Re: Body Hair Loss in Aquatic Mammals

Tom Clarke (clarke@longwood.cs.ucf.edu)
31 Oct 1995 08:40:53 -0500

n8010095@cc.wwu.edu (Phillip Bigelow) writes:

>hubey@pegasus.montclair.edu (H. M. Hubey) writes:

>>clarke@acme.ucf.edu (Thomas Clarke) writes:

>>>Yes why did only the Australopithecus line become bipedal
>>>if all it takes is an ape and savannah or a mosaic savannah?

>>Yes, that's the $64 K question :-). Thank you.

>>The problem is that the first idea of a great change in
>>habitat (the savannah) didn't work, so the second
>>try now is mosaic. But then it might not produce enough
>>of a differentiation in habitat (and niche) to produce the
>>new species.

> You are forgetting the (very possible) possiblity that speciation may have
>predated the move out of the trees. Other pressures than habitat can cause
>speciation.

Phillip,

Would you care to speculate about what these other pressures might
have been?
I suffer a failure of imagination on this point :-)
I like the East Side Story scenario that involves sepration by
the newly formed Rift valley.
I would be interested in other explanations.

Tom Clarke

-- 

  People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment

  and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against

  the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices - Adam Smith, WofN