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Article: Big hairy ape-men. (size differentiation between fossils of ape men and ape women)
- Article from:
- The Economist (US)
- Article date:
- April 23, 1994
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1994 Economist Newspaper Ltd. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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THE description last month of "Son of Lucy", the first nearly complete skull of a male ape-man from 3m years ago, has supported a surprising theory about human ancestors. Males were bigger than females. Not just slightly bigger, as men are slightly bigger than women, but much bigger, as male orangutans are much bigger than females. Average males probably weighed 1.5 times as much as average females.
Australopithecus afarensis first came to light in the 1970s as a fossil skeleton unearthed in Ethiopia by Donald Johansen and his colleagues from the Institute of Human Origins in Berkeley, California. The skeleton--Lucy--proved two surprising things: first that upright ...