- The discovery of a new species of human poses exciting
questions about who we are. How would we treat this close relative if one
were found alive today?
-
- Every time an intrepid anthropologist discovers an old
tooth or part of a jawbone that might possibly have come from one of our
ancient ancestors, there is a flurry of excitement.
-
- Before long a whole skull, then a whole body and finally
a whole human society has been deduced from this tiny fragment.
-
- We are so desperate to know where we came from that this
game of inventing the past has been played over and over again.
-
- The truth, if we are honest, is that there still remains
a huge gap in our knowledge of what happened between the time of our remote
ancestors and our more recent ones.
-
- What occurred in that "great gap", several
million years ago, is anybody's guess - and guesses there have been aplenty.
-
- But the new discovery of a tiny, 3ft tall, flat-faced,
bipedal "ape-man" on the Indonesian island of Flores is rather
different.
-
- Here, the skeletal remains are not only much more detailed,
but they are found in caves along with delicate stone tools and evidence
of fire-making and the hunting of large game.
-
- What is more, these hunters existed as recently as 12,000
years ago and, who knows, living groups of them may still be lingering
on in odd corners even today.
-
- This is shattering news and will create fascinating problems
for both political and religious leaders.
-
- Pet cemetery?
-
- Suppose for a moment that a living tribe of these beings
is discovered, how should they be treated?
-
- Are they merely advanced apes, or are they miniature
humans?
-
- If an explorer brought back one of their infants to study,
would you put him down for Eton or the Zoo?
-
- If he died, would he be buried in consecrated ground
or a pet cemetery?
-
- His very existence among us would make us question all
over again, what it is to be human.
-
- We are not used to this because our ancestors successfully
killed off all our close relatives.
-
- This has created a chasm between us and the other animals,
a chasm so big that religion went as far as to say that we are not even
related to them. Humans have souls and they do not.
-
- Darwin put a stop to this nonsense with his theory of
evolution, but amazingly the blindingly obvious truth he discovered is
still resisted by large sections of the human population.
-
- They stubbornly continue to insist that we are some kind
of special creation.
-
- The arrival of "Mini-Man" is going to give
them nightmares.
-
- How can he be "semi-special"? That won't make
sense. He can't very well have a semi-soul.
-
- So Mini-Man might just be the evolutionary jewel that,
once and for all, sets human beings firmly in the animal kingdom, where
scientifically they belong.
-
- Experimental cages
-
- A great deal will depend on what happens when we first
meet living examples of this new species.
-
- If, when we greet them, they go OOARGH, OOARGH, like
chimps, they will doubtless be classified as rather advanced apes.
-
- And the poor things may even end up in experimental cages.
They would have no more rights than the chimpanzees do to this day.
-
- If on the other hand we discover that they have some
kind of spoken language and we can learn that language, or alternatively
they can learn ours, there we are into a whole new ball-game.
-
- When it comes down to it, being able to talk is really
what defines humanity.
-
- If Mini-Man talks, then, let's face it, there are two
species of human beings on this planet and not one, as we always thought.
-
- If you shot a Mini-Man it would be murder. If you cooked
one and ate it, it would be cannibalism. If you experimented on one it
would be torture.
-
- Test of faith
-
- Personally, I long to be told that he can talk.
-
- It will make him a much more effective bridge between
us and the apes, forcing religions to re-examine many of their basic beliefs.
-
- In theory, the existence of Mini-Man should destroy religion,
but I can already hear the fanatics claiming that he has been put on earth
by the Devil simply to test our faith.
-
- Which brings up an even more intriguing question: does
Mini-Man perform special burial rituals and does he therefore believe in
an afterlife?
-
- This is something that field workers should be able to
discover even without encountering a living tribe.
-
- If the island of Flores is not quickly awash with teams
of eager investigators I shall be very surprised, and I can't wait to hear
the results of their explorations.
-
- © BBC MMIV http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/3964579.stm
|
