Discovery of Ancient Artifacts Rekindles Debate on 'Hobbits'

Scientists said yesterday that stone artifacts found with remains of ancient, tiny "Hobbit"-like people on a remote Indonesian island are similar to much older island artifacts, offering new support for the theory that the fossils represent a unique species of archaic human.

The Australian-Indonesian research team said in the journal Nature that its analysis "negates claims" by critics that only modern humans could have made such tools, and that the Hobbits, with grapefruit-size brains, were modern humans afflicted with microcephaly, a debilitating genetic condition.