Extinct Giant Ape Depended Upon Forest Food

Archaeology ^ | Tuesday, January 05, 2016 | editors

[SunkenCiv]

Scientists from the Senckenberg Center for Human Evolution and Palaeoenvironment in Tübingen, and the Senckenberg Research Institute in Frankfurt, analyzed stable carbon isotopes from the tooth enamel of the little-known giant ape Gigantopithecus. "Unfortunately, there are very few fossil finds of Gigantopithecus -- only a few large teeth and bones from the lower mandible are known," Hervé Bocherens of the University of Tubingen said in a press release. Those fossils are from China and Thailand, which had open savannas and wooden landscapes. The new study of carbon isotopes indicates that Gigantopithecus was a vegetarian that lived only in forests. "Relatives of the giant ape, such as the recent orangutan, have been able to survive despite their specialization on a certain habitat. However, orangutans have a slow metabolism and are able to survive on limited food. Due to its size, Gigantopithecus presumably depended on a large amount of food. When during the Pleistocene era more and more forested areas turned into savanna landscapes, there was simply an insufficient food supply for the giant ape," Bocherens said.

[SunkenCiv]

Estimated size of Giganthopithecus in comparison with a human. © H. Bocherens

[Berlin_Freeper]

Part of my New Year’s diet is a banana in the morning. Satisfying and burned through easily. Healthy too.

[Pontiac]

The new study of carbon isotopes indicates that Gigantopithecus was a vegetarian that lived only in forests.

These days I take such statements with a heavy dose of salt.

In my youth the scientist were sure that Chimpanzees were vegetarian. Later observations of chimps in the wild revealed that they not only ate meat but occasionally practiced cannibalism and tribal wars.

I have come to believe that scientist unknowingly project their idealism on to the subjects of their studies.

Of course with extinct subjects it is much harder to be proven wrong.

[equaviator]

Kwame Kilpatrick has escaped???

[Nailbiter]

LOL-

[raybbr]

Too bad for the environmentalists this ape has disappeared. It would be fun to see them go out and try to hug one a la Goodall.

[Gen.Blather]

“I have come to believe that scientist unknowingly project their idealism on to the subjects of their studies. “

In Arizona there’s a couple of indian dwellings built on top of high bluffs, the access to which was a foot path no wider than your shoe. They had to carry every stick of firewood and cup of water up that treacherous path. The top could have been defended by an elderly lady with a stick. At the entrance to the area the Park Service had put up a bronze plaque reading something like, -The natives obviously built on these high plateaus for the spectacular views they afforded.- We howled with laughter.

[Thorliveshere]

Geez, huge sucker. Why couldn’t it be possible that an offshoot has survived and that’s what we’re calling Sassquatch or Bigfoot?

[Natufian]

Depends what tools are used to support the theory. Isotope analysis is a pretty good one.

[Revelation 911]

forget bigfoot - we call it Michelle

[yefragetuwrabrumuy]

Importantly, not too long ago, a scientist discovered that the assumption that eating raw and cooked food delivered the same amount of calories was very wrong.

In fact, raw food delivers calories so poorly that for a person to live on a “gorilla diet”, they would have to eat almost continually during every waking hour. Plus they would have perpetual diarrhea.

Following this up, he found research about those on various raw food diets and found that almost all of them suffer from some variety of malnutrition.

He also compared the effects of cooking with those of “mechanical action”, such as chopping or grinding. But the latter only produced marginal improvements in nutrition.

So cooking our food seems to have been a major breakthrough in human development.

[VaeVictis]

An entire species known from a mandible and some teeth. Yeah, that is reliable.

[Forward the Light Brigade]

So Bigfoot is a Vegan? I don’t think so.

[jjsheridan5]

Importantly, not too long ago, a scientist discovered that the assumption that eating raw and cooked food delivered the same amount of calories was very wrong ... He also compared the effects of cooking with those of "mechanical action", such as chopping or grinding. But the latter only produced marginal improvements in nutrition.

Do you happen to remember who this was? Because I have seen a number of studies that have indicated the opposite, or that this effect that you describe is only true for people with seriously compromised digestive systems, or for people with destroyed gut flora.

These things are almost impossible to study in a truly scientific way, so any particular study has to be viewed with a huge amount of salt. But I would like to see how he came to his conclusions.

[yefragetuwrabrumuy]

Raw vegetables are dramatically low in calories and we probably only absorb about 50 calories a pound from raw vegetables. Our caloric needs cannot be met on a raw food diet without consuming large amounts of fruits, avocado, nuts and seeds.

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/crux/2011/12/08/why-calorie-counts-are-wrong-cooked-food-provides-a-lot-more-energy/

[Natufian]

They’ve done isotope analysis on Bigfoot?

[jjsheridan5]

I wouldn’t write that in stone, yet. This is a study from, apparently, a graduate student of an anthropology professor (written in Discover Magazine, which is hardly a hotbed of accurate science). In addition, this study (I just glanced through the article), seemed hopelessly superficial — didn’t account for prior conditions, mixed too many types of foods together (meat, grains, etc) to be scientifically useful, no mention of how control groups were implemented (if any were used).

[fishtank]

[fishtank]

The raw food fad is primitivistic, idiotic, narcissistic and anti-human.

[SunkenCiv]