This should really mess with Creationists’ heads.

Seems not only has our species been around for 100,000 ears (a little longer than creationists think) and evolved from early primates, we are also cousins to...hobbits!

"Basically, the wrist evidence tells us that modern humans and Neanderthals share an evolutionary grandparent that the hobbits do not, but all three share an evolutionary great-grandparent. If you think of modern humans and Neanderthals as being first cousins, then the hobbit is more like a second cousin to both," Tocheri said.

There was debate if these little humanoids were actually deformed homosapiens, however, new studies show this is not the case.

Now, a study of the bones in the creature's left wrist lends weight to the human ancestor theory, according to a report in Friday's issue of the journal Science.

Some truth behind the myths?

It is unknown whether the hobbit intermingled with modern humans. The researchers found hobbit and pygmy stegodon remains only below a 12,000-year-old volcanic ash layer. Modern human remains were found only above the layer.

Still, rumors, myths, and legends of tiny creatures have swirled around the isolated island for centuries. It's certainly possible that they interacted with modern humans, according to the researchers.

"Looked at from a regional perspective, we definitely have modern humans in Australia from at least 40,000 years ago, and in Borneo from at least 43,000 years ago," Roberts said. "So there was temporal overlap between the hobbits and ourselves from at least 40,000 years ago until at least 18,000 years ago—more than 20,000 years minimum. What was the nature of their interaction? We have absolutely no idea.."

What did they look like?

Well, not quite so cute as Bilbo -"Physically, they were about the size of a three-year old Homo sapiens [modern human] child, but with a braincase only one-third as large," said Richard Roberts, a geochronologist at the University of Wollongong, Australia, and one on the co-authors of the research paper. "They had slightly longer arms than us. More conspicuously, they had hard, thicker eyebrow ridges than us, a sharply sloping forehead, and no chin."

"While they don't look like modern humans, some of their behaviors were surprisingly human," said Brown, the study co-author.

"The hobbit was nobody's fool," Roberts said. "They survived alongside us [Homo sapiens] for at least 30,000 years, and we're not known for being very amiable eco-companions. And the hobbits were managing some extraordinary things—manufacturing sophisticated stone tools, hunting pygmy elephants, and crossing at least two water barriers to reach Flores from mainland Asia—with a brain only one-third the size of ours.

"Given that Homo floresiensis is the smallest human species ever discovered, they out-punch every known human intellectually, pound for pound."

A few more relatives


1 HOMO HABILIS ~ NICKNAME: Handyman LIVED: 2.4 to 1.6 million years ago
2 HOMO SAPIEN ~ NICKNAME: Human LIVED: 200,000 years ago to present
3 HOMO FLORESIENSIS ~ NICKNAME: Hobbit LIVED: 95,000 to 13,000 years ago
4 HOMO ERECTUS ~ NICKNAME: Erectus LIVED: 1.8 million years to 100,000 years ago
5 PARANTHROPUS BOISEI ~ NICKNAME: Nutcracker man LIVED: 2.3 to 1.4 million years
6 HOMO HEIDELBERGENSIS ~ NICKNAME: Goliath LIVED: 700,000 to 300,000 years
7 HOMO NEANDERTHALENSIS ~ NICKNAME: Neanderthal LIVED: 250,000 to 30,000 years ago

How to be a whole lot much more famouser than small dead animals and Kate McMillan

Dead animals, large and small - how SDA outdid the Big Guys in number of hits. Once.

Well, anyone wanting to out do SDA can use several tactics:

-post free porn
-write something really offensive
-write something really dumb

See, it’s kind of like asking yourself what kind of fish are out there, and what will they go for when deciding on bait. After all, to bloggers who are going for the big numbers and the money above all else, quality and truth don’t matter.

This is why papers like The Enquirer emerged. In fact, if you want to boost visits to your blog, you could by an Enquirer, skim through the articles, and there you are! Free advice on flexible truth in writing!

The post that caused so many to link to SDA had to do with the neo-cons jumping all over a report that challenges some popular theories on climate change. It has a poorly executed, hazy pic of of a dino lying in the sand with a caption - "Not Waiting For The Asteroid." The comments consist of the usual incestuous discourse of Flat Earthers, climate change deniers, and creationists mocking those who are foolish enough to believe the thousands of reports that challenge the one McMillan alludes to. You know, those of us who actually studied evolution, genetics, physics, climatology, and those of us who read in-depth on these issues, analyse and compare reports, and apply logic rather than the teachings of a religious text.

K. Mc’s was not a brilliant post, or a well researched piece. It simply offered a bad picture, a handful of right-wing comments making fun of people who actually understand evolution and believe in it, and a link to a report by a scientist.
Somehow, based on the crappy picture and the lack of any content in the post generated by K. Mc, I suspect what people were looking for was the link to the report.

The right bait, guys. The right bait.

Why does this incident bother me so much? Oh, I’m sure those patting each other (and themselves) on the back for drawing in so many visits to their blogs are saying "jealousy! 900ft J is jealous ‘cause hardly anyone goes there and we have 6,958.2 friends, just like on Facebook!"
No, I am happy to say it isn’t that. What bothers me is that because blogs are becoming more influential on the Net, they threaten to undermine responsible and relatively unbiased journalism. They also feed a disturbing appetite in people for quick news bites, allowing other people to do the thinking and analysis for them. They also tend to cover popular stories and topics, allowing other equally important (but less exciting) issues to slide into the "outer-sphere."

This incident concerns me because the concept of quality is being linked to the number of hits, where blogs are concerned. And this is simply not true. "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" outsold "The Piano" in theatres, but it is not a better movie. Harry Potter novels outsold Raymond Carver’s books, but they are not better. More fun for some people in both cases, perhaps, but certainly not better as books and movies are rated.

As blogs become more influential, people will look for the "best" blogs, and it would do society a great disfavour if the best blogs were decided by who gets the most hits.