What bothers me about the evolution of Man

So in your opinion new ideas are bad. Very interesting.

I had never expected my ideas to be treated otherwise by fanatic followers of an obsolete theory with suspicious motives.

New ideas are not bad.Shit ideas are just that: shit ideas.

Hi Zi Ko,I have removed your posting privileges in the Human Origins and Evolution forum.

Most biologists and anthrologists (?) believe that our brains got so large so that we could better understand and communicate with each other. This has obvious advantages, especially back when it first began to evolve. The cons began to outway the pros eventually, and our brain size caps off at about 1400cc (cubic centimeters). Other aps probably did not need it and it may have something to do with the fact that we are bipedal. Many late bipedal apes did have relatively large brains, as a matter of fact.

When I was in grad school some years ago my physical anthropology professor things larger brain size was a side effect.He was of the opinion that the change to H. erectus involved a number of things, including more grassland adaptation, more bipedalism (and running), tool use, family structure, and that much of this came about in conjunction with persistence hunting.Also included were loss of heavy body hair (for better cooling), much better memory and spacial sense (for tracking an animal and then remembering where you left the family after the hunt), and, to a lesser degree, communication (for the hunt and for explaining to the family if you were gone for days and didn't come back with anything).

And then there is sexual selection for creativeness in mates where brain size is a secondary effect of the selection.Evidence today is that this selection is still in effect in humans. Look at who are considered sexy icons -- pop musicians or nobel prize winners?That this also explains apparent bareness where skin hair halts at the vellus stage in women so that they appear younger.Enjoy.