What Is Human Evolution?
Human evolution is the theory which states that humans developed from primates, or ape-like, ancestors. In 1856, a strange skull was found by some workmen in the Neander Valley in Germany. The odd appearance of the skull led some to believe that it had once belonged to a person who was afflicted with rickets. They did not believe it could have come from an ancestor of modern man. It did, however, form the notion that there could have been creatures that were half-human and half-ape. Ernst Heinrich, a German scientist, claimed that if such a creature were ever found it should be named Pithecanthropus erectus, which means upright apeman.
Even before the discovery of the skull, which is now known as Homo neanderthalensis, people hypothesized that there was some sort of transmutation that took place between species. This, however, was not widely accepted. On November 4, 1859, the view on evolution as a whole changed dramatically. This was the date that Charles......
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