Re: Causes of floresiensis' Dwarfism

From: Marc Verhaegen (fa204466_at_skynet.be)
Date: 10/29/04 

Date: Fri, 29 Oct 2004 17:55:16 +0200

"No Alternative" <noalternative@operamail.com> wrote in message
news:203537a9.0410290155.290da76c@posting.google.com...

> > Insular dwarfism is the only reasonable explanation. What else? Why
would humans be different from all other mammals?? Probably their ancestors
had reached Flores swimming (at least 18 km at lowest sea levels): female
brain size was no larger than a chimp's (380 cc), so it's difficult to
imagine they were able to make boats or so, although their ancestors could
have had larger brains (Hs also has rel.smaller brains than Hn - the
probable brain size reduction illustrates that also chimp ancestors might
have had somewhat larger brains once).

> How do we know that the brain to body size was not proportional?

Well, CC ~380 cc, Wt ~16-28.7 kg (although "femur cross-sect.area of 525 mm˛
gives a mass of 36 kg").
IOW, there's no doubt H.flor.brains were unexpectedly & extremely small for
a member of Homo.

--Marc

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