Mandible with cut marks
The problem with trying to maintain a belief that Earth is between 6 and 10 thousand years old is that 99.9975% of its history occurred earlier than 10,000 years ago, so almost everything archaeologists and geologists discover will prove to be from before you believe Earth existed, which, for normal people, might just be more than a hint that Earth is considerably older than you think.
Not so for creationists however, who consider their beliefs to be sacred and unfalsifiable, so the facts must be wrong.
The traditional way is to declare that radioactive decay rates on which geological formations and archaeological artifacts are dated must have changed, sometimes by many orders of magnitude.
These same creationists will also argue in a different context that the laws of nature which govern the structure and behaviour of the Universe and everything in it are so finely tuned to support life, that they must have been set by an intelligent designer.
However one of those 'fine-tuned' parameters is the weak nuclear force that binds the protons and neutrons in the atomic nuclei and for a radioactive atom to decay means that a quantum fluctuation in the energy levels in some of these particles must exceed the weak force binding them together, so the particle is ejected. But, for radioactive decay rates to be several orders of magnitude higher, the weak nuclear force would need to be much lower, below the point at which even stable atomic nuclei form at all. This means, when they believe the universe was created along with atoms, planets and life were created, there would have been no atoms to make it all from. Life would have been impossible.
An added problem is that scientists have shown that radioactive decay rates of different elements remain absolutely constant in a range of extreme temperature and pressure conditions, so there appears to be no support whatsoever for the declaration that decay rates have changed by several orders of magnitude so that an age of 10,000 year or less just happens to look like 300 million years or whatever finding is being waved aside.
If there were any merit in the creationist claim of a fine-tuned Universe, then it has been fine-tuned to make it look 14 billion years old, Earth to look nearly 4 billion years old and living organisms to have been on it for most of that time.
With that in mind then, researchers have just announced that they have found evidence of the presence of hominins in Eurasia 2 million years ago, which pushes back the earliest evidence of hominin presence outside Africa by at least 150,000 years to a time considerably earlier than Homo sapiens first appear in the fossil record - supporting the theory that the earliest migration into Eurasia was by an archaic hominin such as H. erectus.
What information do you have on the archaeological site of Grăunceanu, Romania? Grăunceanu, also known as Grăunceanu Neolithic Tell, is an important archaeological site in Romania. It is located in the Olt County near the village of Drăgănești-Olt. The site is part of the Neolithic and early Chalcolithic settlements of the region, which were linked to the Vădastra and later cultures.The discovery by a team of researchers led by Ohio University Associate Professor of Anthropology Dr. Sabrina Curran is the subject of an open access paper in Nature Communications and an article in Ohio Today:
Here are some key details about the site:
- Cultural Significance:
Grăunceanu is associated primarily with the Vădastra culture, which flourished in the 5th millennium BCE. This culture is notable for its distinctive pottery, characterized by intricate geometric designs and polished surfaces, as well as its well-developed agricultural practices.- Archaeological Features:
- Tells:The site is a tell, a type of mound created by successive layers of human habitation. Tells like Grăunceanu provide a vertical stratigraphy that helps archaeologists study the development of ancient communities over time.
- Artifacts:Excavations have uncovered pottery, tools, and other artifacts that provide insight into the daily life, trade, and artistic achievements of the inhabitants.
- Geographical Context:
The site lies in the fertile plains of the Danube region, which provided ideal conditions for agriculture and settlement during the Neolithic period. Its proximity to water sources and other natural resources would have supported a thriving community.- Research and Excavation:
Archaeological investigations at Grăunceanu have contributed to the broader understanding of Neolithic and Chalcolithic cultures in Southeastern Europe. Romanian and international archaeologists have studied the site to explore topics such as settlement patterns, social structures, and cultural exchange.
Research team led by OHIO’s Sabrina Curran finds new evidence that pushes back the arrival of early hominins in Europe; discovery published in Nature Communications
Research led by Ohio University Associate Professor of Anthropology Dr. Sabrina Curran reveals new evidence of early hominin activity in Europe, suggesting that hominins were present on the continent far earlier than previously thought.
Research led by Ohio University Associate Professor of Anthropology Dr. Sabrina Curran reveals new evidence of early hominin activity in Europe, suggesting that hominins were present on the continent far earlier than previously thought.
The team of researchers, also led by co-principal investigators Dr. Alexandru Petculescu, of the “Emil Racoviţă” Institute of Speleology, Romanian Academy in Bucharest, Romania and Dr. Claire E. Terhune, an associate professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Arkansas, have uncovered multiple cut marked bones that appear to have been made by early hominins using stone tools at the site of Grăunceanu, Romania. These cut marks, dating to approximately 1.95 million years ago, represent some of the earliest evidence of tool use and meat processing in Eurasia.
