Anth 102 Ch. 10 & 11

Ardipithecus

Ardipithecus is a genus of an extinct hominine that lived during Late Miocene and Early Pliocene in Afar Depression, Ethiopia.

brain size and cranial capacity How do early hominin brains compare with chimpanzees? What is cranial capacity?

As a result, the widest part of the skull of these early hominins was below the brain case. For modern humans, it usually is in the temple region. Early hominin faces were large relative to the size of their brain cases. They had comparatively big molar teeth with thick enamel. By comparison, their front teeth were small.

Australopithecines / Robust australopithecines, Gracile australopithecines

Australopithecines: Australopithecus is an extinct genus of hominins. From paleontological and archaeological evidence, the Australopithecus genus apparently evolved in eastern Africa around 4 million years ago Robust australopithecines:Paranthropus is a genus of extinct hominins. Also known as robust australopithecines, they were bipedal hominids that probably descended from the gracile australopithecine hominids 2.7 million years ago.

Australopithecus afarensis

Australopithecus afarensis is an extinct hominin that lived between 3.9 and 2.9 million years ago in Africa and possibly Europe. A. afarensis was slenderly built, like the younger Australopithecus africanus

Australopithecus garhi

Australopithecus garhi is a 2.5-million-year-old gracile australopithecine species whose fossils were discovered in 1996 by a paleontologist research team led by Berhane Asfaw and Tim White.

culture as adaptation How does cultural adaptation differ from physical adaptation? What are the great adaptive advantages of culture?

Biological adaptation is the way in which populations evolve. Cultural adaptation is the way that humans use non-biological means to survive in their environments

trends in hominin evolution As you read pay attention to how the story unfolds over time. What traits evolve and how do they change over time. Which traits change first? Is there just one lineage that becomes human, or are there multiple lineages? Do hominin species live at the same time?

Bipedalism: the evolution of hominins to walking on two feet instead of four (developed in woodlands). Dental changes occurred because of changes in foods that were being consumed. Cranial capacity expanded as hominins evolved. Material culture evolved as sedentism became more prominent and hominins became more permanent and territorial in their cultures and artifacts

culture as adaptation Some animals have claws, humans have culture. Explain how culture can serve the function of claws. How is culture humanity's our primary adaptation.

Cultural adaptation is the process and time it takes a person to integrate into a new culture and feel comfortable within it. A person in this position may encounter a wide array of emotions that the theory describes in four different stages. This includes the honeymoon, culture shock, recovery, and adjustment stages.

H. floresiensis

Flores man Homo floresiensis is an extinct species in the genus Homo. The remains of an individual that would have stood about 1.1 m in height were discovered in 2003 at Liang Bua on the island of Flores in Indonesia.

genetic diversity How is human genetic diversity distributed? Why are some populations more diverse? How do these patterns of diversity apply to the story of human evolution, i.e., what do they tell us?

Genetic diversity is the total number of genetic characteristics in the genetic makeup of a species. It is distinguished from genetic variability, which describes the tendency of genetic characteristics to vary. Genetic diversity serves as a way for populations to adapt to changing environments.

cannibalism What is the evidence for claims that archaic H. sapiens and modern H. sapiens practiced cannibalism?

Gran Dolina (Spain), Krapina (Croatia), Moula-Guercy (France)

homo habilus

Homo habilis was a species of the tribe Hominini, during the Gelasian and early Calabrian stages of the Pleistocene geological epoch, which lived between roughly 2.1 and 1.5 million years ago.

Homo naledi When was this discovery announced? What fossils were found? What time period are these fossils dated to? What is distinctive about this species? Why might it be particularly important?

Homo naledi is an extinct species of hominin, which anthropologists first described in 2015 and have assigned to the genus Homo. 250,000-3000,000 years old a species of human with some surprisingly primitive features - including a tiny skull and brain - survived into the relatively recent past. Conceivably, H. naledi might even have met early members of our species, H. sapiens. One could even speculate we had something to do with it going extinct.

Laetoli Footprints Who found them? What is the significance of these footprints? How old are they? How are they dated?

Laetoli is a site in Tanzania, dated to the Plio-Pleistocene and famous for its hominin footprints, preserved in volcanic ash. The site of the Laetoli footprints (Site G) is located 45 km south of Olduvai gorge. The location and tracks were discovered by archaeologist Mary Leakey in 1976, and were excavated by 1978.

