Re: Dissecting the Aquatic Ape: Bipedalism
HARRY R. ERWIN (herwin@mason2.gmu.edu)
1 Aug 1996 14:40:56 GMT
Richard Foy (rfoy@netcom.com) wrote:
: In article <4to2ss$kj9@portal.gmu.edu>,
: HARRY R. ERWIN <herwin@mason2.gmu.edu> wrote:
: >: >
: >: >Oh yes, except that we have evidence for very slow cultural change until
: >: >about 110 KYr BP.
: >
: >: Isn't this evidence related to stone tools?
: >
: >They've gone quite a bit beyond that. Leslie Aiello (and colleagues) have a
: >paper coming out soon.
: I would be interested in hearing more about this.
I'll try to post something tonight. Something popped up today that
indicates at least some paleoanthropologists now believe they have
evidence that A. ramidus was specificially adapted to the gallery
forest/rivershore/lakeshore biome.
: >
: >: >
: >: >Fitness is defined in relative terms. If the interpersonal behavior
: >: >within a specific group became deadly, the group would disappear.
: >
: >: Not if the deadlyness only wiped out a subset of the males. Is not
: >: this the result of the Yanamomo culture. They apparrently have not
: >: disappeared, and if they do disapper it will not be a result of there
: >: intraculural behavior but rather from the results of an external
: >: culture with a greater capacity for violence.
: >
: >Yes, but fitness is relative, and if there are other groups in the area
: >that don't lose as many prime males, you're history.
: Your logic escapes me. The number of people in the next generation is
: not determined by how many prime males there are in a population, but
: rather how many females there are who can have adaquete resouces for
: themselves and their children.
If a father's contribution helps maximize the fitness of a child (by
increasing the child's status relative to the status of children in other
groups, improving the child's health, and deferring a daughter's first
pregnancy so that more grandchildren survive), loss of too many males from
a group reduces the average fitness of the group.
: If the loss of prime violent males results in control of more
: territory they it could be genetically beneficial.
: --
: Western Kundali; Chakra 1 awakening,
: "Greed is good." -- Michael Douglas in Wall Street
:
: URL http://www.he.tdl.com/~hfanoe/index.html
--
Harry Erwin, Internet: herwin@gmu.edu, Web Page: http://osf1.gmu.edu/~herwin
49 year old PhD student in computational neuroscience ("how bats do it" 8)
and lecturer for CS 211 (data structures and advanced C++)
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