Monthly Archives: August 2017

The discovery of a 13 million-year-old skull shows what human ancestors may have looked like. (Paul Tafforeau /ESRF)

To the untrained eye, the area west of Lake Turkana in northern Kenya appears to be barren of anything but rocky hills and volcanic ash.

But anthropologists know the Napudet region of the Turkana Basinas a promising new dig site for fossils from the Middle Miocene era, about 13 million years ago.And one professor's persistence there would pay off in a monumental discovery: a rare, complete skull of a baby ape that could give scientists a glimpse at what our common ancestors looked like.

The discovery almost didn't happen.

When Isaiah Nengo, an anthropology professor at De AnzaCollege in California,sought to assemble a team for a three-week expedition there in 2014, no one wanted to go.

There was nothing useful to be found, Nengo said others told him.

Undeterred, Nengo, who had just spent two years at the University of Nairobi on a Fulbright scholarship, returned to Kenya andgathered a ragtaggroup of local fossil finders.There were six of them in total, including the camp cook.

For two weeks in August, the team dug and found nothing. Though Nengo knew it wasn't unusual for the site (You could go for days and days, weeks and weeks without finding anything"), he began hoping to come across some fossil scraps or bone fragments anything to make the expedition worth it.

On Sept. 4, 2014, the team once again worked for hours at the dig site and came up empty-handed. Exhausted and disappointed, the crew packed up and began walking back to their land cruiser, parked about a mile away from where they had beenworking.

One team member, Kenyan fossil hunter John Ekusi, pulled out some tobacco and began rolling a cigarette.

Man, you're gonna kill us with that smoke, Nengo told him.

Ekusi ambled ahead until he was a couple hundred yards away from the group. After a short while, Nengo noticed Ekusi had stopped, and was inspecting something with a familiar fervor.

If you're a fossil finder, you know that look, he said. It's like an atomic bomb can go off, and you don't care, you're so focused at what you're looking for.

By the time the group caught up with Ekusi, he had brushed out the top of a fossil.

Almost instantly we knew it was the skull of a primate, Nengo said. We just broke into a dance, we were so happy.

What the team later excavated would end up being what is thought to be the most complete skull of an extinct ape species in the fossil record.After more than two years of sophisticated imaging work and additional geological research at the dig site, the discovery was published in the Aug. 10 issue of the journal Nature.

According to the article, younger fossil finds those 6- to 7-million-years-old have shed light on humans' common ancestors with chimpanzees. However, far less is known about the common ancestors of all living apes and humans from before 10 million years ago.

Relevant fossils are scarce, consisting mostly of isolated teeth and partial jaw bones, a statement accompanying the Nature article reads. It has therefore been difficult to find answers to two fundamental questions: Did the common ancestor of living apes and humans originate in Africa, and what did these early ancestors look like?

The discovery of the infant ape skull nicknamed Alesi after the local Turkana word for ancestor helps bridge some of those gaps, not only because of how intact the outside of the skull is but for what was preserved on the inside.

In September 2015, about a year after the fossil was excavated, Nengo obtained government clearance to hand-carry the skull from Kenya to the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) in Grenoble, France. It was, he would later admit, one of the most nerve-racking airtravel experiences he had ever had.

I sat with that specimen in my lap all the way until we got to Grenoble, Nengo said. It did not leave my sight. If I was in the bathroom, it went with me.

At the facility, which produces the world's most intense X-rays, scientists scanned the skull and arrived at startlingly clear 3-D images of thewhat it held.

We were able to reveal the brain cavity, the inner ears and the unerupted adult teeth with their daily record of growth lines, Paul Tafforeau, an ESRF scientist, said in a statement. The quality of our images was so good that we could establish from the teeth that the infant was about 1 year and 4 months old when it died.

At first, researchers suspected Alesi had been a baby gibbon because of the small snout. However, once scans revealed fully developed bony inner ear tubes and the unerupted adult teeth, it was clear Alesi had been an ape.

Gibbons are well known for their fast and acrobatic behavior in trees, said Fred Spoor, of University College London and the Max Planck Institute of Evolutionary Anthropology. But the inner ears of Alesi show that it would have had a much more cautious way of moving around.

Alesi's teeth showed that the infant skull hadn't just belonged to just any ape, but one of a previously undiscovered species, now namedNyanzapithecus alesi. Up until then, scientists hadn't been certain if theNyanzapithecus species were apes at all, or whether they had originated in Asia or Africa. Now, Nengo said, they could conclude thatN. alesi had been part of a group of primates that lived more than 10 million years ago, and that they had originated in Africa.

