Anthropology.net

Straight outta BBC News and National Geographic News comes word that Dean Falk is definitively saying Homo floresiensis was a completely new species. You can have a read at each article here, “‘Hobbit’ human ‘is a new species’” and ““Hobbit” Was Own Species, Not Diseased Human, Brain Study Says.”

Falk and crew published their findings in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, which by now you should know is notoriously bad at timing press releases like this with publications of the entire paper… so we’re gonna have to wait to see exactly what she and her colleagues have found out. When the paper is once published, you can access it at this link, “Brain shape in human microcephalics and Homo floresiensis.” But, in the mean time, what I have gathered is that Falk is defining the size, shape, and morphology of the brain as the definitive phenotype of a new species. Two years ago they published a paper similar in methodology, titled, “The Brain of LB1, Homo floresiensis.” In this current paper, their sample size was a bit small, and limited to only,

“10 normal humans, nine microcephalics, one dwarf and the Hobbit.The brain leaves a mirror image imprinted onto the skull, from which anatomists can reconstruct its shape. The resulting brain cast is called an endocast.

Professor Falk’s team scanned all 21 skulls into a computer and then created a “virtual endocast” using specialist software.”

Then, they used statistical techniques to study shape differences between the brain casts and to classify them into two different groups: one microcephalic, the other normal.”

What Falk found was two characteristics that distinguished microcephalic brains from Homo floresiensis. An image from the publication shows a human microcephalic to your left and a Homo floresiensis to your upper right. In laymen terms, “The bottom part sticks out in the back, and the region behind the forehead is unusually narrow,” I can’t really quite translate into scientific terms because I really don’t know what the ‘bottom part’ translates too… is that the cerebellum or occipital lobe?

Curiously, Falk admits that they couldn’t fully negate the claim that Homo floresiensis wasn’t a microcephalic modern human,

“The team was unable to obtain information about another microcephalic skull that a third research team said resembled the hobbit and thus supported the argument that LB1 was diseased, not a new species.”

All in all this is proving to be an interesting paper. I don’t quite know how I feel about the brain cast comparison. I woulda liked to see more comparisons to other microcephalic casts, but that coulda been limited to the sample available. Maybe more Homo floresiensis fossils will be found out, now that the cave in which these specimens were found has now been reopened for research.

Right on the heals of the awesome announcement of the unearthing of a Olmec-inspired city in Mexico, is concerning news that pollution is damaging these archaeological sites within the country. Specifically, Stefan Lovgren reports in National Geographic News‘ “Ancient Mexican Carvings Being Erased by Acid Rain, Experts Say” that the pre-Aztec city of El Tajin, one of Mexico’s most important archaeological sites, and located on Mexico’s Gulf coast is threatened by acid rain and air pollution. Here’s an image of what has been uncovered so far, click the thumbnail for a larger resolution photo:

I know this is a big concern globally. The Great Pyramids of Giza are equally threatened by this unnatural phenomenon as are sites elsewhere. But for El Tajin specifically, this is a big concern because the site is known for its elaborate carvings of pre-Aztec Mesoamerican life, especially the games the people who once inhabited the city enjoyed. It is elaborated in depth in this post:

“El Tajin was built in what is now the state of Veracruz by the Totonac, a civilization that reached its peak from the early 9th to the early 13th century A.D.Much of El Tajin—the city name refers to one of the names for the Totonac god of thunder—remains unexcavated.

The site’s most famous building is an elaborate niche-studded pyramid.

The ceremonial center also has a number of other temple pyramids, palaces, and courts for playing a ritual Mesoamerican ball game sometimes compared to basketball.

No other site has as many depictions of ball players and their equipment as the sculptures and carvings at El Tajin, whose inhabitants were apparently great fans of the game.

It is unclear how exactly the game was played, but it may have served as a training exercise for young warriors. Losers of the game may have been sentenced to death.

Now the carvings depicting the game are beginning to erode at an alarming rate…

John Machado, a pre-Columbian art historian at Chaffey College in Rancho Cucamonga, California explains the importance of El Tajin,

“The art of El Tajin is crucial to our understanding of the ancient history of the Gulf coast.It gives evidence of a powerful and complex civilization that had broad interaction with Mesoamerican cultures in both central Mexico and Maya-controlled regions but still cultivated its own unique Veracruz style and iconography.”

The article outlines how the erosion is due to contaminants like chlorine, sulfates, and nitrates in the air from power stations and oil refineries. Within 10-20 years the carvings of El Tajin will be no more, unless people figure out a way to preserve the site. To the right is an image of one of the pyramids in El Tajin, you can see the intricately carved details from afar. Click to see a higher resolution. Here’s a bit of background on how acid rain does its thing,

“Acid rain causes erosion on ancient monuments because the sulfuric and nitric acid chemically reacts with the calcium carbonate in the stones to create gypsum, which then flakes off.Acid rain forms when pollutants in the air become trapped inside water droplets in a cloud. The pollution is then carried down to earth with the rain.”

These pollutants, as the article outlines are not natural. They are caused by our insatiable desire for energy and fuel. While the the bigger picture of global warming, and green house gases are public health issues and ecological effects, people should be equally aware that changes in our climate, due to our energy demands, harm every aspect of our cultural heritage… something we will never get back once destroyed.

