Evidence that Hobbit-sized people lived in Indonesia

[alicia-w]

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=198867&page=1

[Skywatch_NC]

Very interesting article there, alicia.

Eric

[CaptinCrunch]

So they found Frodo? well thats cool

[PurdueWx80]

I thought it was hilarious that they actually said hobbit-sized people in the article! Talk about creative writing!

[Skywatch_NC]

This could be where JRR Tokien got his idea for that series of books.

Eric

[alicia-w]

i thought it was amusing because of the hobbit comment. but there are lots of aboriginal tribes all over with small people. dont know why this find is supposed to be more significant.

[Brent]

Interesting.

[streetsoldier]

alicia-w,

It is significant because these "dwarf" people are a branch of a MUCH earlier hominid ancestor (100,000 years+) that were cut off from the mainlands, and continued to develop long after their antecedents died out...and are "contemporaries" of modern man, surviving to only 18,000 years ago (which, in anthropological terms, is a millisecond).

Think about the Lascaux cave paintings....45,000 years ago, when our "immediate" ancestors were populating Europe, and then add in a dwarved ancient hominid who had NOT disappeared from the earth, but was still making tools, fire, etc. in a different but significant (and unadulterated by invasion/migration) manner.

Then consider the Neanderthalers, who were living alongside "modern" men from 80,000 to 23,000 years ago before becoming extinct after being driven out of Europe to the Strait of Gibraltar...NOW you see the relevance, I hope.