What was the scientificly correct classificatio of species that first
discovered the use of tools, thus saving man from extinction.  What
was the classification...Homo Erectus, or what?  How many years ago
was that? And how many years had past in our evelution prior to the
radical idea of smashing two rocks together.  Or as in 2001 A Space
Odyssy the Apes going nuts with the bones, slamming them and the one
Ape throughing the bone (Tool) into the air and becoming the bone like
shaped space ship?
I'm trying to explain to my 80 year old Father who co-runs a web site
with me the concept for the need of "Radical" thinking and thought
process that have not yet been strung nuron to nuron together yet in
someone's brain, and that the Internet is as close as any of us can
ever come to having the Ape like "Monolith, Bone Throughing
Experience"
Sorry for the boring disertation.
To recap:
Species?
How long ago?
How long was it before beings with our DNA line lived prior to the
radical invent of the tool?
Thanks.

Dear bluedart-ga -

There's nothing like a father-son debate to raise interesting
questions.  Here's what I found about our ancestors and tools.


The hominid line-started between six and seven million years ago with
Australopithecus.

But the line to modern man is thought to have started with Homo
habilis, a species that lived between 2.4 and 1.5 million years ago.
It is thought to be the first hominid species to use rudimentary
tools. That is, evidence of tools was found along with Homo habilis
fossils.

 Homo erectus, living between 1.8 and 300,00 years ago, used more
sophisticated stone tools and probably used fire as well.

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/species.html#habilis

So you could say that man-like creatures (Australopithecus) existed
for several million years before our line began with Homo habilis. 
But in a way, man became man when the species started using tools.

Also see:

Early Human Culture
http://anthro.palomar.edu/homo/homo_3.htm

Human Evolution
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_evolution

I hope this satisfies: 
Species?
How long ago?
How long was it before beings with our DNA line lived prior to the
radical invent of the tool?


Good luck with your debate Space Odyssey debate.  I hope this helps
one side or the other ;-).

Alanna-ga

My best short form answer is the following:

Specie: Homo Habilis and/or Homo Erectus. Homo habilis from East and
Southern Africa.  This species is the earliest known record of man
that is categorized in the same group as living humans.  It was at
this point in time that stone tools first appeared and they are
classified as the OLDOWAN / DEVELOPED OLDOWAN.
 
When: The PALEOLITHIC Period is defined as the time from the first use
of stone tools around two million years ago to the Pleistocene Period,
12,000 years ago.  The Paleolithic Period is divided into three
categories, Lower, Middle and Upper Paleolithic Period.  Four basic
traditions (and time periods) of their manufacture have been
identified:

OLDOWAN / DEVELOPED OLDOWAN (2 million to 1.5 million years ago) 

ACHEULIAN (1.5 million to 150,000 years ago) 

MOUSTERIAN or MIDDLE STONE AGE or MIDDLE PALEOLITHIC (200,000 to 30,000 years ago) 

LATE STONE AGE or UPPER PALEOLITHIC (30,000 to 10,000 years ago) 

DNA line:  Depending on how I answer this might lead some very angry
Creationist to my door (again).  I would say that the beings using
simple tools had much of the same genetic structure as modern man.

Your archaeologist at large,
Shane