What exactly are paleolithic forms of carbs?

[miles]

Was the main theory about size not that there was more oxygen in the atmosphere? That having more oxygen allowed the development of humongous species, even in the air?

[TylerDurden]

The trouble with the higher oxygen notions is that humans aren't adapted to such high oxygen and their health would suffer as a result.


As regards the claims that humans are a very destructive species, it's very difficult indeed to disprove. I mean one only has to look around at the sheer destruction that humans have wrought on the environment to see how dangerous humans are. And the old notion that hunter-gatherers were somehow saintly beings far above modern man in terms of spirituality is merely one aspect of the fallacious Noble Savage myth. Humans are roughly the same the world over, in terms of ethics or lack thereof. If they were so saintly, how come cannibalism was widely practised in the Palaeolithic, how come entire hominid subspecies such as the Neanderthals got wiped out - climate change is too poor an excuse to give for extinction of a subspecies that was pretty much on the same intelligence level as modern humans.

[William]

From my understanding, elephants are already pushing the limits of the strength-weight ratio, so I have no idea how animals significantly larger (like mammoths) even managed to lift themselves off the ground under current gravitational acceleration.

Our mental models of paleolithic conditions are necessarily influenced by current realities, but this leads to assumptions that are not necessarily true, such as that gravity was the same then as now.
McCanney has said that planetary mass increases continuously; this seems reasonable given the composition of the solar wind. If we add acceptance of the evidence of cataclysms that  increased sea levels (~200 feet?), the added mass should have increased gravity within the last ~10,000 years.

So paleolithic conditions of oxygen  content of air, circulation of ocean water (gulf stream), polar location, geomagnetic field strength and even gravity were sufficiently different that we end up doing a lot of guessing of how life was then.

[William]

As regards the claims that humans are a very destructive species, it's very difficult indeed to disprove. I mean one only has to look around at the sheer destruction that humans have wrought on the environment to see how dangerous humans are.

Not humans. Shrunken and sickly (including mental) neolithic man includes the sub-humans who stupidly do mass murder such as the current slaughter in the middle east and the hundreds of millions of the 20th century.

Environmental destruction is caused by insanely greedy industrialists.

There is no evidence that such man-made destruction happened in the paleolithic.

[TylerDurden]

Your previous  ridiculous notion that  palaeo humans had nothing to do with that is absurd, of course. Any significant evidence shows that humans wiped out huge amounts of megafauna c. 40,000 years ago, well within the Palaeolithic era.

[Squall]

Miles, the higher concentration of oxygen theory is one theory put forward to explain the disappearance of dinosaurs. I've never seen it related to paleolithic megafauna. However, it still overlooks the basic structural engineering principle that as the cross-sectional surface area of a support (muscle) increases, its volume, and therefore weight, will increase as the square. Put simply, if elephants were 10 times stronger, they would be 100 times heavier to accommodate the increased muscle mass. Conversely, if they were 1/10 their current strength, the amount of mass comprising that muscle would be approximately 1/100 of their current mass.

Your previous  ridiculous notion that  palaeo humans had nothing to do with that is absurd, of course. Any significant evidence shows that humans wiped out huge amounts of megafauna c. 40,000 years ago, well within the Palaeolithic era.

I think all that the evidence indisputably shows is that they were wiped out, period. The anthropogenic cause is merely a mental leap made by some paleontologists who, imo, are intellectually lazy, and probably have some deep-seated, self-destructive tendencies that lead them to blame themselves for every single environmental or ecological catastrophe. Seriously, as a collective whole, the human race seems to have an unfathomable obsession with playing the victim on a massive scale.

Tyler, I remember talking about cannibalism a while back, but I don't remember the verdict being that it was widely practiced. That it was practiced is most likely indisputable. That it was a normal course of paleolithic life seems far from true. Cannibalism being practiced on such a large scale would entail warfare on a large scale (unless we're to believe that the victims voluntarily yielded themselves up for the feast), and warfare on a large scale would have been impossible in times of such privation. The opportunity cost of working together, even inter-tribally, would have been so high as to make any other alternative seem positively ridiculous to our ancestors. People may value human life very cheaply today, and maybe that makes it easier for them to kill, but let's not make the fallacious argument that our ancestors had the exact same subjective valuations of life that some of their descendants do.

Also, I find cannibalism economically infeasible. Who makes the determination that its a better idea to kill and eat another hunter instead of working together with that person over years and years to make large kills? A few meals of a fellow human, or hundreds of more nutrient dense meals of megafauna that were the result of cooperation with a person you could've eaten? I know some here have discounted our ancestor's ability to forecast, but are we now discounting their ability to make simple economic decisions? The composite view being painted here is truly astonishing. I'm not sure how I could even be here typing on a computer connected to a vast, decentralized network of millions of others, if I was the descendant of such blood-thirsty, cannibalistic imbeciles.

[reyyzl]

Was the main theory about size not that there was more oxygen in the atmosphere? That having more oxygen allowed the development of humongous species, even in the air?

   Do you think if we gave extra oxygen to a child all their growing up, they could get taller and bigger than otherwise?  I'm thinking not only raw food being more oxygenating than cooked, but animal based food diet and much more so it raw is more oxygenating than plant based.  Could this be part of why children raised on a raw animal food diet grow the biggest, the oxygen from burning this kind of fuel?  

[PaleoPhil]

This is definitely not an unpopular motif, even in these forums.

this off-topic nonsense should cease, or you're going to scare people away.

