On Sat, 1 Dec 2001 19:59:50 -0500, Wally Ballou <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:

>Yes Amadeus... naked with a sharp stick.  Yet you constantly persist in
>trying to push back the date of the widespread use of fire by humans to
>try to eliminate this requirement.  No matter what the actual date is,
>the fact remains that, as Ray suggests, the human animal had evolved
>substantially to its current state (particularly in terms of the
>digestive system) BEFORE the use of fire.

I think the introduction date of fire is debatable, really.
After I read the superb article of Prof.Wrangham again after some years, I
tend to rate early fire with  a greater probability.

Particularly because of one singular fact: in the transition of habilis to
erectines the climbing adaptions were lost. That means no lion protection
by sleeping on trees, thus the need of fire.
I can't imagine the erectines sitting togetherer in the evening on the
floor, just with wooden sticks and stones in the presence of lions and
sabbertooth tigers.

What you tell Ray suggests, is widespread accepted mainstream anthropology.
Would it be without fire there would be no problem to make up a similar
tuber-point, compared to the large-game-hunting theory.
Half of the tubers are edible raw. And as one of the Wrangham comentators
points out, there are five more paleolithic processing techniques without
the usage of fire (take a look).
Before you see the hunting positions in danger from the fire.
Cooked tubers actually support increased meat eating.
Eatin only gazelles would work out like Ray only eating rabbits.
They are too lean.

>You constantly propose the use of foods which would not have been edible
>with no technology beyond the "sharp stick" stage, and when asked to
>propose a realistic diet (using your theories), in any given environment,
>which would have sustained a pre-technological human, you evade.

I thought that it would be clear and pointed out and listed several times
within the many megabytes. I suppose a diet based on
vegetables,tubers,fruit, nuts,meat (if sorted by volume)
or tubers,nuts, fruit, meat, vegetables if sorted by caloric value.

I have not encountered a real alternative to this, which would be plausible
to me. Data on current day gatherhunters from Cordain, Eades etc.
regularly go to the upper possible limit of animal food intake -
around 50%, depending on the fat contents.
That required optiman hunting with limited eapons however.

Where is your guess?


Here's the raw data: "

Food Type Carbohydrate Protein Lipid Calories/g
Fruit       50           10     5      2.85
Seeds       20           15     8      2.12
USOs        30            8     4      1.88
Meat         0           60     4      2.76
note:Carbohydrate,protein,and lipid values are given by
Conklin-Brittain,Wrangham,and Smith (1998 b )for plant items
and Leung,Busson,and Jardin (1968 )for meat.Energy values are
calculated assuming 4 cal/g for carbohydrate and protein and 9
cal/g for lipid (RDA 1980 )."

>Therein lies both your errors in facts, and your evasions.

If there's somethin erraneous, I'd look like to see your
alternatives.

>..admitting that no
>pre-technological human could have long survived that way.

I don't see a limit in surviving for an unlimited time in the same way
as millions of years allowed hominids to survive before.
In a relative warm and dry environment.

The obvious limits of high protein diets lie in energy supply.
This is a real limiting factor in non-arctic environments (where fat is
rare).

>...yet you take up
>an awful lot of bandwidth in the process.

Maybe I should better find an anthropological forum, where what is
important for me isn't considered "bandwith".

Amadeus