Re: Neanderthal noses as an 'aquatic' adapatation?
From: Marc Verhaegen (fa204466_at_skynet.be)
Date: 12/24/04
- Next message: Paul Crowley: "Re: selection criteria for obesity"
- Previous message: Pauline M Ross: "Re: selection criteria for obesity"
- In reply to: Algis Kuliukas: "Re: Neanderthal noses as an 'aquatic' adapatation?"
- Next in thread: Marc Verhaegen: "Re: Neanderthal noses as an 'aquatic' adapatation?"
- Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ]
Date: Fri, 24 Dec 2004 12:42:51 +0100
"Algis Kuliukas" <algis@RiverApes.com> wrote in message
news:1103856071.199241.64910@f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com...
> > Of course, he's wrong, the fool. Well, the very first time when I got
into SAP (IOW, before ever posting anything here!), 5 or more years ago,
that very day, I saw my name mentioned by some dry aper who believed that
the famous passage was wrong: "In a Neandertal swimming on his back, the
large nose with distal nostrils and the protruding midface surrounded by
large air sinuses functioned as a snorkel." (from one of my Med.Hyp.papers,
can be found in the files of http://www.onelist.com/community/AAT ). I knew
this passage would elicit reactions, but since I like some controversion &
try to write as concise as possible, I didn't change it. The dry apers are
incredibly stupid here: a child can see that if a neandertal with a
protruding nose (Zollikofer hadn't yet published on neandertal noses then)
floated on his back, his nose worked as a snorkel. Only idiots (as we find
many of them at SAP) deny this. Whether or not neandertals really did this
frequently, I don't know, but for some obscure reason (read: lack of
intelligence) dry apers think they have to laugh at it,
> They have to laugh at it, Marc, because the idea that a Neanderthal might
have ever swam is just not on their radar. The image of neanderthals we've
all been taught is ugly, ice-age cave men wrapped in animal skins stomping
around the tundra looking for deer to hunt and so the very concept of
swimming just does not compute. It's similar to Homo erectus and the image
of a savannah dweller. That image, instilled from an early age, cannot be
contradicted by reason in minds that are too inflexible. It's as if they're
saying to themselves 'but I know neanderthals never swam, I've seen images
of them.' And yet if anyone goes to the trouble to do this little experiment
one can see that Marc's idea is not so stupid and, in fact, once again is
probably right. Go to a part of a swimming pool that is too deep to touch
the bottom. Take a really deep breath of air and tilt your head forwards and
just hang there floating without moving. You'll find that the orientation of
your floating body is such that your back is at the surface and your mouth
and nose are submerged. Now, merely tilt your head backwards slightly.
You'll find that rather quickly you'll reach a point where your body will
suddenly re-orientate itself in the water so that your mouth and nose become
the parts of the body that are above the water, enabling you to breathe
without any effort whatsoever, as well as open your eyes and look around.
Now, if you are a person with an median amount of adipocity for a western
society, clearly if you exhaled quite deeply your breathing holes would
submerge again but the degree this happens it very much dependant on how fat
you are. With a bit of practice one can soon perfect the technique of taking
long, deep inhalations followed by very short, shallow exhalations to stay
at the surface. It's definitely a very close thing between being able to
breathe whilst floating with no effort at all and not being able to do so.
I would suggest that any slight change in the orientation of the skull and
increased adipocyty would be more than enough to tilt the balance in favour
of effortless breathing whilst floating. This is the sort of thing
aquasceptics have often cited as an argument against the AAH. (Hippos have
breathing holes at the top of their heads, we don't - there you go, proof
it's crap!) I'm suggesting that comparing humans to neanderthals (and
probably H.erectus too) we do see such differences. If neanderthals spent a
significant amount of time swimming then, considering the water would have
been rather cold, it is quite logical that they'd have had far greater
adipocyty than humans - obviously for improved thermoregulation as well as
increased buoyancy. This, plus increased buoyancy that results from colder
water and the greater mass of the occipital parts of the neanderthal cranium
would, in all likelihood allow a neanderthal to float and breath
effortlessly without even having to consciously tilt the head back.
