http://www.ijlera.com/papers/v9-i6/3.202406681A.pdf
International Journal of Latest Engineering
Research and Applications (IJLERA) ISSN: 2455-7137
Volume – 09, Issue – 06, June 2024, PP – 15-21
Abstract:
The evolution of powerful and precise throwing
developed a means of defense and attack that
enabled hominins to colonize the savanna,
occupy a new ecological niche, and become
hunter-gatherers, essentially becoming humans.
The first achievement occurred when the
bipedalism and hand structure of
Australopithecus allowed for throwing that
was powerful and precise enough to defend
against predators when venturing into open
fields to exploit resources. Subsequently,
the precision grip and more complex motor
skills in H. habilis developed throwing as a
means to compete, at least occasionally, for
carrion with savanna predators, similar to
how Hadza women use wooden digging sticks to
drive off a leopard from its fresh kill.
Finally, H. ergaster specialized in throwing,
acquiring the most favorable anthropometry
for maximum performance, with modifications
in the glenohumeral joint, longer legs,
shorter forearms, and optimal weight and
height, which made it a hunter-gatherer of
the savanna and its Homo descendants
colonizers of all the Earth's emergent lands.
"The powerful one-handed throwing of
relatively light objects reaches its
pinnacle in athletic competitions, where we
see burly men and women throwing javelins,
hammers, discs, or shots to record distances
unmatched by any other animal. This ability
is unique to Homo sapiens, as no other
animal can perform this action with such
power."
Primum Sapienti wrote:
The evolution of powerful and precise throwing
developed a means of defense and attack that
enabled hominins to colonize the savanna,
occupy a new ecological niche, and become
hunter-gatherers, essentially becoming humans.
Are we pretending that a savanna environment is what
typifies Homo?
This is literally dogma. One sentence in and we have
a massive circular "Argument" posed in the defense of
Out of Africa purity.
And you wonder why all the intelligent people have
abandoned it?
Mario Petrinovic wrote:
I was thinking about African savanna lately. As I am seeing >> it, African Savanna (as compared to Euro-Asian steppe, which, of
course formed only after the last glacial period, I presume) could
form only because of being depleted of people. Savanna, simply, is too
far inland from the sources of salt. But, savanna, originally, emerged
in Europe, north Mediterranean, Vallesian crisis (officially 9.75 mya,
I just glanced through Agusti at al. 2013 paper about the subject, but
I see that they found such environment, with Hipparion horses, 11.5
mya, in Vienna basin). Bipedal apes emerged in the very same environment.
Ridiculous!
The savanna is the least capable of supporting biodiversity.
The population is at it's smallest on the savanna. There's much higher biodiversity in the forest. Any population that learned to exploit the
sea, and I don't even mean they had to build fishing polls here, could support an even higher population density/biodiversity than could the
forest.
You can argue something of a reverse selection, where a shift to the
savanna put enormous pressures on a population, because it couldn't
support as many mouths to feed, so any little advantage could
persevere. But if that's half the answer than it's the smaller half,
as it doesn't move our ancestors across the globe or grow them larger brains...
Mario Petrinovic wrote:
of course jungle has higher diversity, it isn't the problem in diversity.
Actually, it is. Because the most common result of heavy
"Natural" pressures is extinction. A population has to have
the genetic capacity -- diversity -- to change, adapt. If
it lacks it, which in the vast majority of cases it does,
it goes extinct.
It is the problem that I have hard time to find in Euroasia wild
animals that we have in savanna.
So?
They are all domesticated.
What happened, and continues to happen today is that domesticated
pigs escape, go feral, and breed with the wild boars. This does
not stop. It's a slow trickle (sometimes a very fast trickle) of
DNA from the domesticated pig over time. It's not an all at once
replacement, or it wasn't, but it was a replacement of sorts.
Compare zebras to horses. In Asia even elephants are domesticated.
Now you're getting into the arguments of racists. Well the truth
is that African elephants tend to be more aggressive than Eurasian,
harder to tame. I've read it claimed that Mammoths were likely as
aggressive as African elephants, at least the males. Which may
be why they were never domesticated.
Mario Petrinovic wrote:
Adapt to what? Every animal is adapted to niche. A jaguar >> will not adapt to eat grass.
Common Descent means that the common ancestor to the jaguar and the
goat did adapt to eat one or the other.
The goat eats grass, the jaguar eats meat... what did their LCA eat?
There is a niche in nature.
And the better adapted to that niche, the more vulnerable to changes.
The better matched to a niche, the more likely a population will go
extinct if changes are introduced.
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