The human species: Where do we come from?

Question 1

Multidisciplinary approach

Answer 1

Involves combining different academic disciplines or specialisations to create new knowledge and theories.

Question 2

What are some of the questions biological/physical anthropology seeks to answer?

Answer 2

Based on the principles of evolution, biological/physical anthropologists, formulate and test theories about human beings – past, present and future. Where do we come from? What makes us human? What makes us different from the other animals? Where are we going?

Question 3

Paleoanthropology

Answer 3

Is concerned with the origin and development of the human species. Paleoanthropologists use fossils and other remains to study the evolution of primates and, specifically, hominids.

Question 4

Primatology

Answer 4

Concentrates on the anatomy, social structure and behaviour of non-human primates. Studying our closest living relatives, helps primatologists to determine what makes us human and how human beings differ from other primates.

Question 5

Medical anthropology

Answer 5

Studies the influence of social, cultural, biological and linguistic factors on human health and wellbeing. To prevent the spread of disease and further treatment of illness, medical anthropologists research disease frequency, distribution and determinants in human populations.

Question 6

Forensic anthropology

Answer 6

Applies biological/physical anthropology to the legal process. Forensic anthropologists use their knowledge of the human skeleton and activities to assist in the analysis of deceased and mostly unidentified people.

Question 7

Taxonomy

Answer 7

A method of classifying things through organising, grouping, naming and describing them.

Question 8

Linnaean taxonomy

Answer 8

Based on the assumption that the greater the degree of physical similarity, the closer the biological relationship.

Question 9

Carolus Linnaeus

Answer 9

18th century Swedish biologist, developed a taxonomy for all “living” organisms. The hierarchical system consisted of seven levels

Question 10

Carolus Linnaeus seven levels:

Answer 10

1. Kingdom
2. Phylum
3. Class
4. Order
5. Family
6. Genus
7. Species

Question 11

Kingdom

Answer 11

Traditionally, this was the highest category, in which the original system defined three kingdoms; namely animals, plants and minerals. Modern scientists have expanded it to five kingdoms – animals, plants, fungi, protozoa and bacteria.

Question 12

Phylum

Answer 12

Organisms are further divided by their general characteristics. For example, in the animal kingdom, animals with backbones (phylum Chordata) are placed in a separate category than animals without backbones. The chordates are divided into three subphyla. Humans are members of the subphylum Vertebrata.

Question 13

Class

Answer 13

Organisms in a phylum are divided into classes. In phylum Chordata, for example, birds, mammals and fish are grouped in their own classes. Humans, and most other large animals, are members of the class Mammalia: animals that suckle their young and have body hair.

Question 14

Order

Answer 14

Each class is divided into smaller groups, known as orders. Within the class Mammalia, there are about 26 orders, such as Primates, Carnivora and Rodentia. The order Primate is divided into two suborders: the so-called, “lower primates” or Prosimii, which includes the lemurs, lorises and tarsiers, and the “higher primates” or Anthropoidea, which includes monkeys, apes and humans.

Question 15

Family

Answer 15

In every order, there are different families, which have very similar features. Within the order Primates, families include hominidae (humans, including prehistoric human species and possibly chimpanzees), pongidae (old world monkeys such as the orangutan, gorilla and baboon) and hylobatidae (gibbons and lesser apes).

Question 16

Genus

Answer 16

Based on similar features, every family is divided into smaller groups known as genus, for example, humans are categorised within the genus Homo (man).

Question 17

Species

Answer 17

On the most specific level, species who share unique body structures and characteristics, and are considered to be closely related, are placed together. Genus and species, together make up the scientific name, for example, Homo sapiens (abbreviated H.sapiens).

Question 18

Human beings’ order

Answer 18

Order Primates live in social groups and are active during the day; their behavioural patterns are diverse and flexible. They have an expanded brain capacity, keen vision and rely less on smell. Their young have a relatively long period of growth and development and, hence, take time to learn the behaviours of their group. They have dexterous hands; teeth for a varied diet; the skull and skeleton protect the internal organs.

Question 19

Human beings’ suborder

Answer 19

Suborder Anthropoidea (Anthropoids) are so-called “higher primates”, which includes monkeys, apes and humans. They are characterised by a larger brain, relatively flat face, dry nose, small immobile ears and forward-facing eyes.

Question 20

Human beings’ family

Answer 20

Family Hominidae (Hominids) show a further increase in brain size and complexity, as well as development of bipedalism (walking on two legs) and upright posture – leaving the hands free to carry things and alter the environment. Humans and their ancestors make up this family and some scientists have suggested that African apes, such as chimpanzees and gorillas, should also be included here, because of their close relationship to humans and that humans should be dis-tinguished from them in a separate subfamily, hominins.

Question 21

Human beings’ genus and species

Answer 21

Homo sapiens (wise) – this is where extant (living) humans and their extinct ancestors belong. In anthropological literature, modern humans are referred to as Homo sapiens sapiens (wise-wise) to indicate that they are genetically or anatomically different from archaic (prehistoric) humans.

Question 22

Archaic human groups

Answer 22

H.neanderthalensis
H.rhodesiensisand
H.heidelbergensis.

