Is it possible that some of the Asian/Mongoloid population today, are direct descendants of the Homo erectus..

Question

...found in Java & China, dating from 27,000 to 1.35 million years ago?

Answer 1

Forty years ago, Carlton Coon wrote "the Origin of Races", in which he proposed what is now called the "Regional Descent Hypothesis.  This suggests that modern human populations are directly descended from the Homo erectus populations that had lived there previously.  Unfortunately, he formulated the idea in a rather blatantly racist manner and the hypothesis   pretty much died there.

The prevailing hypothesis is the "Out of Africa" hypothesis, in which Homo erectus evolved in Africa and radiated out through the Old World and then Homo sapiens evolved in Africa and spread out through the Old World, replacing the erectus populations (and the Neandertal populations in Western Europe) with little if any interbreeding.

The main proponent of regional descent today is Milford Wolpoff at the University of Michigan.  He mentions that there are traits found in erectus populations that then are found in the modern populations living in the same areas.

You should check him out in a search engine for his writings on the subject.

wl

Answer 2

Maybe yes, but the DNA from that descent could have been totally dominated and replaced by Homo sapien's.

Answer 3

Not according to the best in evidence; genetic. The mutiregonalists are confused by local adaptions to environment that we see even in populations since the bottleneck our species went through.

Sometimes science does not advance by the falsification of one hypothesis at a time, but one funeral at a time. When the last of the multiregionalists have died, then that hypothesis will be put to rest. " Out of Africa " is the THEORY that is supported by biologists and geneticists and what anthropologists have to say is usually to incoherent to pay much attention to.

Answer 4

Just as much as everyone is.

Answer 5

They are not descended from all the homo erectus and certainly not the recent erectus.  There is no reason that the old ones might not be the only human ancestor but it is not likely. It is possible they contributed by some sort of hybrid in the past but it is almost universally rejected with only a handful of multiregionalists left.  The most prominent one is probably  Milford H. Wolpoff who is actually a brilliant guy.  I think he just sees the logical errors in "Out of Africa" and he also is fixated on comparing "bumps" in the skulls.  Some Asian erectus likely underwent radiation into multiple species and the Java ones seem to be the least humanlike of any of them.  They may have been descended from the Damanski (sp) Georgia erectus and be 2 million years or more removed from modern humans.  The recent find of erectus and habilis cohabitating Africa ~1.6 million years ago put quite a lot of doubt into the origins of erectus.

Answer 6

Well jon has the idea right, but accusing anthropologists of being incoherent while using poor grammar is rather sad, as is discarding alternative theories without explaining why.  Simply saying "genetics", isn't much of an answer.

The possibility remains that homo erectus may have been able to interbreed with homo sapiens or other early humans, which would blend the out of Africa and multiregional models.  Obviously Homo sapiens now dominate the planet, and the chances of homo erectus simply evolving into homo sapiens within the past 25,000 years is rather impossible without the aid of interbreeding.  The most likely scenario is that they were simply outmatched by the homo sapiens and died off.

Answer 7

I agree with the people before me: the human ancestors modern asian populations were much more similar to early human African populations than H. erectus populations.

Answer 8

That sounds probable, it is far deeper into this subject than I have delved. Part of me believes we all are descendants, the other part of me is there has been a third party intervention.

The hand of God or genetic manipulation.

I am not mocking you, it is just as I have aged I have read much about that option.

Answer 9

The possibility exists, despite jonmcn49's put-down. Unlike religionists' unfounded faith, scientific theories are written to be disproved by other honest scientists. However, when their theories - such as Darwin's - survive the test of time, a reasonable human accepts them, until further notice. Followers of Christ, unfortunately, are blatantly unreasonable.