Scientists hoping to study the ancient skeleton known as Kennewick Man are protesting legislation they say could block their efforts. They say a two-word amendment to a bill on American Indians would allow federally recognized tribes to claim ancient remains even if they cannot prove a link to a current tribe.
Scientists fear the bill, if enacted, could end up overturning a federal appeals court ruling that allows them to study the 9,300-year-old bones.
Not much new here from what was posted earlier. Apparently, Senator Cantwell (D-WA) has arrived at the same conclusion we have: "even if the bill is signed into law, tribes "will still have to prove a cultural connection" to an archaeological find before being allowed to claim it."
The lawyers for the Kennewick scientists -- Alan Schneider to be exact here -- seem to imply that this change will mean tirbes can claim remains without demonstrating cultural connection. We're attempting to contact them for more info.
News from the evolutionary tree Does the case for 'Toumai' as ancient human stand up?
IS A FOSSIL creature that grabbed headlines three years ago really the earliest known ancestor of modern humans? Or does it belong elsewhere on the evolutionary tree?
The answer has been hotly debated, but now two studies argue that it does indeed belong on the human branch.
In 2002, scientists announced finding jaw fragments, some isolated teeth and a skull of a creature nicknamed "Toumai" in Chad. At some six million to seven million years old, the fossils came from about the time of a major split in the evolutionary tree, with one branch leading eventually to humans and the other branch leading to chimpanzees.
High-tech hide and seek
If Ho-Chunk Nation archeologists' studies are accurate, Beloit residents may at any time be treading on sacred ground.
On Friday, archaeology specialists from the American Indian tribe and Beloit College faculty scanned areas of the campus, looking for burial or effigy mounds that may no longer be visible.
Using Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR), operators Bill Kingswan and William Quackenbush from the Ho-Chunk Heritage Preservation Cultural Resources roved over the ground, pushing a contraption which transmitted any radio waves indicating irregularities in the soil into a computer system in a nearby van.
Mammoth update Mammoth's remains found at homes' construction site
The remarkably well-preserved remnants of an estimated half-million-year-old mammoth — including both tusks — were discovered at a new housing development in Southern California.
An onsite paleontologist found the remains, which include 50 percent to 70 percent of the Ice Age creature, as crews cleared away hillsides to prepare for building, Mayor Pro Tem Clint Harper said.
Paleontologist Mark Roeder estimated the mammoth was about 12 feet tall, Harper said.
Roeder believed it was not a pygmy or imperial mammoth, but he had not yet determined its exact type, Harper said.
Duh Clues to climate's future may lay in past
Climate change could have drastic consequences.
Just ask the ancient Egyptians.
Harvey Weiss, professor of archaeology at Yale University, says climate change was a fact of life for earlier civilizations. From pharaohs to the medieval Vikings, swift and sometimes violent changes in weather patterns sparked mass migrations and technological innovations like irrigation.
"Those episodes proved to be the single most important stimulus for the major transformations in human history," said Weiss, who digs through the traces of vanished empires for evidence of these climatic events.
As the article indicates further on, this scenario might be a wee bit simplistic. But there is obviously some merit to it (i.e., that climate change has caused cultural changes as well).