Bluegrassfoot Posted May 4, 2018 Posted May 4, 2018 13 hours ago, bipedalist said: In this vid, they said the connective tissues, membranes around joints/bones were intact on death if I read this correctly, 18,000 individuals, that is a lot of crawlers. There was no mention of cannibalistic possibilities in this video such as bone cuts, etc. Sounds like many intact individuals were found, though I did not pick up on the number. Out of 18,000fossils/thousands of individuals it couldn't have been many I wouldn't think. It sounds like there is no possibility those individuals were washed into that system but I know nothing of the geology of South African caves. The quarter million year vs. 1.5 million age was quite the surprise with elements of long legs, curved hands, long thumbs, human like small brained skull, etc. It was on the ground wtih modern humans. That's a good video and it fills in a lot of gaps. I took them to say 18,000 fossils, meaning 18,000 pieces of bones and teeth. If one assumes there are around 200 bone structures and teeth in an individual, that puts the number of bodies near 100. And assuming there was fragmentation of some bones, the total might be closer to 50 individuals. Nevertheless, that's quite a few bodies, and makes the possibility of accidental entombment unlikely. Also, the video's mention of a newly discovered chamber in the same cave system that appears to have a similar accumulation of fossils would seem to solidify the burial theory.
norseman Posted May 4, 2018 Admin Author Posted May 4, 2018 No way I could squirm through that cave..... Id jump from planes or wrestle a grizzly bear first. Bbbbrrrrrrrr. 1
southernyahoo Posted May 5, 2018 Posted May 5, 2018 9 hours ago, Bluegrassfoot said: That's a good video and it fills in a lot of gaps. I took them to say 18,000 fossils, meaning 18,000 pieces of bones and teeth. If one assumes there are around 200 bone structures and teeth in an individual, that puts the number of bodies near 100. And assuming there was fragmentation of some bones, the total might be closer to 50 individuals. Nevertheless, that's quite a few bodies, and makes the possibility of accidental entombment unlikely. Also, the video's mention of a newly discovered chamber in the same cave system that appears to have a similar accumulation of fossils would seem to solidify the burial theory. I found more to fill the gaps here. I think they are saying they have evidence of about fifteen individuals. I agree that when they say they have 15 to 18 thousand specimens they are talking about teeth as well as bones plus fragments. Some still connected with soft tissue. I still dont find mention of the use of fire and yet it is classified as the genus homo. Fire would have been most handy in the complete darkness of the Denaledi chamber. https://elifesciences.org/articles/09560
ShadowBorn Posted May 5, 2018 Moderator Posted May 5, 2018 Could they have been cave dwellers and made darkness there way of life within the world that they lived in? Small brains does not make them less intelligent. It just makes them change the way they survive in the environment that nature has placed them in.
Airdale Posted May 5, 2018 Posted May 5, 2018 I wonder if there might be, or once have been, a rear entrance. The fact they're finding another chamber suggests the cave has more secrets. Tech such as drone mounted LIDAR and ground penetrating radar is becoming more widely available and can reveal features hidden from the sharpest unaided eye.
Airdale Posted May 5, 2018 Posted May 5, 2018 6 minutes ago, ShadowBorn said: Could they have been cave dwellers and made darkness there way of life within the world that they lived in? Small brains does not make them less intelligent. It just makes them change the way they survive in the environment that nature has placed them in. They certainly could have sheltered in caves, but that's a far cry from living in total darkness. The biggest obstacle is the lack of a food source. There might be the odd insect, reptile or burrowing mammal to be stumbled upon, but nothing approaching sufficient quantity for even a single Naledi. That is ignoring the matter of complete nutrition, no sunshine for vitamin D production, living amid their own waste, etc.
ShadowBorn Posted May 5, 2018 Moderator Posted May 5, 2018 How could one know if they lived by darkness? By exam of their eye sockets of their skulls. Bigger eye sockets be a tell tell sign that they lived in total darkness for safety? Those bones were placed there over time , but to carry a body through that system just to hide their dead had to take a lot of work. So yes there must have been another entrance to make this work easier.I have looked up flooding and yes there was some flooding but does not explain why or how they were placed. To go through a cave system in total darkness is not an easy task with out the ability to see in the dark. And to see in the dark does give an advantage to any creature that roams at night. Just spilling out thoughts that's all.
guyzonthropus Posted May 5, 2018 Posted May 5, 2018 But to "see in the dark" still requires the presence of some light, unless the vision is in the infrared spectrum (which opens up a few potentials in regards to the big furries) and from the diagram of that cave, it seems pretty unlikely light penetrated all that far. There's a reason all the strictly cave dwelling species of animals have eyes that are nonfunctional, if not absent, there's no point in maintaining the structures in environments devoid of all light. Of course, I could be wrong about the level of light that made it through the passages, and the cave itself may have shifted(I too am unfamiliar with south African geology!) from a previous configuration.
southernyahoo Posted May 6, 2018 Posted May 6, 2018 I suspect Homo Naledi probably was habitating closer to the entrance of the caves most of the time. The younger ones were obviosly smaller and likely more apt to crawl into the tighter chambers and get in trouble trying to find their way out. This could have forced their parents to go in after them. Blind people have to map their environment in their head by feel. They may not have been able to do that.
southernyahoo Posted May 9, 2018 Posted May 9, 2018 I found this quote from the article I linked above.. Quote Bone taphonomy indicates that hominin individuals reached the chamber complete, with disarticulation occurring during/after deposition.
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