Re: Homo erectus adapted to steppe-desert climate extremes one million years ago

On 1/20/25 1:12 AM, Primum Sapienti wrote:

 https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01919-1
 Abstract
Questions about when early members of the
genus Homo adapted to extreme environments
like deserts and rainforests have
traditionally focused on Homo sapiens.

I default to -- but am not married to -- the idea that there's
only been one single species of Homo for the last million years
or so, and it starts with erectus.
Yeah, I know, erectus changed a lot but I wiggle my way around
this by saying "The last million years or so" when erectus goes
make maybe 2 million years...
Homo sapiens erectus?
I can deep dive into this, btw.
I suspect that Homo sapiens owe their existence, OUR existence,
on the chromosome fusion thing. It threw a monkey wrench into
the crossing breeding with other archiacs, allowing them to
evolve in isolation within a crowd.... in a manner of speaking.
THEN, of course, evolution kept happening!  The very same
selective pressures that created so many different "Ancestors"
in the first place started working on erectus. They evolved to
live in new environments... adapted... resulting in unique
populations.
I've already said to much but, yeah, there it is.
--
https://jtem.tumblr.com/tagged/The%20Book%20of%20JTEM/page/5