GinohnNews

G: Saturday John and I went for a walk in the woods, and found more mushrooms. Lots of oysters out there. We stopped by Rizolda's and ended up hanging out there for a couple of hours with Izolda. We came home and then John went off to a poker gathering, then a little while later Rich called and wanted to hang out. So he came over and stayed really late watching stuff on TV and on the internet with me.

Sunday I went to Renee and Alex's with Rich and Izolda to hang out and play games. We chatted for a while, then played Dance Dance Revolution. We played Extreme II, then a NEW ONE called Supernova. I know what I'm asking for for Xmas! We finished off with a game of Quiddler.

Rich started his anti-psoriasis diet, and needed to finish off his stash of nice beer, so he brought it over Monday night and John helped him drink it. Izolda came over too and we did some DDR - and tried out the Eye Toy with it. Now, we're both not bad at DDR, but even simple foot steps became very confusing when you added in hand movements too. A camera looks at you and puts you on the TV screen behind the arrows and such. On either side of the arrows are hand prints. Hand icons move up the screen just like arrows in DDR, and you have to "hit" the hand buttons when the hand reaches them, just like DDR. If you are really used to just moving your feet, you can get quite discombobulated trying to do hands and feet. Izolda found it so fascinating she thought she might get an Eye Toy too. After a while she went home and Rich and I played one of the Eye Toy games until late at night. This one was a lot like DDR but just hands, with the buttons in a circle around you. Little smiley faces appear in the center and go out towards buttons that you have to hit when they get there. It was fun.

No news next week, we'll be away on vacation!

J: I read this article about a book called Man the Hunted, that puts forth the theory that early protohumans were gatherers, not hunter-gatherers. I think that in the hunter/prey debate there is plenty of room for something in between.

According to the article, the book says that "our intelligence, cooperation and many other features we have as modern humans developed from our attempts to out-smart the predator."

The idea of "Man the Hunter" is the generally accepted paradigm of human evolution, says Sussman, who recently served as editor of American Anthropologist. "It developed from a basic Judeo-Christian ideology of man being inherently evil, aggressive and a natural killer. In fact, when you really examine the fossil and living non-human primate evidence, that is just not the case."

This ignores other kinds of social, intelligent types of animals that hunt or scavenge in groups, like dogs and crows. It also ignores the fact that some nonhuman primates occasionally hunt. Chimpanzees are a good example.

I suspect our late ancestors did have to outsmart predators, but not just to avoid being eaten. Early protohumans were foragers, occasional hunters (of small game), and scavengers. Those who communicated best, worked together, and solved puzzles well could survive by tracking a beast, finding the predator's victim, and then stealing the food when the cat was away for a drink or nap. I've seen an excellent documentary that shows the !Kung bushmen doing just that.

As for fossil evidence, forward looking eyes and large canine teeth aren't always clear indicators of hunting creatures, but they do often point in that direction.

But the book sounds interesting, so if I find a free copy (maybe the library has one) I'll read it.