The direction of human evolution

I believe I speak the truth when I observe that nowhere else in human evolution is such an argument made. So why then, you may well ask, if the Neandertals were so stout and adaptable and cerebrally well endowed, are they no longer with us? One possible (but much disputed) answer is that perhaps they are. Alan Thorne is one of the leading proponents of an alternative theory, known as the multiregional hypothesis, which holds that human evolution has been continuous-that just as australopithecines evolved into Homo habilis and Homo heidelbergensis became over time Homo neanderthalensis, so modern Homo sapiens simply emerged from more ancient Homo forms. Homo erectus is, on this view, not a separate species but just a transitional phase. Thus modern Chinese are descended from ancient Homo erectus forebears in China, modern Europeans from ancient European Homo erectus, and so on. БЂњExcept that for me there are no Homo erectus,БЂ«says Thorne. БЂњI think itБЂ™s a term which has outlived its usefulness. For me, Homo erectus is simply an earlier part of us ...»