The hypothesis is based on a 2013 find in Jordan:
Scardia and his colleagues, having analyzed these artifacts, argue that they are rudimentary tools used by early humans, crafted and discarded around 2.5 million years ago. If they are right, we may need to rethink which hominin species made the first forays out of the African cradle—and when.
The general consensus for decades has been that Homo erectus—an upright, long-legged species—was among the first hominins (or species closely related to modern humans) to leave Africa. Scientists presume members of this species traveled through the natural corridor of the Levant, a region along the eastern edge of the Mediterranean, around 2 million years ago.
Scardia’s study, published in the September issue of Quaternary Science Reviews, suggests a far earlier exit. It proposes that hominins capable of tool creation may have been on the doorstep of Asia some 500,000 years earlier. That claim helps explain the puzzling evolution of a hominin species found in Indonesia, as well as a contentious group of skulls found in Georgia.
Richard Kemeny, “Should the Story of Homo’s Dispersal Out of Africa Be Rewritten?” at Sapiens
One question mark is whether the stones are really tools. It’s hard to tell, especially because there are so few. A classic design inference problem.
See also: Ancient human group as a cold case nearly half a million years ago
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