The first “Walking Critters settled down” thread.
Quote:Ma was born approximately 3 million years ago and belonged to an ancient ancestor species of ours called Australopithecus. She was born in Africa, perhaps Eastern Africa, where archaeologists have discovered a concentration of australopithecine fossils, including the famous “Lucy” found in 1974. Three million years ago is approximately halfway from the time when our species first split from the chimpanzee and bonobo line to the modernday,
Ma weighed 65lbs. She walked much like us, very unusual in that time! Apes do NOT walk like us even if on their hind legs.
Ma did not have fire or weapons. She was small enough even eagles occasionally made a meal of one of her species, let alone predation by felines. Ma became pregant and gave birth. Now she had to carry her baby causing her to spend 25% more energy. Her whole day was avoiding predators, finding food, eating it raw which took most of her day, just like champanzees with their strong jaws spend 6 hours a day eating their raw food.
She could not leave her baby somewhere—the baby would cry and Ma would not find her baby again. So she had to carry her baby all day, with it climb a suitable tree to spend the night hopefully out of reach of predators.
Ma invented a baby-carrying sling! Gathering food, covering distance, dodging predators just got easier. She tied the vine into a sling using a knot—even chimps can tie a knot.
More importantly—the idea of making tools was invented.
There you go—bet you thought fire or the wheel was the first invention
Inventions had to be invented first.
Oh—the male who got Ma pregnant had no interest in helping Ma look after the infant. Some things never change, eh?