Charles Oxnard

After a distinguished career, he has recently retired, but continues to work. Throughout his career, Oxnard has been viewed as a maverick because of his studies which have generally disagreed with the majority view in the scientific community which holds that some of the australopithecines either on or very close to the line of direct human ancestry.

Charles Oxnard is definitely not a creationist, or sympathetic to creationism, and has no desire to become embroiled in the creation/evolution debate, preferring to devote his time to doing real science.

In 2001, the American Association of Physical Anthropologists awarded Oxnard their "Charles Darwin Award" [what for, exactly?]. Oxnard was possibly the first to draw attention, in the 1970's, to features in australopithecine bones which indicated a partially tree-dwelling or tree-climbing lifestyle. This view is now widely held, so Oxnard can consider himself vindicated on this point. On the issue of whether the australopithecines are ancestral (or closely related) to humans, Oxnard also considers himself largely vindicated, as there is more skepticism about this than there was 2 or 3 decades ago.

This page is part of the Fossil Hominids FAQ at the talk.origins Archive.