Israel Claims To Be The Birthplace For Mankind ?
Archeologists claim they have found the earliest evidence of man in an Israeli cave.
Pre-historic teeth are displayed at Qesem cave, an excavation site near the town of Rosh Ha’ayin, east of Tel Aviv December 27, 2010. A group of internationaland Israeli researchers have discovered pre-historic artefacts and human remains at the site that may prove the earliest existence of modern man was about 400,000 years ago. If proven, it would change the currently accepted perception that modern man originated on the African continent about 200,000 years ago. (REUTERS/Baz Ratner)
The AP reported:
Israeli archaeologists said Monday they may have found the earliest evidence yet for the existence of modern man, and if so, it could upset theories of the origin of humans.
A Tel Aviv University team excavating a cave in central Israel said teeth found in the cave are about 400,000 years old and resemble those of other remains of modern man, known scientifically as Homo sapiens, found in Israel. The earliest Homo sapiens remains found until now are half as old.
“It’s very exciting to come to this conclusion,” said archaeologist Avi Gopher, whose team examined the teeth with X-rays and CT scans and dated them according to the layers of earth where they were found.
He stressed that further research is needed to solidify the claim. If it does, he says, “this changes the whole picture of evolution.”
The accepted scientific theory is that Homo sapiens originated in Africa and migrated out of the continent. Gopher said if the remains are definitively linked to modern human’s ancestors, it could mean that modern man in fact originated in what is now Israel.
Sir Paul Mellars, a prehistory expert at Cambridge University, said the study is reputable, and the find is “important” because remains from that critical time period are scarce, but it is premature to say the remains are human.
Archaeologists Claim to Have Found Oldest Human Remains in Israel
A newly published report reveals that recently discovered human remains in a cave in central Israel may be the earliest evidence for the existence of modern man.
Archaeologists from Tel Aviv University found eight teeth in Qesem Cave. The team said the discovery challenges theories of the origin of humans.
Avi Gopher, who led the team, told Agence France-Presse that it calls into question the widely held view that modern humans originated in Africa.
Until now, the earliest remains of modern man, or Homo sapiens, were 200,000 years old and found in East Africa.
The teeth found in Israel are about 400,000 years old.
"It's very exciting to come to this conclusion," Gopher said, as reported by The Associated Press. "This changes the whole picture of evolution."
The teeth were found in 2006 in deep layers of the Qesem cave. The findings were just published this month in the "American Journal of Physical Anthropology."
Though some speculate that the remains are likely related to the now extinct Neanderthals, the report in the journal states that none of the Qesem teeth "shows a suite of Neanderthal characters," though "a few traits may suggest some affinities with members of the Neanderthal evolutionary lineage."
"However, the balance of the evidence suggests a closer similarity with the Skhul/Qafzeh dental material," the report states. Skhul and Qafzeh are sites in Israel where fossils of early modern Homo sapiens were found.
Gopher's team is continuing their dig at the cave. Gopher is confident they will find skulls and bones that could confirm that the teeth are the remains of modern man.
400,000 year old human tooth found in Israel?
December 28, 2010 at 5:28 pm · Filed under Editorial, history, Opinion ·Tagged Ancient Aliens, Anunnaki, DNA, Enlil, history, Human, Neanderthal, Zecharia Sitchin
Here’s one of those interesting little pieces of archaeological evidence that doesn’t support any of the major belief systems that originated in the Middle East:
Researchers: Ancient human remains found in Israel
According to the late Zecharia Sitchin (whose name probably won’t appear on any of the major lists of notable people who died in 2010, but it should), the ancient Sumerian writings tell us that the Anunnaki arrived about 450,000 years ago, and that it was their genetic manipulation (mixing an indigenous species with their own DNA) that produced the first humans. Of course, this thinking will be familiar to anyone who has been following the Ancient Aliens series on the History channel.
If it is ever proven that humans were around that long ago, that could mean that the god of three of the world’s major religions is a johnny-come-lately to the party of human experience, having only first shown up about 6,000 years ago. And it would also mean that all those folks fighting over creation vs. evolution are both right about some things and wrong about others (well, if you consider genetic manipulation a form of creation, that is — it’s certainly a form of intelligent design, if nothing else).
Even Christians say that we are “made in the image of god” (or do we look like the aliens who came to be thought of as gods? — not a huge stretch if you believe that we have their DNA). But on the other hand, humans are a species uniquely unsuited to survival on this harsh planet. Were it not for our intelligence, we’d have frozen to death or starved to death or been killed by falling out of trees long ago. We don’t even have a layer of fur to protect us from the cold, like most mammals (what other animal has to wear clothing to survive?). But that would make sense if some of our genetic ancestors evolved on planets that perhaps had different weather conditions (perhaps a more consistent year-around temperature or weaker gravity).
Early-Christian Gnostic text from a codex disc...
Image via Wikipedia
I suspect that as our technology allows us to made additional archaeological discoveries, we’re going to discover that many of our cherished beliefs don’t hold up. At that point we will be forced to make a choice — will we behave as some of our ancestors did, and choose to in effect continue to believe that the earth is flat and is at the center of the universe, or will we adjust our beliefs to go along with what our most recent discoveries tell us to be true? Many Christians still have a very difficult time with the Nag Hammadi library, and that was discovered 65 years ago.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying there is no God, just that most of us may not really understand who or what he/she/it is. I would posit, however, that the often angry and ill-humored being that assumed the role for a relatively short time in human experience (and perhaps only to a group of people living in a particular geographic area of the planet) may have been just the latest in a string of extraterrestrial visitors to our planet, wielding advanced technology that could do both miraculous and terrible things, depending on his mood and on what he wanted to prove (or, for those who have read Sitchin’s work, it may have been Enlil – it kind of sounds like him in some ways, since Enlil didn’t seem to like us humans very much).
I just find all these new discoveries a bit fascinating, especially when they tend to prove that we humans have been around for much longer than our major religions would have us believe!
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