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Re: fossil foot bones
the skeptic (ZU03725@uabdpo.dpo.uab.edu)
Mon, 16 Oct 95 11:54:56 CDT
In article <hubey.813785325@pegasus.montclair.edu>
hubey@pegasus.montclair.edu (H. M. Hubey) writes:
>
>ZU03725@uabdpo.dpo.uab.edu (the skeptic) writes:
>
>
>>Nobody gave me a percentage of how much time chimpanzees spend on the ground
>>but I will take your word for the 90% figure.
>
>It's not mine. Someone else posted it (along with a whole
>bunch of insults :-))
>
Oooops, sorry about that.
>>However, it is misleading not
>>to include the fact that most of the time when they are 'walking' they are not
>>walking bipedally.
>
>Well, let's see
>
>1) the foot bones say tree-climber
>2) the observation (according to you) says not bipedal, and
>according to the other poster that it's terrestrial (at least
>90% of the time)
>3) the bones of the whole skeleton is somewhere between
>bipedal and quadrupedal.
>
>These comments shold be kept in mind when discussing the
>shapes of fossil bones and when discussing real or alleged aquaticity.
>--
>
> Regards, Mark
Yiiiiiiiikessssss!!! Did you say aquaticity or something like that? I had
no reason to believe that the discussion was about the ridiculous AAT hysteria!
No offense anyone. I only meant to make it clear that while the pongids are
both terrestrial and arboreal, they do not walk on two feet most of the time.
As far as I am concerned, that fact has absolutely nothing at all to do with
water but with morphology of pelvis and other endoskeletal morphology. My
thinking was way off the subject of water. I obviously didn't explain myself
well and wasn't up to date on the thread. I make the point that the pongids
are adapted to arboreal and terrestrial living and that as they gradually
become more and more bipedal, I would speculate that it is possible that our
australopithicene ancestors did the same. I am of the opinion personally that
it would be logical for a.afarensis to have had grasping ability while learning
to walk bipedally and that it was a gradual adaptation to terrestrial living.
With perhaps a dose of Punctuated equalibrium as far as pelvic shape goes there
at the speciation point between (???) and australopithicene. Hope that clears
that up and again, sorry for attributing the wrong statement to you.
In fact, seeing that you wrote that the foot fossil (I assume you are talking
about the Sterkfontein find) shows arboreal viability, I see that we are in
agreement. That statement is of course being debated hotly at the moment and
I follow the thought that our ancestors did indeed have both abilities at least
early on!
Cheers,
Karen
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