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Scientists find 7.2M-year-old pre-human remains in the Balkans

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Re: Scientists find 7.2M-year-old pre-human remains in the Balkans

#101

Post by Scarblac »

landon32 wrote: post #42
rubyn00bie wrote: post #13

The title is misleading (as written on HN) because the meaning of "hominim" is more to do with what we, humans, and other hominim (like neanderthals etc) evolved from. See linked chart: http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-yEUEavwMSCE/ULtMp3e_cVI/AAAAAAAAAD... This isn't our specific species but rather whatever we and similar species evolved from. I'm absolutely no expert on the subject. I actually find the title offensive if I…

Adding on to this: The human ancestors before this single instance were all from Africa. This title picks one particular definition of human and uses that as the basis for its claim. The ancestors of this species were certainly from Africa, and many later human descendants were also from Africa. Africa has much stronger ties to Human kind's birth than Europe does. Also, it's very possible that this species died out a…

If many Europeans have some Neanderthal DNA (which is what I've understood), then neanderthalensis hasn't entirely died out without descendants, right?

Re: Scientists find 7.2M-year-old pre-human remains in the Balkans

#102

Post by rdtsc »

rubyn00bie wrote: post #13

The title is misleading (as written on HN) because the meaning of "hominim" is more to do with what we, humans, and other hominim (like neanderthals etc) evolved from. See linked chart: http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-yEUEavwMSCE/ULtMp3e_cVI/AAAAAAAAAD... This isn't our specific species but rather whatever we and similar species evolved from. I'm absolutely no expert on the subject. I actually find the title offensive if I…

> I actually find the title offensive [...] Mostly because I'm sensitive to how unlikely it is people are up voting this because they understand it and rather they want it to reflect their world views.

What if the title said "South America" or "New Zealand" was the birthplace and people upvoted would you have found the title just as offensive?

Or to put it as another thought experiment, what continent region being upvoted would you find least offensive.

Re: Scientists find 7.2M-year-old pre-human remains in the Balkans

#103

Post by dEnigma »

cm2187 wrote: post #86
LoSboccacc wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it's weird to find just one fossil, with all the excavations going on and around in Europe.

You could argue the contrary. When some construction is going on in Europe, if something is found in the ground, there is a high chance it will result in a scientific excavation. When construction goes on in Africa (when it even does) I doubt the project will be interrupted often to call scientists. So there should be a selection bias toward developped countries in finding remains in the ground.

Isn't that exactly the point the parent comment made? I think you misinterpreted his "excavation" (as in archeological excavation) as "excavation for the purpose of construction". But maybe I am the one who misunderstood.

Re: Scientists find 7.2M-year-old pre-human remains in the Balkans

#104

Post by aaron695 »

pavanky wrote: post #70
grzm wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> hundreds of people upvoting it At the time of this comment, there are 101 up-votes on the article. Making no other judgement of your critique, engaging in exaggeration like this weakens it, especially given the volatility of the topic.

My bad. I saw it on the front page and made an off the cuff remark.

I upvoted because I wanted to know the real story.

There some incredibly interesting comments about human history here now.

Re: Scientists find 7.2M-year-old pre-human remains in the Balkans

#105

Post by barking »

guelo wrote: post #29

What is up with the resurgence of euro-pride among young white guys? I'm genuinely curious were it's coming from, it definitely feels like a new phenomenon in the last 2-3 years.

Everyone else has their pride, black pride, gay pride, womens' pride(?).

Christmas is mentioned less as it's slowly turning into 'Happy Holidays' but we have more mention of Eid, Ramadam, Yom Kippur etc. TV news reports explain to us the meaning of these religious festivals completely uncritically and visit families in their homes as they celebrate them.

It's like our culture is oppressive whilst others are enriching. Turn down the volume on ours and increase it on others.

Re: Scientists find 7.2M-year-old pre-human remains in the Balkans

#106

Post by rosser »

flukus wrote: post #96
rosser wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please tell me more about my privilege. Please tell me about all the times you've had to fear for your life during spurious, random traffic stops. Please tell me about all the times your value as a human being has been determined solely based upon your appearance. Please tell me about all the times you were deemed mentally incapable on the basis of a purely physical disability. EDIT: The word "privilege" as it's used…

> Please tell me about all the times you've had to fear for your life during spurious, random traffic stops. This person or their parents probably had to deal with exactly that. They may even have first hand experience with genocide. If you don't have to worry about all the shit that comes along with those things then you have privilege, regardless of your skin color.

> If you don't have to worry about all the shit that comes along with those things then you have privilege, regardless of your skin color.

Of course. Race and privilege are only joined insofar as their cultural context makes them. In a society that's virulently prejudiced against grey-eyed Slavs, 'pandaman is necessarily going to be "less privileged" than whoever that society favors.

That's exactly what the concept was created to indicate: how much of a given society's aggregate human mental garbage (racism, sexism, ableism, whatever-else-ism) a given person has to deal with, on the basis of who they happen to be, within that society.

Re: Scientists find 7.2M-year-old pre-human remains in the Balkans

#108

Post by rosser »

pandaman wrote: post #97
rosser wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please tell me more about my privilege. Please tell me about all the times you've had to fear for your life during spurious, random traffic stops. Please tell me about all the times your value as a human being has been determined solely based upon your appearance. Please tell me about all the times you were deemed mentally incapable on the basis of a purely physical disability. EDIT: The word "privilege" as it's used…

Sure, I have been searched through customs in different countries. I have not been in a traffic stop ever but I had been under fire (from military, not quite police so maybe not as scary?), does it count? > Please tell me about all the times your value as a human being has been determined solely based upon your appearance. I imagine you did not think this one through, you are actually implying my value as a human bei…

> I have all rights to be afraid of racist cops of different color.

Especially if they're racist against you, of course you do. That's the point. Please see my reply to 'flukus's comment that is a sibling to yours.

> I am not a woman so my chances of assault and murder are way higher...

I was speaking primarily of domestic violence. If you give any kind of credence to the statistics about how under-reported that is, women get beat up a lot more often than men.

Re: Scientists find 7.2M-year-old pre-human remains in the Balkans

#109

Post by dragonwriter »

sheepmullet wrote: post #100
MisterBastahrd wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your entire line of reasoning is borderline moronic. You don't like talking about white privilege because some white people feel like they don't get enough credit because they're white. Meanwhile people of color suffer from real racism, both colloquial and institutional. Sure, it's socioeconomic too, but that's because for many, they're 3 generations from having the right to representation and 5 from having any human…

> Every single black man who has "made it" in America still sits his child down before they Haha nice one!! Black kids don't get to spend time with their fathers. Feminists made sure of that.

> Black kids don't get to spend time with their fathers

All too often true, but...

> Feminists made sure of that.

I think you have the "war on some drugs, especially those in the possession of non-whites" confused with "feminists".

Re: Scientists find 7.2M-year-old pre-human remains in the Balkans

#110

Post by LoSboccacc »

cm2187 wrote: post #86
LoSboccacc wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it's weird to find just one fossil, with all the excavations going on and around in Europe.

You could argue the contrary. When some construction is going on in Europe, if something is found in the ground, there is a high chance it will result in a scientific excavation. When construction goes on in Africa (when it even does) I doubt the project will be interrupted often to call scientists. So there should be a selection bias toward developped countries in finding remains in the ground.

that was my point, sorry if it wasn't clear can't edit now: that there should be more finds in Europe due all the construction going on
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