Photo: Early Humans Were Prey, Not Predators, Experts Say

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This 2.8-million-year-old skull of the early human species Australopithecus afarensis was found near a quarry in Johannesburg, South Africa.

New analysis of the early-human fossil record suggests that our ancestors were a prey species that survived by cooperating. This theory runs counter to long-standing assumptions that early humans were warlike predators.

Photograph courtesy Kenneth Garrett/University of Witwatersrand/NGS

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