Re: A critique of the BBC aquatic ape programme and the transcript.



Algis Kuliukas wrote:
> JAE wrote:
> > Algis Kuliukas wrote:
> >
> > [snip]
> >
> > > Many, but not all, anatomical changes which are consistent with upright
> > > posture and standing are also consistent with those that aid a
> > > terrestrial biped. Wading compells apes, and therefore probably early
> > > hominins, to be upright and move bipedally like no other factor.
> > >
> > > See? I've answered them again. Easy.
> >
> > No, you have not.
>
> Oh yes I have.
>
> > Those are not answers.
>
> Oh yes they are.
>
> > They're your statements.
>
> They are statements which are true. Which do you dispute?
>
> Is it:
>
> a) Many, but not all, anatomical changes which are consistent with
> upright
> posture and standing are also consistent with those that aid a
> terrestrial biped.

There are many things that are consistent that don't indicate
causality. Consistency doesn't address whether or


> or
>
> b) Wading compells apes, and therefore probably early hominins, to be
> upright and move bipedally like no other factor.
>
> or both?
>
> > You must learn to recognize the difference else you're going to do the
> > same thing you've done for years now which is repeat the same line
> > blind to how meaningless it is.
>
> And you must stop dancing away every time I answer your questions for
> the nth time with some determined pretence that I've somehow *not*
> answered them. It just looks like a sleazy evasion. An evasion that
> results from your inability to concede a single point to this most
> simple and plausible idea because to do so would entail you having to
> admit that all of the posturing of superiority over all these years was
> just a facade.

I don't concede false points.

> > You have asserted that there's a possible connection.
>
> Yes. One that is bleeding obvious, even to a three year old.

Obvious to a three year old isn't a ringing endorsement.

> > You have not indicated in ANY way why the
> > ape-like condition is at a disadvantage, why the way a chimp stands and
> > wades doesn't cut it when you compare it to a more human-like
> > condition.
>
> Oh yes I have. Again and again. Just there in the statement above I
> did. Some anatomical traits that favour upright posture would favour
> wading *and* they'd favour walking too. Some of the traits which help
> wading (e.g. long legedness) would, when they reach some
> threshold,*preclude* quadrupedalism on land as an option.

That's actually an interesting possibility. It explains dreadfully
little but could be a prime-mover that makes one direction more likely
than another. But you've not INDICATED why it's a selective difference
(and you're not doing it here either. You're just saying it could be
(and tossing out the laundry list of things that could be too. The
disposible claim of "some traits" indicates that there's nothing worked
out but your hunch. That's quite a bit different than actually
demonstrating the advantage as it relates to particulars of
morphological differences.

You should stop acting like the possibility is more than that, that
it's anything you've demonstrated, that it's anything that you've
indicated occurred with any probability, that it's anything you've
demonstrated would have conveyed a real survival value that
differentiates between an ape-like facultative biped and something more
like us. If you do this rather than posturing about how you've got
such a great hypothesis while you're still not clear on what the
hypothesis is--and if it's at the "some traits" generality, you aren't
sure what it is--you'll be taken more seriously. When you overstep
things like you regularly do and are doing now, you're inviting
criticism and you generate skepticism. You still seem to act like we
should buy all your hunches as if you've actually done the work to
confirm them. You haven't.

Now if you're serious about making the case, you've got to spell out
the specifics. The biomechanic specifics mean actually studying the
biomechanics in a comparative fashion (not just pitting a measurement
against anecdote and posturing that you've shown something). More
important though if you're addressing a selective difference is
indicating why the scenario likely happened. The problem you're up
against here is a plausible lifestyle to select for the difference.
What creatures wade and how? Wading birds have long legs. Why? Is it
to move around or are they largely stationary, waiting for something to
swim by below them? There's a difference and depending on how you come
down with your answer here, some differences are going to be more or
less plausible as *selectively important differences. Wading birds
don't seem to wade for flood avoidance and it seems unlikely that an
inch difference in leg length really opens up much extra territory to
avoid floods, so you're left with an explanation that relates to
behavior and ecology. How do you see this actually happening? (And
before you whine about how no one else has had to do this, please do
consider that CONSIDERABLE research has been done on hominid diets,
trying to figure out what they ate, how they ate it, what sort of
resources were available and what sort of limits this placed them
under. You are quite incorrect that other people don't have to contend
with these limits.)

