Re: A layman's question on bipedalism
david l burkhead (david8@dax.cc.uakron.edu)
12 Jul 1996 03:13:36 GMT
In article <schmal-1007962129460001@ppp043.firstnethou.com> schmal@firstnethou.com (T&B Schmal) writes:
>In article <4r7d4n$hdg@geraldo.cc.utexas.edu>, Robert Scott
><rscott@mail.utexas.edu> wrote:
>
>> In article <4qq2l8$se9@newsbf02.news.aol.com> ORDOVER, ordover@aol.com
>> writes:
>> >Just picking up the thread of my question again -- is there a reason,
>> >other than speciecist egotism, that there is a "mystery" of human
>> >bipedalism but not a "mystery" of avian, dinosauroid, and marsupial
>> >bipedalism?
>
>
>Bipedalism is often just the shorthand word for all the changes in LCA
>that occurred at about the same time. The coincident freeing of the hands
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
To which changes, specifically, are you referring and what
evidence is there that they happenes "about the same time"?
This question is serious since often assumption is made about
when certain things happened that doesn't have any evidence to support
it. For instace, some traits that get cited as happening "about the
same time" include hairlessness (no evidence of which I am aware about
_when_ this happened), height (much later than bipedalism), leg length
(much later than bipedalism), tool use (much later than bipedalism),
brain size (much later than bipedalism), etc.
Habitual bipedalism may have made much of this possible
(particularly tool use), but there's nothing I've seen to justify a
claim of "about the same time."
--
David L. Burkhead "If I had eight hours to cut down
david8@dax.cc.uakron.edu a tree, I'd spend seven sharpening
FAX: 330-253-4490 my axe." Attributed to Abraham
SpaceCub Lincoln
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