On Wed, 11 Oct 2000, Philip Thrift wrote:

> On Wed, 11 Oct 2000 11:08:31 -0400, Todd Moody <[log in to unmask]>
> wrote:
>
> >And even though I count myself among those whose diet is
> >dominated by meat, I have to admit that Amadeus's position has
> >some merit, and furthermore it appears to be gaining ground among
> >paleoanthropologists.  I doubt that we will find a simple answer
> >to this one.
>
> It seems to me that some recent stories are
> revising upwards the total % of meat in these diets; eg:
>
>     http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/120178997v1

Yes, it's pretty clear that recent Neanderthal studies suggest
that they were, as the authors say, "top-level carnivores."  The
jury is still out on whether Neanderthals were ancestral to us,
however, and at the moment the evidence tends to the negative.
In short, we don't know how relevant the Neanderthal case is.

Jared Diamond has a lot to say about this in The Third
Chimpanzee, and cites the relevant recent literature on the
subject.  As I say, I don't expect a simple answer, just as there
is no simple answer to the question of how extensively
contemporary HGs rely on meat.  They all eat *some* of it, to be
sure, but the extent to which it dominates the diet varies
enormously.

Todd Moody
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