It's always very important to know when you're looking for ancestral lineages which continent they evolved. Ithelps you to explain the evolution of that particular group, Nengo said. Alesi provides an important link between apes' and humans' common ancestors and the earliest humans.

To find this little baby that perished in volcanic ash 13 million years ago it's a glimpse of what our prehuman stage looked like.

Alesi is now back in Kenya.Nengo said he plans to continue fieldwork there and also to use Alesi as kind of an anchor for the study of babies and the role of babies in the evolution of apes and humans.

The real work is coming now, he said.

Read more:

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The rest is here:
Discovery of 13 million-year-old ape skull shows what human ancestors may have looked like - Washington Post

Friendly or or a Dalek plot? Random Internationals Zoological, part of Wayne McGregors +/- Human Photograph: Ravi Deepres/Alicia Clarke

In Ren Magrittes surrealist painting La Voix des Airs (1931), three inscrutable spheres hover in an empty blue sky above green fields. Ive always wondered what these enigmatic objects really are. Do they come from outer space? Are they about to open and unleash a robot army? What strange message do they bring from their impersonal dimension?

At last I know, because I have met them. I have even danced with them. In the darkened heights of the Roundhouse in north London, a flying flock of white spheres that uncannily resemble Magrittes dream objects float intelligently and curiously, checking out the humans below, hovering downward to see us better. They are the most convincing embodiment of artificial intelligence I have ever seen. For these responsive, even sensitive machines truly create a sense of encounter with a digital life form that mirrors, or mocks, human free will.

They are the most convincing embodiment of artificial intelligence I have ever seen

Nobody is hidden behind a screen piloting this robotic airborne dance troupe. Each sphere has its own decision-making electronic brain. They fly in elegant unison yet also break ranks as they check their positions against the images recorded by infra-red cameras surrounding the circular space where they float and their human visitors walk. It is fitting to experience this eerily beautiful vision of the future in the steampunk setting of a Victorian railway building whose architectural grandeur evokes the first industrial revolution. It can feel like a Doctor Who episode come to life. What are those flying spheres, Doctor are they friendly or is this a Dalek plot?

Random International, the creators of this post-human visitation, have form in boggling minds. People queued for as long as four hours to get into their interactive installation the Rain Room at the Barbican in 2012. This deserves to be as popular and is arguably a lot more thought-provoking. Working with choreographer Wayne McGregor, whose dancers will perform with the ascendant orbs at weekends, these technologically adept art wizards extend the technology of drones to genuinely and movingly ponder the nature of life itself.

Looked at coldly, these devices are just inflated plastic balls whose movements are guided by rotors, like a toy drone. Yet the crucial fact that they guide themselves, mimicking conscious choice in their unplanned and to all intents and purposes spontaneous actions, is apparent without knowing anything about their design. You can tell by the way they move that they are free entities. Their behaviour is by turns entrancing and mildly menacing. They rise one after another from their resting positions in an upper gallery and calmly hover out into the open domed arena where their human guests are waiting. They are never at rest. As they glide in formation one or another is always changing its position, approaching the people below with what seems like curiosity. Then they all follow. It is when the entire swarm gathers directly above you that it suddenly becomes a threatening, sinister presence.

Surely science could learn a lot from this advanced work of art. McGregors understanding of dance is clearly as crucial as Random Internationals engineering ingenuity in creating what amounts to a fascinating illusion of life. Experiments in robotics often produce disturbing doll-faced machines and stilted conversationalist computers. Yet the true secret of copying life, this installation shows, lies in movement. Dance, the oldest human art, turns out to be a key to comprehending life itself, and reproducing it. The orbs dance with you. They locate and follow members of the audience, not with mechanical inevitability but a complex, gracious harmony. Making and breaking patterns, coming together and loosely floating apart, they dance with each other, too.

This artwork that opens visions of a future in which life evolves beyond biology itself.

Its alive! Its alive!, as Frankenstein would say. Ever since Mary Shelley wrote that novel in 1818, the fantasy of creating life, whether by re-animating dead flesh like her overweening scientist or, now, by building robots, has tended to fixate on the human form. We assume robots will walk and talk like us. This installation demonstrates how very different a future of digital intelligence may look. Far from resembling the human, these entities are completely alien. They have no faces, voices or limbs. They do have openings underneath through which their machinery can be glimpsed. Marcel Duchamp as well as Magritte would recognise their post-human grace. In his masterpiece The Bride Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors, Even, left unfinished in 1923, a large panel of glass carries images of a floating mechanical bride and chocolate-grinding male admirers. Duchamp imagined a future where the organic and inorganic are one. He would be entranced by this artwork that opens visions of a future in which life evolves beyond biology itself. When our robot great-grandchildren drift in great electronic herds to the stars, this is what it may look like. That wont be such a bad legacy for us to leave.

