Re: Asking for AAT refs a
J. Moore (j#d#.moore@canrem.com)
Thu, 16 Nov 95 12:22:00 -0500
JM> j#d#.moore@canrem.com (J. Moore) wrote:
JM> >So you're saying she cannot be expected to provide any refs
JM> >whatsoever, not even this one, despite the fact that, according to
JM> >James Borrett, she is very "helpful in this respect". And while
Ja> Well she is always helpful to me, perhaps I have better manners than
Ja> you.
That is certainly one possiblity; another, perhaps more likely
possibility is that, unlike you, I actually look up Morgan's refs
and check to see if she reports the info accurately. As we've
seen with regard to salt mechanisms, Negus's quotes, tears, salt
glands, and will see in regard to eccrine sweating in seals, the
info she reports is not just wrong, but often suspiciously wrong.
I would suggest that perhaps Morgan prefers to give refs only to
those who won't look at them.
JM> >The theory that seems guilty of grouping distinguishing features
JM> >at one or the other end of a time scale is the AAT; it has been an
JM> >uphill battle trying to make AATers here realise that using this
JM> >particular unexamined assumption doesn't make the slightest sense.
Ja> Wha? AAT sugests that bipedalism came first, in response to the need to
Ja> wade with the head above water 5 million-ish years ago, and that until
Ja> recently (like say, 200,000 years ago) our ancesters were still
Ja> pottering around in lakes and rivers. So the (ambiguous) aquatic
Ja> adaptations could either have all happened at once (unlikely) or been
Ja> gradually acquired over a timespan of 4 million years in response to an
Ja> amphibious lifestyle.
No, it doesn't, at least in Morgan's hands; she has claimed these
traits (some of which do not actually exist) were acquired during
a relatively brief aquatic period which she has shortened with
each passing book. Her latest book says this time was for "up to
a million years".
Ja> The important point is that saying that these
Ja> features were recent rather than 5 million years old doesn't get you any
Ja> closer to explaning them unless you have hard evidence to back up the
Ja> claim that they are recent. Which you don't, do you?
Ja> James Borrett.
For instance hairy bodies, which still exist? But perhaps the
most critical question is why the AAT is supposed to granted this
special, priveleged position of being able to make claims and
assumptions without support or references that can be checked,
unlike any other theories in any branch of science.
Jim Moore (j#d#.moore@canrem.com)
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