Tom Avril
Philadelphia Inquirer
Is fossil a new little human or a deformed human?
The great hobbit debate lives on, and it’s coming to Philadelphia.
Do the fossils of a 3-foot-tall, small-brained creature represent a new humanoid species, or don’t they?
The scientists who first found those remains on an Indonesian island in 2003, including an 18,000-year-old skull, published their latest evidence last week in favor of a new species.
The other side, which includes Robert Eckhardt of Pennsylvania State University, remains skeptical.
Both Eckhardt and Florida State University’s Dean Falk, a leader of the pro-new-species team, plan to be in Philadelphia in March for the annual meeting of the American Association of Physical Anthropologists.
Eckhardt maintains that the “hobbit” is merely a deformed human with some type of microcephaly, resulting in a brain one-third normal size. The fossils were found next to some advanced tools; Eckhardt says no creature with a brain that small could have made such tools, so they must have been made by the hobbit’s fellow humans.
In the latest paper, in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Falk’s team used CAT scans to create a virtual model of what the new creature’s brain looked like. They compared that with the brains of both normal humans and microcephalics. Their conclusion: the hobbit – a nickname taken from the novels of J.R.R. Tolkien – is different from both.
Some participants in the debate have been less than civil; one has accused Falk’s team of being scientifically “naughty.” Eckhardt and Falk say they anticipate a collegial exchange in March, yet both hint that they may accuse the other side of errors.
“It will be a great, fun time,” says Eckhardt.
Adds Falk: “I can’t wait.”
::Tullycast:: 