Voices
sils that represent the complete
record, as preservational events
are in themselves very rare. With
the discovery of Zinjanthropus at
Olduvai Gorge in 1959, my grandmother Mary Leakey pioneered
the research in East Africa, with
my grandfather Louis. Many more
spectacular fossil finds have since
been made both in Africa and
elsewhere, by many researchers
driven to understand our past.
These are exciting times, and new
and often unexpected finds are
announced quite regularly. Since I
presented this TEDTalk in 2008,
we now know of several new species of hominins from different
places in Africa, including additional fossil material from Lake
Turkana, helping us to understand
our own genus, Homo.
Technology has furnished us
with a fascinating genetic story as
well, allowing us to map the migration of early humans in more
intricate detail than ever before.
The work of Spencer Wells, a National Geographic Explorer in
Residence, allows us to participate
in his study by providing a cheek
swab to discover how we fit into
this incredible journey of humanity. In addition, genetic research
has confirmed that there was
LOUISE
LEAKEY
HUFFINGTON
07.14.13
We are undoubtedly
the cause of the sixth mass
extinction event that the
planet has seen in its history.”
gene flow between Homo sapiens
and Neanderthals. Perhaps even
more surprising was the further
discovery that we humans also
shared genes with a totally different hominid species, only known
from DNA extracted from a finger
bone found in a cave in Denisova
in southern Siberia.
To put the history of life on
planet earth into a time perspective, imagine unrolling a toilet
roll down a hillside. If there are
400 sheets of tissue paper in the
roll, then the very first life in the
oceans is seen at sheet 240. The
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spreading” every Friday, anchored in
an exceptional TEDTalk. This week’s
TEDTalk is accompanied by an original
blog post from the featured speaker,
along with new op-eds, thoughts
and responses from the HuffPost
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