At 12:42 PM 2/14/00 -0600, Russell Maatman wrote:
>Now consider fossil remains. When we look at those remains, it is like
>looking at a broken statue. What has always been important on this
>listserv, however, is the context of those fossils. What kind of _behavior_
>were those beings engaged in? Did they build camps, make tools, build
>altars, etc.? At that point, it seems to me, that we take the fossils,
>tools, etc., to constitute a single picture. We simply do not say, "I make
>no decision about the fossil itself." Of course we make decisions, some of
>which are based on the tools, campsites, and all the rest.
>Fossil-plus-context is of one piece.
I agree. And that is why I have constantly pointed out the fossilized
evidence of behavior. Most apologists simply dismiss these people because
they look different from us. And they give a very short and inaccurate
account of their behavior.
Hugh Ross calls H. erectus a bipedal mammal. And Wiester says a stupid
thing about Neandertal:
"However, he reportedly lacked the frontal lobe, the speech center of our
modern brain."John Wiester, The Genesis Connection, (Nashville: Thomas
Nelson Publishers, 1983), p. 180
Neandertal most assuredly had a frontal lobe!!!!!
Was H. erectus human? I believe he was because of what behavior we find in
the record. At Bilzingsleben, Germany, around 400,000 years ago, Homo
erectus built a village. The huts had openings to the south with a hearth
near the door. This is exactly the best way to keep a hut warm when the
north wind blows. This village had a 27 foot diameter paved area with a
quartzite stone in the center of it. On each side of the stone was a bison
horn. and in front of the stone were smashed human skulls. Sounds like an
altar to me. (references below)
In another area of the village was a work area in which wood shavings are
stil preserved in the travertine. Apparently they used this area as a
manufacturing area. They also manufactured bone spear points, something
that some say only upper paleolithic humans did after 40,000 years ago. Yet
this was ten times older. There is even art work there. Taken as a whole,
these people fulfilled almost every observational definition of humanity
save one---they don't look like us.
And this is a point Wiester uses:
"Homo erectus was a world traveler. He is thought to have originated in
East Africa and thence expanded into Asia (Peking Man), Java (Java Man),
and Europe. Although his brain cavity size is between that of apes and
humans, and in some cases approaches that of modern man, his physical
appearance would not make him a welcome guest at a dinner party." ~ John
Wiester, The Genesis Connection, (Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers,
1983), p. 165
While he ends up with a question about erectus, this emotional appeal is
not lost on the readers.
And Wilcox says:
"The only 'cultural' evidence we have of Homo erectus is the Acheulian
bifacial 'handaxe' industry which appeared suddenly and remained more or
less unchanged by time and location for a million years." PSCF 48:2, 1996.
Since most of the articles I cited in support of H. erectus were published
prior to Wilcox's paper, it shows how bad is the research many apologists
put into the topics upon which they write. In my opinion the data clearly
shows that at the very least, late homo erectus was human by almost any
reasonable definition.
references
Robert G. Bednarik, "Concept-mediated Marking in the Lower Palaeolithic,"
Current Anthropology, 36:4(1995), pp. 605-634, p. 611
Robert G. Bednarik, "On Lower Paleolithic Cognitive Development," 23rd
Chacmool Conference Calgary 1990, pp 427-435, p. 432
D. Mania and U. Mania and E. Vlcek, "Latest Finds of Skull Remains of Homo
erectus from Bilzingsleben (Thuringia)", Naturwissenschaften, 81(1994), p.
123-127, p. 124
Paul G. Bahn, "Comments", Rock Art Research 5:2(1988): 91-107, p. 96
Emanuel Vlcek, "A New Discovery of Homo erectus in Central Europe,"Journal
of Human Evolution, (1978) 7:239-251, p. 250
Rick Gore, "The First Europeans," National Geographic, July, 1997, p. 110
glenn
Foundation, Fall and Flood
Adam, Apes and Anthropology
http://www.flash.net/~mortongr/dmd.htm
Lots of information on creation/evolution
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