Listener supported WNYC Studios. It's the 50th anniversary of the discovery of our very, very, very old ancestor, Lucy. And she doesn't look a day over 3.2 million years old. I certainly thought that she would be terribly important to the field of paleoanthropology. I had no idea that she would be the most famous skeleton found in the 20th century. It's Monday, November 25th, and you're listening to Science Friday.
I'm Sci-Fi producer Rasha Aridi. On November 24th, 1974, 50 years ago, a pair of paleoanthropologists made the discovery of a lifetime, a set of 47 bones hidden in the dusty rock. rocky hills of a fossil site in Hadar, Ethiopia. The skeleton belonged to a 3.2 million year old hominin nicknamed Lucy. She marked the very first specimen of Australopithecus afarensis, a species of early hominins that were very likely our own ancestors. Here's Sci-Fi's Kathleen Davis with more.
Lucy might be the most famous fossil in the world, and she's transformed our understanding of human evolution. So today, we're looking back at 50 years of Lucy with the people who know her best. The paleo legend who discovered her, Dr. Don Johansson, founding director of the Institute of Human Origins at Arizona State University.
and Dr. Zarai Alemseged, paleoanthropologist at the University of Chicago. Welcome to Science Friday and welcome back. Happy to be here. Wonderful. Thank you. Thanks for having us. So, Don. I want to start with you. Can you believe it's been 50 years? How are you feeling this week? Well, you know, I went back to Ethiopia a couple of times this year and saw Lucy after 50 years. And she didn't look a day older.
I look in the mirror in the morning when I shave and I realize that 50 years is quite a long time. It is amazing to think about how quickly that time has gone. and how well-known Lucy has become and what an impact she's had not only on the average person's thinking about human origins, but on the science itself. Take me back to that day where you discovered Lucy. What were you doing? How did you find her?
Well, it was a Sunday morning, and my student, Tom Gray, and I were out recording the location of a discovery of a beautiful pig. We think pigs are beautiful at 3.2 million years. On the way back to our Land Rover, it was getting well over 100 degrees, and we were thinking about going for a swim in the river and having some lunch. But I am always looking at the ground.
So I happened to look over my right shoulder and I spotted a little fragment of bone, just about two inches long, that had looked like a wrench with a little notch in it. And it's part of the forearm. bone that allows us to flex and extend at the elbow. And it looked peculiar to me because I thought at first it was probably a baboon. It was so small. But as I bent down, picked it up and looked at it, I could see that it was not a baboon. It was not from an antelope or a gazelle.
It was from a human ancestor. And as we kneeled down and looked closer at the ground, we saw bits of a skull, bits of a lower jaw, bits of ribs. And I realized that right there at my feet. was a partial skeleton which i knew was older than three million years i didn't know who it was but i had no idea that she would be the most famous skeleton found in the 20th century so is the right tell me
How did you meet Lucy and how did she inspire you? Well, when Lucy was discovered, I was a little kid, so I was not aware of her impact. It was not until I was assigned to work at the National Museum of Ethiopia, where Don and his colleagues had a steward Lucy. that I start to spend time with Lucy and many other fossils that were discovered from across Ethiopia.
So for me, the inspiration and the first contact with Lucy was actually hanging out with her physically on a daily basis. So growing up in Ethiopia, was Lucy like a local celebrity? In Ethiopia growing up, she was not as popular as she is today. But clearly, you could find her name in textbooks, in lectures in some places. But if you go to Ethiopia today, you will see Lucy Restaurant, Lucy Cafe, Lucy, you name it, you know. So, yeah, she...
has now led to even the naming of the country's motto or logo, which is the land of origins, which I coined. And in order to do that, I obviously leaned on Lucy and many discoveries, including mine. the discovery of Salaam, to show that Ethiopia is indeed one of the cradles of mankind, even though Africa broadly is the cradle of mankind. And Ethiopia is really one of the great centers of human origins research.
But we also have to be reminded that she has her own Ethiopian name, which is Dinkanesh, which means that you are wonderful. But everybody seems to know her as Lucy, both here and in Ethiopia. I've got to get myself to a Lucy Cafe. That sounds wonderful. And the coffee is good because not only is the country the origin of Lucy, but it's also the origin of coffee. So if you go to Lucy Cafe, you will have great coffee accompanied by Lucy.
Wow, that's on my bucket list now. Let's talk a little bit about why Lucy was such an important discovery. Don, can you pick... Let's say two of the most profound things that we've learned from Lucy in the past 50 years. Well, I think one of the most profound things we learned was that she was a new species. She was a new kind of human ancestor. She was a...
