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Crying Wolf (Life Sciences)
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Ishmael


In: Toronto
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Aluminium Wedge of Aiud Mystery



This aluminum object was found in Romania is association with mastodon bones.

Irrespective of the material from which it is manufactured, I believe we may be looking at part of a harness.

Perhaps aluminum was required for its strength and its light weight.

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Mick Harper
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In: London
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Possibly so but if it does turn out to be aluminium (easy to test surely) then it can't be ancient because aluminium is a thoroughly modern metal. Or is it?
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Ishmael


In: Toronto
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We would then be allowing for aluminum to be "rediscovered."

But this would violate the dictum, "Nothing ever gets worse."
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Mick Harper
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I recently ran into a member of my vast family who was, as is the way with my vastly intellectual family, writing a book. On muntjac deer. He is likely to become the world authority on these for a curious reason -- there are more of them in Britain than the rest of the world combined!

Hundreds of thousands (some say millions) of them are now feral after their introduction as ornamental park animals around 1900. This of course means they can be seen as a parallel with other 'domesticates-gone-feral in huge numbers that we have seen re passenger pigeons, bison and the rest. But that in turn implies that the muntjac was itself originally a domesticate. Since in TME we argued that reindeer were the first ever '(semi)domesticate' it is reasonable to propose that various deer species (it may be all deer species) are domesticates-gone-feral, the original wild progenitor being either the reindeer or one of the other large species (nominations, please).

The muntjac (and other 'ornamental' deer such as the Chinese Water and the Japanese Sika which are also now feral in Britain in vast numbers) is of the small size that we are always on the lookout for. And the genetics also seem satisfyingly bizarre

Muntjacs are of great interest in evolutionary studies because of their dramatic chromosome variations and the recent discovery of several new species. The Indian muntjac (M. muntjak) is the mammal with the lowest recorded chromosome number: The male has a diploid number of 7, the female only 6 chromosomes. Reeves's muntjac (M. reevesi), in comparison, has a diploid number of 46 chromosomes.

If someone could comment on my underlinings I'd appreciate it. Notice also there is an Indian, a Chinese and a Japanese version of these 'ornamentals'.
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Ishmael


In: Toronto
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My understanding is that modern geneticists are still unable to alter the chromosome count in organisms and the no one knows how chromosome count was altered via the process of domestication (where it is acknowledged to have occurred in many plant species).

Is this understanding correct?
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Ishmael


In: Toronto
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Ishmael wrote:
But this would violate the dictum, "Nothing ever gets worse."


For this reason, I have concluded that the aluminum piece is modern. The mastodon bones with which it was found must have been recently extracted from Ice and then re-buried with the metal "artifact."
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Hatty
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In: Berkshire
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According to RationalWiki, the 'wedge' is the broken-off tooth of a digger.

The wedge is simply a tooth from a modern day excavator bucket, the kind used by workers digging foundations for construction projects. The results of metallurgical tests made on the wedge are consistent with modern 2000 series duralumin[wp] which oxidizes fairly rapidly, accounting for the aged appearance of the wedge, and which can be hardened to a degree similar to mild steel. Aluminum will not strike sparks as steel might, which makes the alloy desirable for service in environments with combustible gases or vapors, such as the coal mines that flourished for a while in Romania. With a decline in coal mining, the excavators may be reasonably supposed to have been turned to other uses. It's likely that one of these excavators lost a tooth while digging the hole in Aiud; someone unfamiliar with the machine found it in the sand near the mastodon bones, and assumed it to be an anachronism.
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Mick Harper
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By coincidence, my weekend Barnes Wallis contact was telling me all about the then new wondermetal, duralimin. Which is what BW took away for testing as per my story.
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Mick Harper
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Reading my Barnes Wallis' contact's Family Genealogy stories, I came across this, it's Nottinghamshire countryside, c 1910

A local poacher got me a baby jackdaw out of a nest so I could rear it myself. I fed it on bread, milk and worms and named him Jackie. He became really tame and would follow me everywhere. He would sit on my head or shoulder. The poor cats suffered because he used to peck their tails.

An old lady called Mrs Morris and her daughter, Annie, lived at the bottom of the hill and Jackie flew there and pulled all the pegs out of her newly washed white sheets. She brought him home and my mum was supposed to lock him up but he escaped and was waiting back on the clothes-line by the time Mrs Morris returned home.

He came to a very sad end and was put down due to a broken leg.

Matters arising. First thing is that there appears to be a recognised job, 'the local poacher'. But one of his duties appears to be the provision of baby jackdaws for young children as pets. I conclude this because it is unlikely he would bother to rescue a chick in his line of work but making a few pence "so I could rear it" sounds like a nice little earner.

If so, this is important because it points to jackdaws (ie corvids) being able to imprint on bird parents and on human ones -- would sparrows follow this pattern? -- and a possible route for domestication if they happen to make good pets.

The 'poor cats' reference is important too, confirming corvids complete fearlessness when it comes to all (otherwise) predators of theirs right up to raptors. It opens the further possibility of a sort of 'parliament of animals' in which corvids (presumably because of their intelligence) are actually able to control other farmyard domesticates, surely a more efficient system than humans trying to do the job.

The clothesline story is a bit weird. Theories welcome.
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Ishmael


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Why would a tame corvid be any more likely than a wild one to remove clothesline pins? There must have been an infinite number of wild birds of the sort nearby.
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Hatty
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The clothes pegs may be the equivalent of the trinkets, assorted pins, hooks and so on left at wells/springs that seem to represent modern coins.

This site http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-31795681 recounts people's experiences of semi-tame, tame and wild corvids 'paying' for tidbits of food (and intimidating cats) by depositing small gifts.
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Mick Harper
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If you read that BBC account, the appeal is an unspecified one for stories 'about birds'. The whole world is asked for stories about the whole world of birds. There then follows some twenty or so accounts all of which feature corvids apart from a single reference to 'seabirds' (and corvids) and this

Our Greenwing macaw parrot Roxanne has a set of crow friends who visit daily. They eat our cast-off parrot food we put out for them. On occasion I will find trinkets such as bottle caps and bent nails on the back porch steps.

This is clear evidence that corvids are special among the other zillions of bird families in their relationship with human beings. Either Mother Nature and Darwinian Evolution have brought this absurdly singular situation about or humans have. Take your pick: Intelligent Design or ...um ... intelligent design.
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Boreades


In: finity and beyond
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Mick Harper wrote:
It opens the further possibility of a sort of 'parliament of animals' in which corvids (presumably because of their intelligence) are actually able to control other farmyard domesticates, surely a more efficient system than humans trying to do the job.


Why stop at domesticates? Did I mention our local crow that chases-off our local barn owl?
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Mick Harper
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This trait is included in TME. However you are forgetting that, also according to TME, the barn owl is a(n ex-) domesticate and therefore the crow is merely telling the barn owl to get off his haunches and back to his job of killing corn-munching rodents.
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Boreades


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That's probably why the crows don't bother our hens then. Neither do the neighbour's cats. Visitors are often surprised by that, and some don't even believe me when I say our hens see-off the cats.

Our hens don't bother our bees either (and vice-versa).
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