Footprints of 'first Americans'
 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4650307.stm

Human settlers made it to the Americas 30,000 years earlier than previously thought, according to new evidence.

A team of scientists came to this controversial conclusion by dating human footprints preserved by volcanic ash in an abandoned quarry in Mexico.

They say the first Americans may have arrived by sea, rather than by foot.

...snip...

The team used several methods to date a variety of material from the site near Puebla, Mexico, in order to be sure they were right about the age.

"We have materials that have been dated below the footprint layer, the footprint layer itself and on top of the footprint layer. Everything is making sense," said Dr Gonzalez.

The researchers used radiocarbon dating on shells and animal bones in the sequences and dated mammoth teeth by a technique called electron spin resonance. The sediments themselves were dated by optically stimulated luminescence.

...more...

*insert carbon dating and evolution arguments here* :bolt:

That's why I like this part:

If it's true then they are the oldest FOUND. Doesn't prove them to be the first though. ;)

They're members of the "First X Americans", for an unknown value of X.

Ah but they might be the last of "x" for all we know.
"x" might have been preceded too. ;)

You didn't get the memo! The debil has been planting "scientific" evidence. ;)

Dammit! I knew I shouldn't have fired the secretary for going to those scientology meetings.

Right. by the last "w" Americans.

the first "x" americans didn't even know they were americans!

So...38,000 years ago, inhabitants of what is now Puebla, Mexico were Americans, but today, folks living there are...Mexicans? I am so confused.

They're still Americans. North America is a big continent. So's South America.

We've just appropriated the name for ourselves.

Which we pretty much have to: "United-Statesian" sounds far clumsier to the Anglophone ear than, say, the Spanish equivalent, which does manage to flow in a language that more rattles than flows, at least in most places outside of Mexico -- the other "United States" in North America. And Mexico came later to that name in any case, so somebody who alleges this is yet more Yanquí arrogance needs to go right back to escuela.