The AP is running a press release of an outstanding find from a site near the town of Xochitepec, Mexico. It is titled, “Olmec-Influenced City Found in Mexico.” Archaeologists have unearth a 2,500 year old city that once influenced heavily by the Olmec culture. The site is about 200 miles away from the known Olmec boundary. The piece shares with us some of the importances of the site,

“The remains of Zazacatla are providing insight into the early arrival of advanced civilizations in central Mexico, while also providing lessons about the risks to ruins posed by modern development that now cover much of the ancient city.Archaeologist Giselle Canto said Wednesday that two statues and architectural details at the site, 25 miles south of Mexico City, indicate that the inhabitants of Zazacatla adopted Olmec styles when they changed from a simple, egalitarian society to a more complex, hierarchical one.

“When their society became stratified, the new rulers needed emblems … to justify their rule over people who used to be their equals,” Canto said of the inhabitants, who may not have been ethnically Olmec, but apparently revered the culture as the most prestigious.

Zazacatla covered less than one square mile between 800 B.C. and 500 B.C. But much of it has been covered by housing and commercial development extending from Cuernavaca, a city popular with tourists just seven miles north.”

Digging of Zazacatla started last year and so far archaeologists have unearthed six buildings, and two sculptures of what appear to be Olmec-style priests. The sculptures appear to have headdresses portraying the jaguar, which the Olmecs revered, and other symbols of status and authority. This site shows us how pervasive the Olmec culture was.

Did you know the cat fight between the paleoanthropologists that found the Hobbit specimens, aka Flores man, Homo floresiensis and the ones who took the fossils off to cast them, was so bad that the Indonesian government actually closed down access to the Liang Bua cave where they were found? Well, that’s the story the Indonesian government is saying… the paleoanthropologists are saying that, “access was reportedly blocked due to political sensitivities,” which to me is one in the same.

Back in 2004, if you remember, the Homo floresiensis finds were announced by a team which included Professor Richard “Bert” Roberts but another professor, Teuku Jacob, based at Gadjah Mada University, in Yogyakarta, Indonesia had his doubts. He’s known as known as Indonesia’s “king of palaeoanthropology” and he,

“took the bones away from their repository in Jakarta to his lab in Yogyakarta, 443km (275 miles) away, against the wishes of the researchers who found them.They were eventually returned. But the discoverers claimed the bones were extensively damaged in Jacob’s lab during attempts to make casts.

The damage included long, deep cuts marking the lower edge of the Hobbit’s jaw on both sides, said to be caused by a knife used to cut away the rubber mold.

In addition, the chin of a second Hobbit jaw was snapped off and glued back together. Whoever was responsible misaligned the pieces and put them at an incorrect angle.

The pelvis was smashed, destroying details that reveal body shape, gait and evolutionary history.

After the accusations surfaced, Professor Jacob denied damaging the remains, telling USA Today that breakages could have occurred when the bones were being transported from Yogyakarta back to Jakarta.

Excavations at Liang Bua were reportedly blocked because Indonesian government officials would not issue exploration permits for projects that might prove Professor Jacob wrong.”

The drama that ensued afterwards would probably drive a bunch of teenage high school girls to craziness. Paleoanthropology is a field full of egos and drama, if you didn’t already know. But there’s some home, with news coming from the BBC, that the issues now appear to have been smoothed over. Professor Roberts said,

“It’s now a matter of getting everything organised so we can start digging again.You’ve got to get there in the dry season; in the wet season you can hardly drive to the site and when you are there, there are puddles of water all over the floor – so it’s got to be dry to sensibly dig holes.”

Which peaks my interest, I’d like to see if there are more Homo floresiensis fossil to be found.

There’s an awesome story over at National Geographic News on how some isolated tribes in the Amazon are using high tech gadgets to help conserve their rainforest from loggers and such. These are the very same people that we assume are confined to a prehistoric age of technology, which goes to show how malleable our minds and cultures are despite the language and technological barriers.

The story is titled, “Amazon Tribes Use Latest Gadgets to Battle Developers” and it documents the plight of not only the tribes involved but the activists that are introducing high tech gadgetry like satellites, computers, and even Google Earth in their efforts.

So activists have been training these South American communities to use digital mapping technologies such as geographic information systems (GIS) to build maps that definitively outline their properties.Jen Osha is co-founder of the nonprofit group Aurora Lights and a doctoral student in geography at West Virginia University.

Osha said that participatory GIS—the blending of local geographic knowledge with modern mapping data—can help indigenous communities stop the loss of ancestral lands and decrease Indian’s reliance on foreigners.

“The process of making maps can increase community organization and empower community members in daily relationships with [government] officials, because they now have hard data they can use,”

Osha said.

The Huaorani are mostly talked about in this piece, and the author, Kelly Hearn, writes about how Osha introduced maps into their lives and how they use it to not only defend their lifestyles from encroaching developers, but also

“[How they] are using the maps for a number of things, like defining areas for hunting, tourism, and conservation,” said Jascivan Carvalho of TROPICO, an ecotourism company that has worked with the Huaorani.

Members of the Sipaliwini of south-central Suriname plan a mapping expedition that will use global positioning system (GPS) technology to define their ancestral territories.

Photograph courtesy Amazon Conservation Team

 I appreciate this piece because it documents several things. One thing, right off the bat, is the intersection of technology and not only ecological preservation, but also cultural preservation. So long as the Hoaurani and other tribes adopt these forms of technology they will effectively help protect some lifestyle. And as I mentioned earlier, this is an awesome piece because it truly documents that people who live in the forest, or in the desert, or anywhere for the matter aren’t as primitive as popular culture predisposes them to be.