fairly recent development. "Recent" is in the eye of the beholder, of course. Or Lemming, in this case.

Lampreys and hag-fish: now those things are primitive. Not the current ones so much, but their equally-jawless predecessors back in the good old days when agnatha shared the world with critters that give new meaning to the word "weird."


(D.W. Miller, via the Smithsonian Institution, used w/o permission.)

Of course, if opabinia had kept going for another 500,000,000 years or so, they might be complaining about the younger generation and cost of living: and think critters with only two eyes are weird. And that's another topic. Topics.

Opabina? That's the little critter with five eyes and an improbable-looking mouth-claw-pincer thing sticking out of its front end in that picture.

Allegedly-related posts:

• "Tracing the Y Chromosome, Studying Fossil Proteins, Seeking Truth"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (August 16, 2013)
• "Lowbrow to Highbrow in Four Centuries, Paleolithic Pitchers, and a Fantastic Elastic Echinoderm"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (July 5, 2013)
• "Another 17,000,000 Years on the Coelacanth Timeline"
  (April 16, 2012)
• " 'Nutcracker Man,' Big Teeth, and - - - Grass?!"
  (May 6, 2011)
• "Snakes Don't Have Legs: There's an Explanation For That"
  (February 8, 2011)

(From Chase Studios, via Sam Noble Museum, University of Oklahoma, used w/o permission.)

Another - Thing - From the Burgess Shale

(Marianne Collins, via University of Toronto, used w/o permission)

"University of Toronto/Royal Ontario Museum scientists discover unusual 'tulip' creature"
Kim Luke, U of T News, University of Toronto (January 18, 2012)
"Lived in the ocean more than 500-million years ago

"A bizarre creature that lived in the ocean more than 500-million years ago has emerged from the famous Middle Cambrian Burgess Shale in the Canadian Rockies.

"Officially named Siphusauctum gregarium, fossils reveal a tulip-shaped creature that is about the length of a dinner knife (approximately 20 centimetres) and has a unique filter feeding system.

"Siphusauctum has a long stem, with a calyx - a bulbous cup-like structure - near the top that encloses an unusual filter feeding system and a gut. The animal is thought to have fed by filtering particles from water actively pumped into its calyx through small holes. The stem ends with a small disc which anchored the animal to the seafloor. Siphusauctum lived in large clusters, as indicated by slabs containing over 65 individual specimens...."

These submerged tulip-animal-things were about as long as a butter knife: 8 inches, 20 centimeters.

If the Lemming's going to discuss Siphusauctum gregarium, those critters need a simpler name. How about siphon-sack? Sounds disgusting, maybe greggies? Siphums?

Siphums it is.

More than 1,100 siphums died in a mudslide somewhere between 505,000,000 and 510,000,000 years back. A half-billion years later, they're related to - nothing we know about.

Like other critters caught in the Burgess Shale, siphums were very well preserved: so scientists have a very good picture of how their innards fit together. They may not have had the colors we see in that picture, or maybe they did.

That article says the siphums are tulip-shaped. To the Lemming they look more like bell peppers, not that it really matters.

More Than You Need to Know About an Extinct Animal

"A New Stalked Filter-Feeder from the Middle Cambrian Burgess Shale, British Columbia, Canada"
Lorna J. O'Brien, Jean-Bernard Caron PLOS ONE (January 18, 2012)


(Lorna J. O'Brien, Jean-Bernard Caron, via PLOS ONE, used w/o permission)
"Figure 14. Schematics of the internal anatomy of Siphusauctum gregarium n. gen. and n. sp.

"A, longitudinal-section of the entire animal, with the major features labeled. B, cross-section of the calyx showing hexaradial symmetry. C, longitudinal-section of the calyx, showing raised comb segments above the level of the anus. Abbreviations: A - Anus, BC - Body Cavity, Con - Conical structure, CS - Comb Segments, ES - External Sheath, H - Holdfast, IC - Inner Conical structure with central tube, IS - Inner Stem, LD - Lower Digestive tract, MD - Middle Digestive tract, OS - Outer Stem, SP - Sheath Protrusion, TG - Transverse Groove, UD - Upper Digestive tract...."

If you still need to know more about Burgess Shale and the critters caught in it, the Lemming recommends www.burgess-shale.rom.on.ca.

Vaguely-related posts:

• "Another 17,000,000 Years on the Coelacanth Timeline"
  (April 16, 2012)
• "Eight-Foot Sea Scorpion: Big Claws; Sharp Spines; Weak; Clumsy"
  (January 4, 2011)
• "Ecological Disaster - a Quarter of a Billion Years Ago"
  (December 14, 2010)
• "Cambrian Explosion Evidence: Burgess Shale Fossils aren't Alone"
  (September 12, 2010)
• "Hurdia Victoria: Cambrian Supercritter of the Burgess Shale"
  (March 20, 2009)

Time, the Universe, and Space Aliens

Friday is when the Lemming writes a post about 'whatever.' This time, the topic is space aliens, the universe, and all that. Not to be confused with the book with a different title.

Before getting started on opinion polls, assumptions, and Elvis, the Lemming had better make one thing very clear. In the Lemming's considered opinion, space aliens exist; or, they don't.

The Lemming also thinks that, at this point, either possibility might be true. Either way, "it's a sobering thought."

Do You Believe in Space Aliens?

Never mind space aliens for the moment. Let's look at what "believe in" can mean.

Do you "believe in" Poughkeepsie, New York? If you believe that the county seat of Dutchess County is real: you 'believe in' Poughkeepsie. In a way.

The Lemming believes that Poughkeepsie exists: mostly because there's a great deal of evidence supporting the idea that the city of 32,000 or so is real.

That's not the sort of 'belief' that most folks mean when they say that they 'believe in' space aliens.

Back when sightings of space aliens and Elvis were staple fare in American tabloids, quite a few folks 'believed in' space aliens.' And many folks may have been sincerely convinced that they saw Elvis.

What About Atlantis?

But sincerity isn't the same as evidence. Apart from fuzzy photos and blurred video, there's precious little evidence that people from another planet have been on Earth. It'd be easier, in the Lemming's opinion, to build a plausible case for the existence of Atlantis.

Does the Lemming 'believe in' Atlantis?

Yes: Plato's story might be 'based on actual events,' the way Coleridge's Xanadu is based on Kublai Khan's summer capital.

No: Plato's story might be a roaring great story that's echoed down the ages, and no more real than a history of Coruscant.

The key phrase in both opinions is "might be." The difference is how much plausibility the Lemming demands.

For what it's worth, the Lemming thinks that Plato's story might be a creative retelling of what folks remembered from the 'real' Atlantis.

It's possible that Plato's Atlantis is a (very) fictionalized version of something that happened during the Bronze Age. Θήρα, or Santorini, is a cluster of islands now. About three dozen centuries back, give or take, it was one, larger, island.

Then it exploded.

That was a very bad day for folks living in the area, and might be why the Minoan civilization went out of business so abruptly. Maybe - just maybe - that's what inspired Plato to write about "earthquakes and floods, and one grievous day and night" that destroyed a great civilization.

Or, not.