If it's "not an unpopular motif, even in these forums" then why would it "scare people away" more than it would attract people in? Are you admitting that it's at least unpopular outside of these forums?

Also, I wanted to caution many of you here about the doom and gloom. I usually look past it because I know there's good info here. However, more and more, posters are going off-topic with their personal views about how horrible the human race is.

Are these words directed in part at me? If so, it's rather ironic, because I've also been accused of promoting a "noble savage" theory of an idyllic Stone Age. I can't be guilty of BOTH promoting a "doom and gloom" view of the Stone Age AND of promoting a "noble savage" view of an idyllic Stone Age. Since these criticisms are mutually exclusive at least one of them must be wrong and being attacked from both extremes would tell me that what I've actually been posting is probably somewhere in between the extremes and I'm probably hitting about the right balance.

I'm open to wherever the facts lead me. If you have SPECIFIC facts that point in a different direction, then by all means share them, otherwise you're posts will serve mostly as time-wasting rantings, though maybe they'll at least help convince Tyler that I'm not a blind devotee of a "noble savage" theory.

I've come to understand this reasoning as a form of sociopathy, or at the very least, self-loathing.

...some paleontologists who, imo, are intellectually lazy, and probably have some deep-seated, self-destructive tendencies....

This is one of the most common errors I've noticed in discussion forums--making negative assumptions about the motivations and thinking of others instead of investingating to find out what people's actual views and motivations are. I've noticed that when such assumptions are made that they are often the most negative imaginable, which seems more like ad hominem and setting up straw men than honestly addressing controversial issues. We've probably all made this error at some point in our lives, but surely it's best to try to avoid it as much as possible. If you have questions about why a specific person here or elsewhere finds overhunting to be a plausible important factor (not necessarily the only one) in the extinction of multiple megafauna or why someone is skeptical of some of William's extravagant claims about the Stone Age and Stone Agers, then feel free to ask them (or in the case of people outside this forum like published scientists, read their forum/blog posts, articles or books) instead of making assumptions. Then if you disagree with the reasons given, share why you do instead of just attributing their views to sociopathy, self-loathing, etc.

---*---

   Do you think if we gave extra oxygen to a child all their growing up, they could get taller and bigger than otherwise?  I'm thinking not only raw food being more oxygenating than cooked, but animal based food diet and much more so it raw is more oxygenating than plant based.  Could this be part of why children raised on a raw animal food diet grow the biggest, the oxygen from burning this kind of fuel?

Yes, I think this could possibly be part of it, as animal fats are not only nutritious but also promote healthful aerobic cellular respiration.

[William]

  William's extravagant claims about the Stone Age and Stone Agers

I claim that paleoman had neither the numbers nor the money required to make war, and did not suffer from malnutrition.
This does not make paleoman noble or savage, but in comparison to modern neolithics, paleoman is at least innocent of malice if not superior.

[Squall]

If it's "not an unpopular motif, even in these forums" then why would it "scare people away" more than it would attract people in? Are you admitting that it's at least unpopular outside of these forums?

I'm expressing my belief that outside of these forums its already an established and popular motif. In addition, I'm saying that this motif is creeping into this community where it doesn't really belong. Whether or not mankind is guilty of wholesale slaughter on an unprecedented scale bears little relation to the purpose of these boards, i.e. to assist those with questions regarding a diet of raw meat, fat, etc. I'm afraid that indulging this motif will scare away those who just want their questions answered, and draw in more people who just want to rant about their fellow man.

I can't be guilty of BOTH promoting a "doom and gloom" view of the Stone Age AND of promoting a "noble savage" view of an idyllic Stone Age.

For the record, I never accused you of either. I did however imply that you were in the doom and gloom group. The Noble Savage myth may be wrong on many counts, but at least its positive in nature. I'm all for staying on topic, but if anyone is to stray, I'd rather have them perpetuate a positive myth then a negative one, if only because many people come here looking for anything but more stress, guilt, etc.

If you have SPECIFIC facts that point in a different direction, then by all means share them, otherwise you're posts will serve mostly as time-wasting rantings ...

Read the following and tell me this isn't an instance of the pot calling the kettle black. When you're done, maybe you can explain how this advances the OP's questions regarding paleo carbs.

... our ancient ancestors, apparently starting with Homo erectus and continuing to this day, engaged in wanton destruction of other species (both prey and competitor predators) in a carnage unprecedented in the whole history of the planet. Given that hominids began exterminating whole species of animals once they mastered hunting technologies and techniques and continued to do so through most of human history and still do so today, it's unlikely that early Paleolithic humans were particularly concerned with being wardens of the earth. Can you imagine a H. erectus even considering it, much less enforcing it, given that verbal language hadn't even developed? I think the conservation-minded approach likely developed (like most things) out of necessity, once most of the megafauna were exterminated. It's an approach I advocate, but I don't think it was common in the early or middle Paleolithic.

Human history is drenched in blood and we are literally the products of that blood. If human beings have an original sin it is probably the annhilation of countless other species of animals and plants. It's time that we as a species grew up and came to grips with that and stopped pretending, as many vegans are wont to do, that we are a pristine pure species that tasted nary a drop of blood and never harmed as much as a fly and were perfect wardens of the environment until evil modernity arose. ...