Question 23

The immediate ancestors of humans

Answer 23

Australopithecus

Question 24

Australopithecus

Answer 24

• Means “southern ape” and was the name originally given for a species found in Taung in the Northern Cape, South Africa.
• Transition between apes and humans
• Originated with Australopithecus afarensis, between 3-4 million years ago, who had a brain that was, in all respects, ape-like.
• Stood fully erect and was able to walk on its two legs (bipedal), but its shoulder and hands were more adapted for tree climbing and swinging.
• Used sticks and stones as tools, but there is no direct evidence found yet.

Question 25

Australopithecus africanus

Answer 25

• Emerged about a million years later after the Australopithecus
• Similar human – but less ape-like – features. It had a rounder skull, housing a larger brain and smaller teeth.
• Began using simple tools such as sticks and stones to hunt and pebbles to process meat
• Roughly two million years ago, this species began to disappear and four others appear to have replaced it

Question 26

Homo habilis

Answer 26

• Lived 2.4 million to 1.5 million years ago.

- H.habilis means “handy man”, because this species represents the first maker of stone tools, termed Oldowan tools.

Question 27

Homo erectus

Answer 27

• Lived from about 1.8 million to 150,000 years ago.
• Their name indicates that this species were able to stand and walk upright (erect)
• They were the first to master the use of fire and are associated with Acheulian tools – highly developed hand-axes.
• While males hunted game, females probably gathered vegetable foods to bring to the common camp.
• H. erectus were the first to migrate from Africa. A relatively complete fossil, found in China, is known as “Peking Man” and one found in Indonesia, is called “Java Man
• Disappeared with the appearance of a new, highly successful species, the archaic Homo sapiens.

Question 28

Homo neanderthalensis

Answer 28

• Starting around 400,000 years ago, our closest related speciesbegan to appear in archaic form in Europe and Southwest Asia.
• The word s based on the location where the first major specimen was discovered in 1856 – the Neander Valley, in German
• The “true” Neanderthals made remarkable fine flint projectile points – Mousterian tools.
• They were skilled hunters of large animals, gathered plant foods and made clothing, which enabled them to survive the Ice Age.

Question 29

Homo sapiens sapiens

Answer 29

• Anatomically modern humans
• Began to appear in Africa around 260,000 years ago
• When these humans began to migrate from Africa to Europe and Asia, around 100,000 years ago, they began to gradually displace H.neanderthalensis
• Both species exploited a new ecological niche, that of hunting big-game animals by hurling spears and the capacity to live in cold or warm climates.
• Tool making culminates in Homo sapiens’s truly magnificent Solutrean tools, finely shaped projectile points.
• At some point, Homo sapiens sapiens also developed speech and language.

Question 30

Human speech

Answer 30

• Depends on our ability to distinguish phonemes (meaningless elementary units of sound) from each other in the speech tractor system and to combine these sounds into morphemes – the smallest meaningful elements or units (words or parts of words) – and combine the morphemes into words, or sentences, according to the rules of grammar
• A set of messages that govern how human systems go about processing matter and energy to maintain themselves and, eventually, their species.

Question 31

Homo sapiens sapiens

Answer 31

Distinctive features include communication facilitated by speech, marriage and family relations, expressed through name-given roles and upheld by normative rules such as the incest taboo – a universal prohibition among all human populations. Also included are rituals surrounding the transformations of yearly and lifetime cycles and so forth. These traits were first given expression in a community pattern derived from the primate troop: the human hunting-and-gathering band

Question 32

“Race-defining traits”

Answer 32

The earlier work of biological/physical anthropologists used what was regarded as “race-defining traits” – that is, colour of skin, eyes, hair form; amount of hair on body, face and head; thickness of nose and lips; shape of face and head; and body mass and stature to classify humans into three (sometimes four and even five) race types – Caucasoid, Negroid and Mongoloid (sometimes also Capoid and Australoid.

Question 33

Caucasoids

Answer 33

Supposed to have pale skin, straight or wavy hair, large amounts of body hair, noses of narrow to medium width and medium to tall stature

Question 34

Negroids

Answer 34

Brown or dark brown skin, wiry hair, a medium amount of body hair, lips and noses that are relatively thick and a medium to tall stature.

Question 35

Mongoloids

Answer 35

Supposed to have pale to light brown skin, straight black hair, dark brown eyes with epicanthic folds (flaps over the eyes, giving them a slanted look), short to medium stature and relatively hairless faces and bodies.

Question 36

Capoids

Answer 36

Supposed to be people such as the San and Khoekhoen, from south-western Africa

Question 37

Australoids,

Answer 37

Supposedly, were the Australian aborigines and the Melanesians

Question 38

he biological definition of race:

Answer 38

• First, it is arbitrary; there is no agreement about how many differences constitute a race
• The second issue is that it does not mean that any one race has exclusive possession of any particular variant of any gene or genes
• Thirdly, the differences among individuals and within a population are generally greater than the differences among populations.
• Lastly, there has been and is so much interbreeding between human populations that it is impos-sible to fix boundaries between perceived races.