Hi Geoff, 

You said: Well, those links were pretty damning and Taubes has been
criticised elsewhere :-

[Ron] Just to clarify here, you seem to be saying that despite most of
Fumento's attack being composed of sweeping generalizations, often twisting
and sometimes inventing what Taubes said, and despite the contradicting
emails that Taubes published in his own defense, that Fumento's attack,
because it is so harsh, is somehow more valid? Is that correct? That
validity increases with the harshness of the attack?   


You said: Re studies:- I generally don't respect  a tiny handful of studies.
When the relevant studies are in the 1000s(such as studies done on cooked
saturated fats), then I do respect them, even if they may be slightly off in
their conclusions. 
[Ron] Are you saying that accuracy is less important than widespread
consensus? 



Re Aborigines:- I was already aware that the Aborigines had come to
Australia c.40,000 years ago, though I hadn't heard of the 60,000 figure
until now. But that still is the tail-end of the Palaeolithic era, since the
whole palaeo  epoch was 2.5 million years ago.
[Ron] You previously said " Aboriginal migration to Australia occurred
mainly only in the very last part of the Palaeolithic era". The "very last
part" suggests that you were talking about a much more brief period than the
last few thousand years, not 40,000 to 60,000 years ago.  

The conventional wisdom of several decades ago was that Natives arrived in
North America by crossing the Bering Strait on a land bridge created by the
Late Glacial Maximum between 10,000 and 13,000 years ago. A similar
postulation was offered for the Aboriginals' arrival in Australia. That is
what I took you to mean. Are you claiming that you did not mean that or are
you revising your position to allow for less recent arrivals in Australia
and North America? 

Best Wishes, 
Ron