I read this in a news article on the webb. If anyone wants to read the article do a search and type in Hobbit Skeleton.
Thread: Hobbit Skeleton Found!
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Has anyone else read the news about the skeleton found in a cave in Indonesia.?
I read this in a news article on the webb. If anyone wants to read the article do a search and type in Hobbit Skeleton.
I read this in a news article on the webb. If anyone wants to read the article do a search and type in Hobbit Skeleton.
Enlighten us!!! I'm too lazy to do a search.
Oh, and is your username supposed to be spelt with a y like the archaic? In Modern English it ought to be MAid Marion. GREAT USERNAME BY THE WAY!!!
Can I just call you Marion?
Oh, and is your username supposed to be spelt with a y like the archaic? In Modern English it ought to be MAid Marion. GREAT USERNAME BY THE WAY!!!
Can I just call you Marion?
I saw that and wondered what was so strange about it; after all, aren't there still tribes of pygmys in Africa?
That is ridiculous! HObbits? Bah that's all make believe! As Grondy mentions it is most likely a great ansestor of pygmys, or Sans bushmen (who are now almost an extinct race.) They were very small in stature.
There was an article about this in New Scientist. Apparently the remains are that of an entirely new species of human which shared the planet with modern humans but died out due possibly to a cataclysmic event. The skeleton has been named Ebu.
Ebu
Ebu
They are saying that this find will completely change the way we look at human evolution and ancient human history, but that this skeleton is most likely a relative of early Homo-Erectus. Well, what if this race was not confined to Flores Island? What if one day they find some more of these little folk in the tundras of Siberia or the poles, north or south, or somewhere closer to home? I don't think that it's soooo amazing, I mean, there is still a lot we don't know about the mysteries of life and our planet, and anything is possible.
Or there's the possibility that they have known about this new breed of humans for a long time and have kept it top secret or something until now. You know how those lovely politicians get when they get ahold of something that might stir things up...**Cough(conspiracy)Cough** Maybe our dear Professor knew a little more than he could admit to...perhaps he knew of the existence of these people and felt the need to give them a proper history... I smell a rat!
Or there's the possibility that they have known about this new breed of humans for a long time and have kept it top secret or something until now. You know how those lovely politicians get when they get ahold of something that might stir things up...**Cough(conspiracy)Cough** Maybe our dear Professor knew a little more than he could admit to...perhaps he knew of the existence of these people and felt the need to give them a proper history... I smell a rat!
It's just one of Peter Jackson's ancestors : a pygmy cave troll.
I thought Galadriel said it was
The Age of the Dominion of MenQuote:
(something along those lines) so we are now in the fourth age. So it could be a Hobbit
!!!!!!
Of course most of the Elves have gone to Valinor so we won't find any remains of them
"Loni, yes you can call me Marion, and because I was an archer and my name is Marion you know Robin Hood etc...etc... I just used the 'y' for a change.
I am also called 'The Duke' by a few friends as my surname is Morrison (John Wayne's name)
(something along those lines) so we are now in the fourth age. So it could be a Hobbit
!!!!!! Of course most of the Elves have gone to Valinor so we won't find any remains of them
"Loni, yes you can call me Marion, and because I was an archer and my name is Marion you know Robin Hood etc...etc... I just used the 'y' for a change.
I am also called 'The Duke' by a few friends as my surname is Morrison (John Wayne's name)
sorry about the layout above - the quote - still trying new things!! and getting them wrong!!
I read about Ebu a few months ago in a Sunday newspaper. Although the bones they have found may be 18, 000 years old, inhabitants of the island claim to have seen living specimens within the last generation. It may be possible some still exist today. With isolated gene pools, many species found on small islands evolve rapidly away from the mainland populations. Such hideaways are becoming increasingly scarce now days, but there are still unexplored pockets out there.
John Wayne was one of the greatest people in American history and definetly deserves to have an airport named after him more than a tv show about a bunch of drunken teenagers.(They wanted to rename John Wayne Airport The O.C. Airport, John Wayne Field. That idea was struck down in its sickly bud.)Hobbit skeleton? How do they know it wasn't just a child? Or maybe some kind of rare, hairless monkey or ape. Or an alien? Like the ones that captured Elvis before he died and that fly Cadillac-shaped spacecraft. Of course, I did defeat their invasion.