Space Aliens and the 2012 Election

Here's what got the Lemming thinking about space aliens:

"Asking Candidates Tougher Questions About Faith"
Bill Keller, Magazine, The New York Times (August 25, 2011)

"If a candidate for president said he believed that space aliens dwell among us, would that affect your willingness to vote for him? Personally, I might not disqualify him out of hand; one out of three Americans believe we have had Visitors and, hey, who knows? But I would certainly want to ask a few questions. Like, where does he get his information? Does he talk to the aliens? Do they have an economic plan?..."
That "one out of three" link takes you to an interesting article:

"Poll probes Americans' belief in UFOs, life on other planets"
scrippsnews.com (July 15, 2008)

"Most Americans say it is very likely or somewhat likely that humans are not alone in the universe and that intelligent life exists on other planets.

"Only a third of adults, however, believe it's either very likely or somewhat likely that intelligent aliens from space have visited our planet, according to a survey of 1,003 adults conducted by Scripps Howard News Service and Ohio University. ..."

Depending on how the poll questions were worded, the Lemming might be in the "third of adults" that thinks it's "very likely or somewhat likely" that someone from another planet has landed on Earth. But that doesn't mean that the Lemming thinks space aliens have been mutilating cattle, buzzing cars, and performing interstellar pregnancy tests in wholesale lots over the last half-century.

Space Aliens and the Universe

The Lemming doesn't know whether or not there's life anywhere in this universe, except for what's on Earth. But the Lemming does know that cosmologists, physicists, and astronomers have good reason to estimate the age of the universe at about 13,730,000,000 years: and that Earth has been around for roughly 4,000,000,000 years.

That's a lot of zeroes.

The Lemming relates a little better to pictures, maybe you do too. On the timeline below this paragraph, a pixel in the left column represents 10,000,000 years; a pixel in the right column represents 1,000,000 years.



That's a lot of time. Then there's the physical scale of the universe. There are about 300,000,000,000 stars just in this galaxy, give or take a hundred billion: and a whole lot more galaxies besides this one.

All that space and time is part of why the Lemming thinks humanity may 'not be alone.'

Then again, maybe Earth is the only place in all the universe that harbors life.

A Million Years? Blink, and You'll Miss It

Over the last 1,000,000 years, humans have gone from scorching fingers on campfires to plugging leaks in reactors. That's 1/13,030 of the age of the universe, and 1/4,000 the age of Earth.

A million years on that timeline is half the thickness of the gray line at the top on the right side; 1/20th the thickness of the gray line on the left side.

'A long time' depends on your perspective. Waiting for a red light to turn green, a minute is a long time for the Lemming. Compared to the age of the universe, a million years is in the 'blink and you'll miss it' category.

'What If'

If there is life somewhere else in the universe, if it's 'close on a cosmic scale, and if that life includes someone with the sort of itchy curiosity some of us have - - - That's a lot of "ifs."

Adding two more: if those folks got started just a little sooner than we did, say 1/13,030th of the age of the universe; and if they'd decided to go to other worlds; they'd have been traveling in space for 1,000,000 years.

Remember the scale of the universe, though. Folks who got a 1,000,000 year head start on humanity would still be 'roughly contemporary' on a cosmic timescale.

From Theoretical Physics to Working Spaceships

Over the last 100 years, we've gone from having some interesting math that said interplanetary travel might be possible, to robot explorers mapping the outer Solar system.

Today, we've got off-the-shelf hardware that could get to nearby stars a million years. Much less, actually:

"...The Voyager spacecraft left the solar system at 37,000 miles per hour. At that speed, it would take Voyager 80,000 years to reach Proxima Centauri...."
("A Look at the Scaling," NASA)

Not that Voyager is going to Alpha Centauri: it's headed in another direction, and the ship's radio wouldn't still be working in the year 82012, anyway.

Propulsion technologies that could substantially reduce travel time to other stars are in development. Others are still strictly theoretical: Alcubierre's equations may or may not lead to a practical 'warp drive.'

Give humanity another million years, though, and it's the Lemming's guess that someone will have sent probes to other stars. And, more than likely, made the trip in person.

Possible, but Probable?

Like the Lemming said, under "'What If',"

It's possible, in the Lemming's opinion, that someone else did what humanity is doing now, kept developing new technologies: and might have visited Earth: at some point in the last 4,000,000,000 years. But in the last 40? With nobody noticing? That, in the Lemming's opinion, is very unlikely. Right now, there doesn't seem to be reliable evidence either for or against the idea that travelers found Earth.

But the Lemming thinks it's possible that someone else is out there. It's even possible that someone visited Earth. Maybe recently: like in the last 1,000,000 years. More likely, humanity missed the visitors by roughly 10,000,000 years. Or 100,000,000. Or more. Assuming that someone did stop by, of course.

What are the odds that humanity has company in the universe: folks more-or-less like the featherless bipeds of Earth? Where 'more-or-less like' includes chaps like the imagined alien over there, from "Alien Contact."

That's a good question: and until there's a lot more data available, there doesn't seem to be a definite answer.

Related posts:

• "Genesis, Optimus Prime, and Victorian America"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (April 10, 2012)
• " 'In a State of Journeying' "
  A Catholic Citizen in America (January 18, 2012)
• "Gliese 581g, Space Aliens, and the Canals of Mars"
  (October 12, 2010)
• "'Snowball Earth,' Evolution, and Really Old Rocks"
  (March 16, 2010)
• "Timing is Everything"
  Drifting at the Edge of Time and Space (October 7, 2009)

Somewhat-related posts:

• "Another 17,000,000 Years on the Coelacanth Timeline"
  (April 16, 2012)
• "Here Comes Another Martian Conspiracy Theory"
  (June 7, 2011)
• "Beware Warmonger Imperialist Space Aliens!?"
  (January 11, 2011)
• "Beware! They Control Denver!! (or, not)"
  (November 4, 2010)
• "Change, American Culture, Trilobites, Humanity's History, and the Big Picture"
  (September 26, 2009)
  Particularly
  • News Cycles, Seasonal Cycles, Change, and the Big Picture

Still more related posts:

• "Change, American Culture, Trilobites, Humanity's History, and the Big Picture"
  (Link list)

Another 17,000,000 Years on the Coelacanth Timeline

"Skull Confirms Older Origin for 'Living Fossil' Fish"
Wynne Parry, LiveScience (April 10, 2012)

"A group of ancient fish, called coelacanths, have changed so little over time they are known as "living fossils." Now, the remains of a skull found in the Yunnan Province of China, confirms these creatures have been around, largely unchanged, for more than 400 million years.

"Once thought to have died out at roughly the time the dinosaurs disappeared, the first living coelacanth was discovered in a fishing net in 1938 off the eastern coast of South Africa. Since then, others have turned up elsewhere along the coasts of the Indian Ocean. [Image Gallery: Freaky Fish]

"While it's clear their history goes way back, the fossils they left behind have been scarce so far. A lower jawbone, more than 400 million years old and discovered in Australia, hinted at the earliest known emergence of coelacanths whose appearance matched the two species alive today. This small fossil has been described as the oldest coelacanth, but the authors of the recent research write that it offers so little information that it cannot be reliably placed within the fishes' family tree...."

