Bilbo bullshot

Two missing evolutionary links prior to fossilisation

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Saw a headline on the news wires yesterday

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Hobbit remains found in Australia

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Mmmm, probably a story about some missing film props thought I. But, no, it was the news that scientists had found bones of 18,000 year old, 3ft tall ape people, along with suitably miniaturised stone tools.
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In many ways, this is a classic contemporary scientific news story. The bones were found on an island off Java, not Australia, and, no, they don't belong to hobbits. Above all things, even truth itself, most scientists are devoted to pursuit of that most Holy Grail of Science, research funding, and little bit of PR spin goes a long way.
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Historically, the 'science' of anthropology has been anchored firmly on a bedrock of hard evidence and speculative bullshit; with the bullshit contributing something like 98% to the total mix. Picking through the story, it's clear that anthropologists are still up to their naughty games. A few of the very many choice quotes accompanying the news:

'the scientists believe that Flores Man is a direct descendent of H. erectus'

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'we believe their ancestors may have reached the island in bamboo rafts'

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'The clear implication is, despite tiny brains, these little humans were intelligent and almost certainly had language'

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'A male Homo floresiensis may have looked something like this ...' (cue the standard, totally made-up picture of the hairy, upright monkey man)

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'The scientists suspect the new species became extinct after a massive volcanic eruption on the island'

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'Homo erectus may have arrived on Flores about one million years ago'

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'the long arms were an intriguing feature and might even suggest H. floresiensis spent much of its time in the trees'

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So, no hard evidence to support the bulk of their conclusions then. No change in form there. However, this clearly was a good exercise in finding how many different ways you can say the scientists have made things up, without putting it quite like that. This story reminds me of the classic discovery of Nebraska Man in 1922. On the sole evidence of a single tooth, anthropologists declared they had found the missing link and published detailed, illustrated accounts of the life of Nebraska Man. They had known for years that he existed, all they needed was a fragment of evidence to hook their beliefs onto and away they went. Unfortunately, a few years later someone found an identical tooth rooted firmly in a fossilised pig's skull, oops.
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bigquestion.htm#fakes

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Actually, the hobbit story is interesting. Like Neanderthals they lived at the same time as 'regular' humans which means, even if you believe in evolution, that the Hobbits are either not related to us or they ARE us. Yup, every single fossil 'human ancestor' found to date is either a) a monkey or b) a human. After 160 years of of fruitless searching and many, many discredited discoveries, scientists are still looking for that postulated human ancestor and they will keep looking until the end of time.
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OK, most non-scientific types believe in all this stuff largely because they are told to but in some cases also because it's good ammo for use against institutionalised religion and priests. I can understand that but people should still care about whether what they are told is factual or a fantasy and not just grab hold of it because it supports their dislikes or prejudices. The evidence supporting a lot of the evolutionary tales we are told is so sketchy as to make parts of the Bible or Koran look like technical manuals in comparison. The evidence is really, really thin, often incredibly so, and that is deliberately kept from us.
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When reading stories like the one about the Hobbit Man we should never forget that there is incredible variation between different human ethnic groups. Using the criteria adopted by anthropologists, skeletons of say, an Eskimo, a pygmy, and an aboriginal would be classed as different evolutionary human species; if only those groups didn't have the bad taste to still exist and be able to reproduce with the rest of humanity (now that's video I'd like to see). Actually, forget different ethnic groups, I used to work with a bloke called John who would DEFINITELY be classed as coming from a different species if future scientists just had his bones to work on. Come to think of it the skeletons of a couple of my neighbours could prove the basis of a veritable horde of PhD papers. Then there's that bloke in the corner shop, and my Dad's Uncle, and my Mum's 'peculiar' cousin, and …