From: gts (gts_2000@yahoo.com)
Date: Thu Apr 17 2003 - 14:55:31 MDT
Damien Sulliven wrote:
> I've been seeing this "we scavenged a lot" claim a lot.
> What's the evidence for it?
First of all we seem to be able to survive on just about any diet, (which is
not to say that just any diet is optimal). The flexibility of our diet
suggests that we've been scavenging for any possible kind of food for a very
long time.
The most remarkable evidence of scavenging the dead prey of other predators
dates back approximately two million years. I don't have the ref handy (ask
me to research it if you really want it). At least one site was discovered
in which it appears early hominids were breaking the bones and eating the
marrow of large animals which, at that early stage of evolution, they could
not possibly have killed themselves. I think I mentioned this once before.
It is some of the strongest evidence against vegetarianism.
> We don't seem adapted to eating meat
> with a lot of bacteria on it. Unless 'scavenge' means "chase lions
> away from fresh kills".
The scavenged meat from freshly abandoned kills would not contain a lot of
bacteria. And yes I think it's certainly possible that hungry early hominids
banded together in large number to chase lions away from the freshest kills.
Also lions, and presumably also their ancestors, fall asleep after gorging
their stomachs, regardless of any meat still left on the carcass. Later
hominids might have attacked and killed those sleeping lions for food and to
gain access to their prey, and/or smaller earlier hominids might have stolen
their prey surreptitiously. Intelligence in the making.
-gts
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