Introduction

1 of 20 11/13/2007 7:51 AM A Critique of the Out of Africa Model Michael Maystadt Illinois State University In the scientific community, there is a general consensus as to the origin and history of modern humans; most anthropologists agree that the earliest members of our species, Homo sapiens, emerged in Africa relatively recently and migrated to all parts of the earth. Stringer claimed that Homo sapiens only emerged in Africa. He based this on the fossil record, which showed that the oldest Homo sapiens fossils are from Africa. Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) lineage studies by Wilson, Cann and Stoneking in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s also reinforced this model. The Out of Africa model therefore states that all Homo sapiens evolved in Africa quite recently (circa 150,000 years ago) and replaced all other forms of the genus Homo with little or no interbreeding between the two. Wolpoff has been a strong critic of the Out of Africa model; he claims that modern humans evolved in separate parts of the world and have been exchanging genes for hundreds of thousands of years. He cites contradictions in Stringer’s argument such as the non-African appearance of early Homo sapiens fossils outside of Africa, and inconsistencies in the interpretation of mtDNA evidence. Templeton has also raised questions regarding the mtDNA evidence and what it actually shows. This paper demonstrates that there are significant inconsistencies between the Out of Africa model and all the available archaeological, fossil, and mtDNA evidence. The conclusion reached is that the Out of Africa model is not a legitimate explanation for the emergence and subsequent spread of Homo sapiens.