Almost Human

This first person narrative about an archaeological discovery is rewriting the story of human evolution A story of defiance and determination by a controversial scientist, this is Lee Berger s own take on finding Homo naledi, an all new species on the human family tree and one of the greatest discoveries of the 21st century.In 2013, Berger, a National Geographic Explorer in Residence, caught wind of a cache of bones in a hard to reach underground cave in South Africa He put out a call around the world for petite collaborators men and women small and adventurous enough to be able to squeeze through 8 inch tunnels to reach a sunless cave 40 feet underground With this team of underground astronauts, Berger made the discovery of a lifetime hundreds of prehistoric bones, including entire skeletons of at least 15 individuals, all perhaps two million years old Their features combined those of known prehominids like Lucy, the famous Australopithecus, with thosehuman than anything ever before seen in prehistoric remains Berger s team had discovered an all new species, and they called it Homo naledi.The cave quickly proved to be the richest primitive hominid site ever discovered, full of implications that shake the very foundation of how we define what makes us human Did this species come before, during, or after the emergence of Homo sapiens on our evolutionary tree How did the cave come to contain nothing but the remains of these individuals Did they bury their dead If so, they must have had a level of self knowledge, including an awareness of death And yet those are the very characteristics used to define what makes us human Did an equally advanced species inhabit Earth with us, or before us Berger does not hesitate to address all these questions.Berger is a charming and controversial figure, and some colleagues question his interpretation of this and other finds But in these pages, this charismatic and visionary paleontologist counters their arguments and tells his personal story a rich and readable narrative about science, exploration, and what it means to be human. Read Almost Human – kino-fada.fr Ok if you guys don t know I am an anthropology major so books like this really speak to me , a couple of years ago the paleo anthropology world was rocked when the discovery of Homo naledi was made public , here was a whole different kind of Homo who up to now had not been discovered, you can imagine the controversy this find brought forward, we might need to add another branch to the human tree in its evolution towards Homo sapiens This is the book about that find from the guy who discovered Ok if you guys don t know I am an anthropology major so books like this really speak to me , a couple of years ago the paleo anthropology world was rocked when the discovery of Homo naledi was made public , here was a whole different kind of Homo who up to now had not been discovered, you can imagine the controversy this find brought ...Loved this account of the past 20 years of our fossil discovery and understanding of human evolution, culminating with Rising Star, an archeological dig that captured my attention as a PBS Nova TV presentation when it debuted I watched in awe, at the time, as a team of women scientists documented and uncovered the bones of Homo Naledi This book gives greater detail to this exciting time, and the forefront it heralded in fossil finds, personal evolution, and the way that the Internet, social Loved this account of the past 20 years of our fossil discovery and understanding of human evolution, culminating with Rising Star, an archeological dig that captured my attention as a PBS Nova TV presentation when it debuted I watched in awe, at the time, as a team of women scientists documented and uncovered the bones of Homo Naledi This book gives greater detail to this exciting time, and the forefront it heralded in fossil finds, personal evolution, and the way that the Internet, s...Well written, nicely paced, examination of the discoveries of Australopithecus Sediba and Homo Naledi by teams led by Lee Berger Of special interest is the Berger s commitment to open source research and providing opportunities to young scientists.Far from astonishing, it is the story of a bureaucrat feeling self important The bio wastes time on unimportant details the cap some guy was wearing or how someone does not wear shoes And the paper pusher does not waste any opportunity to inflate minor facts, a life long skill that proba...Lee Berger s recounting of his recent discovery of two new hominin species in South African is enthralling and seems well balanced from a scientific perspective The first few chapters give an overview of older finds in Africa and he updates the classic human family tree based on newer discoveries He is a strong advocate for the new open approach to the handling of fossils and data and has shown the value of involving people from many disciplines in evaluating finds John Hawks from the Unive Lee Berger s recounting of his recent discovery of two new hominin species in South African is enthralling and seems well balanced from a scientific perspective The first few chapters give an overview of older finds in Africa and he updates the classic human family tree based on newer discoveries He is a strong advocate for the new open approach to the handling of fossils and data and has shown the value of invo...This is pretty interesting, though it does get bogged down occasionally And there are definitely sections where there is a lot of bragging And then I transformed the entire field of archaeology, me me ME , which I dunno, whatever But the fossil stuff, and the excavation stuff was pretty cool especially in light of the fact that in today s news they were talking about still other hominid fossils from still other parts of Africa specifically, Morocco , which fact muddies the waters eve This is pretty interesting, though it does get bogged down occasionally And there are definitely sections where there is a lot of bragging And then I transformed the entire field of archaeology, me me ME , which I dunno, whatever But the fossil stuff, and the excavation stuff was pretty cool especially in light of the fact that in today s news they were talking about still other hominid fossils from still other parts of Africa specifically, Morocco , which fact muddies the waters even further than this ...Insightful, light, and fun read I was surprised by how accessible it was If you want a quick read about fossils and where we are at in understanding human ancestry, I highly recommend.This was a book I looked forward to reading The subject is a fascinating development in the study of human origins Homo naledi is an important discovery and one the deserved a book to be written about it It s unfortunate that this is the one it got Lee Berger is nauseating as a writer His ego is almost unbearable as he makes no attempt to contain it page after page That said, I do admire the collaborative approach that his team decided to use to describe the discovery I feel there was muc This was a book I looked forward to reading The subject is a fascinating development in the study of human origins Homo naledi is an important discovery and one the deserved a book to be written about it It s unfortunate that this is the one it got Lee Berger is nauseating as a writer His ego is almost unbearable as he makes no attempt to contain it page after page That said, I do admire the collaborative approach that his team decided to use to describe the discovery I feel there was muchto say about the actual science than this book gives Lee turns this into a personal interest story on a topic that pretty much nobody is interested in Lee Berger As wonderful as Australopithecus sediba and Homo naledi are, they have not somehow changed the entire field of paleoanthropology It s still the same old story The fossil I found is the most important and most r...Reviewed for The Bibliophibian.Way back possibly even before I was doing my biology degree, I was doing all the MOOCs massively open online courses I could, and one of them was run by John Hawks So when I stumbled across this book I had to have it I ve always been vaguely aware of and interested in what s understood about hominin evolution, but I mostly knew about the big classic hits like Lucy Homo naledi, discussed in this book, is new and rather surprising.The story of excavating the rem Reviewed for The Bibliophibian.Way back possibly even before I was doing my biology degree, I was doing all the MOOCs massively open online courses I could, and one of them was run by John Hawks So when I stumbled across this book I had to have it I ve always been vaguely aware of and interested in what s understood about hominin evolution, but I mostly knew about the big classic hits like Lucy Homo naledi, discussed in this book, is new and rather surprising.The story of excavating the remains is also pretty fascina...

• English
• 09 October 2018
Lee Berger
• Hardcover
• 240 pages
• 1426218117
• Lee Berger
• Almost Human