>>16767047
Your point about 80000 years is a complete red herring and demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of the timescales involved.You're confusing minor population adaptations with the creation of entirely new evolutionary lineages.The human and chimpanzee lineages diverged 7-9 million years ago.That is over 100 times longer than the 80000-year period you're citing.
If 80000 years is enough for the "significant specializations" you mention within a single species (like skin pigmentation or lactose tolerance), then 7 million years is more than enough time for two separate lineages on different continents to evolve into completely different families of apes.
This is exactly what the fossil record shows.The apes in Europe evolved and went extinct there.The apes that migrated to Africa had millions of years of separate evolution to develop into gorillas, chimpanzees, and humans.
Your argument doesn't support the article's claim: it actually destroys it. The fact that evolution can operate on these scales means there is zero need to look for a direct European ancestor for humanity.The African apes had more than enough time to evolve all their unique traits and ours in Africa after their ancestors arrived from Eurasia.
In short, you're using evidence for how evolution works to argue against how evolution works. The "cradle of humanity" remains in Africa because that's where every single piece of unambiguous evidence genetic and fossil places the entire multi-million year journey from ape to human.