Hi Friends,

I have been reading a book for the past month which has quite much gotten my attention. Although this book titled the "Last King of Scotland" by Giles Foden basically talks about Uganda, Idi Amin and just what it means to breathe the same air a dictator also takes in, it actually is more than that. This captivating novel also reveals details about hidden facts and open discoveries.

One of the other things I happened to bump into while reading the book is the Semuliki discovery. This finding was basically made during the year Idi Amin's rule was thriving. A group of scientists and archeologists included found some pre-historic bones of the first homo sapiens in Uganda. Now, this was nothing new. It only went on to prove the already established theory that the first known homo sapiens developed in East Africa before some 'packs' moved to North America from whence homo sapiens and humanity began to evolve and to migrate all at once.

However, what the Semuliki discovery did quicken scientists to the realisation that Africa as the biological cradle of humanity should not be ignored or treated as an independent observation that has nothing to do with present day situation. Rather, more studies should be made to know morre about exact timelines, facts and implications.

With regards to this, several studies and researches have been made by many people and other discoveries interlinked with Africa as the seat of the early men have been made. The most astounding one yet is the African multiregionalism theory which maintains that humans did not just sprout up from a little corner of East Africa, they came from all over the continent. But even this theory, uncomplicated as it sounds, is connected to other recently discovered theories. Why not hear them out?

The believed spread of the human race by Reed Dl CC 2.5 License

Old theories described in new ways

First off, before moving forward, it would be important to discard every preconceived traditional notion about human origin or better get ready to expand these theories. As I earlier said, archeologists and scientists were formerly of the opinion that Homosapiens first evolved in East Africa at about the time of 200,000 years ago. It was also earlier believed that the first humans had lodged in East Africa for about 140, 000 years before the Out of Africa movement began. Even more, many thought that those who migrated usurped and occupied the lands that erstwhile belonged to even lesser species who were not as advanced as Homosapiens. These ones were called Neanderthals.

However, scientists now have reason to believe that Homosapiens appeared way earlier than was previously thought. In fact, a 100,000 worth of years have been removed from the original timeline conceived. Hence, humans were already present on Earth even 300,000 years ago. This new claim was built based on the discovery of some scientists. They found remains of homo sapiens from as way back as 3000 centuries ago..

Even more, these remains or fossils were discovered in Morocco. Now, unlike Uganda, Morocco is not a country on the Eastern part of Africa. Rather, it is a North Africa country. This shows that as opposed to former assumptions, humans appeared and began development in not just one part of Africa, but in all.

Evolution from hominid to homo sapiens. Armin Kubelbeck. CC 3.0 License

What this eventually led to was an evolution that was not just sparsed or contained within one location, but one that spanned the length and breadth of the continent of Africa. The evolution happened not on a location basis but on the basis of interlinked groups who grew together, evolved together. Although, at first, the semblance of one group differed from that of another group, in no time at all, the looks started to match up and become similar. Isn't that what still exists till now- Similar looks but different identities?

Now, all of these theories and ideas that I have been discussing have now come to be seen as African multiregionalism theory. Although this theory is broader and wider than what can simply be penned down in a single treatise, I will say this one thing: Scientists who embarked on learning more about the theory agreed that humans in their different shades and colours evolved from several hominids (great apes and ancient humans who were scattered all over Africa). The descent was not exactly symmetrical, it was rather spiral. A single hominid is possibly reasoned to be at the forehead of a group that later scattered and then evolved into a thousand other hominids. Hence, rather than view human evolution on a family tree sort of way, it should rather be viewed as the several avenues and roads and streets that leads to the metaphorical Rome.

The believed family tree of human evolution by Ernst Haeckel Public Domain license

This conclusion was further reached by the discovery that hominids mixed with other ancient species like the Neanderthals. Not only that, they mated with these ones. In fact, it was found out that these Neanderthals existed way before humans did as some of the cave paintings earlier attributed to humans have been said to belong to them.

But it was not just the Neanderthals that we tangoed with, we also mingled with the Denisovans so that just like a good percent of the DNA of non Africans can be traced to the Neanderthals, about 5% of the DNA of modern residents of Papua New Guinea show traces of mating with Denisovans. Given this useful piece of details, it becomes necessary to doubt all other details about the traditional evolutionary theory that was fed to humans.

For instance, no longer can the time hominids started migrating to North America be decided with certainty. Some scientists insist that the migration began way earlier than the proscribed date. And then, as to what parts of North America hosted the first migrants, it is no longer certain. Indeed, there are many things yet to be known about human discovery and evolution, but one fact that had been established is that "there was no one Garden of Eden that hosted the first humans, and even if there was, then it would have been all of Africa." (Jean-Jacques Hublin).

References

http://www.businessinsider.com/ancient-humans-interbred-denisovans-twice-2018-3
http://www.businessinsider.com/neanderthals-created-first-cave-paintings-2018-2
http://www.businessinsider.com/discovery-300000-year-old-skulls-human-origins-2017-6
http://www.businessinsider.com/early-humans-migrated-africa-to-asia-earlier-than-thought-2017-12
https://www.google.com.ng/amp/s/amp.businessinsider.com/discoveries-change-our-understanding-of-human-origins-2018-7