Fascinating as they are, coelacanths are not particularly pretty fish. But, although some folks say they're an "endangered species," these critters were around before those dragonflies with two-and-a-half-foot wingspans flitted around. And they're still here.


(Alberto Fernandez Fernandez, via Wikipedia, used w/o permission)
"Preserved specimen of chalumnae (Also known as Coelacanth [1]) in the Natural History Museum, Vienna, Austria."

Ancient, and Apparently Durable

"...The discovery reinforces what was already suspected about coelacanths: After a period of rapid diversification long ago, these fish have remained pretty much the same over hundreds of millions of years, according to Matt Friedman, a lecturer in paleobiology at the University of Oxford, who was not involved in the research.

" 'It makes their sort of anatomical conservation, this lack of major change over geological time, much more impressive,' Friedman said.

"In fact, the discovery extends the record for coelacanths with modern-looking bodies back by about 17 million years, according to the researchers, led by Min Zhu of the Chinese Academy of Sciences...."

So far, coelacanths have survived assorted ice ages, asteroid impacts, and mobs of volcanoes that make the Mount St. Helens eruption look like a kitchen spill. Maybe they're not quite as delicate as they're supposed to be.

Pushing "coelacanths with modern-looking bodies back by about 17 million years" probably won't help American taxpayers who are struggling with tax forms while hoping that their request for an extension got processed. But the Lemming is fascinated by ugly fish that haven't changed much in 400,000,000 or so years.

Coelacanths, you see, are lobe-finned fish: which apparently led to tetrapods, critters with four limbs they use for moving around. Also lungfish, some of which 'walk' underwater, which suggests that walking started in the water.

Still awake?

The Lemming's noticed that peoples' eyes tend to glaze over pretty fast during these verbal meanders. And that's another topic.

Intermittent Ice Ages, Asteroid Impacts, and the Occasional Massive Volcanic Event

There may be planets where not much happens. Earth isn't one of them.

Some critters, like the koala, panda, and Bee Creek Cave Harvestman spider, require very special conditions. Change the environment, and they die.

Other critters, like rats, cockroaches, and - apparently - coelacanths, aren't quite as easy to kill off. Which is just as well, under the circumstances:

• 225,000,000 years BP (before present)
  • Asteroid hits Earth
• 200,000,000 years BP
  • Heavy volcanic activity starts
  • Pangea breaks in two
    • The gap got called "The Atlantic" recently
• 199,400,000 years BP
  • Heavy volcanic ends
    • Elapsed time: 600,000 years
    • Crurotarsans are extinct
      • Leaving room for dinosaurs
• 65,000,000 years BP
  • Asteroid hits Earth
    • Dinosaurs are extinct
    • Leaving room for mammals
      • And, eventually, humans
  (Adapted from March 24, 2010)

One of the critters that didn't make the cut, about a half-billion years back, was opabinia regalis: the thing shown in that sketch. It had five eyes, and isn't quite like anything that's alive today.

Recent Events: The Last 700,000,000 Years

The observable universe and been around for 13,730,000,000 years, give or take 120,000,000. That's a recent estimate by astronomers, cosmologists, astronomers, and physicists, anyway.

This timeline covers part of Earth's history, picking up the story around the time that glaciers reached the equator. By that time, single-celled critters (and maybe bigger) were leaving tiny (and rare) fossils.

• -700,000,000 - 799,999,999 years BP
  • -716,500,000: Sea ice reaches equator
  • eukaryotic life survives
• -600,000,000 - 699,999,999 years BP
  • -650,000,000: Primitive sponges
  • -652,000,000: Lots of stromatolites and acritarchs die out ("Applied Palaeontology," Robert Wynn Jones)
• -500,000,000 - 599,999,999 years BP
  • -544,000,000: Trilobites show up (The Arthropod Story)
  • -505,000,000: Opabinia regalis, a - thing - with five eyes
• -400,000,000 - 499,999,999 years BP
  • -445,000,000: Lots of volcanoes; about 60% of marine invertebrates become extinct
  • -400,000,000 or so: Coelacanths show up
• -300,000,000 - 399,999,999 years BP
  • -350,000 or so: a fish walks ashore
  • -300,000,000: Really big dragonflies
• -200,000,000 - 299,999,999 years BP
  • -248,000,000: No more trilobites; Dinosaurs show up (The Arthropod Story)
  • -250,000,000 or so: huge volcanic eruptions form Siberian Traps
• -100,000,000 - 199,999,999 years BP
  • -199,999,999 or so: lots of volcanoes for 600,000 years; Pangea cracks
  • Coelacanths still around
• -0 - 99,999,999 years BP
  • -65,000,000 years BP: Asteroid impact(s); huge volcanic eruptions form Deccan traps
  • -65,000,000 years BP (Before Present): No more dinosaurs
    
• Now
  • Coelacanths still around

These days, delicate critters teetering on the brink of extinction get a lot of attention. As important as that might be, the Lemming is also interested in why distinctly indelicate critters don't die out: and keep on not dying out. Sometimes for hundreds of millions of years.

Like coelacanths.

Related posts:

• "Life is On the Clock - And Has Been for a Very Long Time"
  (January 29, 2011)
• "Ecological Disaster - a Quarter of a Billion Years Ago"
  (December 14, 2010)
• "Really Big Dragonflies: Oxygen's What Does It"
  (November 3, 2010)
• "Two Thirds of a Billion Years Ago: Earth's First Animals?"
  (August 18, 2010)
• "Four Legs, a Tail, and Tracks a Third of a Billion Years Old"
  (July 26, 2010)

More related posts:

• "Change, American Culture, Trilobites, Humanity's History, and the Big Picture"

Lemming Tracks: Fire; 1,000,000 Years of Sizzling Steaks and Burned Fingers

"Humans used fire 1 million years ago, scientists say"
Charles Choi, LiveScience, FoxNews.com (April 2, 2012)


(M. Chazan, via LiveScience and FoxNews.com, used w/o permission)
"Researchers found evidence of human fire use in South Africa's Wonderwerk Cave (shown here), a massive cavern located near the edge of the Kalahari Desert. (M. Chazan)"

"Ash and charred bone, the earliest known evidence of controlled use of fire, reveal that human ancestors may have used fire a million years ago, a discovery that researchers say will shed light on this major turning point in human evolution.

"Scientists analyzed material from Wonderwerk Cave in South Africa, a massive cavern located near the edge of the Kalahari Desert. Previous excavations there had uncovered an extensive record of human occupation.

"Microscopic analysis revealed clear evidence of burning, such as plant ash and charred bone fragments. These materials were apparently burned in the cave, as opposed to being carried in there by wind or water, and were found alongside stone tools in a layer dating back about 1 million years. Surface fracturing of ironstone, the kind expected from fires, was also seen...."

There's an old gag that goes "countless ages ago, man learned to make fire. Generations later, man learned to put out fires." And that's almost another topic.

This discovery is a big deal. Along with string, fire is one of those basic technologies people use. And now it looks like people have been using it for about 1,000,000 years. At least.

Not that the fires in Wonderwerk Cave were the sort of thing you'd find in a Bessemer converter.

