Alan Thorne facts for kids

Alan Gordon Thorne (born March 1, 1939 – died May 21, 2012) was an Australian scientist. He studied the human body (an anatomist) and was an expert on where Aboriginal Australian people came from. He also studied how humans evolved. Thorne became interested in old human history (archaeology) and evolution while teaching at the University of Sydney. Later, he became a professor at the Australian National University (ANU). Through his work at places like Lake Mungo and Kow Swamp, Thorne developed new ideas about how early humans spread across the world. These ideas were different from what many other scientists believed.

Alan Thorne's Career

Before becoming a university lecturer, Alan Thorne worked as a journalist. He later became a well-known academic. A famous anthropologist named Neil Macintosh was Thorne's teacher and mentor. Thorne earned his PhD under Macintosh at the University of Sydney. Thorne continued to build on Macintosh's ideas throughout his own career.

Thorne worked with many groups, including the Myanmar-Australian Archaeology Project. He was also part of the Australian Academy of the Humanities. He served on the executive committee for the International Association for the Study of Human Paleontology. Thorne was also famous for making many documentary films about human history, such as the series Man on the Rim.

Discoveries at Lake Mungo

In 1969, while teaching at the University of Sydney, Alan Thorne put together the ancient human remains known as LM1 (also called "Mungo Lady"). In 1974, he reconstructed LM3 ("Mungo Man"). He also reconstructed another fossil, WLH-50, in 1982.

Even though Jim Bowler found "Mungo Lady" and "Mungo Man," Thorne was the one who carefully put their bones back together and studied them. When he reconstructed "Mungo Lady," Thorne noticed her bones were thin and delicate, much like modern human bones. This was a big surprise. Other ancient Australian human bones from around the same time (about 25,000 years ago) were usually from taller people with thick skulls.

This difference made Thorne wonder about the common idea of "where did Homo sapiens (modern humans) come from?"

Challenging the "Out of Africa" Theory

Thorne's discovery of "Mungo Lady" made him question the "Out of Africa" theory. This theory suggests that modern humans left Africa in a recent, second big migration. "Mungo Lady" had an advanced skull and body structure, very similar to people today. But she lived in a time and place where scientists didn't expect to find such modern-looking humans, according to the "Out of Africa" theory.

Because of what he found at Lake Mungo, Thorne spent a lot of time developing a new theory. He believed there was only one major human migration out of Africa. This migration might have happened around two million years ago. He thought this first group was already Homo sapiens, not an earlier species like Homo erectus, as others believed. Thorne was confident in his new ideas, saying, "only one species of human has ever left Africa, and that is us."

For Thorne, the Lake Mungo study showed that instead of a second wave of Homo sapiens leaving Africa around 100,000 to 120,000 years ago, something called "regional continuity" happened. Thorne believed the second migration never occurred. He thought the first migration from Africa two million years ago was the start of all human evolution.

Kow Swamp Discoveries

Thorne was a key leader in the excavations at the Kow Swamp burial ground. This site is about 10 kilometers (6 miles) southeast of Cohuna, Victoria in Australia. Between 1968 and 1972, Thorne and his team uncovered 22 sets of human remains. Some of these dated back to the Pleistocene era (the Ice Age).

The work at Kow Swamp was part of Thorne's PhD research. He was praised for providing Australian anthropology with the first ancient human fossils found in clear, dated locations. By reconstructing these bones, Thorne and his team learned a lot about the features of people from that time. The Kow Swamp research gave great clues about what Australia's ancient ancestors might have looked like and how they lived. This work, along with other excavations in Australia and Asia, helped explore the idea of multiregional human evolution, which was different from the popular "Out of Africa" theory.

Studies of the Kow Swamp fossils also led to a different theory. The reconstructed bodies looked structurally similar to modern humans, even though they were from a very ancient time. Thorne and his colleagues believed this showed that the main "Out of Africa" theory might be wrong.

Regional Continuity Theory

The "regional continuity" theory has been important in the study of human history for many years. Many researchers have explored it to answer the big question of how humans evolved. This theory makes us question what we thought we knew about human anatomy. Thorne and his colleagues around the world believed "regional continuity" was a more likely story for human history.

The theory suggests that about two million years ago, Homo sapiens (not Homo erectus) left Africa. They then spread across the Middle East, into Europe, North and South America, Asia, and all the way to Australia. Thorne argued that all humans today came from this single, first journey.

The theory then explains that different types of early humans (like Homo erectus and Homo antecessor) are the reason for the different physical traits we see in modern humans. For example, tall, slender people in southern regions and short, stocky people in northern regions. A key part of this idea is that these different early human groups could have children together. Thorne used what he learned from his animal studies to support this. As time went on, this mixing of groups likely spread outwards. According to Thorne's theory, this continued mixing created the different human groups we see today.

Death

Alan Gordon Thorne passed away in Canberra on May 21, 2012, from Alzheimer's disease. He was 73 years old.

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