The University of Hong Kong

CCST9081: All You’ve Ever Wanted to Know About Humans

Common Core (Fall 2023)

Modeling human evolution

Aims and background

In contrast to many other sciences, the study of human evolution is frequently

influenced by events which the discipline cannot control, especially the chance and
often unexpected nature of fossil discoveries. This fundamental point about the
nature of palaeoanthropology’s primary data (i.e., hominin fossils) has had a huge
impact on the history and development of our understanding of human evolution.
The main goal of this practical is to get you to explore this phenomenon more closely
and to reflect more deeply upon it.

To understand these ideas better, you may read the following paper uploaded on
Moodle:

Dennell, R.W. (2001) From Sangiran to Olduvai, 1937-1960: the quest for
'centres' of hominid origins in Asia and Africa. In, Roebroeks W., Corbey R. (eds.)
Studying Human Origins: Disciplinary History and Epistemology. Amsterdam
University Press, Amsterdam, pp.45-66.

Practical tasks

You will be asked to pick several ‘specimen cards’ at random from a box containing
information about hypothetical fossil hominin discoveries. Potentially, they will
provide information on the locality, age, brain size (cranial capacity), and tooth size.
An example specimen card is illustrated below. Note that not all this information will
necessarily be available in each case, as is the case in real-life palaeoanthropological
situations. It should be stressed that these are hypothetical specimens, but they do
have some broad basis in reality, and are deliberately designed to throw up some of
the quirks and problems that the currently known fossil record provides.

Step 1:

In the first instance you will be asked to pick five specimen cards at random. You
should then arrange these specimens into what you think is a logical evolutionary
sequence based on the information that you have; note that you will be asked to fully
explain this logic in your write-up of this practical. Your evolutionary sequence may
either be lineal, or it may have branches. You will have to think about the
evolutionary sequence of the features displayed in your specimens (e.g., such as
whether tooth size gets larger or smaller through time) and how these relate to the
date(s) of your fossils. The evolutionary sequence is really what we might term
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a ‘phylogenario’; an informal hypothesis of an evolutionary scenario, that does not
provide a phylogeny based on formal analysis, but represents a sequence of
hypothesized events based on some form of logical thinking.

You can assume some basic knowledge that was available to anthropologists at the
end of the 19th century and the early part of the 20th century (i.e. when the first fossil
hominin discoveries were made and became more widely discussed). For instance, in
his book The Descent of Man (1781), Darwin argued that it was likely that the earliest
fossil evidence for humans would be found in Africa since our closest living relatives
(chimpanzees, bonobos and gorillas) can still be found there. Hence, you might
reasonably assume to base the logic of your reconstruction with this in mind.

Moreover, it is commonly assumed that the (plesiomorphic) features of chimpanzees

(i.e., brain size and tooth size) will be similar to that of the earliest fossil hominins
while later specimens (more closely related to humans) will resemble modern humans
in these (derived) features. Again, you might choose to base the hypothesized
evolutionary sequence of your specimens on this logic – but again – make sure you
articulate and fully describe this logic in your write up.

When you pick your five cards you should fill in the table below. You will note that
the equivalent information for contemporary chimpanzees (both Pan troglodytes and
P. paniscus) and humans (H. sapiens) has already been completed. Observe that you
should provide a code/specimen number for each of your specimens – once you
have assigned this number it always stays the same for that specimen regardless
of how your phylogenario may change as you go through the exercise (this will
allow you to refer to each specimen in your write-up without the use of names;
remember fossils do not come out of the ground with name tags on them –
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palaeoanthropologists assign them!). Any missing information should be marked with
a questions mark (?). Filling in most of the information for each card should be
straightforward, but note that there is also a column marked “Overall morphology”;
this column relates to the picture shown on the card. If you have two cards with the
same picture (either now or when you later add further specimens) you can write
“Same as X”, where ‘X’ refers to the number you have assigned to the other specimen.
If the picture is different from any of your other cards mark this as “New”.

Fill in this table (refer to example below):

Overall morphology
Code / Cranial Tooth
Locality Date (“New” or “Same
specimen # capacity size
as …”)
Humans Global Contemporary 1400 Small ‒

Chimpanzees Africa Contemporary 400 Medium ‒

Example:

Overall morphology
Code / Cranial Tooth
Locality Date (“New” or “Same
specimen # capacity size
as …”)
Humans Global Contemporary 1400 Small ‒

Chimpanzees Africa Contemporary 400 Medium ‒

KN-1 Kenya 1.4 MYR ? Medium New

CH-1 China ? 1000 Medium New

SA-1 S. Africa 1.7 MYR 500 Large New

EN-1 England 500 kyr 1200 Small New

KN-1 Kenya ? 500 Medium Same as 1

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You may also find it useful to use maps to illustrate your phylogenarios.
Remember you can simply use the specimen codes to refer to the fossils, if you
mark their location with a dot or small circle. You may use arrows to indicate
the relationships between them.

