In the study of human origins, the most direct evidence is from different periods of ape fossils, but unfortunately, until today, the existing fossils are not enough to accurately sort out the origin story of human beings, which also makes many people wonder, will Darwin have a view on the origin of human beings, which was wrong in the beginning?
Is Darwin's theory of evolution wrong?
When it comes to Darwin, everyone will think of his theory of evolution, although to this day, the theory of evolution is still a "hypothesis", but in fact, in the past 100 years, it has led human beings to have a deeper understanding of the evolution of living things on the earth, including their own evolution.
However, the reason why Darwin's theory of evolution is still controversial and questionable is because in many links, there is no direct evidence, and the same is true of human evolution.
Darwin believes that early humans appeared about 3-4 million years ago, but the earliest human fossils are only about 2 million years old, and there is also a lot of controversy about how early humans evolved from apes, for example, there are different views on whether the ancestors of early humans were Australopithecus or earlier Rama apes.
Judging from the existing fossil research, about 9.3 million years ago, the ancestors of humans officially appeared, and during this period, the ancestors of humans and the ancestors of chimpanzees also began to part ways.
However, because this time span is too long, and there is also the view that the time when human ancestors differentiated from the chimpanzee lineage may only be 5-6 million years old, Sergio Almécija, a scientist from the United States, believes that until today, human accounts of origins are a mess.
If you want to fully understand the origin of human beings, you need to find the direct ancestor of early humans, that is, the apes that really evolved into "humans", just as in the question of combing the origin of modern humans, it has been basically confirmed that modern humans are directly evolved from late Homo sapiens.
Researchers say there are about two ways to solve the problem, one is top-down and the other is bottom-up. Speaking of Abby, one is gradually deduced through the study of modern humans and chimpanzees; the other is to trace the veins of human evolution through genetic traceability from the earliest ancient fossils.
In addition, there is a question that plagues scientists: Did humans really originate in Africa? Darwin also once mentioned the "African origin theory" when studying the origin of human beings, believing that the ancestors of human beings were different from any existing species, and that human beings were of a single African origin.
However, the theory of a single origin in Africa has been questioned for many years, for the simple reason that many ancient ape fossils have been found in Eurasia, especially in Asia, and even ancient human fossils that are considered to be early humans, at least 2.6 million years old, which seem to indicate that the origin of early humans is not all from Africa.
Did early humans really originate in Africa?
In 1859, Darwin removed the chapter on human beings in The Origin of Species, and instead chose to re-examine and re-introduce his history of human origins in 1871 in the book "The Origin of Man and Sexual Choice".
In simple terms, it is the evolutionary law from simple to complex, the evolution process from ancient apes to humans. However, the process is not as simple as we think.
As we mentioned above, the theory of African origins was proposed by Darwin, but long before Darwin published this view, in 1963, Haigel, the author of The History of Creation of Nature, had already put forward the idea that early human beings originated in South Asia, and believed that human beings traveled from Asia to various parts of the world.
At the end of the 19th century, the "Peking Man" fossils found in China, because they found that they can make tools, and also know how to use fire, which once again made the view that humans originated in Asia was recognized, and then, in the 1960s, a large number of Lamma ancient ape fossils found in China's Yunnan region also helped researchers to restore them, believing that they were apes in the process of evolution and were the direct ancestors of early humans.
But is this really the case? In 1959, australopithecus fossils were discovered in East Africa, dating back to 1.7 million years, which also made Darwin's theory of African origins once again be brought up, that early humans were born 2 million years ago and arrived in Asia and Europe 1.8 million years ago.
In addition, there is also the view that early humans originated in Europe, and there is also relevant evidence. Speaking of which, the reason why the answer has not been found so far is related to the insufficient fossils, and do you think Darwin's theory of evolution is correct? Did humans really originate from ancient apes? Or is there another reason?