Most of us who weren’t educated in a religious-based school have some idea about the main concepts surrounding evolution. Evolution is defined by the Cambridge English Dictionary as “the process by which the physical characteristics of types of creatures change over time, new types of creatures develop, and others disappear.”
Even though we were taught that it was a relatively straight path between apes and humans, the truth is that scientists and evolutionary biologists are making new discoveries about our evolutionary path all the time. Moreover, these discoveries are only raising more questions – not giving us answers.There are a lot of unexplained mysteries that still surround the process of evolution, including several famous unanswered questions that we’re going to talk about today.
1. The Discovery of Homo Naledi
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In 2015, scientists made a huge discovery when they found a cache of bones hidden deep inside a cave in South Africa. They realized that these bones didn’t match any of the other human ancestors that they had previously cataloged. When they reconstructed what Homo Naledi’s body would have looked like, they found that this race had a small brain and broad, ape-like shoulders built for climbing.
The massive trove of bones was discovered by two cave explorers, who immediately alerted a local scientist to the find. A huge expedition into the cave allowed scientists to begin putting the bones together. The mystery came when they attempted to fit this new species into the timeline of evolution. They found that there were several contradictory characteristics – like a modern human pelvis combined with curved fingers for climbing trees – that made classification difficult.Scientists are still not sure whether Homo Naledi lived at the same time as Homo Sapiens.