cretinbob: I wonder if it's going to be about the funerary rites. Holy shiat, if they can prove it it pushes back the oldest know funeral from about 78,000 years ago to almost 250,000 years ago.
fark.
That is consciousness.

It would have to leave physical evidence to be detected. So unless they butchered their dead or left funeral goods, we will never know unless the Doctor lends us the TARDIS. Of course merely puting them in the cave counts as a ritual of sorts whether it is a funeral as we understand it or merely disposing of the corpses before they start stinking.

Music has started on the stream.

Possible guesses of what will be announced: Discovery of artifacts, evidence of fire use, sequencing proteins, or more remains.

Evidence of fire is the announcement. This big news though not surprising If you accepted the body dispose hypothesis.

TheMysteriousStranger: Evidence of fire is the announcement. This big news though not surprising If you accepted the body dispose hypothesis.

Body disposal hypothesis.

Pharmdawg: So this cave had a tiny opening. Was it larger at one point or was there once another entrance?

Unlikely. If the entrance to the Dinaledi subsystem was larger, animals would have gotten in -- well besides an owl and a few rodents. The burnt animal remains were found in Dragon's Back which is before Dinaledi which small animals can more easily access. They are separated by the Chute which one must first rock climb to get to and then climb down a hole that is 18 cm wide.

PartTimeBuddha: Pharmdawg: So this cave had a tiny opening. Was it larger at one point or was there once another entrance?

Soot on the ceiling means nothing like a conventional chimney. Airflow sounds challenging/fatal. Or, perhaps, these little guys went into the cave, lit the fires, left, and then came back later.

There is enough airflow in the system to keep the scientists and the safety cavers alive for hours. They did use carbon monoxide detectors. The first day the scientists went down the CO alarm went off but it turned out to be a false alarm causes by an incorrect setting. It never went off again.

From Twitter, there will be a 4:30 PM ET event from  Princeton. Berger will be joined by Agustín Fuentes* who is a big name anthropologist who got to visit the system a few months ago.

*No relation to Nick.

https://princeton.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJAlf-GorTItGtXUlqCxJKlpukY_uC8l71ax

/A bit to early for us who work for a living.

PartTimeBuddha: TheMysteriousStranger: PartTimeBuddha: Pharmdawg: So this cave had a tiny opening. Was it larger at one point or was there once another entrance?

Soot on the ceiling means nothing like a conventional chimney. Airflow sounds challenging/fatal. Or, perhaps, these little guys went into the cave, lit the fires, left, and then came back later.

There is enough airflow in the system to keep the scientists and the safety cavers alive for hours. They did use carbon monoxide detectors. The first day the scientists went down the CO alarm went off but it turned out to be a false alarm causes by an incorrect setting. It never went off again.

Apologies. I was insufficiently clear. By "the little guys" I meant the early hominids. I did not hope to indicate that 21st Century researchers were starting fires in ancient caves.

The presence of charcoal is interesting. It means that wood was burned in an anoxic environment.

So ... well, I still like my "get in, burn it, get out" theory.

I never thought you you refered to 21st century  fires.  I'm merely pointing out that there is enough air flow to support life. Before teams were sent to excavate the find, carbon monoxide dioxide alarms were installed. This is a big test of that. In the original expedition two or three scientist would work for hours and safety cavers were stationed in places along the way as well.
If air does not circulate then it will build up with potentially deadly consequences for the people in the cave.

/I just realized that mixed up the two gases. Carbon monoxide makes little sense in this context and I just verified from Berger's book that it was a carbon dioxide detector.

Pinnacle Point: The farkng link was trying to charge me $65 to connect to the stream that ended an hour ago.  Then Alexa was arguing with me for 20 minutes because I wanted her to skip the rap songs she was pushing on me I didn't care to listen too, and the Bills-Pats game wouldn't start because my TV storage was full and I needed to pay more to keep the programs I never downloaded in the first farking place. Where is this cave BTW!

I'm confused. People including myself watched it for free. And I just checked, it still plays for me and I paid them $0.00.