The discovery, published in Nature Communications, sheds new light on the timing and extent of hominin dispersal across Eurasia. While previous evidence indicated hominin presence in Dmanisi, Georgia, around 1.8 million years ago, the discovery at Grăunceanu pushes this timeline even further back, suggesting that hominins may have been present in Eurasia by at least 2 million years ago.
The discovery of these cut marks is significant because it pushes back the timeline of hominin activity in Eurasia. While evidence of stone tools has been found in other parts of the world, the presence of these marks on bones offers a rare and valuable glimpse into the behavior of early human ancestors.
Dr. Sabrina Curran, lead author.
Department of Sociology & Anthropology
Ohio University, Athens, Ohio, USA.
Curran and team’s research builds on decades of previous excavations in Romania, where major fossil discoveries were made in the 1960s and 1980s. The bones, which had been curated in the “Emil Racoviţă” Institute of Speleology and the Museum of Oltenia, were largely overlooked until recent re-examinations by Curran and her international team.
Associate Professor of Anthropology Dr. Sabrina Curran conducts research with a student.We didn’t initially expect to find much, but during a routine check of the collections we found several cut marked bones. This led to further investigation in collaboration with Dr. Briana Pobiner of the Smithsonian Institution and Dr. Michael Pante, of Colorado State University, and the discovery of other distinct marks across different bones, suggesting deliberate butchering activities.
Dr. Sabrina Curran.
The discovery is especially notable because it predates the well-known Dmanisi site in Georgia—previously considered the earliest evidence of hominin activity outside of Africa—by roughly 200,000 years. This new finding places Romania as a crucial location for understanding the spread and behaviors of early human ancestors.
The findings are supported by biostratigraphic data and high-resolution U-Pb dating techniques, which have established the site's age with remarkable precision. In addition, Dr. Virgil Drăguşin and the team used isotope analysis to reconstruct the environments that these hominins would have experienced in this area at the time. Those results indicate that the region would have experienced seasonal fluctuations in temperature, much like today, but perhaps with increased levels of rainfall.
According to Curran, this discovery has significant implications for our understanding of human evolution, suggesting that early hominins may have had a widespread presence across Eurasia long before the more established hominin sites in Europe.
The Grăunceanu site represents a pivotal moment in our understanding of human prehistory, Curran said. “It demonstrates that early hominins had already begun to explore and inhabit diverse environments across Eurasia, showing an adaptability that would later play a crucial role in their survival and spread.
The evidence coming out of Romania suggests that early hominins were much more adaptable than we previously thought,” Curran added. “These early humans were capable of surviving and thriving in a variety of environments.
The history of human evolution is far more complex and intricate than we could have imagined, and we are just beginning to uncover the many chapters of that story.
Dr. Sabrina Curran.
In addition to the cut-marked bones, Curran’s team has also uncovered fossils of a wide range of species that lived in Romania at the time, shedding light on the environment in which these early humans lived. The site, which once hosted a diverse range of species, has yielded fossils of saber-toothed cats, giraffes, and even an extinct species of pangolin. This finding highlights the extraordinary biodiversity of the region during the early Pleistocene.
In addition to being published in Nature Communications, Curran and her team will present their findings at the American Association of Biological Anthropologists (AABA) conference in March 2025.
AbstractIt's clear from the abstract, that the team used Uranium-Lead (U-Pb) dating which is highly accurate and subject to minimal error due to contamination so there is little doubt about the accuracy of the radiometric dating. I have explained this method in detail in a previous blog post, but for the doubters:
The timing of the initial dispersal of hominins into Eurasia is unclear. Current evidence indicates hominins were present at Dmanisi, Georgia by 1.8 million years ago (Ma), but other ephemeral traces of hominins across Eurasia predate Dmanisi. However, no hominin remains have been definitively described from Europe until ~1.4 Ma. Here we present evidence of hominin activity at the site of Grăunceanu, Romania in the form of multiple cut-marked bones. Biostratigraphic and high-resolution U-Pb age estimates suggest Grăunceanu is > 1.95 Ma, making this site one of the best-dated early hominin localities in Europe. Environmental reconstructions based on isotopic analyzes of horse dentition suggest Grăunceanu would have been relatively temperate and seasonal, demonstrating a wide habitat tolerance in even the earliest hominins in Eurasia. Our results, presented along with multiple other lines of evidence, point to a widespread, though perhaps intermittent, presence of hominins across Eurasia by at least 2.0 Ma.