Lucy

Lucy is the common name of AL 288-1, several hundred pieces of bone fossils representing 40 percent of the skeleton of a female of the hominin species Australopithecus afarensis. In Ethiopia, the assembly is also known as Dinkinesh, which means "you are marvelous" in the Amharic language. Perhaps the world's most famous early human ancestor, the 3.2-million-year-old ape "Lucy" was the first Australopithecus afarensis skeleton ever found, though her remains are only about 40 percent complete

models for modern human origins What are the three models? How do they differ in their explanation for human origins? Which model seems best supported by the new lines of genetic evidence?

Multiregional Evolution, Out of Africa with Replacement, Out of Africa with Hybridization.

first americans When? How did they get here? What evidence?

Native Americans are believed to have descended from northeast Asia, arriving over a land bridge between Siberia and Alaska some 12,000 years ago and then migrating across North and South America.

climate and environment What role does the climate and environment play in the story of human evolution?

On longer time scales, hominins experienced large-scale shifts in temperature and precipitation that, in turn, caused vast changes in vegetation - shifts from grasslands and shrub lands to woodlands and forests, and also from cold to warm climates.

Robust australopithecines Who were these hominids? What were they adapted to? What happened to them?

Paranthropus is a genus of extinct hominins. Also known as robust australopithecines, they were bipedal hominids that probably descended from the gracile australopithecine hominids 2.7 million years ago

prognathism This means that the nose and jaw projects forward like a dogs. Prognathism is a trait that is measured in studying hominin evolution. What has happened to this trait over time?

Prognathism is the positional relationship of the mandible or maxilla to the skeletal base where either of the jaws protrudes beyond a predetermined imaginary line in the coronal plane of the skull.

Raymond Dart, Mary and Louis Leaky, Don Johanson Who? When? What key discoveries and theories did each contribute to paleoanthropology?

Raymond Dart: an Australian anatomist and anthropologist, best known for his involvement in the 1924 discovery of the first fossil ever found of Australopithecus africanus, an extinct hominin closely related to humans, at Taung in the North of South Africa Mary and Louis Leaky: Olduvai Gorge, where they uncovered fossils of ancient hominines and the earliest hominins, as well as the stone tools produced by the latter group. Mary Leakey developed a system for classifying the stone tools found at Olduvai. Don Johanson: known for discovering - with Yves Coppens and Maurice Taieb - the fossil of a female hominin australopithecine known as "Lucy" in the Afar Triangle region of Hadar, Ethiopia.

archaic H. sapiens

Relating to or being an early form or subspecies of Homo sapiens, anatomically distinct from modern humans. Neanderthals in Europe and Solo man in Asia are usually classed as archaic humans.

Oldowan tool tradition What is it? What do they look like? What were they used for? When do they first appear? Who probably made them?

The Oldowan is the oldest-known stone tool industry. Dating as far back as 2.5 million years ago, these tools are a major milestone in human evolutionary history: the earliest evidence of cultural behavior. Homo habilis, an ancestor of Homo sapiens, manufactured Oldowan tools.

Piltdown Piltdown worked for a time, because people had a false expectation and hypothesis about what the earliest human ancestors would be like. What was that hypothesis? What fossil would first call Piltdown into question?

The Piltdown Man was a paleoanthropological hoax in which bone fragments were presented as the fossilised remains of a previously unknown early human. In 1912, the amateur archaeologist Charles Dawson claimed that he had discovered the "missing link" between ape and man

Nariokotme

Turkana Boy, also called Nariokotome Boy, is the common name of Homo erectus fossil KNM-WT 15000, a nearly complete skeleton of a hominin youth who lived during the early Pleistocene

Australopithecus (Kenyanthropus) platyops

a flat-faced, small-brained, bipedal species living about 3.5 million years ago in Kenya. Kenyanthropus inhabited Africa at the same time as Lucy's species Australopithecus afarensis

bipedalism, anatomical correlates, and significance What is it? When did it first evolve among the hominoids? In what kind of environment? What are the anatomical correlates of bipedalism? How do we recognize it in the fossil record? What theories explain the adaptive significance of bipedalism? Can more than one of these be correct?

a form of terrestrial locomotion where an organism moves by means of its two rear limbs or legs.

transcending limitations What does this have to do with culture?

