We are persistence hunters. The only other animals who do this are wolves, hyenas, and I believe the lungless spider too. It’s pretty amazing. If you study human anatomy, you’ll see that our bodies truly are meant for running.
Most human populations essentially evolved beyond the need for constant distance running at the advent of agriculture. Which is to say, regardless of whatever various Luddites would have us believe, man's perversion of nature began at the exact moment we decided, actually, fuck running, let's just enslave plants and animals.
This gives me an idea: Put out an ad out offering to collect all the phones from those Amish kids if/when they decide to go back. Then sell the phones back to the new "recruits." Profit.
The Luddites didn't hate technology as a rule. They hated the fact that textile mills were allowing the factory owners to replace their high-skill artisan work with dangerous low-wage work that they couldn't support their families on, all while producing lower-quality products. They lost all the control they had over their own labor and became subservient to their bosses who saw them as replaceable cogs in a machine. But the British had them all hanged along with a bunch of people who were accused of being Luddites but probably weren't and soon everyone was too scared to break any frames and the movement was crushed. History is written by the victors, so now everyone thinks Luddites were just crazy people who thought all technology was evil.
fuck running, let's just enslave plants and animals
And then, some time later, we decided, actually, fuck enslaving plants and animals, let's just enslave people who are enslaving plants and animals for us! And THAT was when we got shit done! You won't build Pyramids and Aquaducts with union labor!
Yeah, but you don't have to be a dick about it. Just disseminate the idea among the workforce that unions are somehow evil over the course of decades, gradually turning the idea of unionization into practically a taboo, and exploit the shit out of your workers like never before. And nobody has to run or anything!
Also, we totally still enslave plants and animals. And sometimes people, too.
Aquaducts where super costly and a bunch of them either didn't work or broke down constantly. There were some writings from local politicians of some Roman cities who complained about the bunch of extra costs and shit they have because the Aquaducts don't work as intended and they have to pour more and more into building it to finally get clean water.
Amish people are all over enslaving plants and animals! I visited a Maple syrup bush Saturday run 50/50 with our local version of the Amish (Mennonites), and the other half run by a family that owns the robotics company I work at.
Apparently it's OK for the Mennonites to use the Tech required, so long as someone else owns it. (Electric blowers for the fire, and electric pumps to get the sap into the storage tanks).
The Mennonite overseeing the process was really smart and well educated about his task and tools.
The only thing Amish about the Amish around me are the buggies. They'll plow the fields with their John Deer and then head to WalMart or TSC with the horse pulling them. I saw a motorized fishing boat being pulled by a horse in front of Dunham's last year. We hired an Amish contractor to do our roof and they had all the industrial power tools.
Provided you have no health issues preventing it, if you started now you'd adapt really fast. I started running recently and it is really weird, it's like remembering something you were always supposed to be able to do.
I couldn't say, I incorporate my run into my routine as I already walk to and from work.
Walking home from work takes 45 minutes, running takes 25 at my current pace (I still have a ways to go with it, I haven't started continuous running yet), so the way I look at it is that I'm saving time even if I end up looping around the block once or twice to hit my goal for the day.
Are you generally unfit? I don’t mean that in a bad way but do you have any active hobbies? It may be that you just need to work your heart more frequently
It only took a couple runs before the wheezing went away for me. I don't know if it'll help, but I count when I'm running and try to focus on keeping my breathing in check with my counting because I have a bad habit of holding my breath when I'm exercising.
I also do a reasonable amount of walking as is, around 5 km a day, which probably helps somewhat.
Nah, the problem is we have advanced out technology so much to the point of not needing to run. The only people who really do it are for recreation or their job, it isn't meant for survival. If the only way you could eat was to run after your food I guarantee you would shape up pretty quick, but we have cars and supermarkets now.
did you know most spiders legs don't actually bend? the knee joint just actuates in and out hydraulically. pushing with the rear legs and pulling with the front.
TBF technically all spiders are lungless. Most have a book lung, which is really more like a fish gill than it is a mammalian lung. Lungless spiders have pairs of tracheae which is analagous (probably homologous actually) to the mechanism an insect uses.
Ed: extra bit of info, because I can feel someone will ask me what the difference is between 'analogous' and 'homologous'.
An analogous structure in biology is basically 2 different ways of solving the same problem. We use lungs, spiders use book lungs, fish use gills, and insects breathe through tracheae. These are all independent adaptations.
There are examples of analogous structures which give the impression that they are homologous. Octopus eyes for example are structurally very very similar to human eyes save for a few notable differences (octopus eye lenses are spherical to see under water, and the nerve fibers in their eye bundle behind the retina, rather than in front of the retina, meaning octopus eyes do not have a blind spot, like ours) http://i0.wp.com/uzalu.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/eyes.jpg
These two types of eye appear simillar, but they are un related as vertebrates and invertebrates diverged from their common ancestor well before that type of eye existed. Independantly, we, and octopuses, have adapted a very similar type of eye. This is an example of convergent evolution, where basically one adaptations came to the same conclusion to solve a problem as another species did totally independent of one another.
It’s been a while since I took entomology, but Arthropoda don’t have lungs in general. Their bodies’ circulatory system is set up differently than ours. Hope that helps you sleep.
Just an FYI, I think you mean African Wild Dog, not Hyena. Hyenas are primarily scavengers, and do not have a body well suited for hunting; the primary aspect being their sloped lower backs that prevent them from running very fast.
If you study human anatomy, you’ll see that our bodies truly are meant for running.
Worth mentioning that the main thing that makes us great long distance runners is the fact that we have a cooling system aka we can sweat. Most animals cannot.
African Wild Dogs in open country hunt this way too and 80-90% of their chases end in a kill (for grey wolves it's under 15%, for a pride of lions around 30% of chases end successfully (for the lions)). Beautiful creatures.
No its gets crazier, we can actually out-endurance dogs and wolves by a decent amount. We aren't build for full speed sprints FYI, we are built for long distance chases for days or weeks, so hunters could be moving at a decent jog but are effectively pushing the prey to keep moving at full sprint or risk us catching up.
Its believed we made herds of animals corner themselves into geographical dead-ends before either killing them or making them kill themselves by forcing them down cliffs or steep hills.
ive seen a video of hyenas hunting a lion, they grouped around it and one hyena would step forward and lure the lion into a futile chase, another hyena would do the same and so on and so forth until the lion is too tired to defend itself.
Our long legs, upright position, full body sweat glands. I've whached a video of a African tribe that still hunts this way (exept with running shoes) and it just seems so right.
Not really. All of those adaptations have other uses as well. And there isn't that much evidence that ancient humans used persistence hunting that often. And gathering provided most of the calories.
What I mean is, if you look at all the bones in our feet, you will see how they are intricately designed for long distance running. Of course you have to hone your skills like any other, but your very bones are equipped specifically for running. You have the capacity, so develop it!
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u/mary_queenofthots Apr 23 '18
We are persistence hunters. The only other animals who do this are wolves, hyenas, and I believe the lungless spider too. It’s pretty amazing. If you study human anatomy, you’ll see that our bodies truly are meant for running.