Really, it seems like every time I turn around some creationist or another is trying to argue that Australopithecus afarensis is not a transitional fossil because there are some osteological indicators of knuckle walking in their wrist. Safarti is a case in point. Normally, most creationists quotemine Richard Leakey when this comes up, however, with the passing of time all things change. So now the try to quotemine Richmond and Strait’s Nature article (along with Collard and Aiello’s Nature commentary). Anyway, here is Sarfarti’s version of the argument.
Yet this is contrary to evidence from Lucy’s upper limb bones that her species (Australopithecus afarensis) could lock its wrists just as modern apes can, suggesting that Lucy was a knuckle walker in a similar way.
All I can say is “so what” Richmond and Strait also identify some traits in the human wrist and hand that they claim are indicative of weight bearing (e.g. knuckle walking) so this does not immediately bar A. afarensis a role in our ancestry. So why do creationists even try to make the argument?
While I ponder this, I will be working on a post about an interesting paper on paleodemography and the plague (okay, you caught me, I’m procrastinating on writing that post, sigh, it will be up tomorrow).