Convoluted human evolution: H naledi burials, art refuted (Introduction)

by David Turell , Wednesday, November 15, 2023, 17:42 (164 days ago) @ David Turell

A new negative article:

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0047248423001434

No scientific evidence that Homo naledi buried their dead and produced rock art

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"Here we will examine the evidence for the alleged burials and the purported rock art presented in the three reviewed pre-prints together with a consideration of the open reviews published alongside them. The peer reviews were unanimous in considering the evidence inadequate in its present form. Despite this, these versions remain available and communicated to the press and social media without yet integrating any of the referee's comments.

"Here we argue that the evidence presented so far is not compelling enough to support the deliberate burial of the dead by H. naledi nor that they made the purported engravings. Substantial additional documentation and scientific analyses are needed before we can rule out that natural agents and post-depositional processes are responsible for the accumulation of bodies/body parts and to prove the intentional excavation and filling of pits by H. naledi. Moreover, detailed analyses are needed to demonstrate that the so-called ‘engravings’ are indeed human-made marks and that, like the purported evidence of fire use, they can be securely linked to H. naledi. Our commentary also offers a brief insight on the state of the field regarding the importance of responsible social communication and the challenges brought by new models of scientific publication.

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"There is no convincing scientific evidence to indicate that H. naledi buried their dead and produced rock art in the Rising Star Cave system based on the information thus far presented. As explained here, the investigators have not employed the wide range of scientific methods (e.g., chronology, taphonomy, sedimentology, micromorphology, geochemistry) designed to answer the questions posed nor applied the basic principles of archeothanatology to identify a deliberate burial."

Commentary from Evolution News: https://evolutionnews.org/2023/11/journal-rejects-claims-that-homo-naledi-buried-dead-m...

"The paper argues against intentional burial of the dead on the basis that burials usually involve articulated skeletons, but in this case “the hominin bones are not articulated but scattered.” They note that there is some limited articulation of some body parts but this can also occur in a natural death scenario. The “almost vertical position” of some of the skeletal remains is also very unlike what would be expected if someone was digging a grave for a body.

"Berger and his team had claimed that a stone tool was encased in rock near a skeleton, showing Homo naledi used tools. The paper argues that “it is not possible to rule out the strong likelihood that this stone object is a geofact” — that is, a natural rock feature (as opposed to an artifact, which is a stone carved by an intelligent agent). They point out that it’s made of “the same material as the cave walls,” and the faces would represent “natural fractures” or “erosion.” Because the rock remains encased in sediment, they argue no one can presently perform the kind of study needed to make a proper determination, and thus the Homo naledi team’s claims can’t be verified.

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"They make clear that the evidence for fire use isn’t there:

"More importantly, no scientific evidence (e.g., Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy, micromorphology, archaeomagnetism) has been presented to indicate the occurrence of in situ burnt material, let alone hearths. Previously acquired radiocarbon dates obtained by the site investigators on one of the apparent hearths resulted in very young dates (Lee Berger, unpublished data), questioning its association to H. naledi. Moreover, the occurrence of charcoal is also common in caves, including in South African landscapes, where there are frequent wildfires, so finding burned material in a cave setting does not automatically indicate anthropogenic activity.

"Many critics acknowledged that wall markings in the cave look like art, but they were uncertain about evidence linking the scrawls to Homo naledi. That is because the marks have not been dated. The markings might have been made much more recently, perhaps even by a human in very recent historic times. This paper affirms the criticism, but it also expresses a deeper skepticism about whether the markings are artificial at all. They write:

"[N]umerous examples of shallow cross hatched and patterned natural erosional lines can be found throughout the Malmani dolomite, the geological formation that hosts Rising Star Cave and all the other Plio-Pleistocene hominin fossils in the region.

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"IFL science is a heavily pro-evolution outlet, so when they accuse Homo naledi’s promoters and the Netflix documentary of pushing “hype” and “Homo naledi-mania,” that is really saying something."

Comment: this shows how science solidifies its findings with critical reviews. I reported the original articles here when they were published and accepted the findings at that time. The rejection now must await further work by critics.