The small size of Homo floresiensis was almost certainly due to insular dwarfism because of their isolation on a small island. They would never have been more widespread than the island of Flores.
Ireland only became separate from the rest of Europe due to rising sea level after the end of the last glaciation about 8,000 years ago. This is probably not enough time for insular dwarfism to have developed in a species as long-lived as humans.
About “cultural memories” surviving thousands of years, there’s good evidence of exactly that.
No. Correlation is not 100% evidence of causation.
There are various evidences of water level changes that anyone can see.
The aboriginal australians have their Creation myths as a form of science… as their only formal science… I think we should give them credit for being able to develop a correct science…
Science you see… They explain the land from what they see… Rock here, sedimentary material there… so dig there for water there,… water ! thats how they survive in the desert…they know something of geological science…
So its possible that , if they had been transported to Australia 4000 years ago, say, not that is the fact, but taking some date well after sea level rises… they could develop the knowledge for themselves …
One particular discovery would be that there were fossilized trees standing in the water in various places… They realized that a long time ago, those trees were well above water… Various sea fossils (shells,etc) found above water… conglomerate found at hundreds of meters above sea level… shale and coal in the sides of cliffs…
The Tasmanian’s are believed to have walked to Tasmania… But who can know, they could also float across couldn’t they ? There are ways to be sure that there is a large island down there… (birds…)
You either didn’t read the article, or it didn’t sink in. Try again.
I seriously doubt that any oral tradition survives from that long ago. We do however, generally find anything almost, but not quite human scary. I do think it’s plausible that this is for the same reason we innately find spiders, snakes or anything with sharp teeth scary. Namely that those are the things that were dangerous to our ancestors.
Long before the evolution of Homo sapiens, our hominid ancestors lived in a world where some of the greatest threats might have been from other hominids. This was the situation from several million years ago until just a few tens of thousands of years ago. Is it possible that troll myths, bigfoot, even the ‘uncanny valley’ phenomenon, all owe something to selection over this long period ?
However, History (as a discipline) is a form of Science. While, of course, is is typically expected that physical investigation (e.g. rocks, soil) will conform reasonably to the documentary findings, sometimes reading the historical writings of people before us does give us fairly good confidence in knowing what sort of things probably happened (give or take some victor’s bias and whatnot) when other evidence is lacking. How do we know that Alexander the Great probably existed? Can we confirm his existence by chopping up rocks, gazing into space, culturing bacterial colonies, or taking soil measurements?