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Hobbit skeleton? How do they know it wasn't just a child? Or maybe some kind of rare, hairless monkey or ape. Or an alien?
Hobbit skeleton? How do they know it wasn't just a child? Or maybe some kind of rare, hairless monkey or ape. Or an alien?
One of the most primitive invertebrates is the Lamprey. This slimey, eel-like fish has no jaws, but has 13 sets of gill arches. During evolution, other fish have evolved from the lampreys, and the front sets of gill arches have slowly evolved into jaw bones. This change can be traced back through evolution, so the evolutionary tree can be worked out. In higher vertebrates such as the primates, other factors can also be used for tracing evolutionary pathways. The human skull is composed of 29 separate bones, each of which can be traced through evolution. These are of different shapes and sizes, and can be used as an indicater of how closely related different species are to each other, and where abouts on the evolutionary chain they are to each other. Hence, through the fossil record, an evolution can be seen from apes to humans, through various homonid forms such as Austrailiopithacus, Java Man, Homo erectus, etc to ourselves, Homo sapiens. While these groups appear to be our ancestors, another well known group, Neanderthal, appear to be our cousins rather than ancestors. In their case, they appear to have been a separate branch of the evolutionary tree (similar to how dogs and wolves are of separate branches, rather than evolved from each other). I don't know much about these Ebu creatures yet, but having recovered their skulls, palaeoanthropologists will be able to determine where abouts they fit in the evolutionary tree.
Of course, mistakes can be made, and not all fossils fit precisely into place (particularly when the fossil record is not complete), but generally, once evolution has occurred, it is a one way process that can be tracked. Hope that answers your question.
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sorry about the layout above - the quote - still trying new things!! and getting them wrong!!
Not to worry; however, if you look at the lower right hand corner of your post, you will see an "Edit Post" link. Clicking on it will allow you to correct/improve your post so you won't have to apologize for not getting it right the first time. I often have to edit my own posts, two or four times to get the format, spelling, and wordsmithing more to my liking. sorry about the layout above - the quote - still trying new things!! and getting them wrong!!
For those of you in England who are interested in this creature, there is a documentary about it on TV tonight.... Equinox at 9.30pm on ITV.
A month or so back I watched this discovery channel special about volcanoes, and it said about 70,000-80,000 years ago, a huge volcano (I believe it was Toba, and they said it was in Somatra or something like that) errupted. The erruption was so big, that it affected the entire earth. Around the volcano, 25 cm. of volcano ash was spewed from it, and the whole earth was in a volcanic winter.
Food was scarce, and the volcanic winter lasted 5-10 years, and the average temperature on the earth dropped 5 degrees C. In that period of time, only a few thousand humans were left on the earth. On the ENTIRE earth.
THAT'S why everyone's genetic make up is so silmilar, and THAT'S when a lot of species died out. And it's probably when the mini humans (I shall call them mini me!) died out, but I'm not sure, becuase I'm not sure how old the skeletons are.
But even if scientists use the carbon system to tell how old they are, it might not work, because the guy who invented the system said himself that it wasn't entirebly reliable, and that if the object (But this system might only be for wood) was exposed to air and covered again during the period of time, it oculd very well be from longer ago than scientist think.
*A volcanic winter is when the sky is so filled with ash and chemicals it blocks most of the sun out.
Food was scarce, and the volcanic winter lasted 5-10 years, and the average temperature on the earth dropped 5 degrees C. In that period of time, only a few thousand humans were left on the earth. On the ENTIRE earth.
THAT'S why everyone's genetic make up is so silmilar, and THAT'S when a lot of species died out. And it's probably when the mini humans (I shall call them mini me!) died out, but I'm not sure, becuase I'm not sure how old the skeletons are.
But even if scientists use the carbon system to tell how old they are, it might not work, because the guy who invented the system said himself that it wasn't entirebly reliable, and that if the object (But this system might only be for wood) was exposed to air and covered again during the period of time, it oculd very well be from longer ago than scientist think.
*A volcanic winter is when the sky is so filled with ash and chemicals it blocks most of the sun out.
