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Zinjanthropus has changed quite a bit in appearance since this species was found 50 years ago. Art by Peter Bianchi © National Geographic.
Fifty years ago, Louis and Mary Leakey discovered the remains of Zinjanthropus boisei, a member of the human lineage researchers now call Paranthropus boisei or Australopithecus boisei.
National Geographic ran a story on the discovery of "Zinj" in 1961. It was hailed as a missing link. Now we know that this species was an evolutionary dead end. It may be that it was too specialized, in this case for heavy chewing. Big teeth and massive jaw muscles may have been the wrong thing to invest in, as opposed to big brains, for instance.
I'm fascinated by the transformation of Zinjanthropus. The art above, created by Peter Bianchi for the 1961 article, shows someone who could pass for a pro wrestler. That was painted when we thought we were related. Today's depictions of the same creature show it as ape-like.
This is John Gurche's recent reconstruction of the same species. Art © John Gurche/National Geographic.
This unfortunately has given creationists an excuse to accuse paleoanthropologists and National Geographic for making things up. We don't make things up. Our artwork reflects the best scientific understanding of the time. As we know, scientific understanding changes as time goes on.
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Comments
Aug 21, 2009 11AM #
Nice right up, I always watch national geographic channel, since its one of my favorite channels.
Aug 21, 2009 11AM #
is this a kind of bigfoot thing or along those lines or another creature entirely?
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