Either way, whoever were here first, and second, and third, ........ were the first peoples. OF COURSE, many different groups would have drifted down from Asia, at all different times, along coasts from Malaya to Papua, and pushed their way (or not) into what was Australia.

Perhaps what Thorne meant was that similar skeletal remains to Mungo Man (and presumably Woman as well) have been found in very, very ancient China - i.e. not Chinese, but similar to those found from very ancient times in China. Everybody has moved about, including the people who were in China before the Chinese swept down from the North just three or four thousand years ago.

When people spread out from Africa, some moved along the coasts of Asia, probably at the rate of about a mile a year, while others ventured off north towards central and then eastern Asia - these have been called Denisovans. We're talking about tens of thousands of years ago, so people had plenty of time to have a good look at central and eastern Asia, spreading out and down the east Asian coast, some groups eventually reaching Malaya and Papua, etc.

Let's get real: movement out of Africa and along coasts was not only so slow and gradual that it was not perceptible to the groups, generation after generation, doing it, but also nobody had some sort of map and decided, "Okay, we've come 5,000 miles from Africa now, maybe we should stay here, in what will become known as 'Pakistan'", while other groups said, "Nah, let's keep going around the Malay Peninsula in about five thousand years, turn slightly left and move over the next five thousand years, through those islands which will later be called 'Indonesia', keep going past Papua, turn right over the land bridge down what will become known as Cape York, and keep going, until we are distributed across a huge continent, later known as 'Australia'. Those Denisovans can join us again later. And of course, much later, those fellas from India."

Just trying to bring some sense into the discussion :)

Joe

Why would that help, Foxy.? It is the same material put by the uneducated bullhead, of which I have just disposed. It attempts to show that the dispute raised over the DNA disposes of Thorne’s finding, which it does not.
You have already admitted that you want to confirm some nonsense fabricated in your own mind, when there is no evidence to back it.
Why ask whether the nonsense at your link would help?
Try to find something sensible.

Hi Joe, you seem to have confused me with someone else as I live in Tasmania, which is not anywhere near you. And I think you are bit more aged than me too.

You also seem to have confused my comments and seem to think I believe every oral recount/story told when it comes to Aboriginal heritage and experiences of invasion/colonization. I don’t. As my example of the Tasmanian experiences clearly demonstrated I do not simply believe everything told…or even written by some historians as ‘fact’. I can nominate two historians in particular, Lyndall Ryan and Philip Tardiff, who have clearly fabricated stories and presented them as ‘fact’.

My reference to Aboriginal recounts of historical events was about how ‘Dreaming stories’ detail actual events such as the inundation of the Bassian Plain (now Bass Strait). Underneath the waters of Port Phillip Bay is a waterfall, that still flows when the conditions are right, and Aboriginal oral histories still tell of it. Scientific exploration proved the oral histories to be correct. Here’s a link for you to have a look at/listen to:

http://www.abc.net.au/site-archive/rural/telegraph/content/2011/s3121248.htm

Hopefully others will also have a listen in too.

Foxy, we're wasting out time trying to inform the likes of Leo Lane and Leoj. I wonder what is about the name 'Leo'...seems it bestows a special type of ignorance and inability to recognise their opinions are not fact and easily countered. And when refuted by reputable and verifiable evidence they resort to diversions and name calling.

Seems Paul Hogan got it right by having a character name Leo Vanker (or something close to that and also nicely done by 'nicknamesnick' who described Joseph Banks as Joseph W@anks).

//nobody had some sort of map and decided, "Okay, we've come 5,000 miles from Africa now, maybe we should stay here, in what will become known as 'Pakistan'", while other groups said, "Nah, let's keep going around the Malay Peninsula in about five thousand years, turn slightly left and move over the next five thousand years, through those islands which will later be called 'Indonesia', keep going past Papua, turn right over the land bridge down what will become known as Cape York, and keep going, until we are distributed across a huge continent, later known as 'Australia'.//

Of course they didn't. Where would they have got the maps from?

The really interesting thing is that 10's and even 100's of thousands years after the facts, we can trace their courses of their migrations through genetics (and plot them on our nice shiny Mercator projection maps). Pretty cool, huh?

For some of our more aged posters who were probably old men (mentally if not physically) when Crick, Watson & Franklin discovered the structure of DNA, all this paleogenetics probably sounds like some of pseudoscience. Nothing to do with the proper study of prehistory.

But I bet there were stick-in-the-muds who said the same thing about radiocarbon dating when it was a new idea. And where are they now?

Dear minotaur,

You're right. I can see that I have wasted my time
here.
However, all is not lost. I got to meet you and read
your thoughts on the subject.

Thanks for your link and for sharing your knowledge
on this discussion. I appreciated it greatly.

I look forward to sharing more thoughts with you in future
discussions.

Enjoy your evening.