Re: Doubts over spectacular Jinmium dates

Glenn Morton (grmorton@waymark.net)
Wed, 28 Jan 1998 21:36:34 -0600

At 05:34 AM 1/29/98 +0800, Stephen Jones wrote:
>Glenn
>
>On Sat, 24 Jan 1998 15:37:47 -0600, Glenn Morton wrote:
>
>[...]
>
>>GM>>We know that Homo erectus crossed the ocean 700,000 years ago and was
>>>>on the island of Flores, Indonesia. It isn't far from there to Australia
>>>>(indeed natural forest fires on Australia could have been seen from Timor
>>>>an Island not far from Flores.).
>
>>SJ>Australia...is often ravaged by lightning-lit fires...El-Nino effects can
>>>cause a few years of droughts within otherwise wet periods...
>>>
>>>OTOH I have no problem with Homo erectus being in Australia 700,000
>>>years ago.
>
>GM>Nobody said that H. erectus was in Australia 700,000 years ago,
>least of all I.
>
>Nobody said *you* did say it. I said *I* have no problem with Homo
>erectus being in Australia 700,000 years ago and lighting fires.
>
I have a problem with H. erectus in Australia 700,000 years ago. There is
NO evidence of human occupation that early. I don't know why you chose that
figure. I would suggest that you should have problems with him being there
700,000 years ago. By 140,000 years ago, it is much less certainty about
the existence of someone in Australia.

>>SJ>The issue was whether the Jinmium art was the product of
>>>H. erectus or H. sapiens. If it is 176,000 years old, then either:
>>>a) it was H. erectus (which would make him more intelligent than
>>>previously thought) or b) it was H. sapiens (which would make him
>>>older than previously thought). Since there is no other evidence
>>>elsewhere for either a) or b), and we know about El-Nino caused
>>>fires in Australia, I prefer the latter explanation.
>
>GM>Why no fires prior to 140,000 years ago. The entire pattern of soot in the
>>air around Australia, recorded both in the Lake George Core and in oceanic
>>cores changed significantly from the pattern seen in the earlier rocks.
>
>As I said, this could have been caused by the beginnings of an
>El-Nino cycle. Or it could have been caused by hominids. When there
>is other positive evidence that hominids were in Australia 140,000
>years ago, then I will accept the hominid-lit hypothesis.

The El Nino cycle has been observed in sediments as long ago as 50 million
years ago. El Nino cycle didn't just start in the past few hundred thousand
years.

glenn

Adam, Apes, and Anthropology: Finding the Soul of Fossil Man

and

Foundation, Fall and Flood
http://www.isource.net/~grmorton/dmd.htm