Yup, and the last explosion of Krakatau in 1883 was heard around the world and lowered global temperatures as much as 1.2 degree C in the year after the eruption. Temperatures did not return to normal until 1888.
If and when the giant caldera in Yellowstone Natinal Park ever blows its top again, it may be enough to start another ice age, if man made global warning doesn't get us first. As the world warms the icecaps melt lowering the oceans salinity and causing the currents to reverse making the northern latitudes colder, bringing on yet another Ice Age. We are subject to the whims of nature and as such can only roll with the punches and hope some of us have enough time to adapt.
And was the little Ice Age of some 400 years ago also caused by a volcanic explosion? Or does our Sun undergo changes that we know nothing about due to the very short habitation of mankind on the geological timescale?
Meanwhile back to the skeleton of the wee folk, did some of their descendents built a raft and sail to Africa where they became the pygmies or was it the other way around?
If and when the giant caldera in Yellowstone Natinal Park ever blows its top again, it may be enough to start another ice age, if man made global warning doesn't get us first. As the world warms the icecaps melt lowering the oceans salinity and causing the currents to reverse making the northern latitudes colder, bringing on yet another Ice Age. We are subject to the whims of nature and as such can only roll with the punches and hope some of us have enough time to adapt.
And was the little Ice Age of some 400 years ago also caused by a volcanic explosion? Or does our Sun undergo changes that we know nothing about due to the very short habitation of mankind on the geological timescale?
Meanwhile back to the skeleton of the wee folk, did some of their descendents built a raft and sail to Africa where they became the pygmies or was it the other way around?
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Meanwhile back to the skeleton of the wee folk, did some of their descendents built a raft and sail to Africa where they became the pygmies or was it the other way around?
Meanwhile back to the skeleton of the wee folk, did some of their descendents built a raft and sail to Africa where they became the pygmies or was it the other way around?
The pygmies are Homo Sapiens sapiens, the same as us, Grondy. Although living isolated in dense forests has caused them to evolve smaller, they are genetically the same species as everyone on this site. These Hobbit folk are thought to be a diminuative version of Homo erectus, a different species to Homo Sapiens, but from whom we descended. The reason scientists have come to this conclusion is based on the comparitive shapes of the brain cavities. Homo erectus and these Hobbit skeletons have an almost identical brain shape, albeit on a different scale.
If this is the case, however, it has left the scientists with a few problems. Homo erectus was thought to have died out around 90,000 years ago. Although some of these skeletons date back 80,000 - 90,000 years, some are only 12,000 years old. If these are Homo erectus specimens, it means the species survived far longer than was previously thought. Personally, on an isolated island, I do not see this as being a problem. Homo erectus most probably died out due to competition from his descendant species (us and Neandethal). On an isolated island this competition may not have occurred until much later in history.
What is more doubtful, however, is whether Home erectus was intellegent enough to cross the 22km channel to the island. Rafts were previously thought to have been first built about 12,000 BC by Homo sapiens, not 90,000 years ago by Homo erectus. Although the scientists on the program deliberated this point at length, I feel they were missing the bigger picture. The fossil record was telling them these beings were on the island 90,000 years ago. Whether they got there by raft or some other means, the point is mute; they had got there. Elephants, lizards and giant rats were also present.... What is certain is that they did not build rafts to get there. Although during the last 90,000 years this island has been geographically separated from the mainland, maybe Homo erectus used the same method to get there as the other creatures; swimming or using driftwood.
There are reports from people still living on the island that these diminuative folk were still around as little as 300 years ago. The island, however, is volcanic and the records show layer of volcanic ash a meter thick being layed down 12,000 years ago. Until a fossil younger than that is discovered, it is scientific opinion that this Hobbit species completely died out in that eruption.
As the anthropologists are still finding numerous fossils at this site, I imagine a lot clearer picture will emerge about these folk in the coming years.
Ah, your trying to confuse us with scientific fact. My not being one of the anti-evolution crowd, who believe all the fossils were buried about 6000 years ago when the earth was manufactured for God by the Magratheans, I bow to your knowledge. Thanks Val.
