On Tue, 27 Mar 2001 17:44:03 -0400, matesz <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

Don, I've read your posting. Thank your for the elaboration.
I must say to such a way of developement *near* the coastline and as
habitatof *part* of the population, as you describe, I agree.

You emphasize the benefits of seafood, I must say I would agree to this in
the biggest part.
At last, unfarmed fish is one of the last resources of real wild game which
is caught in amounts which are in relation to the current population even.
E.g. 65g per capita and day in the US.

Fish of course has to be very fresh to be like paleo. Fish spoils very
quickly and a smell like "fish" is actually rotting fish.
Fresh fish doesn't smell.

You know that I see general "meat" eating as unpaleo because nearly all of
these meat masses which are consumed today, are "produced" in the most
unpaleo manner. Not only in the way of production, but also in it's
composition.

Furthermore I looks as if consumption of animal carcass can't have been a
very high part, due to physiological constraints in absence of enough fat,
as it was out of the arctis.

So far my agreement statement.
The importance of seafood I see a little less as you seem to.

>I think, in the early days, there would have been very few of humans
>anyway.

When in India this year, I've seen the natives walk along the beaches with a
net and a torch, capturing various seafood like crabs. I've been told that
they also eat smaller and bigger clams from the sands (of course always with
rice).
However even though this coast is very rich of fish (with plenty of
dolphins) the catch was small. Few items for a long walk.
The fish the tourists get, comes from trawlers.

If the "harvest" from a piece of beach was small, people had to be few and
had to be constantly moving.
Well, they did.

Today I'd see it un-human-like to live in a big area only with a few
relatives. To meet and comunicate with many is an important property of
humanity. The internet is a newer part of it. Villages were the beginning.

>You stated yourself, seaweed, mussels, crabs, and I will add clams,
>lobsters, fish and bird eggs, insects and insect eggs, small mammals
>(including sea mammals, often easy to kill), fruits, vegetables, roots,
>nuts.  Probably more things I'm not aware of.

Mussels, crabs, clams are similar to other wild game, 0.5 to 2% of fat,
while having about 11% protein. meat has 20%, barley has 13%.
The problem with the first two is where to get the energy from.
Fish has more protein, but fat only in cold water cases.
So energy from plants is a essential part of the diet also for coast
dwellers.
Note, I find nothing to disagree in this. It's just what you emphasize.
Emphasizing only the favourites (like fish, lobster or meat) is a custom to
be seen in many researchers.
If homo erectus scavenged zebra brains - what does one make of it?
Some say hurray, they ate meat  I'll eat meat too (and mean steaks).
I try to look at the importance.

Seaweed may be an important source of some minerals like iodide to why
shouldn't homo xyz have visited the coasts from time to time.
Provided there was water - to drink.

>In saying "It would be hard to catch fish, standing on the shore with a
>sharp stick" you are obviously ignoring the fact that humans can swim and
>dive and have no need to be fixed to the shore.  Also, no doubt they used
>primitive water craft made of logs.  Humans are ingenious.

Do you think swimming or diving with a "sharp stick" you could hunt amounts
worth to mention? I know Hans Hass did, only with a spear.
But with diver eyeglasses and flippers. He could aquire his fish
"needs" easily, but for selling he had to use "gun" spears (what he hated).

>> ..australipithecines, homo habilis, homo erectus
>> ramapithecus, earlier primates ..
>> Please explain for which of them you see on the coastline (only).
>> Or is it annother, none of them?
>> And for which time do you assume an aquatic adaption?
>>
>None.

Does that mean no adaption?

> Crawford and Marsh state:  "It makes more sense to say that, like the
>dolphins, one branch of the hominids found that the sea offered a wealth of
>food and a way of life that was congenial, much in the way we enjoy the
>seaside today.  This species would have taken to the shores of the
>freshwater lakes and rivers as well, and the adoption of an aquatic habitat
>would not have cut them off from other suplies of food, for the coastal
>regions, with their high humidities and ample rainfalls, offer equable
>climates and a rich growth of fruits and other vegetation.

Here they mention a real reason why settlements are often near the sea.
Where the adaption is, I can't see.

>  At different times it is likely that
>he would have explored inland regions, and in this way various side shoots
>may have developed with some, like Australopithecus, suffering as a
result."

So they see Australopithecines as a side developement only.
That may be hard to be kept up as there are no artefacts of the
"aquaticus-pithecus" and its intermediates (like homo erectus) are missing
too.

>> Which advantage would have sweating in the water?
>
>No advantage.   Who said that sweating gave an advantage in water?

Well, if it wasn't an advantage, man wouldn't have developed it, would he?

>The
>point is that man loses water easily, not a good trait for an animal in an
>arid region.

I think exactely the point that man does loose water is a good trait for the
arid region. Because it provides for enhanced cooling.
Sweet water resources are found sufficiently everywhere man lives.
Such a Savannah, or galery wood must have had enough water to drink, anyway.

>If humans were native to the savannahs, you would expect them to gravitate
>to inland savannah habitats.  So why are most people in the world settled
>on
>the coasts, not in the savannahs?

You mean now?

That's a different question, and it's easy to answer. Because bigger
populations need agriculture and agriculture needs rainfall and water.
All settlements need water. Neolithic settlements were always near a stream
(or at least were a well could be built).

>Here is a partial list of main cities by the sea, many of them very old:
>Abu Dhabi, Alexandria, Amsterdam, Athens, Auckland, Bahia Blanca, Bombay,
>Cairo, Calcutta, Casablanca, Copenhagen, Dar-es-Salam, Edinburgh, Gdansk,
>Genoa, Glasgow, Helsinki, Hania, Ho Chi Minh, Hong Kong, Istanbul, Kuala
>Lumpur, Leningrad, Lisbon, London, Marseille, Melbourne, Oslo, Rangoon,
>Rome, Sebastapol, Seoul, Sidney, Singapore, Stockholm, Tokyo, Vancouver and
>Venice.

Was paleo Sydney more important than paleo Alice Springs?
Obviously these coastal cicies developed so well because of their *harbours*
and the importance of navigation since greek times.

>In fact, aside from poisoned fish, or fish allergies,  I know of no study
>showing that fish consumption increases risk for any degenerative disease;
>rather it is the inverse.  (For example, coastal dwelling fish eaters in
>Northern Europe have a very low incidence of MS, in comparison to a high
>incidence among inland dwelling eaters of grains and dairy and meat.)

ok.

> This
>makes perfect sense if humans originated as coastal dwelling, fish eaters.

Or that fish is simply healthier than meat.
In the aspect of fats (omega3/6 and PUFA) they can equal out the omega-6
overload and other shortcomings of cereal grain based nutrition.

>(In contrast, eating red meat from land animals has in many studies been
>related to degenerative diseases. Yes modern meat is different, but even
>wild red meat is different from fish.)

Do you have some special properties in your mind?
It came to my mind that *raw* fish is dangerous to eat, because it contains
thiaminases, which wipe out thiamin which is a critical and shortlived
vitamin.

Regards, Amadeus