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According to this site: http://www.d.umn.edu/cla/faculty/troufs/anth1602/pcaustr.html, australopithecine is the name of the subfamily which includes the various types of australopithecus and some other genera. Bingley
Bingley
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Australopithecus
Also it makes a great sixth line in a Double-Dactyl doggerel.
Which might make a catchy way for the students to remember it. Or even introduce a poetry unit! (run-and-hide-e)
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OP
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In the Sunday paper, there was mention of a 32,000-year-old work of art found in a cave. Well, actually several small objects carved out of ivory--a horse head and some of other figure or figures, can't remember exactly right now.
Anyway:
Here's a problem. Carbon-dating dated the figures at approximately 32,000 years of age. But couldn't that dating be quite inaccurate here? After all, the ivory came from some elephant, I suppose, that could be dated back 32,000 years; however, couldn't a group of artists have found that very old ivory and carved the figures much, much later?
Just asking...
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addict
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couldn't a group of artists have found that very old ivory and carved the figures much, much later?
I can't envision any way that carbon dating could disprove that proposition. If I understand how carbon dating works (and I don't), it only tells you when the thing you are dating (must be organic) died, because that's when it stops producing that form of carbon. I'll try to look into the intricacies of dating man-made artifacts more this week.
(And no off-color puns about "dating man-made artifacts", please -- my wife is not a cyborg, as far as I know)
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Carpal Tunnel
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While a carbon based life form is alive it takes up carbon from the environment and incorporates it into its structure. A certain percentage of this carbon is going to be the radioactive isotope carbon 14; the standard, stable form is carbon 12. Carbon 14 is Nitrogen 14 that, through the magic of nuclear physics has temporarily decided to become carbon, but will slowly decide to go back to being nitrogen. A given sample of carbon 14 will have half its atoms decide to revert in 5730 years, but, as long as the organism is alive it replenishes its carbon supply with available carbon. Once dead, it stops taking up environmental carbon and the clock starts ticking. By examining the ration of carbon 14 to carbon 12 in the sample, carbochronologists can roughly date a specimen. This is based on several assumptions, not the least of which is that the ratio of carbon 14 to carbon 12 tens of thousands of years ago was the same as it is now. As y'all have correctly sussed, this dating of ivory will only tell you when the animal that the ivory came from died. If the artifacts being dated were discovered in ashes from a prehistoric fire, then the date of the fire can be determined. This could give us supporting evidence for the date, if the dates of the fire and the ivory match.
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And the report from the Los Angeles Times/Washington Post news SErvice indicates carbon dating was used. Here's a quote:
"Radiocarbon dating indicates that the figurines are between 32,000 and 34,000 years old, making them the earliest known examples of figurative art."
I still would like to know the direct connection between the carbon dating dates and the people who made the figurines. It may be inferred in this next bit from the article:
"No skeletons were found in the cave near the objects, but other artifacts suggest that they were made by humans, not by Neanderthals, who still lives in the area at the time..."
Edit: Thanks, Bingley, for that link! Terrific to get to see a couple of the figures. I've copied the photographs to my photograph file!
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Took me long enough:
Diggedly, doggedly,
Louis B. Leakey the
famed anthropologist
scraping the ground
found some old bones that he
thought were our ancestors'.
Australopithecine
Lucy was found
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Took me long enough:worth the wait! 
formerly known as etaoin...
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