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Re: First Family and AAT
J. Moore (j#d#.moore@canrem.com)
Mon, 16 Oct 95 10:58:00 -0500
TC> > TC> In other words why aren't chimpanzees and gorillas bipedal?
TC> > TC> Tom Clarke
TC>
TC> > You've missed the irony in Alex's question. You see, it's a
TC> > standard question among AATers, Morgan included, to continually
TC> > ask things like "if it was useful for hominids to be bipedal, why
TC> > aren't all non-forest primates bipedal?" Alex simply was
TC> > turning it around for effect and asking it of the AATers. I've
TC> > done this, as have others, because when we try to explain that
TC> > evolution doesn't work that way, we're ignored.
TC>
TC> I guess I did miss the irony. The problem is that you haven't truly
TC> reversed the AAT argument.
TC> <snipped>
TC> In short the question is about the evolution of apes, not about
TC> quadrapedal pre-seals etc.
TC> Tom Clarke
We (or at least I) am not trying to seriously "reverse the AAT
argument", because, as I suggested in my last sentence, that
argument is not the way evolution works. Evolution deals (or
should deal) with "how?" If you want to ask "why?", you need to
head on over to philosophy. Evolutionary studies do not have, and
cannot have, the answer to nevertheless fascinating question "why?"
Jim Moore (j#d#.moore@canrem.com)
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