Re: Polar Bear Challenge for AAH opponents
Pat Dooley (patdooley@aol.com)
17 Dec 1994 00:30:43 -0500
In article <1994Dec14.190902.15679@henson.cc.wwu.edu>,
n8010095@henson.cc.wwu.edu (Phillip Bigelow) writes:
>All of the aquatic ape supporters on this dissussion group have
consistently
>stated that there may be no structural changes in the hominid skeleton
due
>to aquatic lifestyle. If so, no conclusion can be reached.
Absolutely amazing. We have been saying wading/bipedalism/proboscis
monkey/Lucy/Macaque monkeys/major structural change/ etc. etc. and
this Phillip caught none of it. Beyond belief. Totally beyond description.
Is this guy for real? Has he read nothing? Or anything?
Dear PB:
If an ape goes into the water it is more likely to do it on 2 legs than 4.
Of the primates observed doing this in the wild the score is :
2 legs: 2; 4 legs: nil.
If environmental conditions make an ape do it often enough, it will
get better at it. It might take a few million years of evolution to
achieve proficiency, but it'll happen, or the ape will go extinct.
One of the major props of bipedalism (forgive the pun) is that
it facilitated wading, and then swimming and diving. There was
a huge cost involved in bipedalism.
For your benefit, I'll quote some experts on what bipedalism
required in evolutionary terms:
The evolution of bipedalism required major skeletal adjustments.
According to Richard Leakey and Roger Lewin (who studiously ignore
the AAT), "the evolutionary shift from quadrupedalism to bipedalism
would have required an extensive remodelling of the ape's bone
and muscle architecture and of the overall proportion in the lower
half of the body. Mechanisms of gait are different, mechanics of
balance are different, functions of major muscles are different.
An entire functional complex had to be transformed for efficient
bipedalism to be possible." cf. "Origins Reconsidered".
The AAH people ask: under what evolutionary conditions could this occur
without breaking the principle of non-disadvantageous intermediates?
And answer came there nothing but a bunch of convoluted theories that
explained
nothing else.
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