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Did Humans come to the Americas during the Last Ice Ice Across the Bering Strait? (or is The Bering Strait Theory a myth?)
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Stephen wrote: "5.Can the genetic, physical, and facial differences between the native American Indians, native Central Americans, and the native South Americans be accounted for by just a 15,000 year span?..."The above seems unlikely.
15,000 years ain't long for evolutionary changes, surely.
I've spoken to Indian (tribal) peoples of North and South America who say they believe from stories handed down to them that their ancestors were living in the Americas for much longer than 15,000 years...And they don't descend from Asians who migrated from Russia to Alaska as per the official story. Not saying they are right, that's just what they believe.
I read this article "The Bering Strait Theory" a while back and thought perhaps you might find it interesting. I found it during a period I was curious about the African Adam and Eve:http://www.historyandtheheadlines.abc...
Stephen wrote: "Since a child, I was always taught that humans came to the Americas across the frozen Bering Strait during the last Ice Age some 15,000 years ago. However, there are some lingering concerns about t..."Do you think there are older races in the Americas that perhaps are not related to those from Asia, Stephen?
I am pretty sure some came across the straight, but the evidence continues to mount that there were others who in South America and East Coast NA before then.
Were People Killing Giant Sloths in South America 30,000 Years Ago? http://news.nationalgeographic.com/ne...Were People Killing Giant Sloths in South America 30,000 Years Ago?
Bones with marks left by human tools could point to earlier human arrival in the Americas.
By Helen Thompson, for National Geographic
PUBLISHED November 21, 2013
When did people get to the Americas? The answer remains a subject of fiery debate.
Most scientists agree that humans began arriving in the Americas between 13,000 and 15,000 years ago, and the Clovis people of North and Central America are generally considered the "first Americans."
But new fossil evidence from a streambed in southern Uruguay could challenge such theories.
Results published November 19 in Proceedings of the Royal Society B suggest the presence at the site of human hunters who may have killed giant sloths and other megafauna. That itself isn't odd, but the site, called Arroyo del Vizcaíno, has been radiocarbon dated to between 29,000 and 30,000 years old—thousands of years before people were thought to be there. (Also see "Photos: Speared Mastodon Bone Hints at Earlier Americans.")
"That's pretty old for a site that has evidence of human presence, particularly in South America," said study co-author Richard Fariña, a paleontologist at Uruguay's Universidad de la República.
"So, it's strange and unexpected."
What's the controversy?
Giant sloths, saber-toothed cats, oversize armadillos, and other large mammals once roamed the Americas—a diversity that would easily rival an African savannah today. (Watch a saber-toothed cat video.)
But by 11,000 years ago, many of the species had disappeared, likely due to climate change or the arrival of human hunters in the New World. But when exactly humans got here, and how they arrived, remains unknown.
What's new?
In 1997, severe drought forced local farmers to drain a lagoon in Arroyo del Vizcaíno, which exposed a mysterious bed of gigantic bones.
After a series of bureaucratic roadblocks, paleontologists excavated the site in 2011 and 2012, unearthing over a thousand fossils. "From the paleontological point of view, that is absolutely marvelous in itself," Fariña said.
Many of the bones belong to three extinct ground sloth species, mainly Lestodon armatus. Weighing in at up to four tons, the animals "were the size of smallish elephants," he said.
Fossils from other common South American megafauna turned up in the mud as well: three species of glyptodonts, or armadillo ancestors; a hippo-like animal called a toxodon, which has no living relatives; a South American saber-toothed cat (Smilodon populator); and an elephant-like stegomastodon, among others. (Learn more about extinct animals that could possibly be revived.)
Some of the bones bear telltale markings of human tools, which suggests the animals were hunted for food. The team also found a potentially human-made scraper that could have been used on dry animal hides, and stone flakes.
Why is it important?
Clues from the site point to a human presence at Arroyo del Vizcaíno much earlier than accepted theories of migration. Fariña and his team are both excited and cautious about their results.
Fariña said the strength of the new evidence lies in the team's methodology and the fact that two of the bones they tested for dating also bore markings similar to those made by human tools. "The association can't be closer than it is," he said.
The date of Arroyo del Vizcaíno may make some archaeologists cringe: South America's earliest human settlement at Monte Verde in Chile dates to only 14,000 years ago. (Also see "Clovis People Not First Americans, Study Shows.")
What does this mean?
The study certainly does not prove definitively that humans were killing giant sloths 30,000 years ago in South America.
The fossils found at Arroyo del Vizcaíno might simply be a product of nature mimicking human tools, and the authors acknowledge that possibility.
"South America played an exceptionally important role in the peopling of the Americas, and I'm pretty sure we have some significant surprises waiting for us," Bonnie Pitblado, an archaeologist at the University of Oklahoma who was not associated with the study, said in an email.
"Maybe people killing sloths at [the Arroyo del Vizcaíno site] 30,000 years ago is one of them, maybe it's not—but it certainly isn't going to hurt to have it on our collective radar screen as we continue to contemplate the peopling of the New World."
What's next?
The Uruguayan team has further excavations and environmental reconstruction studies planned for the site.
Fariña estimates that it could yield a thousand more bones, and they plan to build a local museum to house the site's many fossils.
Remarkable New Evidence for Human Activity in North America 130,000 Years Ago http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science...Researchers say prehistoric mastodon bones bear human-made markings
My feeling is that evidence is kind of thin. I'd like to see more supporting evidence discovered.I certainly don't rule out the possibility that the Americas were inhabited and/or visited prior to 20,000 years ago, possibly from many places.
Agree it is thin. However, it begins to seem that the "accepted" versions of human evolution is beginning to show a lot of holes. I am NOT a fan of intelligent design (especially Bible version) but there must be more than we have been taught. Maybe "Prometheus" movie has it right? :-)
The start of Prometheus was interesting and obviously based on actual ancient alien theories.We know so little, we know so little...
The Behring Strait theory could be more or less right, but the timing wrong. Most of the last several million years have been ice ages; full interglacials are actually rather rare because it takes so long to melt the ice, and of course, even when the Strait was open people could have gone north and made the crossing over the Arctic.
Remarkable New Evidence for Human Activity in North America 130,000 Years Ago http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science...Smithsonian: "Researchers say prehistoric mastodon bones bear human-made markings".
I read somewhere that phenotypes can develop in less than 10,000 years. White skin was virtually nonexistent before agriculture which is not much more than 10,000 years old.I would argue that sexual selection alone can make significant changes within a few hundred years.
I support the theory that humankind was able to travel by water much earlier than we could ever have imagined. It makes more sense that people coastal hopped or ocean travelled than that they traversed terrain that is not traversible even with today's modern technology.
Unless, of course, the travel technology of the ancients was superior...
Our ancestors had vimanas but they ended up being too expensive to maintain. :)
Well, the politicians of that era wanted to invest in green energy, not free energy...the fools!
1.Why would humans travel 1,000 miles across barren ice to find big game? It would seem the most illogical path to follow in the pursuit of food.
2.What did early man eat during this arduous journey?
3.What were the presumed “big game” animals such as mammoths eating in such a barren environment? From stomach samples of frozen mammoths, it obviously wasn’t fish.
4.Why would early man just not migrate southwards to more habitable climates as the presumed ice made its southward march?
5.Can the genetic, physical, and facial differences between the native American Indians, native Central Americans, and the native South Americans be accounted for by just a 15,000 year span?
6.Do the excavations at Monte Verde in Southern Chile, which suggest that early man’s arrival in the Americas was much sooner, disprove this theory?