From: Keith Henson (hkhenson@rogers.com)
Date: Sat 30 Jul 2005 - 00:49:26 GMT
At 10:32 AM 29/07/05 -0400, Keith wrote:
snip
> You can make a case that really old cultural elements like the use of
> fire might have shaped human psychological traits. Consider the interest
> human children have in fire (they will play with fires for hours) and
> contrast that to a lack of interest or fear other young apes have.
By measuring the genetic distance between two different kinds of human
lice, researchers put a date on when humans lost most of their hair. I
just wonder if this date is roughly the same as the date for humans
starting to control fire?
Many other proposals for why humans lost most of their hair have been
proposed, but thinking about an ape child trying to play with fire and
setting their hair on fire . . . .
But looking around for information doesn't provide strong dates on either
when the human line became hairless or when our ancestors started using
fire. But if hairlessness didn't co evolved with the use of fire, it seems
like it would be a preadaption.
Keith Henson
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