A paper published in Nature describes the finding of the most ancient stone tools, and informs that they predate the genus "Homo". So it was not old Homo habilis who made the first tools. Instead it was made by some other hominin. The authors propose the name Lomekwian for this pre-Oldovan lithic technology.
Below are some photos, of the tools and the site (yes, like my previous post, this one too was inspired by news that I read today in bbc.com)
The paper (can be read in full) is: Harmand, S. et al. 3.3 Million-Year-Old Stone Tools from Lomekwi 3, West Turkana, Kenya. Nature, published online May 21, 2015
It is an exciting find, pushing back the origin of tool making to the very first of our kin. But it also makes me wonder about the prejudice in science. Similar stones found in America, at the Calico site would be dismissed as geofacts, made by nature, flash floods knocking stones together in a desert environment. Nobody even suggests such an origin for African stones. After all, oldest hominin fossils come from Africa so any old chipped stone found in the area where these people lived must surely have been made by them.
Below are some stones from Calico (source)
They look man-made don't they? However they are considered as natural.
In America, on the other hand, we all know that Siberians migrated there some 15 kya after spending some time isolated in Beringia so anything found in America that does not resemble a modern Homo sapiens "advanced" tool is not even identified by those looking for stone tools (Mousterian, Acheulean or Oldovan tools are not considered when seeking stone tools in America).
We need scientists with an open mind, seeking the truth, not just seeing what they were taught to see...
Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2015 by Austin Whittall ©
Bravo Austin,
ReplyDeleteWhen I saw the first pics of the Lomekwi finds, Calico/Manix Lake came to mind. I would love to know how a water course can chip a stone in an alternating saw tooth pattern, and a stone that is not found anywhere in the imediate area.
The prejudice is almost so thick you need a trowel to cut through it.
What is most telling about the Calico situation, not of the most vociferous critics actually visited the site , to see artifacts still in situ.
Eventually definitive evidence will come to light.
I'm seeing Mousterian looking stone tools here in Pike County Alabama. As a matter of fact, I took notice of one that resembled a stone tool I saw on the Asbach blog. Mine has caliche on it and as I understand it, caliche forms on limestone matrix materials between the latitude of 20 and 40 degrees.
ReplyDeleteI learned this as it puzzled me why my artifact had this calcium carbonate deposit whereas the French mousterian artifact did not. My farm is at 31 degrees North. Toulouse France is at 43 degrees North.
I have learned caliche is absent from french chert due to this phenomenon.
If anyone has any data to refute what I have learned so far in the last few weeks trying to determine if caliche formation on a worked chert manuport tool found in a creek bottom where there is no natural source of stone.