1,900,000 Years and Counting

"...Although modern humans are the only human species alive today, originating about 200,000 years ago, other human species once roamed the Earth, such as Homo erectus, which arose about 1.9 million years ago. [10 Things That Make Humans Special]

" 'The analysis pushes the timing for the human use of fire back by 300,000 years, suggesting that human ancestors as early as Homo erectus may have begun using fire as part of their way of life,' said researcher Michael Chazan, a paleolithic archaeologist at the University of Toronto and director of the university's archaeology center.

"The research team's analysis suggests that materials in the cave were not heated above about 1,300 degrees Fahrenheit (700 degrees Celsius)...."

Granted, even with a shave, haircut, and new clothes, someone from 1,900,000 years back would have had trouble blending into a crowd today. But folks seem to have been using kitchens for upwards of 800,000 years: and what scientists found in Wonderwerk Cave says that cooking fires go back 200,000 years before that.

I'm not terribly surprised at this latest finding. Over the last century or so, folks have been learning that the universe is bigger, and older, with fascinating structures at increasingly large and small scales.

I've been fascinated by the unfolding story: and by what we've been learning about my remote ancestors. Not everybody has the 'oh wow' response I have, and I'll get back to that.

Gathering 'Round the Campfire

"...Fire would have helped early humans stay warm and keep nighttime predators at bay, and enabled cooking, which would have made food more digestible. In addition, 'socializing around a campfire might actually be an essential aspect of what makes us human,' Chazan said. 'The control of fire would have been a major turning point in human evolution.'

"Harvard anthropologist Richard Wrangham has speculated that controlled fires and cooked meat even influenced human brain evolution. He suggests that humans were cooking their prey as far back as the first appearance of Homo erectus 1.9 million years ago, just when humans were experiencing major brain expansion, and proposes that cooking allowed our ancestors to evolve larger, more calorie-hungry brains and bodies, and smaller guts suited for more easily digested cooked food.

" 'It's possible we may find evidence of fire use as early as Wrangham has suggested,' Chazan told LiveScience...."

Human beings are, from one point of view, opportunistic omnivores. We can get by without meat. But for the last 2,500,000 years, it's been part of the diet for most of us. Richard Wrangham says we've been cooking our meat for the last 1,600,000 years - which wouldn't surprise me a bit.

Besides tasting better, cooked meat is easier to digest - which meant that our distant ancestors needed smaller digestive systems when the said goodby to steak tartare. For the most part.

Meat, Muscle, Brains, and Burned Fingers

Good thing, too, since a given unit of our brain burns energy about 22 times as much as the same unit of muscle. (Aiello, 1997) Not that someone decided, about 1,600,000 years back, 'we'd better start growing bigger brains - so those big guts have got to go.' The last I heard, scientists hadn't nailed down just how and why critters change over time.

Still, switching from munching berries and fruit to a diet that included cooked meat gave our bodies room to grow these outsize brains we have. And occasionally use.

I've played with the idea that dangerous new technologies like fire and flint knapping may have put 'evolutionary pressure' on folks whose neighbors were early adapters. I'm not very serious about the notion - but it takes a little extra intellectual work to:

• Remember to keep the fire going
• Make sure the fire doesn't spread
• Do something when the fire does spread

Then there's the tricky matter of cooking meat without burning your fingers. Sure, it's simple for us: but we're folks whose ancestors have been dealing with fire for about a million years.

These days, some folks who eat cooked food without a qualm seem convinced that today's 'dangerous new technologies' will kill us all. That reminds me of the cartoon where one caveman was grumbling to another about what that crazy kid was doing: "Just wait, someday it'll get out of control, and destroy the entire village."

He was right: but I think there's a reason why most of us cook food, and steak tartare is a specialty food.

Related posts:

• Tools, teeth, and compassion
  • " 'Nutcracker Man,' Big Teeth, and - - - Grass?!"
    (May 6, 2011)
  • "New Clue in Human Evolution: It's All in the Wrist"
    (January 28, 2011)
  • "Evidence of Human Compassion: 500,000 Years Ago"
    (October 13, 2010)
  • "Earliest Known Tool Use: 3,390,000 Years Ago"
    (August 12, 2010)
  • "Homo Erectus, Kitchens, and Human (Pre)History"
    (December 21, 2009)
  • " 'Journey of Mankind:' 160,000 Years of Ups and Downs"
    (November 1, 2007)
    • Links to an interactive timeline
• Brains and language
  • "Growing Up Neanderthal: A New Look"
    (November 8, 2010)
  • " 'Mommy Brain' Research by a Mother"
    (October 23, 2010)
  • "Homo Gautengensis: Big Teeth, Tiny Brain, Fire, Stone Tools; and a New Puzzle"
    (May 21, 2010)
  • "Babies and Language: What We Hear is What We Cry?"
    (November 8, 2009)
  • "Broca's Center Multitasks: Big Brain Breakthrough"
    (October 15, 2009)
• Getting a grip
  • "Beauty, Science, and a Crazy Idea"
    A Catholic Citizen in America (March 14, 2012)
  • " 'In a State of Journeying' "
    A Catholic Citizen in America (January 18, 2012)
  • " 'Inevitable Progress;' 'We're All Gonna Die;' and Getting a Grip"
    A Catholic Citizen in America (January 16, 2012)
  • "Fukushima Power Plant: Explosion, Yes; Reactor, No"
    (March 12, 2011)
    Particularly
    • Godzilla, Rodan, and New Technologies
  • "Tofu Turkeys, Genetically Altered Foods, and the Evil Eye"
    (November 14, 2009)

More related posts:

• "Change, American Culture, Trilobites, Humanity's History, and the Big Picture"

More articles:

• "Man Entered the Kitchen 1.9 Million Years Ago"
  Jennifer Welsh, LiveScience (August 22, 2011)
• "Fire Used to Make Better Tools 75,000 Years Ago"
  Clara Moskowitz, LiveScience (August 13, 2009)
• "Outdoor BBQ: A 700,000-year-old Ritual"
  Meredith F. Small, LiveScience (July 3, 2008)
• And, on a geekier note:
  • "Dietary quality and encephalization in platyrrhine primates" Kari L. Allen and Richard F. Kay, Biology, Proceedings of the Royal Society (Received June 22, 2011; Accepted July 21, 2011)
  • "Brains and guts in human evolution: The Expensive Tissue Hypothesis*"
    Leslie C. Aiello, Brazilian Journal of Genetics (March, 1997)

'Nutcracker Man,' Big Teeth, and - - - Grass?!

" 'Nutcracker Man' Ate Like a Cow (or Pig)"
Charles Q. Choi, LiveScience (May 2, 2011)

"The strong-jawed human relative nicknamed "Nutcracker Man" likely didn't crack nuts at all, preferring to graze on grass like a cow instead, scientists find.

"These findings could dramatically alter conventional wisdom regarding what the earliest members of the human lineage and their relatives ate.

"The extinct hominid, officially called Paranthropus boisei, ranged across East Africa 1.2 million to 2.3 million years ago, living side-by-side with the direct ancestors of humanity. It earned its nickname because of its massive jaw and huge molars...."

"...It was long assumed that because of its powerful jaw, P. boisei lived up to its nickname and ate nuts, seeds and other hard items. Still, a recent study of its teeth did not turn up the kind of pitting one would expect from hard meals, hinting that it actually dined on softer fare.

