Chimp Fossils

[Aidan Karley <aidan_karley@yahoo.co.uk>]

In article <006901c5af42$ebf791e0$c33967d5@gericom>, David Marjanovic 
wrote:
> "The final research paper in this collection fills a big gap in our 
> knowledge: the first chimpanzee fossils ever found show that chimps and 
> early humans inhabited the same environments in which they evolved and 
> diverged. The fossils -- three teeth -- are from half-million-year-old 
> sediments in Kenya that also yielded fossils of *Homo*."
>
       The reportage I've seen is that the chimp teeth were found in 
semi-arid deposits to the East of the East African Rift, which in 
particular blew a small hole in one of the proposals as to why we have an 
appreciable fossil record for Homo, but very little for Pan and Gorilla : 
previously people had suggested that the ancestors of Pan and Gorilla were 
primarily inhabitants of a rainforest habitat, where wet, acidic soils 
made a preservation-hostile environment for their cold dead bones. Finding 
the chimp teeth in semi-arid sourced deposits leaves that thesis listing 
somewhat. It also points to other possibilities for environments to hunt 
chimp fossils in, which is good.
       
-- 
 Aidan Karley,
 Aberdeen, Scotland,
 Location: 57°10' N,  02°09'  W (sub-tropical Aberdeen), 0.021233
 Written at Fri, 02 Sep 2005 07:46 +0100



        
        
                
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