
Human ancestors walked on two feet but their children still had a backup plan - dnetesn
https://phys.org/news/2018-07-human-ancestors-feet-children-backup.html
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dTal
>Based on the skeletal structure of the child's foot, specifically, the base
of the big toe, the kids probably spent more time in the trees than adults.

Fascinatingly, this is still true today! Kids love climbing trees. _I_ used to
love climbing trees. It's funny to think that the true reason for my
disposition was a deep, ancestral fear of being eaten.

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dboreham
Also true of Bears. Cubs can climb trees while adults can't.

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Harvey-Specter
Adult bears definitely can climb trees. [0] So can adult humans, obviously.

[0] [http://www.bearsmart.com/about-bears/dispelling-
myths/](http://www.bearsmart.com/about-bears/dispelling-myths/)

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taeric
I'm curious if that is just a mutilation of "Cubs can climb trees that adults
can't." Not that "Cubs can climb trees, adults can't."

That said, I thought it was common knowledge that bears are good climbers.
There are some wonderful videos of bears climbing up to a hunter's tree stand.
Would have to be a terrifying experience.

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bb101
If you find this interesting, I'd highly recommend watching the Cosmos series
on Netflix. Once you get past the first few minutes of cringeworthy effects,
it gets deep very quickly and presents the evolution of our species, planet
and universe in very accessible terms.

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ekianjo
The one from Carl Sagan or the new one?

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bb101
The new one with Neil deGrasse Tyson.

To be fair, the effects end up helping once the series moves along.
Visualizing 13.5 billion years is not easy, but the show does a remarkable job
-- a few million years is but a blink of an eye.

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patrickg_zill
I hate this (too common) stupid phrasing for science articles, as if a 1 year
old rationally decided that he/she should climb trees more often. Does it bug
anyone else?

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amriksohata
Yes! It's shampoo science

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tabtab
Big cats do most hunting at night, so sleeping in the trees but wandering
around on foot looking for food during the day seems like a good life
strategy. Fending off the smaller daytime predators was probably within a
walking ape's ability via sticks and stones.

I suspect they had to use sticks and stones for such, because they were
otherwise physically wimpy creatures: relatively small jaw & teeth and no
significant "claws". As they perfected defense with sticks & stones eventually
they probably started using it for offense, and self-breeding for skill with
tools, leading to modern humans. (Modern chimps even occasionally use tooth-
sharpened sticks for hunting tree mammals.)

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nomy99
I remember wanting a tree house to feel safe and alone

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quadcore
Curious if those guys had discovered fire already, had furs or tools, 3
millions years ago.

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ttsda
Fire is estimated to have begun to be controlled by humans around 1.7 to 0.2
million years ago.

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toasterlovin
I'm curious who is estimating 0.2 million (200k) years. That is not very long
ago. As a point of comparison, there are populations of humans who have been
genetically isolated for that long (the Khoisan in southern Africa).