Now scientists investigating carbon isotope ratios in Nutcracker Man's teeth found 'it most likely was eating grass, and most definitely was not cracking nuts,' Cerling said...."

Those are really big teeth. And there's more than isotopes to indicate that the now-extinct 'Nutcracker Man' ate grass:

"...'...No living ape feeds mostly on grass, and the practice is rare among primates. "There is one primate that is primarily a grass-eater, the gelada baboon in Ethiopia,' Cerling told LiveScience, and Ungar noted the wear and tear seen on P. boisei teeth 'looks very similar to that of the gelada baboon.'..."

Eating grass seems to be a sort of good news-bad news situation.

On the one hand, grass grows like - well, like grass. It's a very common plant.

On the other hand, back when Paranthropus boisei was around, ancestors of zebras, pigs, warthogs and hippos were in the neighborhood: also eating grass.

Maybe that's why P.b. is extinct, and we're not. There's probably more to it than that: in the Lemming's opinion.

That LiveScience article gives a little of the technical side of how researchers worked out what isotopes were in those big teeth:

"...The researchers drilled enamel off 24 teeth collected in central and northern Kenya from 22 P. boisei that lived between 1.4 million and 1.9 million years ago. They pulverized approximately 2 milligrams of enamel per tooth to look at the carbon isotopes within. All carbon isotopes have six protons in their atoms, but they differ from each other in how many neutrons they have in their nuclei -- for instance, carbon-12 has six, while carbon-13 has seven.

"By looking at the carbon isotope ratios in tooth enamel, scientists can decipher the past diet. The method relies on the type of carbon used in photosynthesis, the process in which carbon dioxide and water, with energy from the sun, are turned into food for certain plants. For instance, trees and the leaves, nuts and fruits they produce, as well as shrubs, herbs and cool-season grasses, all rely on C3 photosynthesis, which prefers carbon-12, while tropical grasses and sedges such as papyrus rely on C4 photosynthesis, where both carbon-12 and the heavier carbon-13 isotope are used...."
(LiveScience)

Fascinating stuff, in the Lemming's opinion: although your experience may vary.

Somewhat-related posts:

• "New Clue in Human Evolution: It's All in the Wrist"
  (January 28, 2011)
• "Growing Up Neanderthal: Another New Look"
  (November 15, 2010)
• "Homo Gautengensis: Big Teeth, Tiny Brain, Fire, Stone Tools; and a New Puzzle"
  (May 21, 2010)
• "Neanderthals and Me: New Data About Old Relatives"
  (May 7, 2010)
• "Homo Erectus, Kitchens, and Human (Pre)History"
  (December 21, 2009)

More related posts:

• "Change, American Culture, Trilobites, Humanity's History, and the Big Picture"

---

How the Lemming sees science, religion, and all that:

• "God's Creation: He Seems to Think Big"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (September 23, 2010)
• "Copernicus, Galileo, Science and a Reality Check"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (October 26, 2009)
• "Faith and Reason, Religion and Science"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (March 20, 2009)
  Particularly
  • Darwin and Huxley vs. Ussher and Carlyle
  • What If Darwin Had Been an Astronomer?
• "Catholic Church, Creationism, Evolution, Facts and Faith"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (March 5, 2009)

Big, "Beautiful" Fossil Ant in Tennessee

"Hummingbird-Sized Ants Once Roamed Wyoming"
Susan Milius, Science News, Wired Science, Wired (May 5, 2011)

"It's not a bird or a plane, but it is an ant the size of a hummingbird.

"A winged ant queen fossilized in 49.5-million-year-old Wyoming rock ranks as the first body of a giant ant from the Western Hemisphere, says paleoentomologist Bruce Archibald of Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, British Columbia.

"The new species, Titanomyrma lubei, is related to giant ants previously found in German fossils. These long-distance relatives bolster the notion that the climate of the time had hot blips that allowed warmth-loving giant insects to spread from continent to continent, Archibald and a U.S.-Canada team propose online May 4 in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B...."

Those "hot blips" were fairly long periods of time in comparison with, say, the production run of television series like 2007's Quarterlife. On a geological scale, though - not so much.

These big ants, by the way, aren't all that old. They lived, the article says, about 49,500,000 years back - practically 'recent,' compared to the 300,000,000-year-old dragonflies with two-and-a-half-foot wingspans. Ah, those were the 'good old days.' (November 3, 2010)

Back to the article.

Tennessee's Ancient Ant: Big, But Not Biggest

"...An ancient ant wing from Tennessee had hinted that big ants lived in North America during this time, says Torsten Wappler of the University of Bonn in Germany. 'But complete preserved specimens were not known until Bruce came up with this beautiful preserved fossil.'

"The new fossil caught Archibald's eye as he and co-author Kirk Johnson poked around storage drawers at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science, where Johnson works. The spookiest thing about the Wyoming ant may be that even at 5.1 centimeters [2 inches] long, she is not the largest ant ever found. A German specimen is slightly longer, as are queens of a living African driver ant, Dorylus wilverthi.

"Although ants overall trend toward greater size in cooler places, Archibald notes that the eight largest living species dwell mostly in the tropics. The team looked at climate reconstructions for the fossil species and found hot spots where the ancient giants lived as well.

"For a tropical lineage to have sprawled between continents meant taking ancient land bridges through Greenland or Iceland. During much of the ants' time those northern routes were merely temperate. But brief hot spells were possible, Archibald and his colleagues say.

"Climate scientists have already suggested there were several around 50 million years ago. One, for example, lasted about 170,000 years...."
(Wired Science)

Once again: one of those "hot spells" lasted around 170,000 years. The article doesn't say whose fault they were. Or, indeed, if they were anybody's fault. And the Lemming's ranted about that before:

• "Lemming Tracks: 'My Mind's Made Up, Don't Confuse Me With the Facts;' and Climate Change"
  (April 5, 2011)

The Lemming notes that, big as that Tennessee fossil ant is - a living species is bigger. Still: That's one big ant.

What's more puzzling, apparently, are fossil critters like "hippo predecessors, tropical plankton and pollen from tropical palms" found in a region that should be distinctly arctic in some ways. "...'The major challenge is to explain how a region that does not receive sunlight for six months keeps from freezing its giant ants and other creatures that don't tolerate frost.'..." (the Netherlands's Utrecht University's Appy Sluijs)

As the Lemming's said before, when observations back up established and/or common-sense ideas - that's great. When observations just don't add up - and can't be dismissed - - - even better! That means there's something new to learn.

Sort-of-related posts:

• "Eight-Foot Sea Scorpion: Big Claws; Sharp Spines; Weak; Clumsy"
  (January 4, 2011)
• "Very Old, Quite Small, Lamprey: A Big Deal for Scientists"
  (November 3, 2010)
• "Really Big Dragonflies: Oxygen's What Does It"
  (November 3, 2010)
• "Every Wondered About Trilobites? Have I Got a Micro-Review for You!"
  (November 12, 2009)
• "Trilobites, Arthropods, Evolution, and Why Mothra Isn't Real"
  (October 17, 2009)

Apex Chert: Microfossils, Microfractures, or Maybe Both

"Most Ancient Fossils Aren't Life, Study Suggests"
Charles Q. Choi, Space.com (March 24 , 2011)

"Structures thought of as the oldest known fossils of microbes might actually be microscopic mineral formations not associated with life, suggesting that astrobiologists must be careful calling alien objects 'life' when scientists have trouble telling what is or was alive on Earth.