This is one of the most common errors I've noticed in discussion forums--making negative assumptions about the motivations and thinking of others instead of investingating to find out what people's actual views and motivations are. I've noticed that when such assumptions are made that they are often the most negative imaginable, which seems more like ad hominem and setting up straw men than honestly addressing controversial issues. We've probably all made this error at some point in our lives, but surely it's best to try to avoid it as much as possible. If you have questions about why a specific person here or elsewhere finds overhunting to be a plausible important factor (not necessarily the only one) in the extinction of multiple megafauna or why someone is skeptical of some of William's extravagant claims about the Stone Age and Stone Agers, then feel free to ask them (or in the case of people outside this forum like published scientists, read their forum/blog posts, articles or books) instead of making assumptions. Then if you disagree with the reasons given, share why you do instead of just attributing their views to sociopathy, self-loathing, etc.

Although pervasive in society, the incessant attribution of every natural calamity to human beings is an incredibly negative viewpoint. To have such a perspective while discounting nature's obvious capriciousness, power, and unpredictability falls under the definition of sociopathy. IMO, many people look for any conceivable reason to blame mankind for anything. Over-hunting is one theory about why megafauna no longer exist. Changes in key environmental factors (which today preclude the existence of extremely large land animals) is another. They share the same evidence: a lack of megafauna today. Paleontologists more often than not choose the first, and educational curricula based on their theories don't even bother to inform students that other viable theories exist. This is a specific instance of the general format explained above.

I don't think questioning the bases of mainstream paleontologists' theories is constructing a straw man argument, especially given that relevant viewpoints aren't even considered for the most part: i.e. basic structural engineering principles.

Regarding assumptions, if you read my posts, you'll find that I make very few. About the only one made previously was that the tendency to blame humans for everything stems from a deep-rooted psychological distress. Good thing when I made that, I was sure to qualify it as an opinion. Those opinions, however, were not used as a basis for a counter-argument; they were attempts to ferret out why current theories exist, all within a similar (and macabre) vein of thought. My counter-arguments actually are just logical deductions that attempt to expose fallacies in the original. The most common fallacy I see here is the argument from convention. Aside from that, I've taken issue with discounting the ability of paleolithic man to properly rationalize his situation. So far, no one has answered why several people are doing this. Also no one has addressed the arguments from convention that both William and I have pointed out.

[alphagruis]

Miles, the higher concentration of oxygen theory is one theory put forward to explain the disappearance of dinosaurs. I've never seen it related to paleolithic megafauna. However, it still overlooks the basic structural engineering principle that as the cross-sectional surface area of a support (muscle) increases, its volume, and therefore weight, will increase as the square. Put simply, if elephants were 10 times stronger, they would be 100 times heavier to accommodate the increased muscle mass. Conversely, if they were 1/10 their current strength, the amount of mass comprising that muscle would be approximately 1/100 of their current mass.

This is just plain wrong reasoning.

What scaling theory in biology actually tells us can be learned here instead.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allometry

If just muscle cross-sectional area increases by a factor of 10 and its length remains unchanged it scales precisely as the volume or mass of the animal and everything would be OK. There is no factor of 100 in weight change.

Period.

I think all that the evidence indisputably shows is that they were wiped out, period.

This is just wishful thinking. Period.

 As most of your post(s) about our species's so called "ability to forecast" what were the consequences of its behaviour and activities on the ecosystems it lived in. Very funny.

[TylerDurden]

There are several obvious flaws in some of the above claims. First of all, elephants don't have the biggest size possible of all land animals. There were plant-eating dinosaurs of a far bigger size than mere elephants, so  mammoths could easily live and survive with their much smaller size, by comparison. Another point is that climate-change is relatively slow, allowing creatures like mammoths plenty of enough time to migrate to other areas with better climates. Unless there is some sort of definite proof that some cataclysmic event occurred that suddenly cooled the world in a manner similiar to the dinosaur-extinction event, then the most likely explanation is that humans wiped out the mammoths. Humans have been able to carry out some remarkably sudden extinctions that would be extremely unlikely to occur in nature. A good example would be the passenger-pigeon extinction and many species on islands and elsewhere have been completely wiped out not just by aggression on the part of mankind, but simply due to the fact that humans travel all over the world and therefore bring numerous completely foreign species with them via ships etc. which then wipe out local fauna.

As for the cannibalism question, that's pretty difficult to disprove. There is evidence of cannibalism being practised by Neanderthals for example as an automatic part of their burial rites, so it was clearly a common aspect of their culture. Also, it makes perfect sense, economically and logically, for palaeo tribes to eat the flesh of any fellow tribal members who die in the hunt or from old age etc. Killing other tribes for food would provide a partial explanation for why palaeo populations stayed relatively static for long periods.

[PaleoPhil]

I claim that paleoman had neither the numbers nor the money required to make war, and did not suffer from malnutrition.
This does not make paleoman noble or savage, but in comparison to modern neolithics, paleoman is at least innocent of malice if not superior.

Sorry William, but I'm not convinced that Paleoman was innocent of malice and never suffered malnutrition. Unless you can provide extraordinary evidence to support those extraordinary claims, I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on those. Re: war, it depends on what your definition of war is. During the Paleolithic there certainly weren't the large-scale wars of the Neolithic, so we can agree on that, but I do believe there were smaller-scale wars.

Quote from: PaleoPhil
If it's "not an unpopular motif, even in these forums" then why would it "scare people away" more than it would attract people in? Are you admitting that it's at least unpopular outside of these forums?

