On Mon, 26 Mar 2001, Philip Thrift wrote:

> On Mon, 26 Mar 2001 09:21:52 -0500, Todd Moody <[log in to unmask]>
> wrote:
>
> >We seem to be
> >able to accept that these rather unimposing primates had the
> >ingenuity to hunt, kill, and butcher animals, using simple stone
> >tools.  Why is it so difficult to imagine that they also had the
> >ingenuity to exploit the grasses themselves, by gathering,
> >soaking, and/or parching grains?
>
> I don't think homo erectus on were that unimposing. It is not
> difficult to imagine and perhaps they could have done it. But
> maybe they just liked eating meat and the effort to aquire meat
> was not so difficult they had to exploit grasses for the base of their
> diet. After all,
> they didn't have a Dean Ornish around telling them otherwise.

Again, I'm not arguing that they exploited grasses for the *base*
of their diet.  I doubt this.  My personal view is that hunting
and scavenging meat were the primary adaptations to the grassland
environment.  The point is simply that getting and eating grains
is not that difficult either, and it represents a secondary sort
of adaptation to the grassland environment.  It was not until
grains were cultivated that they became the *base* of the diet.

And anyone who argues that paleolithic people didn't eat, and
like, grains *at all* must have a difficult time explaining the
rather rapid transition to large-scale cultivation of these crops
when agriculture finally did begin.  It is much easier to
conceive of grains moving from the status of adjunct to staple
than to imagine them going directly from non-food to staple.

Todd Moody
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