"More than 20 years ago, microscopic structures uncovered in the roughly 3.5-billion-year-old Apex Chert formation in western Australia were described as the oldest microbial fossils. These structures were interpreted as cyanobacteria, once known as blue-green algae, embedded in a silica-loaded rock formed in a shallow marine setting. These structures were all detected in slices of rock just 300 microns thick, or roughly three times the diameter of a human hair.

"However, the interpretation of the structures has always been controversial, and it is still hotly debated among scientists searching for Earth’s earliest evidence for life. Specimens from the site apparently displayed branching structures that some researchers said were inconsistent with life, while others dismissed such branching as artifacts from photo software...."

One of the more interesting parts of this article, in the Lemming's opinion, may be the date stamp: April 24, 2011. At this moment, it's 10:55 a.m. in North America's Central time zone. That's 3:55 p.m. in the United Kingdom, 9:25 p.m. in Mumbai, (Still Saturday, April 23, 2011), and 12:55 a.m. Sunday morning, April 24, 2011, in Tokyo. And back to 5:55 a.m. April 23, 2011, in Honolulu.

Looks like this article was written by someone living near the western edge of the Pacific Ocean. That's more interesting than microfossils that may not be microfossils? Of living things, anyway? Not really: but nearly-as-interesting. For the Lemming. Your experience may vary.

"A Little More Complex"

"...'We were interested in developing new methods of looking at ancient microfossils, and so we were drawn to the Apex Chert as these putative microfossils are so iconic,' [University of Kansas geospectroscopist Craig] Marshall explained. "However, when we started working on the rocks, we discovered things were a little more complex than we thought they would be.'..."

That phrase, "a little more complex than we thought they would be," sums up quite a bit of what we know, as the Lemming sees it. Particularly in comparatively new fields, like studies of what's happened for the last few billion years on this planet.

The issue with the Apex Chert micro-things seems to be that when you take a close look at them, they look like fossils of living things. When you look closer: not so much. The microbe-things start looking more like fracture-things.

Sort of like the canals of Mars, only going in the other direction in terms of scale.

On the other hand, Marshall and company point out that their closer look may be a closer look at something different from what researchers took a close look at before. Both samples could look like the same thing at 'normal' distances - but not be quite the same thing at all.

So, where's the absolute certainty that scientists have about stuff? The Lemming thinks the sort of scientific triumphalism that was fashionable in some circles a half-century back - isn't quite so fashionable now.

Besides, the Lemming suspects that 'those scientists' never were quite as self-assured as some of their fans wanted to think they were. And that's another topic.

Back to the Apex Chert microfossils that may not be microfossils - or not fossilized organisms, after all. Again.

Apex Chert and the Search for Extraterrestrial Life

"...If the new study is true, the findings are important not only when it comes to evaluating evidence of life in ancient rocks on Earth, but have ramifications for astrobiological prospecting elsewhere in the universe.

" 'If it is really this hard to find convincing evidence for life on early Earth when we know there is life on Earth now, then it becomes clear that we need to be extra cautious interpreting data collected on Mars,' said paleobiogeochemist Alison Olcott Marshall at the University of Kansas, a co-author of the new study.

"The scientists detailed their findings online Feb. 20 in the journal Nature Geoscience."

Being "extra cautious" makes sense, in the Lemming's opinion. Particularly when there's not all that much data to go on, or when studying something new.

So, interpreting the Viking lander's life experiment results as "peculiar chemistry" may have been more sensible caution than insufficient imagination.

On the other hand, if a camera on one of the Mars rovers sent back a picture of something with four arms, eight legs, and tool belt - that hadn't been there a minute before - being "extra cautious" might not be quite so necessary.

Related posts:

• "Viking Life Experiments: Another Look at Organic Stuff on Mars"
  (January 6, 2011)
• "Two Thirds of a Billion Years Ago: Earth's First Animals?"
  (August 18, 2010)
• "Martian Microbe Markers - Maybe - and Mysterious Mark on Mercury"
  (October 2, 2009)
• "Origins of Life, a Virtual Ocean, and a Million Computers"
  (July 3, 2009)
• "Diamonds: Ancient Crystals, New Speculation, and the Origin of Life"
  (July 28, 2008)

More related posts:

• "Change, American Culture, Trilobites, Humanity's History, and the Big Picture"

More in this blog:

• "A Serious Search for Other Worlds, Life, and - Maybe - Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence"

New Clue in Human Evolution: It's All in the Wrist

"Humans Left Trees 4.2 Million Years Ago"
Jennifer Viegas, Archaeology News, Discovery News (January 28, 2011 )

"Wrist bones of human ancestors reveal when humans switched from living in trees to on the ground.

"Early human ancestors stopped swinging in trees and started walking on the ground sometime between 4.2 and 3.5 million years ago, according to a new study.

"This key moment, when our ancestors became anatomically and behaviorally less ape-like, coincides with increased cooling, more defined seasonality, and a grassland growth spurt. All transformed former forest habitats into more varied ones, forcing our very early relatives to change their ways.

" 'With the trees being farther apart, it became energetically advantageous for hominids to cross the gaps bipedally,' said Gabriele Macho, lead author of the study that was published in the latest issue of Folia Primatologica.

"Macho, a paleoanthropologist at the Catalan Institute of Paleontology in Barcelona, and his colleagues made the determinations after analyzing wrist bones from two early hominid relatives: Australopithecus anamensis and Australopithecus afarensis (also known as the "Lucy" fossil). The former species is 600,000 years older than the latter and is believed to be its ancestor...."

The article is more paleontology news than "archaeology news:" but, never mind.

There's a fair amount of detail in the article - including a discussion of what it is about the wrist bones that tells about how they were used.

The bottom line seems to be that there's more evidence that we were 'us' earlier than we thought. Not that a haircut and new clothes would help one of the folks who made the earliest known kitchen blend into the crowd these days. But looks aren't everything - and that's another topic.

It still looks like we got started in east Africa. But it looks like some of us may have left quite a bit earlier than paleontologists thought until recently. And that's another topic, too, sort of:

• "Ancestors may have left Africa earlier than thought"
  Amina Khan, Los Angeles Times (January 28, 2011)
  Briefly:
  • Tools found at Jebel Faya, United Arab Emirates
    • Seem to be about 125,000 years old
      • That's around 60,000 years before we were assumed to have left Africa
    • The tools aren't like those found along the known migration route
      
  • Change happens
    • Including sea level
      • The Bab al Mandab strait was (fairly) dry at low tide back then
    • Lakes, rivers, and grasslands covered Arabia then
      • Good hunting

Nothing new there, in a way. The more humanity finds out, the bigger, older, and more complex the world turns out to be. And the Lemming is not going to get into the fine-structure constant, galaxies, cosmology, and just how many universes we're talking about. (September 16, 2010, November 3, 2009, June 4, 2008)

Related posts:

• "Teeth: Human, Very Old, and in an Unexpected Place"
  (December 29, 2010)
• "Growing Up Neanderthal: Another New Look"
  (November 15, 2010)
• "Evidence of Human Compassion: 500,000 Years Ago"
  (October 13, 2010)
• "Neanderthals and Me: New Data About Old Relatives"
  (May 7, 2010)
• "Homo Erectus, Kitchens, and Human (Pre)History"
  (December 21, 2009)

More related posts:

• "Change, American Culture, Trilobites, Humanity's History, and the Big Picture"

Neanderthal: Big Nose, Big Mystery

"The Neanderthal Enigma: Why Were their Noses So Big?"
FoxNews.com (January 14, 2011)

"A mystery of Neanderthals for more than a century is one that's literally as plain as the noses on their faces — why did they have such big schnozes?

