Which human characteristics are primary in the evolution of intelligence? Naturally different authorities have different emphases. We shall discuss them here to get some clues to indicate what characteristics an intelligent dinosaur might have.
The importance of walking bipedally is that the hands are freed to manipulate things, making the evolution of a large brain more likely and then toolmaking, art and written communication possible. Don Johanson quotes Owen Lovejoy, an expert on locomotion, as stating:
From the standpoint of pure efficiency bipedalism is a preposterous way of running.
Preposterous? Inefficient? Besides humans, birds find bipedalism a perfectly efficient way of running as did many dinosaurs. Some say it was crucial to the development of mankind. Dr J Bronowski in The Ascent of Man writes:
When he put his foot on the ground and walked upright, man made a commitment to a new integration of life and therefore of his limbs.
And Richard Leakey, a leading authority on the origins of mankind, says:
The origin of bipedalism must be seen as one of the major steps, if not the major step, in human evolution.
He continues:
Habitually walking around on the hindlimbs, leaving the forelimbs free for other jobs, is an unusual (sic) mode of locomotion. Once our ancestors had adopted an upright stance many things associated with being human became possible, such as fine manipulation with the hands, and the carrying of food back to base camp.
Yet, if bipedalism is so vital to being human and is “a new integration of life”, and dinosaurs had made this commitment two hundred million years before man, why couldn’t they have developed the human characteristics of intelligence? Is it possible they did?
The change to bipedalism required major changes in our ancestors’ anatomy. Bones, muscles, internal organs all had to alter. Dinosaurs did not need such drastic modification. They had evolved as bipedal animals. Why did our ancestors become upright? Not “so that man could make tools” as old fashioned schoolbooks told us. Evolution is not conscious—it cannot think ahead and make arrangements to meet its purposes. Furthermore, man was walking upright two million years before tools were made. The Laetoli footprints and Johanson’s discoveries show that primates were walking about fully erect almost four million years ago. The crude stone tools at found at Hadar were possibly 2.5 million years old, but some prefer an age of two million years. Watching for predators is a more likely reason for uprightness.
Another is to do with feeding habits. Baboons partially sit upright while seeking scattered food items. Perhaps primitive prehominids did the same. Moving about upright would also have allowed food to be carried away to be eaten at leisure safe from predators. Gradually, because it conferred such advantages, they adopted the upright stance permanently. Such arguments emphasize the immense start the dinosaurs had in being upright from the beginning.
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