Early Humans


                                                                 Early Humans,

When we look back into our distant evolutionary past in how we became human we realize that evolution doesn’t follow a straight line, there are many branches and adaptations of early human species in our evolutionary time line.  These adaptations over 7 millions years can be noticed from the size of the large brain, the ability to walk upright and making tools for cooking , hunting, and self-defense. These adaptations helped the only members of our ancestral line to survive that  is us.
Our origins begin in Africa about seven million years ago. The scientists found thousands of fossils from dozens of species of early human ancestors in Africa. Fossil evidence indicates that Homo Sapiens originated in Africa, and this has been confirmed by DNA studies.


The Australopithecus is felt to be the earliest direct ancestor of Homo Sapiens. The Lucy Fossil, found in Ethiopia was 3.2 million years old.  





   



Was Australopithecus a species of human? This was our oldest ancestor in a direct evolutionary line, and it was a biped. Its skeleton is similar to human skeleton, but its skull is smaller than ours. 








Me and" Lucy" at California Academy of Sciences








Homo Erectus resembled modern day Humans more than its ancestors. Tall, with a larger brain, it made tools and used fire. Homo Erectus is the next known Homo Species that is in the direct line with Homo Sapiens.  Homo Erectus lived between 1.9 million years to 143 thousand years ago.  It also developed in Africa and migrated to Asia.


Homo Sapiens has lived from 180 thousand  years ago to the present. Homo Sapiens migrated out of Africa in two waves.


 It is thought that Homo Sapiens reached the Middle East  100 thousand years ago and China 80 thousand years ago. In the second wave Homo Sapiens Migrated from Africa 60 thousand years ago and settled in Europe, Asia , Australia, and lastly reached the Americas. By contrast Homo Erectus migrated out of Africa only to Asia. 




I would like to recommend to the class the movie 2001 A Space Odyssey (1968 ) by Stanley Kubrick in this movie we can see the origin and future of human species( the human evolution),  life in the cosmos, the evolution of our machines and artificial intelligence. It’s a science fiction movie, to ponder it.


                                                                           




References /Sources:
https://cosmosmagazine.com/palaeontology/where-did-we-come-from-a-primer-on-early-human-evolution
https://www.calacademy.org/exhibits/human-odyssey
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zmX7K8noikE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oR_e9y-bka0



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