May 15, 2013
Some people in the Bigfoot community feel that Gigantopithecus is the most likely candidate as the precursor for Bigfoot. Jeff Meldrum and Grover Krantz are in this camp.
But others such as Loren Coleman feel there is a more likely candidate, Paranthropus.
Everyone seems to be Gigantopithecus lovers, right? But what of the other major fossil choice, Paranthropus?
The general scientific agreement is that Gigantopithecus specimens were in the range of about 10 feet tall, in fully grown adults. Some of the fossil primate scholars most linked to Gigantopithecus even have interpretations that assume Gigantopithecus was not bipedal.
Other than mandibles and over a thousand teeth, no other bones of Gigantopithecus have been found. Despite this, the late Grover Krantz and others have constantly said that Gigantopithecus is the best fossil candidate for Sasquatch. The one major fossil candidate often overlooked by the Krantz camp is Paranthropus.Loren Coleman
Gigantopithecus or Paranthropus?
What does this news do to the Paranthropus theory?
Early hominins couldn’t have heard modern speech
Our australopith ancestors heard their world differently from modern humans.
Rolf Quam at Binghamton University in New York State and colleagues have discovered rare middle ear bones from two extinct southern African hominins – Australopithecus africanus and Paranthropus robustus.
A combination of ape-like and human-like features in the bones indicate some australopiths lacked sensitivity to the midrange frequencies that modern humans use for speech.
“Anthropologists are in general agreement that these early hominins likely did not possess spoken language,” says Quam – the new findings back that claim.
His team now plans to use CT scans of the fossils and 3D virtual reconstruction of the ear anatomy to work out more precisely what the world sounded like to our distant ancestors.
Journal reference: PNAS, DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1303375110
Co-founder of Cryptomundo in 2005.
I have appeared in or contributed to the following TV programs, documentaries and films:
OLN's Mysterious Encounters: "Caddo Critter", Southern Fried Bigfoot, Travel Channel's Weird Travels: "Bigfoot", History Channel's MonsterQuest: "Swamp Stalker", The Wild Man of the Navidad, Destination America's Monsters and Mysteries in America: Texas Terror - Lake Worth Monster, Animal Planet's Finding Bigfoot: Return to Boggy Creek and Beast of the Bayou.
Filed under Bigfoot, Bigfoot Report, Cryptozoologists, Cryptozoology, Evidence, Extinct, Forensic Science, Fossil Finds, Sasquatch, True Giant