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Re: AAT Theory
Clara N. Fitzgerald (cfitzger@s.psych.uiuc.edu)
2 Oct 1995 01:18:19 GMT
chris brochu <gator@mail.utexas.edu> writes:
>"Non-AAS" could be summarized, from my non-anthropological perspective,
>thus: the immediate ancestors of hominids were arboreal animals that
>were facultative bipeds on the ground. Chimps and gorillas are like this
>today, though admittedly they are not our direct ancestors. As the
>continuous forest cover in eastern Africa began to break up, they found a
>need to move from one grove to the other. As they were already capable
>of bipedal locomotion, they may have found this to be a good way of
>moving on the ground, especially if carrying things like infants or food.
Infants, until the development of larger brains led to 'premature'
births, could carry themselves if they could perch on a horizontal
back and did not need to support their whole weight. The brains got
bigger rather more recently than Lucy.
Where would they carry food too? There is no evidence of 'home bases'
where the females and infants stayed (they would be safer travelling
with the group, as chimps, and the infants (as above) were sufficiently
developed to tag along). Why would these chimps develop food-sharing
(which in other chimps only happens from mothers to infants) when the
rest of the group is already there?
> Brooks and McLennan's _Phylogeny,Ecology, and Behavior_
I'll look for it. Thanks.
>Peace and long life,
Live long and prosper.
--
-Clara A. N. Fitzgerald cfitzger@s.psych.uiuc.edu
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