Re: An alternative to ST and AAT
Paul Crowley (Paul@crowleyp.demon.co.uk)
Mon, 09 Dec 96 14:10:38 GMT
In article <32a926c8.488942@news.NL.net>
G.Hanenburg@inter.nl.net "Gerrit Hanenburg" writes:
> Paul@crowleyp.demon.co.uk (Paul Crowley) wrote:
> >All I'm saying is that she must not have done a lot of
> >walking. She wasn't designed for it. So what was she
> >designed for?
>
> Sure she was designed for walking. If you deny *that* then you only
> show a bad understanding of functional morphology.The changes in her
> pelvis and lower limb can hardly be explained otherwise. But
> terrestrial bipedalism was not the only component of her locomotor
> repertoire and the result is a compromise morphology.
My meaning was "she was not designed for a lot of walking".
Perhaps I should also have said " . . and not designed for
long-distance or strenuous walking."
You quoted Christine Berge (J.of Human Evol.26 (1994):259-273):
"It seems that the australopithecine walk differed
significantly from that of humans, involving a sort of
waddling gait, with large rotatory movements of the pelvis
and shoulders around the vertebral column. Such a
walk,likely required a greater energetic cost than does
human bipedalism."
Given these inefficiencies, it's likely that she did not
often need to engage in such a clumsy activity; and that she
normally only needed to take short steps. Her morphology
indicates that she probably lived in static sites and spent
much of her time slowly foraging. Of course this, and the
institution of some system for shared infant care, is also
required by the absence of any effective means for carrying
infants.
Paul.
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