Africa’s new human ancestor sparks racial row
Johannesburg: Some prominent South Africans have dismissed the discovery of a new human ancestor as a racist theory designed to cast Africans as “subhuman”, an opinion that resonates in a country deeply bruised by apartheid.
“No one will dig old monkey bones to back up a theory that I was once a baboon. Sorry,” said Zwelinzima Vavi, former general secretary of the powerful trade union group Cosatu, a faithful ally of the ruling African National Congress (ANC).
“I am no grandchild of any ape, monkey or baboon — finish en klaar (Afrikaans for “that’s it”),” he said on his Twitter account, which is followed by more than 300,000 people.
His comments were backed by the South African Council of Churches (SACC), which was historically involved in the fight against apartheid. Vavi recalled that when South Africa was under apartheid rule he was a target of racist remarks
“I been also called a baboon all my life so did my father and his fathers.” Apartheid ended in 1994 after Nelson Mandela was elected as the country’s first black president in a democratic South Africa. Vavi’s comments came after last week’s discovery of Homo naledi, described by scientists as a new distant ancestor of humans.
The discovery of the ancient relative generated a huge amount of international interest. But the South African backlash has perplexed people around the world at a time when Darwin’s theory of evolution is widely accepted as fact. It “breathes new life into paranoia,” said prominent British biologist Richard Dawkins on his Twitter account this week.
“Whole point is we’re all African apes.” Lee Berger, an American working at Johannesburg’s University of the Witwatersrand and overseeing the Homo naledi dig, tried to keep his distance from the charged debate, though he did specifically clarify that man doesn’t descend from baboons. “For our scientists the search for human origins is one that celebrates all of humankind’s common origins on the continent of Africa,” he told AFP.
“The science is not asking questions of religion nor challenging anyone’s belief systems, it is simply exploring the fossil evidence for the origins of our species.” The body of Homo naledi resembles that of a modern man, but researchers say its orange-sized brain places it closer to Australopithecus, a group of extinct hominids that walked on two legs and lived around 2 million years ago.
Some 1,550 fossils were unearthed in the “Rising Star”, a cave located in the “Cradle of Humankind”, a site 50 kilometres northwest of Johannesburg that has proven over the years to be a rich source for palaeontologists. (AFP)
Air pollution kills 3.3 million worldwide, may double
Washington: Air pollution is killing 3.3 million people a year worldwide, according to a new study that includes this surprise: Farming plays a large role in smog and soot deaths in industrial nations.
Scientists in Germany, Cyprus, Saudi Arabia and Harvard University calculated the most detailed estimates yet of the toll of air pollution, looking at what caused it.
The study also projects that if trends don’t change, the yearly death total will double to about 6.6 million a year by 2050. The study, published Wednesday in the journal Nature, used health statistics and computer models.
About three quarters of the deaths are from strokes and heart attacks, said lead author Jos Lelieveld at the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry in Germany. The findings are similar to other less detailed pollution death estimates, outside experts said.
“About 6 percent of all global deaths each occur prematurely due to exposure to ambient air pollution. This number is higher than most experts would have expected, say, 10 years ago,” said Jason West, a University of North Carolina environmental sciences professor who wasn’t part of the study but praised it.
Air pollution kills more than HIV and malaria combined, Lelieveld said. With nearly 1.4 million deaths a year, China has the most air pollution fatalities, followed by India with 645,000 and Pakistan with 110,000.
The United States, with 54,905 deaths in 2010 from soot and smog, ranks seventh highest for air pollution deaths.
What’s unusual is that the study says that agriculture caused 16,221 of those deaths, second only to 16,929 deaths blamed on power plants. (AP)
Air Canada pilot diverts flight to save dog from freezing
Toronto: In a heart-warming incident, an Air Canada pilot diverted a flight to save the life of a pet dog on board after realising that a cargo hold heating unit of the plane failed, thus threatening the canine’s life.
The dog named ‘Simba’ was flying from Tel Aviv (Israel) to Toronto when the the pilot noticed a problem with the cargo area’s heating system.
“As soon as the crew became aware of the temperature issue, the captain grew rightfully concerned for the dog’s comfort and well-being,” Air Canada spokesman Peter Fitzpatrick told CNN.
“With the altitude it can become very uncomfortable, and possibly the situation could have been life-threatening if the flight had continued,” he added. The aircraft was diverted to Germany where the 7-year-old bulldog was boarded onto another flight, causing a delay of more than 1 hour for the original flight’s 200 passengers.
“While we recognise this was an inconvenience for our customers, the overall reaction was positive, particularly once people understood the dog was in potential danger but safe as a result of the diversion,” Peter said.
“It’s my dog, it’s like (my) child. It’s everything,” Simba’s owner German Kontorovich, who was also in the plane, said. “It was definitely the right thing to do,” a fellow passenger said.
According to aviation expert Phyl Durby, the diversion could cost the airline thousands of dollars in fuel costs, but called it the right decision as “the captain is responsible for all lives on board.” (PTI)
3D-printed shelter for astronauts on Mars designed
London: A French firm has designed a conceptual shelter for future astronauts on Mars that would be 3D-printed on the red planet using locally-available materials.
Resembling an igloo from the surface, the shelter, dubbed Sfero, would be partially buried beneath the ground. Access to the shelter would be gained by its one long corridor, which contains an airlock.
The interior comprises three floors. The uppermost floor measures just 3 sq m, and food can be grown here, while the next floor down measures 29 sq m and comprises a work area and bathroom. The lowermost floor measures 40 sq m and contains sleeping quarters. The occupants would navigate between each floor by a spiral staircase, ‘Gizmag’ reported. The firm Fabulous envisions that the red planet’s own substrata could be used as a raw material for 3D printing.
The process would involve a central mast that can extract iron from the planet’s soil and rock, and also seek out permafrost to turn into water and use as insulation between the structure’s inner and outer shell, reducing the effects of solar radiation. The firm envisions the shelter being tested in California’s Mojave Desert or somewhere in Hawaii, while the Gale Crater is slated as the shelter’s final Mars location.
The project has been created in response to NASA’s call for designs for 3D-printed habitats for Mars, despite the competition being only officially open to US residents, according to ‘Dezeen’. “We still decided to show the French expertise in 3D printing, space travel, and architecture, presenting a standout record,” said Fabulous founder Arnault Coulet. (PTI)