Increased nose size would only aid this effect. Marc's use of the word
'snorkel' might have led to some misunderstanding and ridicule but his basic
point is clearly valid if - outrageous for some people here to even
consider, we know - neanderthals swam regularly.
Yes.
a) snorkel = "air tube that can rise above the surface of water".
Only idiots say that when a neandertal floats on his back his nose is no
snorkel.
b) The real point is: did they even float? how frequently? Well, there's
little doubt any more IMO at least some populations of Hn or their immediate
ancestors regularly did, possibly only the males, possibly only in some
seasons, I don't know, but there are a lot of indications some of them spent
some time in water, eg,
1) Extensive, even bilateral ear exostoses in some older Hn males. Typical
of human divers & surfers.
2) Traces of cattails on Hn tools.
3) Medullar stenosis & pachyostosis of skull & several postcrania (less than
in He, but more than in apes, apiths, Hs...). Only seen in slow
bottom-feeding mammals.
The other indications are not waterproof:
4) As you say, light build of anterior skull (large frontal sinuses), heavy
build of posterior skull (extremely dense occiput in some spms). The
Petralona skull (no Hn though) is a very nice illustrations.
5) Very long nose (Zollikofer).
6) Description by discoverer (Otto Hauser IIRC) of nostrils being more
anterior than in Hs.
7) Protruding midface (incl. postmolar space).
8) Flattened skull (lengthening the airway).
9) Less basicranial flexion (idem).
10) Finds at coasts, eg, Gibraltar, Italy, and AFAIK when inland, always
near large waters.
11) Isotope evidence of diet between wolves & mammoths (= wetland feeders).
12) I forgot a few less important "arguments" (eg, iodine).
If some dry apers believes Hn never floated, I'd like to see their evidence.
:-D Poor duds...
> So once again a big objection to the AAH and one that has resulted only in
pure sneering appears to have validity if you look at it more closely.
> > although they're still unable, after so many years, to give 1 argument
against the hypothesis. I can't describe their behaviour in other words than
unscientific biasedness. The same with all my other hypotheses. I don't care
whether my hypotheses are wrong, but if somebody believes they're wrong, he
should at least be able to give some arguments...
> They (the aquasceptic majority on sap) don't want to give arguments.
They can't, the fools!
> They just want us to accept that it's wrong because they think they know
best. All they have is the ex cathedra argument now. Jason even disputed
that Langdon's refutation had won primacy against a majority of papers in
the literature by clearly neutral authors. Get that!
Eshleman is a sick mind & a liar. Don't read his nonsense: blablablabla, but
no relevant contents.
> The one paper published in JHE that has attempted to refute the AAH and
*he's* questioning whether it has won primacy! If not Langdon, then what? -
Lowenstein and Zihlman is even worse and Roede et al was a knife edge
decision to reject the idea that there was actually an aquatic ape but gave
support to the idea that water acted as an agency of selection in our
evolution. I can only conclude that coffee room gossip must be Jason's
preferred means of rejecting such hypotheses. I think we can declare
that this debate is really over, Marc. The tide has turned. When the best
they can come up with is calls to killfile and calling names, I think it's
pretty clear which side has won the argument. Merry Christmas and a very
Happy New Year to you and your family, Marc (but not your dog!) :-D All
the best Algis Kuliukas
My dog is as nice as I am, but you have to know how to handle him.
:-D
All best wishes to you & your family & to all people of good will, Algis!
:-)
--Marc
- Next message: Paul Crowley: "Re: selection criteria for obesity"
- Previous message: Pauline M Ross: "Re: selection criteria for obesity"
- In reply to: Algis Kuliukas: "Re: Neanderthal noses as an 'aquatic' adapatation?"
- Next in thread: Marc Verhaegen: "Re: Neanderthal noses as an 'aquatic' adapatation?"
- Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ]
Relevant Pages
|