Introduction
Current evidence for the earliest appearance of hominins outside Africa comes from the site of Dmanisi, Georgia. Dated to 1.85-1.77 Ma1, the Dmanisi assemblage includes a large number of hominin remains2, as well as lithics and evidence of hominin modification of animal remains (e.g., butchery marks3). This site clearly demonstrates a hominin presence in Southwest Asia/ Eastern Europe by the Early Pleistocene (Gelasian), yet the exact timing of the initial dispersal of hominins out of Africa and the long-term success of these dispersals is debated (e.g.,4). This is especially true for Europe, where there is an ongoing discourse regarding the timing of hominin presence in southern and northern Europe5,6. Updated chronologies for fossil localities in Asia (especially China7) and a growing number of localities that may represent fleeting or ephemeral traces of hominin activity (e.g., lithics and/or anthropogenic modifications of bones unaccompanied by hominin fossils) throughout Eurasia increasingly suggest hominins were likely present in Eurasia prior to Dmanisi (Fig. 1).Fig. 1: Map of fossil localities showing evidence of hominins (either hominin fossils, lithics, or cut-marked bones) in northern Africa and Eurasia prior to 1.0 Ma.
Sites shown in blue text are suggested to be > 2 Ma. Inset in the lower left corner shows locations of fossil sites discussed in this study. Citations for fossil localities are provided in Supplementary Data 4. Blank world map data with country borders was drawn from Wikimedia Commons (CC-BY-SA 3.0). Map inset images are drawn from satellite imagery available via Google Earth (GoogleLandsat / CopernicusData SIO, NOAA, U.S. Navy, NGA, GEBCOGeoBasis-DE/BKG ©2009 and GoogleAirbusMaxar TechnologiesCNES / Airbus).
One Early Pleistocene Eurasian locality that could shed light on the initial dispersal of hominins into Eurasia is Grăunceanu, located in the Olteţ River Valley (ORV) of Romania. This region is situated in the Dacian sedimentary basin, just south of the Carpathian Mountains (Fig. 1). Deposits stem from the Tetoiu Formation, sediments of which represent multiple fluvio-lacustrine sequences that are rich in fossils8,9. This formation extends from the base of the Pleistocene to as young as ~1.3 Ma8 (see Supplementary Note 1). Grăunceanu was originally excavated in the 1960s and is one of the best known Early Pleistocene sites from East-Central Europe. Biochronological assessments indicate Grăunceanu is Late Villafranchian ( ~ 2.2–1.9 Ma) and is attributed to mammalian biostratigraphic zones MN17/MmQ19,10,11. At least 31 taxa (Supplementary Data 1) are identified from Grăunceanu, including mammoth, multiple species of bovids and cervids, giraffids, equids, rhinocerotids, multiple carnivore species, rodents (beaver, porcupine), ostrich, a large species of terrestrial monkey (Paradolichopithecus), and the youngest representative of pangolins in Europe11,12,13,14. Paleoecological analyses suggest Grăunceanu was a forest-steppe environment along the paleo-Olteţ river15. Other localities in the ORV include the penecontemporaneous sites of La Pietriș and Valea Roșcăi and the slightly biochronologically younger Fântâna lui Mitilan9, as well as multiple smaller localities. Though no hominin remains or in situ lithics have been identified from Grăunceanu, prior researchers have described lithics (see Supplementary Note 2 and Supplementary Fig. 1) from the nearby penecontemporaneous site of Dealul Mijlociu16, which Radulesco and Samson9 placed in a similar faunal horizon as Grăunceanu based on their biochronological comparisons.
Here we present evidence of hominin presence in Eurasia by at least 1.95 Ma in the form of cut-marked bones from the site of Grăunceanu, Romania, supported by high-precision uranium-lead (U-Pb) age estimates. We also perform high-resolution oxygen and carbon stable isotope analysis of a horse maxilla from the same site to reconstruct temperature seasonality and precipitation. We place these data into the context of the larger discussion regarding ephemeral traces of early hominin dispersals into Eurasia in the Early Pleistocene and argue in favor of a hominin presence across Eurasia by at least 2.0 Ma.
The technique depends on four facts:
- Zircon forms crystals (zircons) in cooling volcanic magma and ash.
- A small amount of uranium (U), some of which will be radioactive, with a very long, known half-life is included within the crystal lattice. The half-life is the time taken for half the atoms to have decayed.
- Lead cannot be incorporated because its electron configuration won't allow it.
- When radioactive uranium decays it results in stable isotopes of lead (Pb) which remain trapped within the zircon crystal matrix.
To quote the scientists, "Biostratigraphic and high-resolution U-Pb age estimates suggest Grăunceanu is > 1.95 Ma, making this site one of the best-dated early hominin localities in Europe."
So, creationists need to decide: have the parameters of the Universe changed to make 6-10,000 years or less look like 2 million years so life could not have existed when it was allegedly created, or were there hominids around in Eurasia 2 million years before 'Creation Week'?
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