> When you
> repeatedly make that claim you are, of course, conveniently forgetting
> that water comes in a continuum of depths. In your mind, apparently,
> there are only two: "deep" and "zero".

*** and fall backwards, Algis, if you're going to continue to be so
ridiculously dishonest. You've repeated this again and again: a lie
(yes, a lie because at this point, you've been told otherwise a number
of times and continue to repeat it willingly) that I only consider two
depths. You repeat this when I make you own up to the relevence of
your claim about "waist deep" meaning something. You pretend to be
able to read my mind. You can't. I've acknowledged that water comes at
varying depths. YOU seem to be the one who repeats "waist deep" like
an parrot.

> At waist deep depths, according
> to you, there's no selective advantage for a slightly more homo like
> biped.

Actually, if you were an honest person (which, I've come to believe you
are not until you demonstrate otherwise) you'd recongnize that what
I've done is ask for the selective difference between facultative and
obligate biped at this depth. You tangent into how they were all
facultative at this point, but if you never explain what the difference
is, why we do better than a chimp at this depth. If you can't figure
out this difference, why are less pronounced differences selectively
important? What about the way we stand in waist deep water increases
our reproductive success? What about the way chimps stand decreases
theirs? I don't see this as obvious and you've yet to explain why it
is. You either talk about drowning (why do chimps drown if they can
stand up?) or talk about shallower water. In the latter case, you
completely kill the relevence of waist deep water.

> This might be true (although I very much doubt it) - but at
> shallower depths it *absolutely* cannot be true, because as the water
> depth recedes, wading morphs into walking. And you wouldn't be claiming
> that a chimp stands no disadvantage compared to the human-like
> condition whilst walking, would you?

I would say that the difference in the ability of a chimp to walk
versus our ability is going to be different at different speeds. I
would also say that even with varying depths, you haven't made anything
close to a compelling case for why apes would do that much *moving
about* in very shallow water. Trips back and forth all day long? I
dispute your hyperDawkins view of evolution maximizing every minimal
environmental difference. If there's not a reason why they're moving
about all that much in shallow water--and so far, you've given no
compelling reason--then there's nothing to generate a difference for
selection to work on. The way we walk has a whole lot to do with
balance to minimize lateral motion. At slower speeds, this isn't as
pronounced a cost. My experience is that wading, even in shallower
water, is slower than walking on land for a number of reasons. My
experience is that balance by minimizing lateral movement of the torso
while wading isn't as big a deal. In anything but the very shallowest
water, wading is slower, more deliberate with each step. Balance is
maintained differently than on dry land. Wading seemingly involves a
different stride at anything other than the VERY shallowest depths.
Perhaps I'm wrong about this, but my experience is that water produces
different challenges and I don't defacto believe that ours is a
morphology that necessarily deals with them better than an ape does.
Feel free to *demonstrate* otherwise, but be ware that your
pronouncement that it's the same blah blah blah will be met with
skepticism, in part because I don't feel you've demonstrated
competently that you understand the functional morphology enough for
your pronouncements to carry much weight (pardon the pun).


> > You have punted on this, claiming to have addressed it
> > (else you've hidden behind your wall of conspiracy).
>
> Oh no I haven't. I have addressed it. Again and again. And *easily*.

"Easy" does not mean well. You have not addressed the issues well at
all. I know you believe otherwise. Good luck publishing. You will
have a bear of a time with the attitudes you have.

[snip]

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