Study Guide for Quiz 2: Johanson, Prologue and Chapters 1-8

Prologue. What are Lucy's most important characteristics, and why is she considered so important?

Chapter 1. What was the initial reaction to the Neanderthal fossils? What was the reaction to Dubois' "Pithecanthropus," and why was that name later changed to Homo erectus?

Chapter 2. Why did Raymond Dart think the Taung fossil was a hominid, and what was the scientific establishment's argument against it? How did Piltdown Man contribute to the non-acceptance of Dart's ideas? How did Robert Broom prove Dart right? What is the difference between Broom's Paranthropus and Dart's Australopithecus? Why are the layers in South African caves so hard to date? What is the "osteodontokeric" articfact complex, how did this lead to Dart's "killer ape" theory of human evolution, and how did later work prove him wrong? What is Paranthropus called now?

Chapter 3. How did Le Gros Clark confirm that Australopithecus was a hominid? Why did the scientific community throw Piltdown Man on the rubbish heap? What hominid did Louis and Mary Leakey find in 1959 to go with their ancient tools at Olduvai Gorge, and why was Louis disappointed with it? What new dating technique revolutionized archeology and allowed the Leakeys to date their new fossil at 1.8 million years?

Chapter 4. On what basis did Louis Leakey propose the new species Homo habilis, and why was the scientific community reluctant at first to go along with him?

Chapter 5. If the Omo fossils were as unimpressive as Johanson says, why does he consider it such an important site? What does he mean by "magic ruler"? What is biostratigraphy?

Chapter 6. What and where is Koobi Fora? What is the KBS Tuff? How did Richard Leakey's "1470" fossil vindicate his father's theories? What doubts were raised about it?

Chapter 7. What made Johanson think that the distal femur and proximal tibia he found at Hadar were those of a hominid? What did Owen Lovejoy find so surprising about it?

Chapter 8. Why did some scientists disagree with Richard Leakey about the age of the KBS Tuff, and what did the horse and pig tooth fossils have to do with it? Why did Alemayehu Asfaw's hominid jaws strike Johanson as both more human and more apelike than those of the known australopithecines? What was Lucy like, and how did she contradict earlier theories of human evolution?