Posted: Jun 19, 2014 9:52 am
Jayjay4547 wrote:Termites are predated at least by aardvark,pangolin, ants, I guess spiders, and of course, spectacularly by birds. They are embedded in the African food web, just like the australopiths were. Of course their defence systems work, so must those of the australopiths. I don’t see how I was making your point for you.
Well we know the defence systems of the termites worked, because they're still here, all over the world. Not only that, but they were here quite some time before the australopiths. So Termite defence systems are pretty solid in so far as standing the test of time.
Not so for the australopith.
Jayjay4547 wrote:OK, if the whole troop got involved, the more effective their choice and use of sticks, the more trauma to the predators and the less damage to themselves.
This makes all kinds of assumptions that australopiths were able to select suitably weighty and durable sticks for beating leopards with, given leopards are pretty durable creatures. So your expectation is that australopiths are able to select sticks that make suitable weapons, rather than pointlessly flail away with sticks that break upon contact with the Leopard and do it no significant harm.
This is a fairly sophisticated level of tool selection and use you're talking about here.