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Re: Holloway re: Savanna Strawman
Ralph L Holloway (rlh2@columbia.edu)
Mon, 8 Jul 1996 19:53:53 -0400
On Mon, 8 Jul 1996, Mike Muller wrote:
> I cannot discuss the laser ablation technique on line for it is in print
> at this time. AS for other isotope work...that is what I am trying to
> find pelple willing to do. SO far there is no work being done on the
> hominid fossils themselves. Until the new laser technique the tooth had
> to be damaged by removing a strip of enamel to drill for sampling and no
> one is willing to allow this. Even thought he wealth of information that
> could be recovered from that one small strip seems to outweigh the
> limited morphological information it can supply.
>
> Isotopic data can deliver information on seasonality, long-term climate
> fluctuations, seasons of birth and death, heterochrony, diet and ecology.
> Issues that currently paloeanthropologists are only able to speculate
> about.
Thanks for expanding on this research a little. Hope you don't
misunderstand, but I think all of this new research is great, and to be
encouraged, and it will be very helpful to all of us in paleoanthropology,
morphologists, experiementalists, whatever. But I think I detect a very
smug attitude, particularly in your previous post in answer to Karen that
leaves me wondering why you are so negative toward the study of
morphology, since without it, there will be nothing for you to work on...
Ralph Holloway
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