"Did cooking make us human?"

Post #337,776 by static 12/28/10 7:51:40 AM Reply	"Did cooking make us human?" TV documentary from the BBC shown the other day on SBS: Bascially, Humans are the only species on the planet that cooks its food. This looks at why that might be so and the effects on us as a species. This link may not work outside Australia, but SBS have no information about that on their website. http://player.sbs.co...Us-Human-Full-Ep/ Wade. Q:Is it proper to eat cheeseburgers with your fingers? A:No, the fingers should be eaten separately.
Post #337,781 by boxley 12/28/10 9:18:07 AM Reply	you sure? http://www.youtube.c...tch?v=lK1-KL6sq_Y Any opinions expressed by me are mine alone, posted from my home computer, on my own time as a free American and do not reflect the opinions of any person or company that I have had professional relations with in the past 55 years. meep
Post #337,784 by folkert 12/28/10 9:53:10 AM Reply	That is a trained Bonobo. I thought you'd be showing me ones using fire from a lightning strike cooking using stick or something... or throwing meat or something on the fire and digging it out with a stick or something. It ain't proof of anything.
Post #337,793 by static 12/28/10 5:39:06 PM Reply	Show me them doing that in the wild. Bonobos are known to be amongst the smartest of primates outside of humans and thus can be taught things like that. You could probably teach orangutans to cook, too. Besides, the claim was made by that program. Wade. Q:Is it proper to eat cheeseburgers with your fingers? A:No, the fingers should be eaten separately.
Post #337,794 by boxley 12/28/10 6:19:57 PM Reply	you and greg are starting your new years resolutions early? giving up sly humor for a year? Any opinions expressed by me are mine alone, posted from my home computer, on my own time as a free American and do not reflect the opinions of any person or company that I have had professional relations with in the past 55 years. meep
Post #337,808 by static 12/29/10 4:05:51 AM Reply	You're attributing sly humour to me? I'm flattered. :-) Actually, regardless of how humans discovered cooking (a point the program completely avoids), I thought it would be an interesting documentary to you lot. I was a bit disappointed they didn't spend much time examining how cooking changed food, though. They showed just one scientist who showed that cooking breaks down cell walls in potato. On the other hand, they had a fascinating excerpt from a successful hunt from some bushmen in Namibia. They caught a porcupine in its burrow. It took more than four hours to get it out so they could kill it. Wade. Q:Is it proper to eat cheeseburgers with your fingers? A:No, the fingers should be eaten separately.
Post #337,799 by drook 12/28/10 8:14:35 PM Reply	Take an average population of humans ... Think they'd figure out cooking on their own? In how many generations? I don't know anyone who independently invented the concept of cooking. We all learned it from someone else who already knew it. -- Drew
Post #337,844 by jake123 12/29/10 10:16:55 PM Reply	You cannot speak of a human being without speaking of its culture. And cooking is always part of it. We cooked before we were human. I suspect we're wired for it.
Post #337,850 by mhuber 12/30/10 1:13:03 AM Reply	More than wired Apparently we evolved a gut that takes less resources (allowing more for brains) but doesn't actually run on raw food. Homo sap on raw food diets survive but are not able to reproduce. --------------------------------------- I think it's perfectly clear we're in the wrong band. (Tori Amos)
Post #337,852 by Andrew Grygus 12/30/10 1:27:08 AM Reply	You mean all those "raw foods" nutters . . . . . are going to go extinct all on their own? I find it highly amusing that "raw foods" enthusiasts import their cashews from Indonesia where there is one company that claims they do not use heat to detoxify them. The pulp around a cashew kernel is extremely toxic, causing serious blistering, etc., so most processors use moderate heat to see to it their "raw" cashews are non-toxic. This, of course, means they do not pass the litmus test for "truly raw". Of course Indonesians are Asians, and many are even of Chinese descent, so what are the chances this vendor is actually doing what he claims to be doing? For every predator there is a rightful prey.
Post #337,853 by mhuber 12/30/10 2:18:10 AM Reply	Yeah, but more or less on purpose The few I've met consider reproduction a crime against nature. So having the monthly cycle shut down isn't exactly a disaster... --------------------------------------- I think it's perfectly clear we're in the wrong band. (Tori Amos)
Post #337,856 by static 12/30/10 3:55:53 AM Reply	The documentary covers this. They had a group of volunteers eat raw fruit and vegetables like the apes do for two weeks. All of them lost weight because none of them could get enough nutrition from the ancient diet. Many of them could not get through the required quantities, either! It turns out our teeth are shaped wrong and our gut is too small for a diet of raw fruit and vegetables. Our teeth are shaped for mincing and pulping cooked food. They also had an artifical stomach for experimenting with how ours processed different foods. Raw food was much harder to process than cooked food. I've already mentioned the brief experiment in what happens to food as it is cooked: it destroys the structures we can't digest so we can get to the nutrients locked inside. Wade. Q:Is it proper to eat cheeseburgers with your fingers? A:No, the fingers should be eaten separately.
