Re: Alex's point... was R
J. Moore (j#d#.moore@canrem.com)
Sat, 21 Oct 95 22:52:00 -0500
Cl> >That being predominately bipedal is useful does not mean that all
Cl> >organisms will take it up. Chimpanzee locomotion worked quite
Cl> >well in their neck of the woods for millions of years, and it
Cl> >works well still. Unfortunately, unlike our locomotor adaptation,
Cl> >it has confined them to a rapidly dwindling neck of the woods.
Cl> So since Chimps are out nearest neighbors and they lived very close to
Cl> our neck of the woods, I still would like to know why they evolved one
Cl> method of locomotion and we evolved another.
Cl> I could see something like us having black hair and them having brown,
Cl> or us being taller and them being shorter as the result of some random,
Cl> selectively neutral, evolution. But the differences between chimp and
Cl> human are pretty big, and I think, demand explanation in terms of
Cl> differential environmental factors, isolated environments, and similar
Cl> factors that are invoked in modern evolutionary theory.
Cl> Tom Clarke
The differences between chimps and modern humans are indeed
"pretty big", but the differences between chimps and early
australopithecines are not really very large at all. They amount
essentially to very slightly larger brains with some possibility
of slight brain differences, and different predominate modes of
locomotion.
Cl> I am trying a new tack. Let me try it on you.
Cl> Would you admit the possibility that early hominids may have obtained
Cl> part of their calories from things living in the water?
Sure, it's quite possible, but this doesn't have anything to do with
the AAT, for reasons that have been outlined in my post on "What
the AAT Isn't".
Jim Moore (j#d#.moore@canrem.com)
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