>> Jim Foley writes:
>> <<I doubt that Tattersall says
>> that none of these are human ancestors, or that none of them are
>> erectus/sapiens intermediates.>>
>> The point is this. Tattersall says modern man was an extraordinary,
>> recent event.
To be more precise, the arrival of *fully* modern behaviour,
specifically the fairly sudden appearance of artistic ability and
creativity, was a recent event. There are many modern behaviours, which
we associate with humanness, which are found before then: use of fire,
stone tools, hunting, use of language (almost certainly in Neandertals
and archaic sapiens, probably in erectus).
It's important to note that this event involves *no detectable
anatomical change*, contrary to [the other] Jim's contention that brain
size increased 50% within a few thousand years, or one of his sources
that stated it had occurred within a few tens of thousands of years.
Brain sizes have been modern, or close to it, for hundreds of thousands
of years.
Any disagreement with the above?
[My comments are based on Tattersall's "The Human Odyssey", not "The
Fossil Trail", which Jim Bell was using earlier.]
>> Point 1. He further says we don't know how it happened. Point
>> 2. That leaves a puzzle. Tattersall: "[I]t is the nature of that very
>> recent yet still obscure happening that poses the true enigma of
>> human evolution." [pg. 246]
All of this is true, but that is no evidence of a supernatural cause.
Even if it occurs naturally, this sort of change is not likely to leave
the sort of information in the fossil record that would let us determine
how and why it happened.
It may be that the "event" occurred elsewhere, at an unknown place, time
and rate, and appears sudden only because Cro-Magnon man migrated into
Europe, leaving a rich fossil record to be found by Europeans. Evidence
for this would be the recent discovery of very sophisticated barbed
spear points, carved out of bone, found in Africa and dated about 90,000
years ago.
>> Naturalists hold out for a naturalistic answer. But I contend there
>> is another answer.
Of course your answer is possible. But you also claimed that it was the
only answer, and you have not shown that. It happened rapidly, possibly
too rapidly for natural selection to have had anything to do with it,
but that is not a problem. Cultural changes, as we know in the age of
future shock, can happen far faster than anything that natural selection
can do.
-- Jim Foley Symbios Logic, Fort CollinsJim.Foley@symbios.com (303) 223-5100 x9765* 1st 1.11 #4955 * "I am Homer of Borg! Prepare to be...OOooooo! Donuts!!!"