Star. Ships ... and Hobbits

I got my copy of Gordon White's book 'Star. Ships' two days ago in the post from the UK and started reading it this morning.

On the first page of the book Gordon mentions the "Indonesian hobbit" and I thought to myself, now there is a creature I haven't heard much about for a while, then I check the ABC news headlines after reading that chapter and see this headline - 

ANU researchers discount theory Indonesian hobbits evolved from Homo erectus
"A controversial theory that a mysterious species known as hobbits were closely linked to modern humans has been ruled out by Australian scientists.
Hobbits, scientifically known as Homo floresiensis, were first discovered during an archaeological dig on the Indonesian island of Flores in 2003.
The species, which stood about 1 metre tall and weighed about 25 kilograms, was known to live in the area as recently as 54,000 years ago.
A major theory about their origin held that they descended from human ancestor Homo erectus, shrinking in stature over hundreds of generations.
However, a new study from the Australian National University (ANU), which analysed characteristics of the hobbit skeletons, found they were more likely descended from hominids in Africa and could be far older than predicted.
Professor Colin Groves, who worked on the study, said the species likely evolved from the older Homo habilis.
We think it very unlikely that it was descended from Homo erectus, and in fact its sister species - that is the one it is most closely related to - is Homo habilis, which lived in Africa about 1.5 to 2 million years ago."
The study found several points of difference between Homo floresiensis skeletons and those of Homo erectus.
Study leader Debbie Argue said the structure of the Homo floresiensis jaw was inconsistent with that of Homo erectus.
"We looked at whether Homo floresiensis could be descended from Homo erectus," she said.
"Logically, it would be hard to understand how you could have that regression - why would the jaw of Homo erectus evolve back to the primitive condition we see in Homo floresiensis?"
Researchers said they were 99 per cent sure the species was not descended from Homo erectus, and could totally discount the theory that hobbits were malformed modern humans."

That news story kind of proves Gordon's point when you read the first chapter of the book.
And I like how the study leader is named Debbie Argue.
I also thought her name linked up nicely to the last major flood event which hit Australia and New Zealand, Cyclone Debbie:-) 

Cyclone Debbie's path

Those Debbie synchs just keep coming and if you have read my post you'd know what I mean;-) -

Not a Week to Clown Around with Fish it Seems
Hopefully as I read through Gordon's book he might mention a plate of shrimp:-)

Please note: the views expressed to the introduction of the above video are those of the podcaster's and not necessarily those views of my own, it's only Gordon's interview I was interested in, not the POV of the Aeon Byte host.

So far, the book has started off with a bang for me ... let's see what else the Trickster has in store for me as I read on.

UPDATE: November 2021

While Gordon's book was worth a read I thought, I have since cast the book adrift at the Bribie Island Book Exchange, since I had no plans in the future to read it again and I thought it was better to circulate the book rather than it sit on my bookcase until I keel over ... it's not like the book was a personally signed copy, or it still would have been anchored in my bookcase:-)