All about sediba

Science this week has five new papers on the marvelous fossil Australopithecus sediba that debuted some 18 months ago. There's one on the brain, the pelvis, the hand, the ankle/foot, and the date of the known sediba fossils. The verdict? From my brief skimming of the articles, sediba is a mixed bag of australopith and Homo traits (surprise, surprise). I'm eager to have a more detailed look, and I just can't wait for my fellow creationists to weigh in with their opinions. There's plenty of material here that they can selectively quote to support their claims that it isn't human. There's also plenty I can selectively quote to support my claim that sediba is part of the human family. But when it comes down to it, selective quoting isn't science. I'm eager to see if the new data actually changes any of my previous analyses (what a concept).

I'll be reading over these papers this weekend, and maybe I'll be back with a more informed commentary next week. In the meantime, Science has a nice website introducing the papers and the news commentaries.

Feedback? Email me at toddcharleswood [at] gmail [dot] com.