Re: Not Enough Data

"Jim McGinn" <jimmcginn@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

"Agriculture probably stretches back hundreds of thousand if not
millions of years. " Dimmy (aka Claudius) 10/22/2006

Let me guess. Mikey objects because he saw in a textbook something
that said otherwise. And the textbook said otherwise based not on
evidence but on lack of evidence.

Guess again. Mikey objects because he saw on the internet something
written by Jimbo. And he knows that anything written by Jimbo is
bull***, based on evidence...

So, Ross, you realize, don't you, that humans have had the ability to
fashion weapons/tools out of stone and wood going back at least 2
million years. Do you really think that a hominid that is smart enough
to shape a rock and attach it to a shaft would not be smart enough to
make the connection between planting a seed and having it result in a
plant/bush/tree? Let me guess, in your brain-dead paradigm you're not
even allowed to ask these kind of questions.

It's not that we deny Homo erectus a priori the ability to dispose of
the dead by deliberate burial or the ability to cultivate crops, but
in the absence of evidence the default hypothesis (to be falsified)
should be that they didn't. If you dispose of the requirement for
evidence, what remains of the science?
Indeed, there is hard evidence that hominids manufactured stone tools
as early as 2.5 mya and that is quite compatible with a
hunter-gatherer kind of lifestyle, the default for nonsedentary
people. There is no indication that Homo erectus sites were occupied
for more than a season, and that isn't good enough to reap the
benefits of cultivation (sow, tend, harvest, store).

Gerrit
.

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