I'm expressing my belief that outside of these forums its already an established and popular motif. In addition, I'm saying that this motif is creeping into this community where it doesn't really belong.

 Whether or not mankind is guilty of wholesale slaughter on an unprecedented scale bears little relation to the purpose of these boards, i.e. to assist those with questions regarding a diet of raw meat, fat, etc. I'm afraid that indulging this motif will scare away those who just want their questions answered, and draw in more people who just want to rant about their fellow man.

So your fear is not that it's going to "scare people away" in general, but rather that it's going to scare away the sort of people you want around and attract those you don't, yes? It sounds like you want the overall tone of the forum to be more positive, but insulting people isn't going to advance that cause and if you've read many of my past posts then you know that I've done more than my share of posting positive things about this WOE, the Stone Age, Stone Agers, etc. You only need to check out my journal, for instance, to know that. As I've mentioned, I've been so positive at times that Tyler accused me of promoting an idyllic "noble savage" view of Stone Agers. So I think your concerns are overblown in my case and re: the forum as a whole too. I wish we would do less criticizing of each other, which you have ironically now contributed to, and focus our ire more on those outside our group who promote unhealthy foods/diets. However, I favor honesty and facts over false hype and self delusion and that means acknowledging unpleasant facts rather than trying to cover them up or delude ourselves about them.

In this case I actually see the overhunting of megafauna as SUPPORTING a raw Paleo diet because it refutes the claims of those extreme vegans who say that Stone Agers were incapable of hunting and rarely or never ate meat. So if you thought I saw it as a weakness in the RPD or as an "attribution of every natural calamity to human beings," then you completely missed my point and it would explain your puzzling implied criticism that I've been overly negative about Stone Agers and the RPD when in fact Tyler's criticism that I've been overly positive is closer to the mark (though I would argue that he was off the mark with that as well and your criticism has at least served me in demonstrating that).

Quote from: PaleoPhil
I can't be guilty of BOTH promoting a "doom and gloom" view of the Stone Age AND of promoting a "noble savage" view of an idyllic Stone Age.

For the record, I never accused you of either. I did however imply that you were in the doom and gloom group.

And that was my impression. I actually prefer it when people address me directly and make a specific charge that I can respond to, rather than make vague charges applied broad brush to a group of people with the implication that I'm one of them. I respect critics more when they are more forthright and offer evidence instead of just ad hominem to support their arguments.

The Noble Savage myth may be wrong on many counts, but at least its positive in nature. I'm all for staying on topic, but if anyone is to stray, I'd rather have them perpetuate a positive myth then a negative one, if only because many people come here looking for anything but more stress, guilt, etc.

I prefer honesty and facts to myths. I think in the long run that will pay off more than trying to sugar coat things.

Tyler and Alphagruis are doing a sufficient job of refuting your unsupported claims re: megafauna extinction and related matters, so I'll leave it to them.

[Squall]

This is just plain wrong reasoning.

What scaling theory in biology actually tells us can be learned here instead.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allometry

If just muscle cross-sectional area increases by a factor of 10 and its length remains unchanged it scales precisely as the volume or mass of the animal and everything would be OK. There is no factor of 100 in weight change.

Period.

The subsection under that link entitled Isometric Scaling is precisely what I'm talking about. In fact what they call the square-cube law is another way of describing a strength-weight ratio.

You're understanding of proportionality is lacking. Let's use a cylinder as a test. The volume of a cylinder is computed as the product of pi, the square of the radius, and its height. If you were to increase the size of a cylinder by factor of 10, you would be increasing its radius and its height by the same amount. So a cylinder with a radius of 10cm and a height of 10cm would have a cross-sectional surface area of 314 square cm, and a volume of 3140 cubic cm. A cylinder with a radius and height of 100cm would have a cross-sectional surface area of 31400 square cm and a volume of 3.14 million cubic cm. Whereas the cross-sectional surface area changed by a factor of 100, its volume changed by a factor of 1000.

This is an important concept regarding muscles. The maximal strength a muscle can reach is a function of the cross-sectional surface area of the muscle at its thickest point. If one were inclined to double the strength of a muscle, its volume would increase as the square, yielding at least an increase of 4 units. The volume may have to increase further to keep the muscle stable, as thicker (and stronger) muscles need larger heads with which to attach to internal structures. Therefore, as muscles get larger, the volume they take up increases as well. That proportion is not linear though; in fact, its volume varies directly as the square of area.

I think all that the evidence indisputably shows is that they were wiped out, period.

This is just wishful thinking. Period.

Are you saying that the evidence does not indisputably show that megafauna were wiped out? Is there evidence that they were not wiped out?

As most of your post(s) about our species's so called "ability to forecast" what were the consequences of its behaviour and activities on the ecosystems it lived in. Very funny.

I'm not even sure I understand this question. If you're asking me what the consequences of paleolithic man's ability to forecast were, that seems kinda broad.

There are several obvious flaws in some of the above claims. First of all, elephants don't have the biggest size possible of all land animals. There were plant-eating dinosaurs of a far bigger size than mere elephants, so  mammoths could easily live and survive with their much smaller size, by comparison.

