Page 669 - Atlas of Creation Volume 2

Harun Yahya

sources. The famous French popular scientific maga-
zine Science et Vie made the subject the cover of its May
1999 issue. Under the headline "Adieu Lucy"—Lucy
being the most important fossil example of the species
Australopithecus afarensis—the magazine reported that

apes of the species Australopithecus would have to be
removed from the human family tree. In this article,
based on the discovery of another Australopithecus fos-
sil known simply as St W573, the following sentences
appear:

A new theory states that the genus Australopithecus is

not the root of the human race… The results arrived at
by the only woman authorized to examine St W573 are
different from the normal theories regarding
mankind's ancestors: this destroys the hominid family
tree. Large primates, considered the ancestors of man,
have been removed from the equation of this family

tree… Australopithecus and Homo (human) species do
not appear on the same branch. Man's direct ancestors
are still waiting to be discovered. 152

Homo Habilis

The great similarity between the skeletal and cra-
"GOODBYE, LUCY"
nial structures of australopithecines and chimpanzees, Scientific discoveries have left evolutionist assumptions

and the refutation of the claim that these creatures regarding "Lucy," once considered the most important
walked upright, have caused great difficulty for evolu- example of the Australopithecus genus, completely un-
founded. The famous French scientific magazine,
tionary paleoanthropologists. The reason is that, ac-
Science et Vie, accepted this truth under the headline
cording to the imaginary evolution scheme, Homo "Goodbye, Lucy," in its February 1999 issue, and con-
erectus comes after Australopithecus. As the genus name firmed that Australopithecus cannot be considered an
Homo (meaning "man") implies, Homo erectus is a ancestor of man.

human species, and its skeleton is straight. Its cranial ca-
pacity is twice as large as that of Australopithecus. A direct transition from Australopithecus, which is a chim-
panzee-like ape, to Homo erectus, which has a skeleton no different from that of man of today, is out of the
question, even according to evolutionist theory. Therefore, "links"— that is, transitional forms—are needed.
The concept of Homo habilis arose from this necessity.

The classification of Homo habilis was put forward in the 1960s by the Leakeys, a family of "fossil
hunters." According to the Leakeys, this new species, which they classified as Homo habilis, had a relatively
large cranial capacity, the ability to walk upright and to use stone and wooden tools. Therefore, it could have
been the ancestor of man.
New fossils of the same species unearthed in the late 1980s were to completely change this view. Some
researchers, such as Bernard Wood and C. Loring Brace, who relied on those newly-found fossils, stated that

Homo habilis (which means "skillful man," that is, man capable of using tools), should be classified as
Australopithecus habilis, or "skillful southern ape," because Homo habilis had a lot of characteristics in common
with the austalopithecine apes. It had long arms, short legs and an ape-like skeletal structure just like
Australopithecus. Its fingers and toes were suitable for climbing. Their jaw was very similar to that of today's
apes. Their 600 cc average cranial capacity is also an indication of the fact that they were apes. In short, Homo

habilis, which was presented as a different species by some evolutionists, was in reality an ape species just
like all the other australopithecines.
Research carried out in the years since Wood and Brace's work has demonstrated that Homo habilis was

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