Page 672 - Atlas of Creation Volume 2

... In other words, with the hypodigms of H. habilis and H. rudolfensis assigned to it, the genus Homo is not a good

genus. Thus, H. habilis and H. rudolfensis (or Homo habilis sensu lato for those who do not subscribe to the taxonomic
subdivision of "early Homo") should be removed from Homo. The obvious taxonomic alternative, which is to trans-
fer one or both of the taxa to one of the existing early hominin genera, is not without problems, but we recommend
that, for the time being, both H. habilis and H. rudolfensis should be transferred to the genus Australopithecus. 160

The conclusion of Wood and Collard corroborates the conclusion that we have maintained here: "Primitive
human ancestors" do not exist in history. Creatures that are alleged to be so are actually apes that ought to be
assigned to the genus Australopithecus. The fossil record shows that there is no evolutionary link between

these extinct apes and Homo, i.e., human species that suddenly appears in the fossil record.

Homo erectus

According to the fanciful scheme suggested by evolutionists, the internal evolution of the Homo genus is as
follows: First Homo erectus, then so-called "archaic" Homo sapiens and Neanderthal man (Homo sapiens nean-
derthalensis), and finally, Cro-Magnon man (Homo sapiens sapiens). However all these classifications are really

only variations and unique races in the human family. The difference between them is no greater than the dif-
ference between an Inuit and an African, or a pygmy and a European.
Let us first examine Homo erectus, which is referred to as the most primitive human species. As the name
implies, Homo erectus means "man who walks upright." Evolutionists have had to separate these fossils from
earlier ones by adding the qualification of "erectness," because all the available Homo erectus fossils are straight

to an extent not observed in any of the australopithecines or so-called Homo habilis specimens. There is no dif-
ference between the postcranial skeleton of man of today and that of Homo erectus.
The primary reason for evolutionists' defining Homo erectus as "primitive" is the cranial capacity of its skull
(900-1,100 cc), which is smaller than the average present-day man, and its thick eyebrow projections. However,
there are many people living today in the world who have the same cranial capacity as Homo erectus (pyg-
mies, for instance) and other races have protruding eyebrows (Native Australians, for instance). It is a com-

monly agreed-upon fact that differences in cranial capacity do not necessarily denote differences in intelligence
or abilities. Intelligence depends on the internal organization of the brain, rather than on its volume. 161
The fossils that have made Homo erectus known to the entire world are those of Peking man and Java man
in Asia. However, in time it was realized that these two fossils are not reliable. Peking man consists of some el-

ements made of plaster whose originals have been lost, and Java man is composed of a skull fragment plus a
pelvic bone that was found yards away from it with no indication that these belonged to the same creature.
This is why the Homo erectus fossils found in Africa have gained such increasing importance. (It should also be
noted that some of the fossils said to be Homo erectus were included under a second species named Homo er-
gaster by some evolutionists. There is disagreement among the experts on this issue. We will treat all these fos-
sils under the classification of Homo erectus.)

The most famous of the Homo erectus specimens found in Africa is the fossil of "Narikotome Homo erectus,"
or the "Turkana Boy," which was found near Lake Turkana in Kenya. It is confirmed that the fossil was that of
a 12-year-old boy, who would have been 1.83 meters tall in adolescence. The upright skeletal structure of the
fossil is no different from that of man of today. The American paleoanthropologist Alan Walker said that he
doubted that "the average pathologist could tell the difference between the fossil skeleton and that of a today's

human." Concerning the skull, Walker wrote that he laughed when he saw it because "it looked so much like a
Neanderthal." 162 As we will see in the next chapter, Neanderthals are a present-day human race. Therefore,
Homo erectus is also a human race of today.
Even the evolutionist Richard Leakey states that the differences between Homo erectus and man of today are
no more than racial variance:

One would also see differences: in the shape of the skull, in the degree of protrusion of the face, the robustness of the

brows and so on. These differences are probably no more pronounced than we see today between the separate ge-
ographical races of modern humans. Such biological variation arises when populations are geographically sepa-
rated from each other for significant lengths of time. 163

670 Atlas of Creation Vol. 2