Access
This article is part of Nature's premium content.
Published online 7 October 2009 | Nature 461, 705 (2009) | doi:10.1038/461705a
News
Fossil rewrites early human evolution
Ethiopian find dates back 4.4 million years.
A 17-year investigation into a fossilized early human skeleton from Ethiopia culminated last week with 11 papers published in Science.
Detailed descriptions of the skeleton, of a fairly complete 4.
To read this story in full you will need to login or make a payment (see right).
Comments
Reader comments are usually moderated after posting. If you find something offensive or inappropriate, you can speed this process by clicking 'Report this comment' (or, if that doesn't work for you, email webadmin@nature.com). For more controversial topics, we reserve the right to moderate before comments are published.
This discovery is like a breath of fresh air. It is time that we move away from the "tree of life" serial evolution paradigm and make way for a parallel sourced genesis. An event occurred back some billions of years that promoted clone single cell DNA based genomic life on earth. From some unknown event these cells were traumatized and the variable genome appeared. From that point on evolution and natural selection determined form. Each genome strain carried a predisposition which led to today’s phylum groups. This is parallel evolution; with speciation, that is unwittingly studied today.
Natural selection can only work on genetic (and phenotypic) variation(s). How already existing genetic programs are reshuffled to generate genetic novelty is a matter of current research. Yes, natural selection works on variation but to say that these are the results of random mutations is overstated: we don't yet know how the architecture of genetic novelty emerges from preexisting genetic components. This IS NOT a creationist comment but a statement based on current "understanding" of how evolution might work.
theophil