Eva Hedin wrote:

>> berries and even becoming intoxicated by them. Early humans probably
>> learned what to eat largely by watching other animals.
> 
> When humans were bright enough to realise the value of
> watching what other beings did they already knew what was
> edible and what was not. They were not idiots.

I certainly don't think they were "idiots." On the contrary, humans were
migrating in all directions all over the planet as they came out of Africa,
to new habitats with new foods. They would have been idiots *not* to watch
the animals for clues as they were out scavenging for food, in Africa as
well as out of it. 

In fact the first evidence of meat-eating is evidence of early hominids
scavenging the carcasses of animals killed by other animals. Some clever
hominid thought "Well, if this animal meat and bone marrow is good enough
for the lions then it's probably good enough for me too." Had he not been so
clever (and hungry) then we'd still be jungle vegetarians.


-gts