Beyond bones & stones
Remember in 2005-06 when there was a whole lot of buzz about the quadrupedal siblings in Turkey? There first was this paper, "Cerebellar hypoplasia and quadrupedal locomotion in humans as a recessive trait mapping to chromosome 17p," and then there was this paper, "A new syndrome with quadrupedal gait, primitive speech, and severe mental retardation... Continue Reading →
New research from the Proceedings of the Royal Society B raises the possibility that Homo floresiensis was nothing more than population of Homo sapiens that were endemic cretins. The paper, "Are the small human-like fossils found on Flores human endemic cretins?" comes from academics in Australia who "show that the fossils display many signs of... Continue Reading →
If you read the overview on limb evolution that I wrote yesterday, I think you maybe interested in watching this 51 minute conversation between Carl Zimmer and Neil Shubin that the Panda's Thumb pointed too.
One of the hallmarks of human evolution, aside from our bipedalism and extraordinarily large brains, are our forelimbs... especially the famed prehensile thumb. Our forelimbs, or arms, are extremely flexible compared to a quadruped. For example, because of the shallowness of the ball and socket joint that connects our humerus to our scapula, our arms... Continue Reading →
