Dear Lucaspa,
AUSTRALOPITHECUS - APE OR APE-MAN?
The next, an much more recent, candidate, chronologically speaking, as one of man's homind ancestors, is Australopithecus. The first find of this creature was by Dart in 1924, to which he gave the name Australopithecus africanus. He pointed out the many ape-like features of the skull, but he believed that some features of the skull and particularly of the teeth were man-like. The name Australopithecus means "southern ape," but after Dart examined the teeth further, he decided A. africanus was a hominid. This claim created considerably controversy, most workers at that time claiming that A. africanus was an ape with some interesting but irrelevant parallel features with man. Additional finds of Australopithecus were made in later years by Broom and by Dart.
The find by Louis Leakey and his wife of what they called Zinjanthropus bosei, or "East-Africa Man," At Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania has attracted great attention from the public. As it turned out, they really found nothing essentially different than had been discovered by Dart many years earlier.
. . .Even Leakey admitted later, however, that his Zinjanthropus bosei is a varity of Australopithecus, discovered years previously in South Africa.
The australopithecines have been classified into two species. One is more gracile with somewhat smaller jaws and teeth and has been designated Australopithecus africanus. The other has more massive teeth and jaws and possesses sagittal and supramastoid crests (bony ridges), found in gorillas and orangs, and has been named Australopithecus robustus.
All of these animals possessed small brains, the cranial capacity averaging 500 c.c. or less, which is in the range of a gorilla, and about the third of that for man. These animals thus unquestionably had the brains of apes,regardless of what else can be said about them. Both of them had ape-like skulls and jaws, these features being particulary obvious in the case of A. robustus.
The dentition, above all, it is said, is what makes these animals distinctive and which has served to cause paleoanthropologists to claim a hominid status for them. The front teeth, incisors, and canines, are relatively small, and the dental arcade or curve of the jaw, ismore parabolic and less U-shaped than is typical of modern apes. It is also claimed that the morphology, or shape, of the teeth is in features more man-like than ape-like. The cheek teeth (premolars and molars), however, are massive, even in the gracile, or africanus form. A. africanus, even though only about 60-70 lbs, or about the size of a smallish chimpanzee, had cheek teeth larger than chimps and orangs and as large as gorillas, some of the latter of which reach 400 lbs. in size. As s consequence, the jaws are very large, particularly in A. robustus.
Some fragments of the pelvis, limb and foot bones of these animals have been recovered and, based on studies of these fragments, it has been theconsensus among evolutionists that the Aultralopithecines walked habitually upright. This was especially so after such authorities as Broom and LeGros Clark strongly supported this conclusion.
In more recent years, however, this veiw has been challenged by Solly Lord Zuckerman, famous British anatomist, and by Dr. Charles Oxnard, professor of anatomy and anthropology at the University of Chicago.
For over 15 years a research team headed by Lord Zuckerman studied the anatomical features of man, monkeys, apes and the Australopithecine fossils. Practically all available important fossil fragments of australopithecus, along with anatomical specimens from hundreds of monkeys, apes and humans were compared. No one has done a more thorough and careful study on the status of Australopithecus than Lord Zuckerman.
Concerning the claim by LeGros Clark and others that Austrlopithecus should be classified as a genus of the anthropoid apes, Lord Zuckerman said:
"But I myself remain totally unpersuaded. Almost always when I have tried to check the anatomical claims on which the status Australpithecus is based, I have ended in failure."
Lord Zuckerman's conclusion is that Australopithecus was an ape, in no way related to the origin of man.
Oxnard's research has led him to say:
"Although most studies emphasize the similarity of the australopithecines to modern man, and suggest, therefore, that these creatures were bipedal too-makers at least one form of which (Australopithecus africanus-homo habilis,""Homo africanus") was almost directly ancestral to man, a series of multivariate statistical studies of various postcranial fragments suggest other conclusions."
From his results Oxnard concluded that the australopithecus did not walk upright in human manner, But probably had amode of locomotion similar to that of the orang. (Evolution; The fossils Say No! Duane T. Gish)
I edited mu last Gish quote and put quotation marks.
Reference for S. Zuckerman, Beyond the Ivory Tower, Taplinger Pub. Co., New York, 1970, pp. 75-94. (p.77)
C. Oxnard, University of Chicago Magazine, Winter 1974, pp.8-12. (pp.11-12)
C. Oxnard, Nature, Vol. 258, pp. 389-395. (p. 389)
