People Who Have Discovered Early Humans

PEOPLE WHO HAVE DISCOVERED EARLY HUMANS

Donald Johanson

Donald Johanson is an American paleoanthropologist. Along with Maurice Taieb, and Yves Coppens he is known for the discovery of the skeleton of the female hominid australopithecine known as "Lucy", in the Afar Triangle region of Hadar, Ethiopia.  In 1981, he established the Institute of Human Origins in Berkeley, California.  Lucy herself was not at once recognized as a unlike species, but was considered an older member of Australopithecus africanus, and only the later discovery of skulls of afarensis convinced the general paleontological world that Lucy represents a species called afarensis.

Louis and Mary Leakey

Mary Leakey (6 February 1913 – 9 December 1996) was a British archaeologist and anthropologist, who discovered the first skull of a fossil ape on Rusinga Island and also a noted robust Australopithecine called Zinjanthropus at Olduvai. Louis Leakey was a British archaeologist and naturalist whose work was important in establishing human evolutionary development in Africa. He also played a major role in creating organizations for future research in Africa and for protecting wildlife there.

Raymond Dart

Raymond Dart grew up on a family farm in Queensland, Australia. In 1924, he examined fossil-bearing rocks blasted from a limestone quarry at Taung, a small town in the North West Province of South Africa.  He found a skullcap, that he believed was obviously that of a primate. It fit precisely over a brain-cast protruding from the surface of one of the rocks. After more than a month of patient chipping, he managed to reveal the skull's face. It was the first specimen of an australopithecine ever found. 

Eugene Dubois
Eugene Dubois was the first person to ever deliberately search for fossils of human ancestors. Only a handful of fossil humans had already been discovered, and those were by chance. In a remarkable story of dedication and luck, Dubois succeeded in his quest. In September 1890, he and his workers found a human, or human-like, fossil at Koreroing Broeboes. They found the right side of the chin of a lower jaw and three attached teeth. In August 1891 he found a primate molar tooth. Two months later he found an intact skullcap, which would be known as Java Man. In August 1892, a third primate fossil, an almost complete left thigh bone, was found near the skullcap.  In 1894 Dubois published a description of his fossils, naming them Pithecanthropus erectus, describing it as neither ape nor human, but something in the middle.  In 1895, he returned to Europe to promote the fossil and his interpretation. A few scientists enthusiastically endorsed Dubois' work, but most disagreed.

10 Early Human Facts

1.)    As mammals, all primates share some of the same characteristics such as a flat face, making them have more room for a brain.  They are also bi-pedal and that leaves their hands free to grasp objects.  They also have opposing thumbs, arms and shoulders that rotate and binocular vision.  

2.)  In the evolutionary process humans are said to be products of apes.  The physical differences between humans and apes, is that a humans brain is much more complex.  There’s more hair on an apes body than on a humans.  The ape has a brow ridge above their eye sockets, while the humans do not leaving them with more brain room.  Also their communication is different. For example, the apes by hooting and hollering, the humans by talking, shrugging their shoulders, waving, laughing, or smiling. On an apes foot the big toe is pointing outward so it can climb trees in search of food.  The humans don’t have that toe because we don’t need to climb trees to get food.  Also we don’t have to have a bent pelvis to walk on two feet.  We can walk on two feet without bending our knees or back.  

3.)  In 1974, Donald Johanson set out looking for the earliest human. He expected to find anything else.  Donald Johanson found a smart ape in 1974 while looking for the earliest humans.   It happens that the fossils were from 3.5 million years ago.  Johanson proved that there were humans before us and that they were descended from monkeys.  Donald Johanson found the complete skeleton of a woman with characteristics from both humans and apes.  She became known as Lucy, the Austrolopithecus.  Johanson found Lucy in Hadar, Ethiopia.   

4.)  In 1924, Raymond Dart found an early human in Taung, South Africa.  He found the skull of a child dated approximately 3.5 million years ago. Many people thought him strange because other scientists thought that people thought didn’t even exist yet.  Raymond Dart turned out to be correct and everyone finally believed him.

5.)  Fire helped the early humans survive because it kept them warm and made wild animals stay away from them during the nights.  The fire was always placed at the overhang of the cave where the humans were staying because the caves were wet inside and the fire wouldn’t do much good in there.  Fire was extremely useful.  It provided early men/women with a means of warmth and defense -- the wild animals were frightened of the fire and avoided the campsites and allowed them to settle in previously inhospitable areas.  Before the use of fire, men/women could only eat raw food--meats, fruits and berries.  Now cooking softened the food, allowing an expansion of the diet that helped the men/women to grow stronger.  One hidden benefit of the use of fire is the effect that it had on social groups.  Sitting around the warmth of the fire, men and women developed communications skills that helped their mental development.

6.)  Scientists think that early humans originated in Africa because Genetic and fossil evidence is interpreted to show that archaic Homo sapiens evolved to anatomically modern humans solely in Africa, between 200,000 and 150,000 years ago,^[3] that members of one branch of Homo sapiens left Africa by between 125,000 and 60,000 years ago, and that over time these humans replaced earlier human populations such as Neanderthals and Homo erectus.^[4] The date of the earliest successful "out of Africa" migration has generally been placed at 60,000 years ago as suggested by genetics, although attempts at migration out of the continent may have taken place as early as 125,000 years ago according to Arabian archaeology finds of tools in the region.

7.)  The development of tools helped early humans because they were used to find food, make shelter and live.  The tools helped create language which helped create communication and led to evolution.  The tools also helped with the language and evolution because the early humans evolved into the modern civilized, speaking people today. 

8.)  Theories or misconceptions about Neanderthals are that they were brutes, had bad posture, and were very unintelligent.  The scientists thought that the Neanderthals were brutes because they looked stronger than all the other early humans.  The scientists also thought that they had bad posture because their bodies looked like they were hunched over when they walked because their build looked wrong for good walking, but the Neanderthals really had arthritis which affected their posture making them walk improperly.  Scientists thought that the Neanderthals had smaller brains but they actually had larger ones.

9.)  Ways that Cro-Magnons and modern humans are the same is that we all look alike and we have the same sized brain  Some differences between Cro-Magnons and us are that we don’t use hunter and gatherer groups to get our food and flowers.

10.)  A hunting and gathering society is a group of people living together.  The men are always the hunters because they don’t have to stay near home and take care of the new-born babies or the children.  The women are the gatherers because they must stay by the village to take care of each other and the children.  Also the hunters hunt down buffalo and big animals, and the gatherers collect nuts, berries and flowers for décor and eating.  In that case the women wouldn’t be strong enough to take down a large animal like a buffalo, because they are home all day taking care of little kids and picking up light objects while the men are used to the wilderness and fighting so they are better to hunt not collect berries and nuts.