"One common answer suggests their faces somehow helped our extinct relatives deal with the extreme cold they faced. Now, however, scientists find that Neanderthal faces were not built for the cold — meaning that no one still knows why Neanderthals had such noses.

"The enigma that such a large nose poses is that it seems like an excellent way to lose heat — a paradox, given that Neanderthals lived when glaciers dominated Europe. Modern humans and other animals, in contrast, typically have evolved significantly narrower, longer noses in cold climates. [The Many Mysteries of Neanderthals]

"Scientists have tried solving this mystery by suggesting there were equally giant sinuses behind the broad noses. Some proposed the sinuses helped warm the air before it entered the lungs so Neanderthals were able to keep their bodies warm. Others speculated the sinuses actually had the exact opposite function, helping Neanderthals rid their bodies of heat, preventing them from drenching in sweat that could have cooled them off even more...."

The bottom line seems to be that we just don't know why the Neanderthal Schnoz was of such noble proportions. Turns out, their sinuses were around the same size as ours - and some critters, like rats and macaque monkeys, get smaller sinuses in the cold. Not that Neanderthals or us are rats or monkeys - but we're not all that dissimilar, either.

What's the big deal with those big noses?

"...'One of the things that's really fascinating about Neanderthals is that they are perhaps the most closely related species to humans that have ever lived, and in that way can help us really understand the evolutionary forces that shaped us,' [University of California's Tim] Weaver added...."

From the Lemming's point of view, tweezing out what's happened in the last few billion years is more fascinating than an Agatha Christie mystery - and the Lemming likes Agatha Christie mysteries. Which is another topic.

Although a recent National Geographic documentary, "Human Ape," pointed out that the human and human-like fossils dug up to date would barely fill the back of a pickup: we've learned a lot in just the last half-century.

Partly, in the Lemming's opinion, we've learned how much we still have to learn.

About that photo: It's from a slideshow on the FoxNews.com website, that starts with the title "Your Ancestor, the Caveman." Since it's a sculpted reconstruction of a Neanderthal man's head, some of the Lemming's ancestors may very well have looked like that. If your family tree doesn't have roots in western Europe, or other locales where Neanderthals lived: it's not quite so likely. (May 7, 2010)

The Lemming doesn't look a whole lot like that Neanderthal: but the Lemming doesn't look quite like his Campbell ancestors, either. Change happens. And that's another topic.

Related posts:

• "Neanderthals, Teeth, Us, and an Ongoing Puzzle"
  (June 25, 2010)
• "Neanderthals and Me: New Data About Old Relatives"
  (May 7, 2010)

---

More related posts, at

• "Change, American Culture, Trilobites, Humanity's History, and the Big Picture"

Yet more, about the Lemming's take on science, religion, and facts:

• "Science, Religion, and being Catholic"
  A Catholic Citizen in America

Eight-Foot Sea Scorpion: Big Claws; Sharp Spines; Weak; Clumsy

"Ancient 8-Foot Sea Scorpions Probably Were Pussycats"
LiveScience, via FoxNews.com (December 30, 2010)

"Ancient sea scorpions included the largest and arguably most frightening bug-like creatures known to have lived on Earth, but despite their fearsome claws, these giants might actually have been creampuffs, scientists think.


(from William L. Parsons, Buffalo Museum of Science, via FoxNews.com, used w/o permission)

"Sea scorpions, known as pterygotid eurypterids, were arthropods, a group that includes insects and crabs. Though not actually scorpions, many of the animals had tails ending in spikes, hence the name. [image of giant sea scorpion]

"These monstrous pterygotids were believed to be terrors of the seas 470 million to 370 million years ago, long before the dinosaurs appeared, reaching more than 8 feet (2.5 meters) long with large claws laden with sharp spines. [Dangers in the Deep: 10 Scariest Sea Creatures]..."

Big claws, sharp spines, eight feet long: looks impressive. Until someone takes starts looking closely at the mechanics of that sea scorpion's claws. Back to the article:

"...The scientists analyzed claws from a group of one of the largest sea scorpions, Acutiramus, which lived about 416 million to 419 million years ago in what is now New York and Ontario, Canada. They calculated that the pincers could only safely apply no more than 5 newtons of force without damaging themselves. This would make them incapable of penetrating even a medium-size horseshoe crab's armor, which needs 8 to 17 newtons to crack open. (For comparison, research has suggested T. rex's lower jaw could apply 200,000 newtons of force, or enough strength to lift a tractor-trailer.)

"As such, the pincers could not have attacked anything with a hard shell, or any creature that could have put up a significant struggle...."

On top of that, the claws lack what the article calls an "elbow joint," which means they'd have been okay for grasping prey on the seafloor: for catching something swimming above the seafloor? not so much.

At this point, it seems those eight-foot scorpion-things looked fearsome: but were weak and a tad clumsy. A next step would be to check out similar critters of the period, to see how strong and agile they were.

Somewhat-related posts:

• "Really Big Dragonflies: Oxygen's What Does It"
  (November 3, 2010)
• "Cambrian Explosion Evidence: Burgess Shale Fossils aren't Alone"
  (September 12, 2010)
• "Trilobites, Arthropods, Evolution, and Why Mothra Isn't Real"
  (October 17, 2009)

More:

• "Change, American Culture, Trilobites, Humanity's History, and the Big Picture "

Teeth: Human, Very Old, and in an Unexpected Place

People who look pretty much like the folks you see in the papers and on television today may have been around longer than we thought. A lot longer.

Really Old Teeth: New Facts to Chew On

"400,000 year old teeth challenge evolutionary theory"Anne Barker, ABC News Online (December 29, 2010)

"ELEANOR HALL: Israeli archaeologists say they've uncovered evidence that could challenge the accepted theories on human evolution.

"A team from Tel Aviv found human teeth that they estimate are 400,000 years old: twice as old as any previous finds.

"But they say they can't be sure of the significance of their discovery until further tests are done as Middle East correspondent Anne Barker reports.

"ANNE BARKER: The accepted theory among evolutionary scientists is that homo sapiens originated in Africa around 200,000 years ago and gradually migrated around the world.

"And until now the earliest human remains were found in eastern Africa.

"But now Israeli archaeologists have uncovered a set of teeth that they believe are twice as old and if so would force a complete rethink of the whole concept of human evolution.

"AVI GOPHER: This conclusion may be of great importance because it may be a first hint at changing some of the paradigms we are used to think about, used to use in terms of human evolution.