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Homo erectus was thought to have died out around 90,000 years ago. Although some of these skeletons date back 80,000 - 90,000 years, some are only 12,000 years old.
Homo erectus was thought to have died out around 90,000 years ago. Although some of these skeletons date back 80,000 - 90,000 years, some are only 12,000 years old.
Yes, but the carbon dating still could be off. I don't know anything about the island, or the climate of the island, but I do know this:
A month or so ago I watched a program on the history channel about Noah's Ark, and people who have claimed to find it somewhere.
On one expedition, people brought back a piece of wood that they believed to be the ark, but when they carbon dated it, it was much too close to the present date, so many people dismissed it.
BUT when they went to the guy who invented the carbon dating system, he said his system was unreliable, and because of the freezing and thawing of the wood, and because it might have been uncovered many times, that it could have extra carbon, and could very well be a piece of the ark.
In conclusion, these people could really have died a long time ago, but could have resurfaced, causing more carbon to get into the bones, thus the gap between them could have been a lot less.
But hey, like I said before, I don't know anything about the sight, so I could be wrong.
And it could have been the huge volcano erruption that wiped some of the out, maybe even all of them.
Isn't it amazing? 
I watched the documentary on Discovery Channel, and I was in awe. I looked at my dad with my mouth gaping and said, "Dad! Tolkien was right! Hobbits did live!" He just shook his head and laughed at me. I thought it was fascinating!
To some of you who figured it was a child's skeleton: it has been proven it was not, due to the formation of the skull and the evidence shown in the bones. In fact, the skull plates were fully grown together, not present in a child of that size. Also, the full skeleton was that of a femal, and the bone density wasn't strong as that of a child's. They were judged to be brittle at the time of life, and a child's would have been more sturdy.
I'm just glad that they named it after Tolkien's "Hobbit" instead of naming it midget or something else. I'll just keep doing research to convince myself and my family that Hobbits truly lived.
I watched the documentary on Discovery Channel, and I was in awe. I looked at my dad with my mouth gaping and said, "Dad! Tolkien was right! Hobbits did live!" He just shook his head and laughed at me. I thought it was fascinating!To some of you who figured it was a child's skeleton: it has been proven it was not, due to the formation of the skull and the evidence shown in the bones. In fact, the skull plates were fully grown together, not present in a child of that size. Also, the full skeleton was that of a femal, and the bone density wasn't strong as that of a child's. They were judged to be brittle at the time of life, and a child's would have been more sturdy.
I'm just glad that they named it after Tolkien's "Hobbit" instead of naming it midget or something else. I'll just keep doing research to convince myself and my family that Hobbits truly lived.
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I'm just glad that they named it after Tolkien's "Hobbit" instead of naming it midget or something else. I'll just keep doing research to convince myself and my family that Hobbits truly lived.
I'm just glad that they named it after Tolkien's "Hobbit" instead of naming it midget or something else. I'll just keep doing research to convince myself and my family that Hobbits truly lived.
Twas not a Hobbit, twas one of PJ's forefathers : a pygmy cave troll.
I also recently saw the program on the Discovery Chanel and now know that these hobbit-like people were half the size of todays pygmys, so my previous posts in this thread may be considered as written without the hinderance of fact.
So Hobbits were real ????????
I wonder if anyone will find any Hobbit Holes - wouldn't that be a find!!
I wonder if anyone will find any Hobbit Holes - wouldn't that be a find!!
If they did, we'd all started mining the mountains for mithril, searching for people with pointy ears, and looking back in history for oliphaunt sized elephants...
I honestly wouldn't be surprised if Ebu was a hobbit, or something close to one. Tolkien was a boy in Africa, and it wouldn't be too far of a stretch from these pygmee things to hobbits. Besides, fiction is only a distorted reality reflected by its author's perseption of reality...
Did that make sence?
Did that make sence?
A few thoughts..on a Sunday evening. Was wandering threw and came across "Hobbit Skeleton Found"- maybe it's not what we might have hoped it to be but, for that moment when it set our imaginations on fire...isn't that why we all gathered here? ---- Aragorn's Lady 8/20/06
Yup, to have our imaginations stimulated and to have some fellowship with like minded people who come at Tolkien's works from the same or different perspectives. Share and enjoy.
