How to Build a Human by Pamela S. Turner

Author:Pamela S. Turner [Turner, Pamela S.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Charlesbridge
Published: 2022-04-12T00:00:00+00:00

An Indonesian scientist holds a cast of a Flores Hobbit skull.

Adult Flores Hobbits were about the height and weight of an eight-year-old human. They had stocky bodies with relatively long arms and long feet.[6] Despite their chimp-sized brains, the Hobbits controlled fire and used stone tools. They did not, however, live in snug Hobbit holes with round doors and cozy fireplaces. The Hobbits’ world was a tropical forest inhabited by pygmy elephants and Komodo dragons.

If Flores sounds strange, all I can say is: just wait until we get to Australia.

The Flores Hobbits lived on Flores when the island was separated from the mainland by hundreds of kilometers of open water. A tsunami may have washed a group of Erectus (or possibly another hominin) out to sea, and the survivors clung to a raft of vegetation until they washed up on Flores. It’s likely lizards also arrived via some kind of accidental ark. Elephants, being surprisingly good swimmers,[7] may have paddled over on their own.

Island environments often select for smaller individuals. That’s because the smaller you are, the less food you need, and islands tend to have more limited food supplies than mainland environments. Scientists think this selection pressure caused the descendants of those first castaways to gradually downsize into Hobbits. Similar selection pressure caused the elephants to become pony sized.

Okay, but what about those supersized lizards?

On the Southeast Asian mainland, the role of big predator was filled by tigers and leopards. Big cats, however, never floated across to Flores. Evolution works with whatever is at hand, and what was at hand on Flores was a lizard. The Flores environment selected for bigger lizards because bigger ones were better able to take advantage of the island’s deer, pigs, and pony-sized elephants. The Flores lizards upsized into Komodo dragons.

Here’s a handy rule about evolution: weird things happen on islands.

Bones and teeth from a second Hobbit species (Homo luzonensis) have been found on Luzon Island in the Philippines. The Luzon Hobbit was slightly bigger than the Flores Hobbit and had curved finger and toe bones designed for tree climbing. We don’t know if humans made it to Luzon before its Hobbits went extinct.

By about 65,000 years ago, we had island-hopped all the way to Australia. There we found kangaroos the size of horses, wombats the size of rhinos, and marsupial lions the size of, well, lions. Not to mention 6-meter (19-foot) lizards that could’ve eaten a Komodo dragon for breakfast. Plus Genyornis newtoni, last in a line of giant flightless birds nicknamed the “Demon Ducks of Doom.”[8]

Another handy rule: weird things happen on isolated continents.

Let’s pause at around 50,000 years ago. Humanity has spread eastward from Africa all the way to Australia. We aren’t the only hominins around, but given the diverse habitats we live in, we’re clearly the most adaptable. We’ve invented new technologies like javelins, arrows, chisels, barbed points for spearfishing, and bone needles for sewing skins into clothing or shelter.

Around 46,000 years ago, we finally reached Europe. The oldest human remains found there belong to a woman who lived in the Czech Republic (eastern Europe).

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