Three High Profile Genus Homo Discoveries in the Early 21st Century and the Continuing Complexities of Species Designation: A Review—Part I

Abstract

Human paleontologists are unable to extricate species-level variation from individual, sexual, regional, geographical, pathological, and skull bone variations despite sophisticated statistical methodology. Additionally, true variation within and between groups cannot be generated from a handful of regional and geographical specimens presently used in comparative studies. I therefore conclude that we cannot identify species in the human paleontological record. This conclusion is supported by the analysis and discussion (in this paper) of research conducted on, what I deem to be, three high-profile genus Homo fossil discoveries: Dmanisi hominins, Homo floresiensis, and Homo naledi. The data compiled in these comprehensive studies conclude that Dmanisi, floresiensis, and naledi share features with all Homo and Australopithecine taxa. Specifically, none of these three fossils clustered or aligned definitively with any Homo specimens. Consequently, it may now be prudent for us to use numbers or look for gross similarities and differences in hominin fossils to classify them. As such, identifying fossils at the genus level, which was proposed recently, might be a solution worth considering. Using genera will reduce the specificity needed in species identification, but it might be preferable to the chaos we have now in species-level identification. This paper is published in two parts.