I wouldn't use dinosaurs here to help the argument Tyler, as they exacerbate the problems with strength-weight ratios. Elephants (according to wikipedia) are the largest land animals today. They are quite ponderous and require extremely sturdy frames. The majority of their muscle mass is tied up in keeping them upright and building momentum when necessary. The tyrannosaurus (which is one of the smaller dinosaurs) was easily a match for an elephant in terms of average height and size. Clearly, much less muscle mass is being concentrated in the lower frame, and in fact, a major amount resided in the jaw alone. Yet we're to believe that the T Rex was able to execute extremely tight maneuvers in minimal time while hunting smaller, quicker prey? Now consider a massive sauropod. Even paleontologists were aware that there were some inherent difficulties in their existence. They used to reason it away by saying that they spent their entire lives in the water where their mass would be buoyed. That theory has been discarded in recent decades, however, as prolific fossilized sauropod footprints were found. Now the unstable structure implications are just ignored.

Also, it makes perfect sense, economically and logically, for palaeo tribes to eat the flesh of any fellow tribal members who die in the hunt or from old age etc. Killing other tribes for food would provide a partial explanation for why palaeo populations stayed relatively static for long periods.

Eating the dead makes sense in an odd way, at least when you don't consider the diseases that tend to be inherent in eating the flesh of the same species. Keep in mind, you're talking about a sub species that no longer exists. We aren't neanderthals, and they died out somehow. I've read quite a few theories. Honestly, they don't interest me, because we are not descended from them. However, tribes killing each other for food will never work out in the long run. Aside from destroying your trading partners, you're eliminating potential cooperative arrangements in hunting, as well as needlessly jeopardizing the lives of your own hunters. Hunters died during the hunt, no doubt. Those were due to enraged, cornered animals. Going up against other hunters seems like the potential loss of life would be markedly higher.

Like I said before, its very difficult for modern people to determine just how highly paleolithic man judged human life. I believe its value was considered high; you apparently disagree. Economics is on my side though, as the supply of food-gathers was very low then. Things which are scarce, are things which are conserved.

So your fear is not that it's going to "scare people away" in general, but rather that it's going to scare away the sort of people you want around and attract those you don't, yes?

Nice try. Let me ask you this: if I were a moderator and I told you that your negative ranting wasn't in the best spirit of the community, or, if a moderator told you the same thing that I did, would you ask them this same inane question?

Tyler and Alphagruis are doing a sufficient job of refuting your unsupported claims re: megafauna extinction and related matters, so I'll leave it to them.

How are they unsupported again? I've used math, logic, and basic economic principles to point out inconsistencies. Are these not sufficient? You may disagree with my positions, but at least do me the courtesy of recognizing that I'm supporting my arguments.

[Paleo Donk]

You are assuming entirely way too much and completely forgetting the interplay between the fascia and the muscles and the structural property called tensegrity.

Do you really not believe that extremely large dinosaurs did not exist?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tensegrity

http://www.anatomytrains.com/explore/tensegrity

Fascia is the fascinating biological fabric and glue that holds us together.  Long ignored, the fascial system is now getting its rightful due of attention, from both therapists and researchers.

Tensegrity is a model for understanding the geometry of the body, on both a micro- and a macro-cosmic scale, that leads to many new insights in terms of body connectivity, the relation between stability and movement, and how we can develop what might be called “Spatial Medicine."

With your logic, how would you explain a giraffe's neck? Wouldn't it collapse in on itself?

Heres a good thread on it - http://www.thunderbolts.info/forum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=44
and another - http://www.ttem.org/forum/index.php?topic=1807.0

THE ANOMALIES

If we accept the precepts of most present day biomechanical engineers a 100 kg weight lifted by your average competitive weight lifter will tear his erector spinae muscle, rupture his discs, crush his vertebra and burst his blood vessels (Gracovetsky, 1988). Even the less daring sports person is at risk. A two kg fish dangling at the end of a three-meter fly rod exerts a compressive load of at least 120 kg on the lumbosacral junction. If we include the weight of the rod and the weight of the torso, arms and head the calculated load on the spine would easily exceed the critical load that would fracture the lumbar vertebrae of the average mature male. This would make fly fishing an exceedingly dangerous activity.  Pounded by the forces of the runner striking the ground and the first metatarsal head acting as the hammer and the ground as the anvil the soft sesamoids would crush. A batter striking a baseball traveling at one hundred miles per hour, (160km/h), will be sheared from the ground, spikes and all. A hockey player, striking a puck will be propelled backwards on the near frictionless ice, as for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

Fig. 1. competitive weightlifting  is a mathematical absurdity.  If we modeled the weightlifter using  standard, Newtonian models, bones would crush and muscles would tear.
There is more to ponder. The brittleness of bones is about the same in a mouse as it is in an elephant, as the strength and stiffness of bones is about the same in all animals. Animals larger than a lion, for example horses, leaping on their slender limbs, would smash their bones with any leap (Gordon, 1988). According to the linear mechanical laws that dominate biomechanical thinking, animal mass must cube as their surface area squared and animals as large as an elephant will crush of their own weight. The large dinosaurs could never have existed, let alone be a dominant species for millions of years.  Biologic tissues work elastically at strains that are about a thousand times higher than strains that ordinary technological solids can withstand. If they behaved as most non-biologic materials, with each heartbeat the skull should explode as the blood vessels expand and crowd out the brain and urinary bladders should thin and burst as they full. The pregnant uterus should burst with the contractions of delivery.


