4 ms·

> evolutionary cohort This is a very cool idea; I haven't heard of it before, and I'm not finding much on this concept on the 'web. Anything you can point me

> evolutionary cohort This is a very cool idea; I haven't heard of it before, and I'm not finding much on this concept on the 'web. Anything you can point me to? :)

maxerickson 3y ago
Large land animals only really survive in Africa, where they evolved alongside early hominids. Everywhere else they got slaughtered.
- CyberDildonics 3y ago
  What about elephants, grizzly bears and polar bears?
  - dredmorbius 3y ago
    Wrong end of the viewscope. You're considering what's survived. Those are largely exceptions. What's gone extinct: Virtually all of South America's marsupial megafauna (much of this prior to the arrival of humans, triggered by the rising of the central American ithsmus), mammoths, mastodons, native horses (the species was reintroduced by Europeans), giant ground sloth (Megalonyx), short-faced bears, saber-toothed cats, dire wolves, tapirs, peccaries, giant tortoises, the American lion, Miracinonyx (the American cheetah), siaga antelope, several species of llamas, Camelops (a giant camel), and more, all in North America alone. Very nearly the American bison ("buffalo") and California condor, amongst others. In Europe there were also several species of mammoth and mastodons, native straight-tusked elephants, lions, cave bear, Irish elk, woolly rhinocerous, aurochs, and more. Australia saw two phases of human-driven extinctions, one triggered by the aboriginies roughly 50kya, the second by Europeans, beginning about 250 years ago. <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pleistocene_megafauna https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pleistocene_megafauna> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_North_American_animals_extinct_in_the_Holocene https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_North_American_animals...> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_megafauna https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_megafauna>
    - CyberDildonics 3y ago
      You're considering what's survived. It was about what has survived Large land animals only really survive in Africa
      - dredmorbius 3y ago
        First, that's an informal statement made in an online discussion forum, rather than a tightly-worded scientific assessment. However it might be charitably interpreted along the lines of "of the prehuman megafauna extant on the multiple continents, the greatest degree of survival to the present day is found in Africa, where those species co-evolved with humans rather than experiencing humans as a suddenly-appearing invasive species". Which is what the sources I'm familiar with generally suggest. Though not a primary source, Wikipedia reasonably summarises the situation: Sub-Saharan Africa is the region of the world with the highest amount of Pleistocene megafauna surviving to the present day. These surviving species include the African bush elephant, African forest elephant, black rhinoceros, white rhinoceros and the hippopotamus. All of these species maintained populations in sub-Saharan Africa even after many of them were extirpated from Eurasia during the early Holocene.[58] This means that all of the largest herbivore genera present in Pleistocene Africa are still present today. Citing: Stuart, Anthony John (May 2015). "Late Quaternary megafaunal extinctions on the continents: a short review: LATE QUATERNARY MEGAFAUNAL EXTINCTIONS". Geological Journal. 50 (3): 338–363. doi:10.1002/gj.2633. S2CID 128868400 Stuart, Anthony J. (1991). "Mammalian Extinctions in the Late Pleistocene of Northern Eurasia and North America". Biological Reviews. 66 (4): 453–562. doi:10.1111/j.1469-185X.1991.tb01149.x. ISSN 1469-185X. PMID 1801948. S2CID 41295526 Which would strongly support the original statement by maxerickson above.
        CyberDildonics 3y ago
        tl;dr?

> evolutionary cohort This is a very cool idea; I haven't heard of it before, and I'm not finding much on this concept on the 'web. Anything you can point me to? :)

maxerickson 3y ago

Large land animals only really survive in Africa, where they evolved alongside early hominids. Everywhere else they got slaughtered.

CyberDildonics 3y ago
What about elephants, grizzly bears and polar bears?
- dredmorbius 3y ago
  Wrong end of the viewscope. You're considering what's survived. Those are largely exceptions. What's gone extinct: Virtually all of South America's marsupial megafauna (much of this prior to the arrival of humans, triggered by the rising of the central American ithsmus), mammoths, mastodons, native horses (the species was reintroduced by Europeans), giant ground sloth (Megalonyx), short-faced bears, saber-toothed cats, dire wolves, tapirs, peccaries, giant tortoises, the American lion, Miracinonyx (the American cheetah), siaga antelope, several species of llamas, Camelops (a giant camel), and more, all in North America alone. Very nearly the American bison ("buffalo") and California condor, amongst others. In Europe there were also several species of mammoth and mastodons, native straight-tusked elephants, lions, cave bear, Irish elk, woolly rhinocerous, aurochs, and more. Australia saw two phases of human-driven extinctions, one triggered by the aboriginies roughly 50kya, the second by Europeans, beginning about 250 years ago. <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pleistocene_megafauna https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pleistocene_megafauna> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_North_American_animals_extinct_in_the_Holocene https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_North_American_animals...> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_megafauna https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_megafauna>
  - CyberDildonics 3y ago
    You're considering what's survived. It was about what has survived Large land animals only really survive in Africa
    - dredmorbius 3y ago
      First, that's an informal statement made in an online discussion forum, rather than a tightly-worded scientific assessment. However it might be charitably interpreted along the lines of "of the prehuman megafauna extant on the multiple continents, the greatest degree of survival to the present day is found in Africa, where those species co-evolved with humans rather than experiencing humans as a suddenly-appearing invasive species". Which is what the sources I'm familiar with generally suggest. Though not a primary source, Wikipedia reasonably summarises the situation: Sub-Saharan Africa is the region of the world with the highest amount of Pleistocene megafauna surviving to the present day. These surviving species include the African bush elephant, African forest elephant, black rhinoceros, white rhinoceros and the hippopotamus. All of these species maintained populations in sub-Saharan Africa even after many of them were extirpated from Eurasia during the early Holocene.[58] This means that all of the largest herbivore genera present in Pleistocene Africa are still present today. Citing: Stuart, Anthony John (May 2015). "Late Quaternary megafaunal extinctions on the continents: a short review: LATE QUATERNARY MEGAFAUNAL EXTINCTIONS". Geological Journal. 50 (3): 338–363. doi:10.1002/gj.2633. S2CID 128868400 Stuart, Anthony J. (1991). "Mammalian Extinctions in the Late Pleistocene of Northern Eurasia and North America". Biological Reviews. 66 (4): 453–562. doi:10.1111/j.1469-185X.1991.tb01149.x. ISSN 1469-185X. PMID 1801948. S2CID 41295526 Which would strongly support the original statement by maxerickson above.
      - CyberDildonics 3y ago
        tl;dr?