The 1974 discovery of a 3.2-million-year-old skeleton named Lucy revolutionized the understanding of human evolution. Found by paleoanthropologist Donald Johanson in Ethiopia, Lucy’s knee bone showed she walked upright, despite having a small brain. This challenged the previous belief that brain growth and bipedalism developed simultaneously. Lucy’s discovery suggested that walking upright preceded the evolution of larger brains, prompting a shift away from the oversimplified “March of Progress” model. Scientists now view human evolution as a complex process, resembling a “bushy tree” or “braided river” with multiple human species coexisting, evolving, and sometimes interbreeding. Lucy’s classification as Australopithecus afarensis paved the way for a deeper exploration of humanity’s origins, highlighting the ongoing search for missing evolutionary links and a fuller understanding of our lineage.
SOURCE: DW