Not only mechanical but also physiologic processes would be inconsistent with linear physics. Pressure within a balloon decreases as it empties. Following the same physics the systolic pressure should decrease as the heart empties, it, of course, increases.  We could never get the air out of our lungs or empty our bladders or bowels.  If we functioned as columns and levers, our center of gravity is too high and our base is too small and weak for ordinary activities. When swinging an ax, sledgehammer, golf club or fishing rod our center of gravity would fall outside our base and topple us over. We could not lift a shovel full of dirt. The calcaneus is a very soft bone. Our heels should crush from the super incumbent load and could not sustain the load of a gymnast coming off a high bar. The ‘iron cross’ position, [fig 2] attainable by any competent gymnast, would tear him limb from limb unless he defied the cosine law taught in every basic physics course which, in effect, states that the forces pulling on a rope strung between two poles becomes infinite as the rope becomes straight.

<page continues at length >
[eg - ring any bones Da Cheng Chuan-ers ]

...Tendons and bone can store large amounts of energy and return it like a spring in leaps and bounds....

...Elastic structures when deformed store energy and as they return to their original shape, the energy is released.  Much of the movement is with stored elastic energy. Stress, and resultant strain, stores energy within the system. In bone and tendons, this energy can be quite large and when modeled as tensegrity structures even more impressive because of its non-linearity and the resulting initial explosive force that automatically smoothes out as it reaches its resting state...

[William]

Sorry William, but I'm not convinced that Paleoman was innocent of malice and never suffered malnutrition. Unless you can provide extraordinary evidence to support those extraordinary claims, I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on those.

I'll leave the convincing to others.
With reference to malnutrition, their bones are the reason why we try to copy the diet of paleolithic man, so that we might enjoy something approaching the same level of health as they did.
If you have knowledge of paleolithic bones that show malnutrition, please present that evidence here so that we can stop this difficult attempt to copy their diet.

With respect to malice, if you piss off your neighbour he is likely to refuse to go hunting with you. Man is a pack hunter. Lone hunting is a recipe for failure, resulting in malnutrition and possibly even death.


 

Re: war, it depends on what your definition of war is. During the Paleolithic there certainly weren't the large-scale wars of the Neolithic, so we can agree on that, but I do believe there were smaller-scale wars.

There are no marks of war on the bones. If there are please let us know the honest scientific study that tells of them.


 

I'm expressing my belief that outside of these forums its already an established and popular motif. In addition, I'm saying that this motif is creeping into this community where it doesn't really belong.

?No comprendo.

  

I wish we would do less criticizing of each other, which you have ironically now contributed to, and focus our ire more on those outside our group who promote unhealthy foods/diets. However, I favor honesty and facts over false hype and self delusion and that means acknowledging unpleasant facts rather than trying to cover them up or delude ourselves about them.

Yes, I agree with less personal criticism.
How about those inside our group who promote unhealthy foods/diets? I refer to Taubes, Stefansson, Blake F. Donaldson MD all of whom described proven healthy diets.
Let's clean up our act before we refer to other groups.

[PaleoPhil]

...Nice try. Let me ask you this: if I were a moderator and I told you that your negative ranting wasn't in the best spirit of the community, or, if a moderator told you the same thing that I did, would you ask them this same inane question?

You've made no serious effort to understand anything I've written and you've shown no inclination to be constructive, so I'm done discussing it with you. Rant on if you wish, I don't care. If Tyler and Alphagruis wish to continue, then feel free to debate with them.

------

I'll leave the convincing to others.
With reference to malnutrition, their bones are the reason why we try to copy the diet of paleolithic man, so that we might enjoy something approaching the same level of health as they did.
If you have knowledge of paleolithic bones that show malnutrition, please present that evidence here so that we can stop this difficult attempt to copy their diet.

With respect to malice, if you piss off your neighbour he is likely to refuse to go hunting with you. Man is a pack hunter. Lone hunting is a recipe for failure, resulting in malnutrition and possibly even death.

I'm aware that most Paleo bones were in better shape than today's average, I'm only saying that I'm not aware of any evidence that Paleo men never experienced malnutrition. If you have evidence to support that claim, then feel free to present it. I'm not making any claims regarding this, so no evidence is necessary from me.

Re: malice, I remain unconvinced, and if you're not trying to convince me, then I guess it's pretty moot anyway.

There are no marks of war on the bones. If there are please let us know the honest scientific study that tells of them.

I believe Tyler already presented evidence of warring and cannibalism in the past when debating this with you and me. He apparently believes there was more of it than I suspect, and I don't think all the evidence he presented was evidence of cannibalism or warfare, but some of it is compelling and there's no reason to believe that human beings never engaged in warfare when most traditional human societies and even chimpanzees have been observed engaging in small-scale warfare and murder. If chimpanzees can manage to engage in group hunting, group murder, group combat and even tribal wars of extermination, then surely Stone Age humans could have managed it. You don't even have to believe in evolution to believe that traditional humans are just as capable of managing small scale warfare as chimps.

Darwinian Evolution on Display in Chimp Group Raids (Team Aggression)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DTkhp9sv58

Jane Goodall
http://discovermagazine.com/2007/mar/the-discover-interview-jane-goodall
Goodall said: "[Chimpanzees] have violent and brutal aggression, even a kind of primitive war. In all these ways, they’re very like us."

Of course, chimpanzee warfare is of a different character than modern human warfare, as Dr. Goodall pointed out: "I think modern warfare is very different from chimpanzee warfare. Chimpanzee warfare is not unlike gang warfare, but modern warfare is about economics. It isn’t about defending territory."

