KANIN

Hmmmm, lemme think...

This one is a little basic, but I think about the fact that John Laurens's death was considered Hamilton's largest wound from the war frequently. Their whole affair is so interesting to me, and I daydream of a version of Hamilton that includes it.

Researchers think that an early species of human from around the Middle Pleistocene era, homo naledi, may have practiced some kind of religion due to their complex burials! If I remember correctly, at least one body was found buried with a tool. These burials were found in the Rising Star cave system in South Africa, which makes the whole thing even more interesting bc the journey was not at all easy. It was actually pretty dangerous, which signifies even more importance to their burial rituals. There is also evidence of art, fire, and intentional, repetitive burials in this cave system! There's a really good documentary about it on Netflix called Unknown: The Cave of Bones that I highly recommend! The whole thing is very interesting, especially when you take into account their brain size compared to modern day humans

Another fun one is that, during the African Humid Period, the Sahara Desert used to be green and fertile! I won't go too far into the how, but basically the Earth wobbles and that impacts the amount of solar radiation any given area receives, leading to the African Humid Period. There are cave paintings depicting all sorts of fauna and even what looks to be people swimming! It's absolutely fascinating! I've talked about him before, but there's this really cool video by Milo Rossi, aka Miniminuteman, about it called the Ghosts of the Green Sahara that I've linked, definitely check it out!!!

While it is absoutly possible Naledi practiced ritual burial, created art, etc- this is an EXTREAMLY huge claim, like field changing claim, made by the lead researcher Lee Berger and much the paleoanth community finds his methodology to be lacking and insufficient. I have met people in anthropology with a range of opinions to be fair, (my favorite professor said Berger just "wanted to be famous in a field where people dont gets famous") but even on the optimistic end its usually "this is promising" not "this is true". Homo Naledi had a brain case size around 660cc, the only hominins known to practice ritual burial are us, Homo Sapiens, and Homo Neanderthalensis- who have brain cases of 1300cc & 1400cc respectively. Homo Naledi is more comparable to late Australopithocines or Homo Rudolphensis. Which makes this a reallyyy big claim.

Idk you nor is this a critism of you to be clear!! I'm just passionate abt this and people spreading the burial claims is part of why I take such issue with the way Berger handled this site. The general public has a pretty limited understanding of what anthropology is and what we do- which usually boils down to Indiana Jones, Bones, Lucy fossil, and maybe in some cases bad shit like Ancient Aliens lol. Not to say you have to be an anthropologist to spot presumptuous claims or learn about anthropology, or that you dont know things about it (again idk you xD) just most folks choose not to or are uninterested in it. Which makes documentaries based on highly criticized pre-prints... concerning lol. People don't realize how huge of a claim this is, or know how to fact check it.

Unknown Cave of Bones was made when Berger had released a pre-print in Elife, which allows publication of pre-prints so long as peer reviews are shared along side it. All except I belive 1 reviewer was extreamly critical of his claims, generally taking issue with the paper making presumptuous claims or neglecting to use standard methodology surrounding the supposed art work in the cave as well as insufficient evidence of burial. One paper critiquing him is actually authored by someone he sites as being the originator of his non-standard methodology which is also... not good for him lol.

Ie- Berger made a documentary knowing his claims had not been published and were generally rejected by his field.

Later he made revisions to the paper which dampened down the claims and imo (and in the opinion of a few returning reviewers) this was an improvement. However Berger would advertise these revisions on Twitter implying the revisions proved burial and THAT was why it was received better.

None of this is meant to be a hit piece on Berger, he is a legitimate scientist and muchhhh more established, educated, and accomplished in the field than myself. But overall paleoanth folks are a lot more critical of his work at Rising Star than the general public, considering Berger has reach that others don't through his work in science communication.

I would really recommend these papers if interested in some of the critism of Berger, or if you're not into reading long papers (fair lol) Paleoanthropologist Gutsick Gibbon has covered updates in the paper & site on YouTube for a few years!

Kimberly Foecke et al “No Sedimentological Evidence for Deliberate Burial by Homo Naledi

Maria Martinon-Torres et al No scientific evidence that Homo naledi buried their dead and produced rock art

Gutsick Gibbon videos (sorry she doesn't seem to have them in a playlist TwT)

The girls are fighting!!!