Post #337,851 by Andrew Grygus 12/30/10 1:14:31 AM Reply	Cooking food made possible a larger or . . . . . more resilient human population, because the process detoxifies many plant foods. Non-human primates are very reluctant to move from feeding on one tree to another because even within the same species toxicity varies significantly. Usually the more marginal members of the clan are "encouraged" to try out a new tree before the main group moves to it. Particularly cyanide toxins (a common plant biological defense) are driven off by cooking, but many others as well. Also, relatively indigestible plant materials are rendered digestible and nutritious by cooking. Of course overcooking vegetables (see England and Germany) has a deleterious effect on both flavor and nutrition.
Post #337,854 by mhuber 12/30/10 2:19:16 AM Reply	Makes grain almost food-like --------------------------------------- I think it's perfectly clear we're in the wrong band. (Tori Amos)
Post #337,864 by SpiceWare 12/30/10 1:07:35 PM Reply	Looks like Neanderthals cooked too http://www.bbc.co.uk...ironment-12071424
Post #337,866 by Andrew Grygus 12/30/10 2:50:06 PM Reply	These two photos . . . . . appeared on the same Los Angeles Times Web page (a couple months back). They were not associated - an omission which I correct here: http://www.clovegard.../ajg/neander.html
Post #337,895 by boxley 12/31/10 8:39:43 AM Reply	teddy is not the one to meet in a dark alley Any opinions expressed by me are mine alone, posted from my home computer, on my own time as a free American and do not reflect the opinions of any person or company that I have had professional relations with in the past 55 years. meep
Post #337,867 by static 12/30/10 5:51:27 PM Reply	Clarification. The documentary I linked to regarded neanderthals as humans (albeit in a roundabout way) for the purposes of their topic. So no disagreement, then. :-) Wade. Q:Is it proper to eat cheeseburgers with your fingers? A:No, the fingers should be eaten separately.
Post #337,869 by Andrew Grygus 12/30/10 7:24:32 PM Reply	Neanderthals were clearly humans. It is now known there was some interbreeding between Neanderthals and Cro Magnon, thus pretty much the same species. Persons of European extraction have some of the Neanderthal genome (Africans do not). Now it has been found that Neanderthals split into two groups early on - one went north into Europe, and the other went East. They also interbred, explaining some formerly mysterious genetic code found in the Asia-Pacific region.
Post #337,873 by static 12/30/10 7:57:53 PM Reply	Vaguely interesting discussion... ... but I'm thinking no-one watched the linked documentary! For the purposes of their topic, they spoke about Australopithecus, Homo Erectus, and Modern Humans. I kept expecting them to refer to the latter as Homo Sapiens. They didn't, but I'm pretty sure that's what they meant. These three very broad categories were enough to show the three major differences in diet and corresponding fundamental body differences: Australopithecus had teeth and gut suitable for mashing and digesting raw plant matter; Homo Erectus had teeth more suitable for tearing raw meat and had a larger brain from the better nutrients; "Modern Man" developed a gut better at digesting cooked food and an even larger brain from the even better nutrients. This was the program's main thrust. I suspect if they had another hour to fill, they could have explored how Homo Sapiens developed cooking, including looking at which Neanderthals experimented with it. They could have also spent more time looking at what cooking does to food. But they didn't. Wade. Q:Is it proper to eat cheeseburgers with your fingers? A:No, the fingers should be eaten separately.
Post #337,875 by SpiceWare 12/30/10 9:05:13 PM Reply	got a full house for the holidays I plan to check it out after everybody goes home. However, the link currently shows the following message and starts to play a different video: Asset not found The video you requested does not exist or is no longer available.
Post #337,876 by Andrew Grygus 12/30/10 9:19:25 PM Reply	Yup, same as I got 2 days ago - she be gone.
Post #337,877 by Another Scott 12/30/10 9:27:38 PM Reply	This it? Only 3:33 clip still available. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00r9svk Only a clip is still available. http://www.youtube.c...tch?v=A7JuMTlZVvM (3:33) Cheers, Scott.
Post #337,879 by static 12/30/10 10:04:30 PM 12/30/10 10:06:33 PM Reply	Maybe they limit it to Oz. Sorry, guys... :-( I copied it again from the website. This definitely works for me. http://player.sbs.co...Us-Human-Full-Ep/ However, the Horizon site does a good text summary of the contents. Wade. Q:Is it proper to eat cheeseburgers with your fingers? A:No, the fingers should be eaten separately. Edited by static Dec. 30, 2010, 10:06:33 PM EST Expand All History

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