"ANNE BARKER: Professor Avi Gopher at Tel Aviv University heads the team which was excavating the Qesem Cave, a prehistoric site in central Israel that was discovered 10 years ago where they found eight teeth believed to be 400,000 years old.

"AVI GOPHER: The dating of the cave shows that the presence of homo sapiens in this part of the world is earlier than any other evidence we have to date.

"The earliest we know until now is Homo sapiens found in eastern Africa dated to around 200,000 years.

"That means that we have to rethink the basic reconstructions we have for human evolution and spread.

"ANNE BARKER: Professor Gopher says more research is needed to confirm the remains are the earliest evidence of the existence of modern man.

"But scientists have already done a morphological analysis of the teeth which included CT scans and X-rays that indicate their size and shape are very similar to those of today's humans.

"And he says other findings suggest that whoever it was who lived in the cave were hunters who used fire and shared animal meat, all of which are consistent with modern man...."

The Lemming isn't all that surprised at this news. Folks who make a serious study of life on Earth have generally been discovering that things happened earlier than they thought.

This is a pretty big jump, though, in terms of time: from 200,000 years back being as early as folks looking pretty much like us were around; to 400,000 years back. The shift from west Africa to the east end of the Mediterranean isn't such a big shift, though. It's walking distance. If you're willing to spend a few years on the hike.

Human Origins, Teeth, Writing Headlines, and Accepting Change

Another article, from Monday:
"Researchers: Ancient human remains found in Israel"
Associated Press, via FoxNews.com (December 27, 2010)

" Israeli archaeologists said Monday they may have found the earliest evidence yet for the existence of modern man, and if so, it could upset theories of the origin of humans.

A Tel Aviv University team excavating a cave in central Israel said teeth found in the cave are about 400,000 years old and resemble those of other remains of modern man, known scientifically as Homo sapiens, found in Israel. The earliest Homo sapiens remains found until now are half as old...."

"...The prehistoric Qesem cave was discovered in 2000, and excavations began in 2004. Researchers Gopher, Ran Barkai and Israel Hershkowitz published their study in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology."

The Lemming thinks that phrase, "challenge evolutionary theory," in the ABC article should be taken with a grain of salt. Make that a few pounds.

Yes, the evolutionary theories that have folks looking like us starting in Africa about 200,000 years back may be due for an overhaul. At least.

But the general idea that homo sapiens sapiens didn't always look like we do now? And that if you go back far enough, our ancestors looked different enough to have another tag in the 'species' column? The Qesem cave finds don't change that.

The Lemming recognizes that news is written to sell newspapers. Or, these days, to attract visitors to websites. That "challenge evolutionary theory" thing in the headline was, the Lemming suspects, calculated to attract readers who are still wrangling over the preferred realities of Darwin and Ussher.

The idea that change happens, and that it's okay, is something the Lemming accepts. At any rate, change happens: and I've got the choice of dealing with it, or being miserable. It's not such a hard choice.

What, No Rant About Godless Science?

If you've been following this blog, you've probably learned that the Lemming is a practicing Catholic. Which doesn't mean what some folks in America apparently think it does:

• "Home Schooling, Religious and Moral Instruction, and American Culture"
  (March 6, 2010)
  Particularly
  • NOT ALL CHRISTIANS ARE DOLTS
• "Dinosaurs, Mutant Chickens, Evolution, and Faith in God"
  (June 29, 2009)

Bottom line, I believe that God exists. I also acknowledge that He's smarter and stronger than I am. More patient, too. And I'm inclined to take the world as it is: not as I'd like it to be.

Moving along.

One reason the Lemming wasn't all that surprised at the idea that folks who look "human" have been around longer than we thought is that 'things happened earlier.' Like I said, the time of the earliest known modern humans, fish, or whatever, has generally been getting pushed back as we learn more.

Another is that archeologists/paleontologists (the distinction seems to be getting blurred) found a kitchen in the same general area - that folks used some 800,000 years ago. They didn't have a dishwasher, freezer, or microwave oven: but they did have an area that was designed around the tasks of preparing food.

Related posts:

• "Growing Up Neanderthal: Another New Look"
  (November 15, 2010)
• "Evidence of Human Compassion: 500,000 Years Ago"
  (October 13, 2010)
• "Earliest Known Tool Use: 3,390,000 Years Ago"
  (August 12, 2010)
• "Neanderthals and Me: New Data About Old Relatives"
  (May 7, 2010)
• "Homo Erectus, Kitchens, and Human (Pre)History"
  (December 21, 2009)

More related posts:

• "Change, American Culture, Trilobites, Humanity's History, and the Big Picture"

Solar System: In For Heavy Radiation, 'Soon'

"Earth Biodiversity Pattern May Trace Back to Bobbing Solar System Path"
Mike Wall, Space.com (September 22, 2010)

"A puzzlingly regular waxing and waning of Earth's biodiversity may ultimately trace back to our solar system's bobbing path around the Milky Way, a new study suggests.

"Every 60 million years or so, two things happen, roughly in synch: The solar system peeks its head to the north of the average plane of our galaxy's disk, and the richness of life on Earth dips noticeably.

"Researchers had hypothesized that the former process drives the latter, via an increased exposure to high-energy subatomic particles called cosmic rays coming from intergalactic space. That radiation might be helping to kill off large swaths of the creatures on Earth, scientists say.

"The new study lends credence to that idea, putting some hard numbers on possible radiation exposures for the first time. When the solar system pops its head out, radiation doses at the Earth's surface shoot up, perhaps by a factor of 24, researchers found...."

The article's got a picture that illustrates how our star bobs up and down, relative to the galactic plane, as it goes around the center of our galaxy. The motion is a bit like that of a carousel's horses.

So, should we be digging in, building fallout shelters: like Americans did back in my 'good old days?' ("Cold War, United States History)

Eventually, maybe: but according to the article, we don't need to rush. The next era of peak radiation is due in maybe 10,000,000 years. Okay: compared to how long life's been on Earth, that's not all that long. Compared to, say, the expiration date on milk containers? Like the Lemming said, there's no need to rush.

Mr. Wall does a pretty good job of outlining what's happened in terms of biodiversity over the last 542,000,000 years. Basically:

• Lots of animals and plants died
Species
• Appeared
• Changed
• Occasionally died out
• Life went on

What's notable for its absence, considering contemporary conventions regarding biodiversity in the news, is that it doesn't look like the the sun's orbit is anybody's fault.

These days, that's a bit noteworthy. In the Lemming's opinion.

Related posts:

• "Ecological Disaster - a Quarter of a Billion Years Ago"
  (December 14, 2010)
• "Ecological Disaster - a Third of a Billion Years Ago"
  (September 30, 2010)
• "Life on Other Worlds: Evolution, Orbits, and the Galactic Environment"
  (August 13, 2009)
• "Re-Thinking This Galaxy's Habitable Zone"
  (September 23, 2008)
• "The Sun as a Swinger? Cardiff U's Title is Better for Mass Extinction Article"
  (May 12, 2008)

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Related posts, at

• "A Serious Search for Other Worlds, Life, and - Maybe - Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence"
• "Change, American Culture, Trilobites, Humanity's History, and the Big Picture "