EvC Forum: Homo floresiensis

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Topic: Homo floresiensis

Ben!

Member (Idle past 1426 days)

Posts: 1161

From: Hayward, CA

Joined: 10-14-2004

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Message 78 of 213 (158973)
11-12-2004 11:50 PM

Reply to: Message 51 by RAZD
10-28-2004 8:24 PM

Re:

A nit:

Actually, 'brain power' (without defining what it is) would be dependent both on volume and surface area:
- the number of neurons depends much more on surface area than volume
- the white matter connections between neurons depends much more on volume than surface area.

But you're right; 'brain power' (operationally defined most often by our numerous 'intelligence tests') doesn't correlate with brain volume OR neuron number, and the smaller size of this creature's brain doesn't present any problem for explainin tool-making behavior.

Here's a link to the abstract of an excellent article which uses comparative neuroanatomy and neuroscience to investigate just this type of thing.

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	Message 51 by RAZD, posted 10-28-2004 8:24 PM		RAZD has not replied

Ben!

Member (Idle past 1426 days)

Posts: 1161

From: Hayward, CA

Joined: 10-14-2004

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Message 79 of 213 (158981)
11-13-2004 12:45 AM

Reply to: Message 77 by Quetzal
11-12-2004 9:05 PM

Re: Chimps, Gorrilas, Humans, Orangutans

Since:

evolution operates at the level of functional abilities
we can't consistently map complex functional abilities to genetics
we're talking about creatures whose adaptive traits would be considered complex functional abilties (chimps, humans)

then it seems to me that the current classification scheme, which is basically a reconstruction of evolutionary history, is the one to use. But I do agree that, ideally (i.e. if we had mappings of these functions to genetics), genetic classification would be the best.

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	Message 77 by Quetzal, posted 11-12-2004 9:05 PM		Quetzal has replied

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	Message 82 by The Dread Dormammu, posted 11-13-2004 5:20 PM	Ben! has replied
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Ben!

Member (Idle past 1426 days)

Posts: 1161

From: Hayward, CA

Joined: 10-14-2004

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Message 83 of 213 (159304)
11-14-2004 6:18 AM

Reply to: Message 82 by The Dread Dormammu
11-13-2004 5:20 PM

Re: So what's your position on birds?

Dread,

First off, thanks for the welcome to the forum.

Since I don't know too much about the classification system and the , I am currently reading more about it. It's confusing... anyway, I'll post a reply after I've done a better job educating myself. I have been trying SO HARD to read before I speak, but this is an instance where I failed (in reply to Quetzal's post). So, time to read.

Ben

This message is a reply to:
	Message 82 by The Dread Dormammu, posted 11-13-2004 5:20 PM		The Dread Dormammu has replied

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	Message 84 by The Dread Dormammu, posted 11-14-2004 6:57 AM		Ben! has not replied

Ben!

Member (Idle past 1426 days)

Posts: 1161

From: Hayward, CA

Joined: 10-14-2004

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Message 148 of 213 (250151)
10-08-2005 7:55 PM

Reply to: Message 146 by RAZD
10-08-2005 6:58 PM

Re: Digital H. floriensis skull

Here's a link to the Science article that the Nature article seems to be referencing.

Just a moment...

Apologies to those who don't have access to the article; you can request a reprint from Dr. Falk's website if you really want. Here's the abstract:

The brain of Homo floresiensis was assessed by comparing a virtual endocast from the type specimen (LB1) with endocasts from great apes, Homo erectus, Homo sapiens, a human pygmy, a human microcephalic, specimen number Sts 5 (Australopithecus africanus), and specimen number WT 17000 (Paranthropus aethiopicus). Morphometric, allometric, and shape data indicate that LB1 is not a microcephalic or pygmy. LB1's brain/body size ratio scales like that of an australopithecine, but its endocast shape resembles that of Homo erectus. LB1 has derived frontal and temporal lobes and a lunate sulcus in a derived position, which are consistent with capabilities for higher cognitive processing.

PubMed abstract

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