In news releases that would do credit to P.T.(There's a sucker born every minute) Barnum, the "Eighth Wonder of The World", the "validation of Darwin's Theory", the ancestral "Missing Link" between lemurs and apes has been found.
In storybook fashion the find was saved for research by paying $1M to a collector who admired it but had no idea of its potential - for both research and for hype.
What was the discovery? A fossil of what appears to be a combination of Lemur and monkey, according to reports. The full report is here. A fairly dispassionate review taken from a BBC report comments on both the find and the hype surrounding it.
It turns out that even team members who have examined the fossil, called both "Ida" and, somewhat pompously, Darwinius masillae, don't really think it is a missing link. Jenz Franzen said:
"some aspects of the teeth indicate she is not a direct ancestor - more of an "aunt" than a "grandmother".
And other researchers are skeptical:
"Independent experts are keen to see the new fossil but somewhat sceptical of any claim that it could be "a missing link".
Dr Henry Gee, a senior editor at the journal Nature, said the term itself was misleading and that the scientific community would need to evaluate its significance.
"It's extremely nice to have a new find and it will be well-studied," he said. But he added that it was not likely to be in the same league as major discoveries such as "Flores man" or feathered dinosaurs."
One thing is certain. Lead researcher, Jorn Hurum, said, "There will be plenty more papers coming out."
Why of course there will.
Addendum:
Two more articles on this; the first is sheer parody; the second makes a case for "shoddy scholarship" associated with the paper on the discovery.
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