Genesis Impact Clip - Human Family Tree March of Progress

Can you explain this slide to me?

Sure.

It shows the idea of the human evolution tree over time.

This chart is from Professor Klein at Stanford.

It was published on the 200th anniversary of Darwin's birth to show how much we've learned about human evolution since Darwin's

time.

And what do the eight question marks on the chart mean?

Well, they are inferred relationships between the different fossil icons in the chart.

Same with the dashed lines and the thin solid lines.

They show the theoretical evolutionary connections between the fossil icons.

They're all based on guesswork?

Yes.

Only the thick vertical bars show the actual fossil evidence that was discovered.

Sir, there is no fossil evidence connecting Arte to Afarensis, none connecting

Afarensis to Habilis, none connecting Habilis to Ergaster or Erectus, and no

fossil evidence whatsoever connecting them to Homo sapiens in any intermediate

form.

The lines drawn from early Australopithecine apes to the first humans are

speculation and inference.

Well, without going back through time, we can't see the actual connection.

So, yes, it's inference.