Scientists deliver blow to Clovis myth about how people arrived in America

originally posted by: Lojack
a reply to: Marduk

I've been watching this thread and felt inclined to throw this in after seeing this post. Regarding the tidal wave at 13,000 ft thing: maybe it wasn't at 13,000 ft. Lake Titicaca has the only known freshwater seahorses in the world. Geological upheavals? Just a thought.

There are no sea horses in Lake Titicaca, the "legend" of Posnansky finding one, was that he was sold one which was dried, by a local fisherman, even to this day in the same region you can buy starfish from Andean farmers, who are well aware of their value to tourists. No one has ever found a live sea horse in Titicaca and the story is one frequently told by pseudo historians, desperate to support their claim that the Tiahuanaco ruins are much older than they actually are. Of course they leave out the fact that the sea horse was dried and not actually in the lake. I posted the entire range of radiocarbon dates earlier in the thread, not a one of them was over 2000 years old iirc
book

Something I found that Harte referred to a few pages back that I would like to clear up that it is conjecture that "a river runs through it" on the Steen-McIntyre debates is the Waters concept, however, the evidence provided does not match.

"the Waters' concept of a younger stream channel inset, that is, cut down to its present level from somewhere above the Tetela brown mud unit and is now represented by 2 m of preserved sediment and 9 m of missing section is a "vacant hypothesis," in the sense that much of the evidence for its existence is assumed to have eroded away. The presumed unconformable relation of these deposits to topographically higher beds such as the Hueyatlaco ash and Tetela brown mud cannot be directly demonstrated. Where does this deep channel cross the Tetela Peninsula, given that the Tetela brown mud is continuously preserved on the peninsula above it, with no evidence of its being cut through by an ancient stream? (Figure 6 and Figure 9). The evidence that follows makes us question the presence of Waters' deep channel."

this is not sint8, wikilinks or youtube, sorry

It also discuss's dating as well but to my laymen eyes it's a jumble, I'm sure many of you understand the nomenclature better. (why can't it be standard and succinct for us layman?) It also has "other' dating techniques other than carbon 14 dating

Just wanted to help clear up some misconceptions, carry on.

a reply to: Marduk

Very good, sir. I will check my self before my next outburst.

Star for you, also. But the link was bad for me. I'll look into it further. Thanks for making me seek more knowledge.

a reply to: thedigirati

thank you for postin that link. It brings up some things to think about.
I have read VanLandingham's work, but I was of the impression that he had put the ages between 75-125kya.
Even in my rather open view 250kya is hard to back up, but newer work at Calico Hills Ca, shows the surface pavments to be no less than 190-200kya, and the artifacts are coming from several meters below that.
One also has to consider these are the only finds or sites in this region of mexico, the Tequixquiac carving
~24kya and many sets of remains have been found in the area.
Casts of several skulls found there are on display @ the Smithsonian, in a collection of early modern and archaic human skulls.
Certain features of the skulls stand out, large brow ridges and a pronounced sagittal crest.
This researcher says some interesting things about one of the skulls,

One Chapala superciliary arch deserves specific mention due to its large size. Studies by
Solórzano show the bone resembles that in archaic Homo sapiens at Arago, France. In an
unpublished 1990 report, Texas A&M osteologists suggest the brow’s thickness and robustness
are comparable to those of KNM-ER 3733 (African Homo erectus). Our measurements show the
central torus thickness is 13.3, compared with 8.5 mm for KNM-ER 3733; the lateral torus
thickness is 11.5 versus 9.0 mm (Rightmire 1998). Thus for the sake of comparison, the brow is
more like that of Zhoukoudian Skull XI (Asian Homo erectus), with a central torus thickness of
13.2 +/- mm; lateral torus thickness was not measured (Rightmire 1998). Modern brows are too
diminutive to allow these measurements. The brow also shows pneumatization (air pockets)
along its length.

www.dropbox.com...

a reply to: punkinworks10

The data showing comparable cranio-morphological features is definitely interesting and I for one would be thrilled beyond comprehension if there was evidence that Erectus or other archaic hominids had made their way to the Americas. But... knowing some of what has been learned regarding genetics the last 2 decades, I think it's a little premature to rush to judgement based on morphology alone. Persistence of archaic features isn't that uncommon and we have no idea what denisovans looked like so it's not at all outside the bounds of reality that what we are seeing is persistence of archaic features or features that we have no comparison to based on lack of anatomy to make a comparison against. Just a thought.

a reply to: peter vlar

Hello PeterV,

If archaics made it to the new world, they pass on their lineage to subsequent native americans, or if they did it is so washed out now that it is lost in the background. But there is someone out there that makes a good argument for 2 of the founding MtDna lineages to have originated in HSN, possibly with that early AMH introgression into eastern HSN around 100kya.
Given the tantalizing clues found in some early native american physiology, the pneumenisation of the brow ridges in mexico, retromolar gap in some plains indians, the extremely robust crania found brazil and baja and the fact indigenous central mexicans have the highest HSN dna, its hard to argue there is not some sort of connection. Whether it be actual archaics, or a AMH population very shortly after a hybridization encounter with HSN or HSA.

originally posted by: peter vlar
a reply to: punkinworks10

The data showing comparable cranio-morphological features is definitely interesting and I for one would be thrilled beyond comprehension if there was evidence that Erectus or other archaic hominids had made their way to the Americas.

I'm with you on that. It would be a fantastic discovery for sure.

But there's simply not enough clear evidence for it - yet - and we can't simply go with it from evidence found at Hueyatlaco.
We need other sites. Several other sites, possibly with remains.

Harte

a reply to: Harte

But like I said before, Hueyatlaco is not the only site in that area, the paper i linked to is in the region.
Nor is it the only site producing crania with similar features; Lagoa Santa, and several other sites in brazil that too show an extreme age of occupation. Central California, with the Tranquility burials. The burials themselves are not as old(or are they?, they are only a few miles from a site that is 60ky old), but do show some of the same features as Chapala.
I found this interesting discussion on paleoindian taxonomy,
s1.zetaboards.com...
and here
www.jstor.org...
A link is made between a group of California indians and chapala skulls based on their taxonomy. Now what I find interesting is, that there is a definative connection between central Californian and central mexico, through the uto-aztecan language family. These groups also share a creation mythos, that relates to their arrival in their new lands. When they arrive, in the case of the california stories, its cold/foggy and without sun, which would be an accurate description of the central valley at the last ice age, and the people "steal" fire from people already living here.
Given that the Chapala skulls are characterized as a derived gracialized form of skulls found to the north in california, and the Chapala skull in question has been indirectly dated to 18,200kya, and there was ample time for regional variation to develop between california and mexico, people have clearly been here long enough to have encountered archaics or, like i mentioned earlier, were a population very close to a hybridization episode.
But if Chapala is 18kya and is derived from california, and there was time for adaptive radiation, implying california occupation is much older, who was already living here when those people arrived?, in their shared mythos.