The Hourglass Cave man — whoever he was, whatever his relationship to specific modern communities — deserves the same kind of careful, dignified treatment that we would want for any ancestor.

The scientific findings from his bones are real and important.

The limits of those findings are equally real.

Presenting both with honesty is the minimum that accuracy and respect demand.

What The Bones Could Not Say

The skeleton from Hourglass Cave provided information that no other evidence in the cave could — information about the physical characteristics of a specific individual who had entered the cave nearly 8,800 years ago.

But the skeleton also has limits, and those limits are worth being explicit about.