a state of being that has overcome the limitations of physical existence and by some definitions has also become independent of it

H. sapiens neanderthalensis In addition to the usual questions about a species, what were their relationships to modern H. sapeins? Are there similarities and or differences concerning behavior?

archaic humans that became extinct about 40,000 years ago. They seem to have appeared in Europe and later expanded into Southwest, Central and Northern Asia

bones What can bones tell us about how people lived and their personal histories? What do bones tell us about the impact of agriculture on human health and activity?

disclose who they were, how they lived and even how they died

sexual dimorphism What is this? What are some of the correlations associated with sexual dimorphism? What are the implications of sexual dimorphism for the interpretation of human evolution?

distinct difference in size or appearance between the sexes of an animal in addition to difference between the sexual organs themselves.

Tools Mousterian, Aschulean, Levallois technique. How were these tools made and used? What kind of thought processes were involved?

distinctive type of stone knapping developed by precursors to modern humans during the Palaeolithic period.

scavenging hypothesis Evidence for scavenging vs. hunting

early humans who lived as much as two million or more years ago procured their meat needs primarily through hunting, versus the 'man the scavenger' hypothesis, which proposes that the early humans procured these needs mostly by scavenging dead carcus

brain How has brain size and structure changed over the course of hominin evolution? When do significant changes appear in the fossil record?

evolved most rapidly during a time of dramatic climate change. Larger, more complex brains enabled early humans of this time period to interact with each other and with their surroundings in new and different ways

fire What is the adaptive significance of fire? What makes the evidence of fire difficult to interpret?

food and cooking fire detroys evidence

tracing ancestry with genetics How is this done?

genetics-based ancestry reports and tools, which means that we analyze your DNA to trace your lineage

modern H. sapiens When do the first fully modern H. sapiens appear in the fossil records for: Africa, western Asia, Europe, N. America, Australia

he earliest finds of modern Homo sapiens skeletons come from Africa. They date to nearly 200,000 years ago on that continent.

hominin / hominid In case you didn't resolve this earlier, here it is again. Who is included in these group of animals? Why have these classifications changed in recent times?

hominin: The Hominini form a taxonomic tribe of the subfamily Homininae. Hominini includes genus Homo, but excludes genus Gorilla hominid: The Hominidae, whose members are known as great apes or hominids, are a taxonomic family of primates that includes eight extant species in four genera: Pongo, the Bornean, Sumatran and Tapanuli orangutan

evolution of culture Culture is the ultimate behavioral adaptation? When does fully human culture emerge in the fossil record? What is your evidence?

human cultural change can be described as a Darwinian evolutionary process that is similar in key respects (but not identical) to biological/genetic evolution

hunting hypothesis What is the hunting hypothesis? What has happened to this hypothesis? Why?

human evolution was primarily influenced by the activity of hunting for relatively large and fast animals, and that the activity of hunting distinguished human ancestors from other hominins.

three elements (preconditions) of evolution keep these important ideas from Unit I in mind as you consider the fossil record.

mutation, gene flow, genetic drift, and natural selection

abstract thought Explain why Achulean tools must have required abstract thought.

stone tool manufacture characterized by distinctive oval and pear-shaped "hand-axes" associated with early humans. Acheulean tools were produced during the Lower Palaeolithic era across Africa and much of West Asia, South Asia, and Europe,

symbolism / abstract thinking What are symbols? How are they different from signs? How do anthropologists look for evidence of symbolic thought over the course of hominid evolution? What can tools teach us?

symbolism: used to gain a better understanding of a particular society abstract thinking:

time- epoch Hominin evolution is focused on what epoch?

the beginning of a distinctive period in the history of someone or something.

Achulean tool tradition What are the characteristics of these tools? When did they appear? What hominids are associated with them?

the name "Acheulean" (ash-you-LEE-un) is taken from the name of a site named Saint-Acheul, near Amiens in northern France, and is used to refer to a range of Lower Paleolithic tool-making traditions found widely across Afro-Eurasia. The typical tool is a general-purpose hand-ax.

domestication

the process of taming an animal and keeping it as a pet or on a farm

Homo erectus

upright man Homo erectus is an extinct species of archaic humans that lived throughout most of the Pleistocene geological epoch. Its earliest fossil evidence dates to 1.9 million years ago

valgus knee / adducted knee

valgus knee: turned outward adducted knee: closed or drawn together