JANE GOODALL 1934-
by Adrian G. Weiss
http://www.webster.edu/~woolflm/janegoodall.html
"1974:  Warfare--a war broke out between the Kasakela males and seven males of a splinter group. This lasted four years; the rival group was eradicated, except for a few females. This type of violence had not been recorded in chimpanzees."

(Squall wrote): I'm expressing my belief that outside of these forums its already an established and popular motif. In addition, I'm saying that this motif is creeping into this community where it doesn't really belong.

William wrote: ?No comprendo.

Squall wrote that.
 

Yes, I agree with less personal criticism.
How about those inside our group who promote unhealthy foods/diets? I refer to Taubes, Stefansson, Blake F. Donaldson MD all of whom described proven healthy diets.
Let's clean up our act before we refer to other groups.

That's a good point. Even our comments on outsiders should focus on their points and try to avoid ad hominem, though that is understandably more difficult when dealing with folks who disagree with us to a much greater extent than we do with each other and who use ad hominem against us, but I agree with your basic sentiments, though it's not likely that everyone here will ever agree with your ZC approach, however beneficial it has been for you. I know that from your perspective there are no Paleo carbs, but others feel there are, or that they can at least tolerate them.

[alphagruis]

The subsection under that link entitled Isometric Scaling is precisely what I'm talking about. In fact what they call the square-cube law is another way of describing a strength-weight ratio.

You're understanding of proportionality is lacking. Let's use a cylinder as a test. The volume of a cylinder is computed as the product of pi, the square of the radius, and its height. If you were to increase the size of a cylinder by factor of 10, you would be increasing its radius and its height by the same amount. So a cylinder with a radius of 10cm and a height of 10cm would have a cross-sectional surface area of 314 square cm, and a volume of 3140 cubic cm. A cylinder with a radius and height of 100cm would have a cross-sectional surface area of 31400 square cm and a volume of 3.14 million cubic cm. Whereas the cross-sectional surface area changed by a factor of 100, its volume changed by a factor of 1000.

Not even these statements are true. If, as you claim now you were talking about isometric scaling, increasing the muscle strength by a factor of 10 means that you increase muscle cross-sectional area by that factor of 10 or the linear scale by the square root of 10 i.e. by a factor of a bit more as 3.1. This implies with isometric scaling an increase in volume or weight of the animal by a factor about 31 and by no means a factor of 100 as you claimed erronously in your previous post.

Moreover allometric rather than isometric scaling obviously does take place in biology and so your argument is merely out of topic and irrelevant anyway.

[alphagruis]

This is just wishful thinking. Period.

Are you saying that the evidence does not indisputably show that megafauna were wiped out? Is there evidence that they were not wiped out?

I'm not even sure I understand this question. If you're asking me what the consequences of paleolithic man's ability to forecast were, that seems kinda broad.

I'm saying that we know much more about megafauna extinction and the major role our species played in this phenomenon, a reality at odds with your ridiculous and pretentious claims.

Moreover you've most likely perfectly well got my point and as PaleoPhil I'll spent no more time arguing with hypocrites.  

[TylerDurden]

The fact that huge dinosaurs were easily able to survive and breed for many millions of years shows that the standard ideas re structure etc. are quite wrong. Brontosaurus and other similiar species must have been able to have moved around with relative ease or they would have died out at a much earlier date than they did.


As for cannibalism and warfare issues, I think people are confusing them with issues of hatred etc. For example, human sacrifice has been common-place throughout history/prehistory - yet, on closer examination, a number of volunteers for human sacrifice were actually quite willing to be sacrificed as they were deeply religious and thought they'd get a better after-life as a result.

Similiarly, warfare does not have to be always hostile involving mass-murder. If one looks at tribes which have lasted to the present day, their behaviour varies considerably. The Bushmen for example are basically pacifistic while the Maori practised constant real warfare plus cannibalism etc., so those tribes show the huge variety in human behaviour. Plus, much intertribal warfare is highly ritualised and filled with taboos, with usually only small amounts of killing, with  real warfare erupting every so often.  All that said, wiping out entire (nonsentient) species is very easy for humans to do. It is telling that the mass extinctions of megafauna in the Palaeolithic era occurred some time after more advanced tools were created by humans c.60,000 years ago re development of traps/spears/nets etc.

[TylerDurden]

How about those inside our group who promote unhealthy foods/diets? I refer to Taubes, Stefansson, Blake F. Donaldson MD all of whom described proven healthy diets.
Let's clean up our act before we refer to other groups.

 Taubes, Stefansson and Blake F. Donaldson all described extremely unhealthy cooked diets. Stefansson and Blake F Donaldson were hypocrites who cited the Eskimoes as being supposedly "proof" of the so-called health of their cooked-meat diets, conveniently ignoring the fact that the Eskimoes lived on diets which were partially raw. In other words the raw component of the Eskimoes' diets made them a bit healthier than Westerners on SAD diets, with the cooked component of their diet harming their health to some extent.

I've already posted a critique of Stefansson, mentioning how he was openly accused of fraud on another issue, and mentioning his many faults and false assumptions re the cooked/raw issue and other matters. Taubes will be getting a rather harsher review given that he is prone to even more cases of exaggeration or dismissal of hard facts. First, I'll do reviews of Loren Cordain, AV, Wrangham and Weston-Price, though.

