The Hobbits of Flores
Jordan Kreager
In October of 2004, scientists were exploring a cave on the island of Flores, located in Indonesia, when they made a very surprising discovery of tiny human-like skeletal remains. It is safe to assume that the overall knowledge of human ancestry is blurred at best, however finding this dwarf-like skeleton presents very prolific evidence as it raises questions we did not even know we should have been asking in regard to the history of our distant relatives. Though there is much more to realize with regard to human genome sequencing, this discovery at its very least sheds light onto the fact that many mysteries regarding the variability in the hominid genus may never truly be solved.
The particular article provides incite from the anthropologists involved with researching this specific phenomenon. In order to give an accurate description of this article, the main specific points of the article will be examined and explained briefly. These focal points will include a concise description of what was found at the site, the importance of this discovery to anthropology, the conclusions drawn on this species of human, and a critical analysis of the information presented in the article itself.
Since being discovered, the species was named Homo floresiensis, after the island of Flores in Indonesia, as this location was home to the discovery. The skeletal remains found belonged to a female, and when compared to a modern human, it was about the size of an average three year old's skeleton. Incidentally, the skull found dictates that the brain was much smaller than our brains as well, but this evidence is not conclusive to a lack of intelligence expressed by this particular species of human. As paleoanthropologists arrived on the scene they were able to find certain artifacts that could be connected to this to type of species. Certain artifacts that appeared include several pieces of stegodon bones, well crafted tools made of stone, while other data recovered provides insight to its diet of fish, stegodon, and a variety of smaller land and water animals. After examining the scene more thoroughly, paleoanthropologists were able to determine that the hobbits of Flore used fire to cook with, as they were able to identify remnants of stone hearths. It is also presumed that they were even capable of making it across the sea that divides Asia and Indonesia, which is still up for debate. Most of the evidence found correlates to other archaeological discoveries found all over the world of similar time frames as far as technology is concerned.
Moreover, the hobbits of Flores' discovery may not provide a whole lot of clues regarding our ancestors, but it does make significant contributions towards this field of study. While there is no evidence of homo sapiens inhabiting Flores until about 11,000 years ago, the remains of the hobbit was discovered under a blanket of volcanic ash that only dates about 12,000 years old. This would mean that the specific skeletal figure found had died around 18,000 years ago. This is significant because in Australia for instance, modern humans have been proven to have existed around 40,000 years ago. So there may have been a point in time where modern humans and the hobbits interacted, however the researchers have been unable to link acute evidence to this presumption. When they first found this skeleton, they assumed it was the skeleton of an adolescent modern human. "H. floresiensis presents an intriguing problem in evolutionary biology..." one researcher admits. This problem describes the fact that little is really known about the evolution of modern humans' ancestors. Though the Homo floresiensis is categorized in the same genus as the Homo sapien and Homo erectus, we can only assume that the common ancestors between the H. floresiensis, H. sapien, and H. erectus are genetically linked by primates that lived millions of years prior to these human species' existence.
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Lastly, after a few years had preceded from the initial discovery, anthropologists have temporarily concluded that the Homo floresiensis was indeed a product of natural selection on the small island of Flores. More specifically, island dwarfism, a concept in population genetics, is determined to be the most likely reason for the abnormally small skeletal structures of the hobbits. As once a carrying capacity has been reached for a specific species in a given environment, there is simply no advantage to a species' survival if they were to continue to become larger over generations, and so physical growth gets phased out on any significant scale, genetically speaking. After more thorough examination, they have found that the brain was proportionately smaller in the hobbit species, than in modern day pygmy humans and Indonesians. They currently believe this species was a descendant of the ape, and not the Homo erectus or Homo sapien, though certain features could very well lead one to believe otherwise. Scientists are also adamant that this species was larger when they first arrived at Flore, and then evolved into a smaller species over time. Again, this would correlate to island dwarfism, as recent studies have shown natural selection in island settings supports the downgrade in size to live more efficiently in a smaller environment, and this can also be demonstrated through the stegodons, or dwarf elephants, that the hobbits hunted during their years. Unfortunately, there are many missing pieces to this puzzle, but it has inspired many to explore the island regions around Southeast Asia much more carefully.
In conclusion, this article demonstrates that there are many gaps in the 'official' records of hominid evolution into modern homo sapiens. But this provides some inspiration that maybe the evidence is still out there waiting to be discovered. Human evolution has many missing links when it comes to completely understanding who our ancestors were, but this discovery has left researchers all over the world optimistic that there is still much out there to explore.
In order to see the entire puzzle of our evolution, one must understand how each piece fits into it, and why it fits in that way. Unfortunately, many of the 'pieces' in this case are likely never to be found.
The article can really only offer confirmation in the sense that, while studying genetics, environment can be equally, if not more than, important to evolution as the genes of the species being examined. Assuming that the conclusions drawn by scientists researching the hobbit of Flores are accurate, then this is undoubtedly true.
References:
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2004/10/1027_041027_homo_floresiensis_2.html
http://www.southeastasianarchaeology.com/2007/04/18/indonesia-new-evidence-for-island-dwarfism-with-implications-for-homo-floresiensis/
Human Genetics Applications and Concepts by Ricki Lewis, Chapter 16
Chapter 16: Human Ancestry http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2004/10/1027_041027_homo_floresiensis_2.html