More:
+/- Human review Is this the future of artificial intelligence? Bring it on - The Guardian

Suspected human trafficking victims are crammed on a Thai trawler, which was rescued by the Bangladesh Coast Guard, in southern Bangladesh on June 11, 2014, in this handout picture provided by the Bangladesh Coast Guard.

To tackle human trafficking from Cambodia, Lao PDR and Myanmar into Thailand, governments must first better understand it as part of the broader phenomenon of irregular migration from those three countries, according to a new report launched today by UNODC and the Thailand Institute of Justice (TIJ).

The report,Trafficking in persons from Cambodia, Lao PDR and Myanmar to Thailand, is the first joint report of its kind to explore human trafficking in the sub-region, and emphasises the need to combine robust criminal justice responses that cripple trafficking networks with approaches that protect migrants and maximise the benefits of international migration.

It is estimated that four million migrants live in Thailand, 90% of whom come from the neighbouring countries of the Greater Mekong Subregion Cambodia, Lao PDR and Myanmar. Many of these migrants enter the country irregularly and remain in an irregular situation. They are therefore not only vulnerable to deception, coercion, violence, and exploitation whilst travelling, but also once they have arrived at their destination. The vulnerabilities and risks are amplified for children.

While trafficking to Thailand occurs for a range of purposes, the most common form is labour trafficking. People seeking higher wages are recruited by traffickers that exploit their vulnerabilities using physical violence or threats to work in industries such as fishing or construction. Many victims of trafficking, women and children in particular, are also brought to Thailand for the purpose of sexual exploitation.

While the lack of data and information remains one of the biggest challenges when it comes to countering trafficking in persons within Asia, this report aims to address some of the gaps in the understanding of human trafficking - and related migrant smuggling - in Thailand. Some new areas of focus include profiles of victims and traffickers, the contemporary push and pull factors, the routes taken by regular and irregular migrants, the fees paid to smugglers and traffickers, and the behaviours and methods of traffickers and their networks. It also explores the circumstances that make Cambodia, Lao PDR, and Myanmar source countries for the majority of persons trafficked into and through Thailand.

Stressing the need for a more complete picture of the current trafficking situation in the target countries. UNODCs Regional Representative, Jeremy Douglas stated, We now understand the situation better, and have identified some challenges and opportunities for enforcement and justice authorities in the countries. Importantly, the study provides a platform for us to expand our cooperation and assistance. He added, We are also considering if the findings might be helpful across the Mekong beyond the four countries that participated.

Promoting the development of data and research on crime and justice issues is a central part of the TIJ mission. Building on Thailands engagement in UN crime and justice forums, the TIJ is working to bridge global debates and local practice, and is looking to enhancing justice reforms within the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) region, said Professor Dr Kittipong Kittayarak, Executive Director of the TIJ.

The subversive nature of trafficking further underscores the difficulties in detecting cases and identifying victims. While limited information is a global challenge, it is particularly acute in Asia. Maritime movements are opaque and the flow of boats around and between national waters are too unregulated to generate data. Crimes including migrant smuggling often remain hidden amongst daily traffic.

To help combat migrant smuggling, UNODC runs a secure, online database the Voluntary Reporting System on Migrant Smuggling and Related Conduct (VRS-MSRC) for the collection and sharing of law enforcement data between member countries. UNODC Regional Coordinator, Benjamin Smith, highlighted that, As migration flows grow and crimes such as human trafficking and migrant smuggling become more complex, increased law enforcement cooperation and information sharing is essential.

There is growing awareness among target countries on the necessity of better data collection and better documentation. This includes initial measures to accurately report on investigations, arrests, prosecutions, and convictions of cases involving trafficking. In undertaking systematic national collection methods regularly and consistently, a basis can be established on which to conduct further research, identify trends and patterns, and develop informed policies and countermeasures.

Download the report, Trafficking in persons from Cambodia, Lao PDR and Myanmar to Thailand.

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New UN report spotlights human trafficking into Thailand - Bangkok Post