Evolution: a different view (Introduction)

by Balance_Maintained , U.S.A., Saturday, May 09, 2015, 12:04 (3486 days ago) @ David Turell


> > Tony: Yes, but we have no EVIDENCE that the larynx dropped. Only speculation, a story based on the assumption that we were originally chimpanzees, whose larynx sits marginally higher than ours. That is my point. It is a story, a story with no evidence. The larynx bones of infants sit much higher than that of adults. So we KNOW that the bone migrates during development.
> 
> David:The evidence is indirect. In this website you can see how much higher our tongue and lips are from the larynx as compared to the ape. I realize you don't think we are directly related to apes in evolution, but I accept some sort of evolutionary process happened and the larynx dropped.
> 
> http://crankylinguist.blogspot.com/2010/10/chimp-vs-human-vocal-tracts.html
&am... http://www.babelsdawn.com/babels_dawn/2010/10/the-evolution-of-the-vocal-tract.html-Did you read these articles thoroughly?-from http://www.babelsdawn.com/babels_dawn/2010/10/the-evolution-of-the-vocal-tract.html :-"This suggests that there was no pre-adaption of the vocal tract necessary to start the lineage speaking. For example, it is not necessary for the larynx to descend before speech sounds become possible...De Boer concludes, "Evidence of absence of a lowered larynx is therefore no evidence for the absence of speech in an ancestral hominin." So if we found a Homo erectus fossil in superb enough shape to determine the position of its larynx we could not use an undescended larynx to argue that erectus did not speak.-What strikes me is this bit: "if we found a Homo erectus fossil in superb enough shape to determine the position of its larynx" which means that they have not found one. -So:-A) The lowering of the larynx was not necessary for basic speach, and is thus decoupled from the development of rudimentary language. 
B) We have no evidence that the human larynx was every higher than it is now, and an absence of evidence is not proof of this claim. 
C) This claim ONLY works if we assume that we are descended from chimps despite the gross number of morphological differences, even in the relatively simple aparatus that comprises our vocal tract. -Sorry, this is a story told to justify another story, all without evidence. Great for science fiction, crap for science.

--
What is the purpose of living? How about, 'to reduce needless suffering. It seems to me to be a worthy purpose.