Australopithecus, that tongue twister, but she was very different from all other species. And with that recognition came the realization that we had to look again at the gene. geometry of the human family tree. Where did she sit on the human family tree? When she was found, the predominant view was that the common ancestor to our own genus Homo
We are Homo sapiens. And other kinds, other species of Australopithecus was Australopithecus africanus in South Africa. Now she was placed at the pivotal place on the tree. where she roughly around three million years ago gave rise to at least two, probably three different lineages. And one of those lineages ultimately led. to us, Homo sapiens, through a very complicated pathway. But she became the last common ancestor for all those later humans. Zorai, what is on Lucy's highlight reel for you?
Well, you know, what Lucy did was a discovery of the small brain in Lucy and also upright walking. It's sealed. The deal that is, yes, upright walking came before small brain, and we did not need the large brains that we have today to become. part of a member of the human lineage. I think that was the one of the main contributions of Lucy. Don, have we learned everything that we can from Lucy in that time? I mean, has her time come and gone or is there still more to learn?
Well, you know, when we talk about Lucy, we really talk about her species, Australopithecus afarensis. I would say that there will always be something new. There was a recent wonderful article that Sarai participated in where they... began to reconstruct brain capacities in virtual space.
which was not really possible before then. We know that now they were about 30% larger brains than the average for a chimpanzee. So there is something going on in terms of... selection for larger brains so i would say that as new techniques become available we will find a lot more information and as we look at her through a different theoretical telescope we may
change your place on the tree, I'm sure much more will be learned. Zorai, I want to ask you about this fossil that has been nicknamed Lucy's Baby. Tell us about her and how did you find her? Yes, so I was working at a site called the Kika, which is not far from Hadar, where Lucy was found. And obviously I expected to make discoveries, but I never would have thought. of discovering such an amazingly complete skeleton. It is over 60% complete. It is a child that died at the age of two and a half.
dated to 3.2 million years ago, which is 150,000 years older than Lucy. But what was important about the discovery? is most of the bones that we find, including Lucy, come from adult individuals. And that is because the juvenile, the infants, their skeletons are fragile. So they disintegrate or get chewed by scavengers. So in many ways, when you work just on adults...
the sample size you have is biased. Just think of someone from Mars coming to the planet Earth, and you would hide all the children, and they'll study only the grown-ups. And they will go report. They say, well, humans are this high, this tall, this big, but they're ignoring the children. So in many ways, what Salaam or Lucy's child did is brought new information that completes the picture.
that has already been drawn by Don and his colleagues. So it's a unique and amazing addition to our knowledge of the Lucy species, but broadly speaking, early humans. After the break, what it means on a personal level to study our origins. Stick around. WNYC Studios is supported by Lumen, the world's first handheld metabolic coach that measures your metabolism through your breath.
And on the app, it lets you know if you're burning fat or carbs and gives you tailored guidance to improve your nutrition, workouts, sleep, and even stress management. All you have to do is breathe into your Lumen first thing in the morning, and you'll know what's going on with your metabolism, whether you're burning mostly fats or carbs. Then, Lumen gives you a personalized nutrition plan for that day based on your measurements.
You can also breathe into it before and after workouts and meals, so you know exactly what's going on in your body in real time, and Lumen will give you tips to keep on top of your health game. So, if you want to stay on track with your health this holiday season, go to lumen.me to get 15% off your lumen. That is lumen.me. Hi, I'm Alexis Ohanian. You may know me as one of the co-founders of Reddit, but more recently, a large part of my identity is being a father to my wonderful daughters.
In my podcast, Business Dad, I hope to open the conversation about working parents a bit. You'll get to hear from a wide range of business dads, from Rainn Wilson and Guy Raz to Todd Carmichael and Shane Battier. to find out how they balance being a dad with a successful career. Business Dad is available now, so be sure to listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Don, you have had quite the career, and that's putting it mildly,
What has motivated you to spend so many years searching for our origins? Well, it really came from reading about human origins when I was a teenager. And the book that startled me was Man's Place in Nature. stated that we and the African ape shared a common ancestor. Therefore, our oldest ancestors should be found in Africa. And I think that the title continues to be exceedingly important to me and relevant today.
man's place in nature. Because for a long time, people in anthropology have thought that culture makes us above the natural world. And I think that we are still part of the natural world. And I think every time we find one of these fossils, of course, it was a missing, so it was a missing link. But I think more importantly, it's a link to the natural world in which we live. And I think everybody has this.
question sometime in their lives, usually when they're very young, where did I come from? How did I get here? And we are fortunate on this planet as Homo sapiens to have the curiosity and the ability to go back and to actually find that evidence. And it deeply sets us in the framework of the natural world. In the grand scheme of evolution, is our species all that unique, in your opinion?
