Who needs an osteologist? (Installment 29)

Today's big news is, of course, Homo naledi, a new hominin species discovered in South Africa.  Every major (and most minor) news outlet is covering it.  (I wrote it up for Forbes here: "A New Human Ancestor Arises from the Depths of a South African Cave.")

The New York Times?  Well, they need an osteologist.  Badly.  The reconstructed skull they are showing (as of 7:22 eastern time) on their front page is, to any biological anthropologist, obviously not H. naledi.  The cast is of a hominin nicknamed Mrs Ples, an Australopithecus africanus specimen found in 1947.

Front page.  FRONT. PAGE. Jeezum, NY Times.

Ouch.

Also wrong in the article. Oof. Someone's getting fired...

Good work, New York Times!  Might want to hire yourself an osteologist... or at least an editor who can recognize that that image was not in the press packet.

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Previous Installments of Who needs an osteologist?

• Morgan's Cove needs an osteologist.
• Dunstable Baptist Church needs an osteologist.
• Once again, Bones needs an osteologist.
• Tampa Bay History Center needs an osteologist.
• The Archaeological Museum of the Castle of Santo Anton needs an osteologist.
• The Gruppo Archeologico della Val Nure needs an osteologist.
• Polish archaeologists at the site of Kamien Pomorski need an osteologist.
• The South Florida Science Center and Aquarium needs an osteologist.
• GitHub needs an osteologist.
• The Telegraph needs an osteologist.
• University Museum in Chieti-Pescara needs an osteologist.
• NKP Salve Institute of Medical Sciences needs an osteologist.
• Huffington Post and the Mars Rover need an osteologist.
• PBS and Richard III need an osteologist.
• Abbot House Museum needs an osteologist.
• The Zanjan Museum needs an osteologist.
• National Geographic Channel's "Nazi War Diggers" needs an osteologist.
• BBC/NOVA needs an osteologist.
• The Penn Museum needs an osteologist.
• National Geographic needs an osteologist.
• Acura needs an osteologist.
• The "African" woman in Fairford, England, needs an osteologist.
• Museo delle Grotte needs an osteologist.
• Either NPR or Yale needs an osteologist.
• Yorkshire Museum needs an osteologist.
• Staffordshire University needs an osteologist.
• And, of course, Bones needs an osteologist.