[TylerDurden]

A previous poster mentioned that cannibalism can lead to brain-diseases(ie such as http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuru_(disease)  ). However, Kuru is a prion-related disease very similiar to BSE and it is well-known that BSE-rates were heavily linked to cattle consuming rendered animal fats. In other words, if a rawpalaeo cannibal in ancient times ate  fellow rawpalaeo cavemens' brains, then he would not get kuru. Eating the brains of a cooked-food-eater on the other hand would indeed lead to kuru outbreaks, after the advent of cooking.

[William]

Re: malice, I remain unconvinced, and if you're not trying to convince me, then I guess it's pretty moot anyway.
I believe Tyler already presented evidence of warring and cannibalism in the past when debating this with you and me.

What Tyler presents as "evidence" is peculiar to himself.
We are not animals, and never have been.

I know that from your perspective there are no Paleo carbs, but others feel there are, or that they can at least tolerate them.

Feel, shmeel.
Wrong again. I did not write that. There are indeed plenty of paleo carbs, and their wild form still exists today.

My point was that almost nobody eats them, and then not often. The carb addicts here are all eating neolithic.
For good reason, which has been explained by those who have tried paleo carbs.

[TylerDurden]

Ah, William is as usual writing unscientific b*ll*cks, I see. All humans are animals, incidentally,  we are living organisms and have much the same biological urges and instincts re competition and survival  as any other species. Besides, we have the evidence of the ultimate extinction of other hominid subspecies such as the Neanderthals/Homo Erectus, as well as the extinction of megafauna in the Palaeolithic era, to show that humans were never idyllic saints.

The 2nd argument re "Neolithic carbs/palaeo carbs/paleo meats" has already been wholly refuted by another member. I believe it was pointed out that all those grassfed animals we RPDers now eat are the product of extremely  intensive (in-)breeding over many millenia of domestication so that they do not even remotely resemble their much healthier ancestral animals that existed in the Palaeolithic era, in terms of nutritional quality.Only quality  raw meat from wild animals could therefore be considered remotely "palaeo" by that absurd extremist assumption made by William. Few if any people eat such raw wild meats within the RVAF diet community, and certainly not the cooked-fat-addict William who mentions how he subsists on unhealthy, grainfed(!) meat and similiar cr*ppy food such as pemmican. Indeed(!), since I am one of the few who eats regular  plentiful supplies of raw wild game, and raw wild berries and raw wild veg  on the rare occasions when I can get hold of the latter, I can therefore lay a far more credible claim to be on an authentic palaeodiet than William can with his Neolithic grainfed meats from inbred animals.Same with rawpalaeo,as William  commonly eats cooked cr*p such as pemmican.


In some ways, I rather appreciate William's usual unscientific claims. It actually makes the cooked-zero-carb community, and pro-cooked-diet-advocates  in general, look bad as a result. That can only be a good thing.

[Squall]

Not even these statements are true. If, as you claim now you were talking about isometric scaling, increasing the muscle strength by a factor of 10 means that you increase muscle cross-sectional area by that factor of 10 or the linear scale by the square root of 10 i.e. by a factor of a bit more as 3.1. This implies with isometric scaling an increase in volume or weight of the animal by a factor about 31 and by no means a factor of 100 as you claimed erronously in your previous post.

Moreover allometric rather than isometric scaling obviously does take place in biology and so your argument is merely out of topic and irrelevant anyway.

Those statements were just an illustration of proportionality. Like PaleoDonk implied, there is much more going on in living organisms, the least of which is the fact that muscles don't typically assume simple geometric shapes (like cylinders). However, the scaling factors are of immense importance, and you still seem to not be understanding it.

From your own link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allometry

Isometric scaling is governed by the square-cube law. An organism which doubles in length isometrically will find that the surface area available to it will increase fourfold, while its volume and mass will increase by a factor of eight.

From the embedded link to the square-cube law: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Square-cube_law

When an object undergoes a proportional increase in size, its new volume is proportional to the cube of the multiplier and its new surface area is proportional to the square of the multiplier.

And back again to your supplied link:

This can present problems for organisms. In the case of above, the animal now has eight times the biologically active tissue to support, but the surface area of its respiratory organs has only increased fourfold, creating a mismatch between scaling and physical demands. Similarly, the organism in the above example now has eight times the mass to support on its legs, but the strength of its bones and muscles is dependent upon their surface area, which has only increased fourfold. Therefore, this hypothetical organism would experience twice the bone and muscle loads of its smaller version.

So where you're having trouble with this completely escapes me. I've used your reference and the math is sound. If you don't like 10's, just redo the cylinder math I did above with 2's. You still have to square them, so instead of 100, you'll get 4. If all you're doing is arbitrarily picking one dimension and increasing it, then ya, it will increase linearly. But the result isn't an object of the same proportion, which is precisely what I and your own reference are talking about.

I'm saying that we know much more about megafauna extinction and the major role our species played in this phenomenon, a reality at odds with your ridiculous and pretentious claims.

Moreover you've most likely perfectly well got my point and as PaleoPhil I'll spent no more time arguing with hypocrites. 

The least you can do is to address how my claims are ridiculous and pretentious, and how I am an hypocrite. But then I guess you're through with this thread. How convenient.

And as far as the "reality" of humanity's role in megafauna extinction, it wasn't my aim to debate its merits in this thread. However, that debate has happened, and since then I've found it engaging, though its burdening the original post. Therefore, I'll continue discussion in its own thread, which I have started here:

http://www.rawpaleoforum.com/hot-topics/what-are-the-evidence-that-humans-are-responsible-for-megafauna-extinction/