Hominid diversity and "ancestor" myths

Niels Bonde

pp. 151-191

in: Theresa Schilhab, Frederik Stjernfelt, Terrence W. Deacon (eds), The symbolic species evolved, Berlin, Springer, 2012

Abstract

Many of the "myths' of direct ancestors of "all hominids' or of Homo or of H. sapiens and age of these "ancestors' are shown to be "false" or based on poor character analyses and/or suboptimal classifications and/or inconsequent choices of names of taxa. Ernst Mayr's devastating influence since 1950 on naming fossil hominids and therefore on comprehending their diversity is obvious. Recently, that is since mid 1990s, many more new taxa of fossil hominids have been found and named, and this has produced a much better appreciation of the prehistoric diversity, and has questioned and put into doubt, if not outright refuted, many of the traditional, often too simplified and adaptationistic scenarios (or "just-so stories") about human evolution as evidenced by "direct fossil ancestors". The most famous of these, "Lucy", is here named Afaranthropus (n. gen.) antiquus (Ferguson, 1984).

Cited authors

Mayr Ernst