Well, we have a certain level of uniqueness, each species does. We are unique because we are a combination of both biological evolution, which is glacially very slow. genetic change is slow, but also cultural evolution. And we are a creature that is actually not because we wanted it, but we're in control of the future of the planet and we're not doing a very good job.
So I think every species is unique, and we have to recognize that and understand that we are not the end point in evolutionary change. We were not destined to be. We're here because we... We have survived the whims and caprices of climate change, of challenges that we don't even know about. And we should cherish that.
and really appreciate the fact that we're alive, because a few genes different, and you wouldn't be you. Zorai wouldn't be Zorai. I wouldn't be me. We have been given the gift of the universe. Zorai, in studying human evolution, has it changed how you think about humanity? Oh yeah, definitely. It's a privilege to study human origins. You know, as Don says, We are unique, yes, but the fish is unique also. The frog is as is the antelope.
So our uniqueness should not dictate that we feel detached from nature because we are an integral part of nature. You know, I jokingly ask my students at the University of Chicago, are you more or less evolved than the fish? And all of them would answer, we are more evolved. Well, I will put you in the ocean, and we will see who is more evolved. So unless we contextualize our understanding of being human...
it is going to be difficult for us to interact, at least to continue to interact with nature as we destroy it in terms of global warming and climate change and acidification. As we destroy and kill... any species, it's going to come back and haunt us. And that's why understanding our place in nature and really determining how we want to interact with nature is going to determine our own.
survival or not. You know, the species that Lucy and Salam belong to, we call it primitive ancient species, but they managed to survive for...
Close to a million years. Homo sapiens have been on the planet only for 200, 300,000 years ago. So we need to be a little humble and have respect for the past and ensure that we can actually have the future. So it's a combination of... understanding the past and then so we can work on present and then try to forecast the future is what excites me and what inspires me to do what I do. How has Lucy's discovery changed the field of paleoanthropology in Ethiopia over the past 50 years?
When I began in 1970, a long time ago, my first trip to Ethiopia, there were no Ethiopian scholars. There were only foreign scientists who came and did their research and left. And it's very, very gratifying that over the years, quite a number of Ethiopian-born scholars are now at the forefront of the research. And in addition to that... In the 1970s, there was really no place for us to work. There was a very old museum, but there was no place that was dedicated.
to storing and working on these fossils. Today, there's a major building that was constructed by the government of Ethiopia that invites scholars from all over the world to come and study those fossils in contemporary very modern laboratories. And as the rise said, it is now called country of origins. uh and our origins in fact of many origins lucy and these fossils have dramatically changed the world view of ethiopia well you know
Just yesterday at the University of Chicago, my PhD student graduated. He earned his PhD effectively working on the Lucy's species. So basically, this would be Don's grandchild in some way. And if not for the inspiration that came from Lucy and many other discoveries, including mine, I don't think you would be interviewing me today. I don't think you'll be interviewing Don today.
So, yes, you can make many discoveries. And Lucy is not the only fossil. We have so many hundreds and thousands of fossils, both human and non-human. But you always need that iconic specimen that is going to catch your... imagination. So you can then think broadly and then ask the question, where do we come from? And in regards to what happens locally in Ethiopia, I think what Lucia did is inspired young people like myself.
to not only train themselves, but train others, inspire the government to invest in paleoanthropology and build this lovely building for us to do research, but also inspire the public. So now in the grade four textbook. you will see my name on page five or six, where kids will say Ethiopian anthropologists are I who discovered salam. So it's just this, you know, gestalt, everything put together.
The Lucy impact is simply huge and it never stops. Lucy continues to be the benchmark for any discovery. You cannot run away from Lucy. Well, what a wonderful place to end. I would like to thank you both so much for being here. Thank you for having us. Thank you so much. Dr. Don Johansson, founding director of the Institute of Human Origins at Arizona State University, and Dr. Zarai Alemseged, paleoanthropologist at the University of Chicago.
That's it for this week's show. Lots of people helped make it happen, including... On our next episode, why it took more than seven weeks for Asheville to get potable water after Hurricane Helene, and using oyster shell reefs to counter sea level rise in Louisiana. Join us. I'm Sci-Fi producer Rasha Aridi.