Phylogenario after step 1 (map):

Another way would be to draw cladograms, based off of spotting those shared
derived characteristics (synapomorphies).

Phylogenario after step 1 (cladogram):

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Step 2:

Pick an additional four cards and fill in their information below. (If any of your new
cards is identical to one your previous discoveries in **all** aspects then replace it
and pick another. If, however, you have two near-identical cards but that differ in a
small way [i.e., one has brain size missing, but the other has it present] you should
include both specimens in your sample.)

Overall morphology
Code / Cranial Tooth
Locality Date (“New” or “Same
specimen # capacity size
as …”)

Now rearrange your original phylogenario based on these additional ‘discoveries’ and
the information they provide. How and why does you phylogenario change? What is
the logic of your changes in each case? What new information is added? Again, you
will be asked to write up these decision and thought processes in your report.

Phylogenario after step 2 (map):

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Phylogenario after step 2 (cladogram):

Step 3:

Pick an additional four cards (you will now have a total of 13 specimens) and repeat
step 2.

Overall morphology
Code / Cranial Tooth
Locality Date (“New” or “Same
specimen # capacity size
as …”)

Phylogenario after step 3 (map):

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Phylogenario after step 3 (cladogram):

Writing up your report (approximately 1500 - 2000 words)

Your report should have five sections comprised of: (1) Introduction/Aims; (2)
Materials and Methods; (3) Results; (4) Discussion; (5) Conclusion.

Guidelines for writing up each of these sections is provided below.

1. Introduction/Aims

This should provide a very short (one paragraph) background to the topic based on
what is discussed in this document, what we discussed in class and your reading of
the Dennell paper. You really need to say in basic terms that the development of
palaeoanthropological knowledge has been influenced by the history of fossil
discovery and this practical was designed to critically examine this issue. You may
also want to add a brief statement as to why this is important. Note that it may be
best to write this section last, after you have written the remainder of the report.

2. Materials and methods

Briefly describe the procedures employed in the practical (i.e., that you were asked to
several series of pick cards at random each representing a hypothetical fossil hominin
discovery). Also describe the types of information provided on the cards. Do not
provide any specific information about the cards that YOU yourself picked yet (that
will come in the results section), this is just a statement of procedures. Also explain
that you were asked to build a ‘phylogenario’ (explain what that is) for each of your
five, nine (5+4) and thirteen (5+4+4) sets of fossil hominins, and that you were asked
to describe how and why each changed with new information brought by the new
discoveries.

3. Results

This section and the following (discussion) sections will count most toward your
final marks for this exercise. You should include a table of results/characteristics for

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your 5, 9, and 13 specimens. After EACH of these three tables you should draw your
phylogenario for those specimens (it might be useful to use the specimen/code
numbers here). In EACH of the three cases you should detail the logic/rationale
underlying your phylogenario. In the case of the 9 and 13 specimen phylogenarios
you should be sure to detail how and why the addition of new specimens changes (or
confirms) the phylogenario illustrated previously. You should ask yourself in each
case ‘how and why does the new information either change or confirm what I
thought previously?’ and also ‘what new information is added?’

4. Discussion

Here it is important that you do not merely repeat the information that is in your
results section, but you should explain how they illustrate the effects that historical
happenstance can have on the growth of palaeoanthropological knowledge. For
instance, how might the pattern of fossil discovery influence our ideas about the
evolutionary trajectory of certain characteristics? How might the pattern of fossil
discovery influence our ideas about the dispersal of hominins and the pattern of
hominin colonisation of certain regions? What effect might differential levels of
fieldwork in various parts of the world have upon the discipline? Refer to your own
results to illustrate such hypothesised effects. Also consider the effects that revised
dating of fossil specimens has on palaeoanthropology in the light of your practical
and readings. You should integrate this with a discussion of the Dennell (2001) paper,
particularly the effect of the Piltdown forgery. When writing this section you may also
wish to note other discoveries that have radically changed or challenged our thinking
about the sequence of human evolution. Two obvious candidates here to discuss is
the discoveries of Homo floresiensis and Homo naledi. These small-brained and small-
bodied (but relatively late) fossil hominins pose some serious questions for
palaeoanthropology, especially in regard to brain size and body size changes through
evolutionary time.

You may find this article (on Moodle) useful:

Lahr, M.M., Foley, R.A. (2004) Human evolution writ small. Nature 432: 1043-
1044.

5. Conclusion

You should end with a series of clear statements as to how and why the fundamental
nature of palaeoanthropology’s basic database (fossil discovery) has influenced the
historical development and growth of knowledge about human evolution over the
last 150 years. You may want to summarise these conclusions in the final sentence of
your introduction (which is why it might be useful to write the introduction last, after
you have written the rest of the report).

Total report should be a minimum of 1,500 words and a maximum of 2,000

words. The deadline for uploading the completed report on Moodle is two weeks
after the third tutorial on 4 / 9 / 11 October, 5:00pm.
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