Will Vanheim Ever Become Spayed?

[Kristoffer O]

When I walked to Santiago de Compostela (1000 miles) we met a guy on a horse that made the same journey. We met him for a couple of days before he advanced ahead of us. I think he traveled slightly faster then a human, but for a shorter time each day not to exhaust his mount. By the time we met him he had been traveling for several weeks IIRC. It was just before we crossed the pyrenées and he was a bit worried that his horse 'Pedro' (strange that I don't remember the name of the man, but his horse) would become worse in its hind leg that was a bit exhausted and shaky (or whatever happens to tired horses). So my impression is that hoses are able to travel faster, but are less durable and might need some rest or so once in a while. Not that we didn't rest :-)

[HoneyBadger]

He definitely did it in armor as far as I know, he was afraid of running into the enemy along the way, so he carried weapons and armor. And that's the thing about humans vs horses-humans can travel steadily and wear down a horse if the horse has to keep moving. Stopping and starting is fine for a horse, but a human hunter might not give the horse the option. That's also why wolves hunt in packs, because an individual wolf quickly gets tired, while a pack can relay off and give it's members time to recover in a long hunt.

[Corwin]

HoneyBadger said:
He definitely did it in armor as far as I know, he was afraid of running into the enemy along the way, so he carried weapons and armor. And that's the thing about humans vs horses-humans can travel steadily and wear down a horse if the horse has to keep moving. Stopping and starting is fine for a horse, but a human hunter might not give the horse the option. That's also why wolves hunt in packs, because an individual wolf quickly gets tired, while a pack can relay off and give it's members time to recover in a long hunt.

I disagree. I happen to have some experience with riding and horses.

The young healthy and strong horse with a rider who knows how to take good care of his horse, and with enough good food (not the grass type of food that horse may be able to find during the breaks, but the real horse food) will cover much longer daily distance then human, and will be able to do it consistently over more or less unlimited period of time, as long as the rider is taking good care of the horse.


Also biologically humans are quite weak comparable to many animals. The reason why we got on the top of the food chain are not our fragile bodies, small teeth and lack of claws, lack of fur to protect against cold, very weak (by animal standards) hearing and sense of smell, lack of night vision, extremely slow and inefficient reproduction system, et cetera, et cetera...

The reason we got to the top of the food chain and become dominant lifeform on this palnet, despite being rather weak race, is our brain, which helped us to overcome all these weaknesses. One might argue that humans developed intelligence exactly because they were so weak, and they needed it to survive competing against better prepared species and hostile enviroment.

[HoneyBadger]

That may be the case, but it would be circumstantial. You're postulating a certain horse supplied with certain food traveling over certain ground against a certain opponent. I don't disagree with the assessment in theory, but you're talking about a horse PLUS a human VS a human, that throws the experiment off. Animal vs animal is a whole other deal since one of the reasons humans perform so well is by using our brains. We're talking a flat stretch of more or less constant motion. Again, in your experiment, the horse would be stopping and starting at the discretion of it's rider, not motivated by it's own fear. Don't forget also that some humans can travel 50 miles at a stretch, day after day. That's a good run even for a horse. I know horses might be able to go 70 miles or more, but they also tend to take more wear and tear than a human does and tend to recover from injury more slowly if at all.

[HoneyBadger]

Well, I won't disagree that humans are weaker than a bear, have worse vision than an eagle, breed more slowly than a rat, etc. But my point is that in some ways, we can compete against animals, and even are superior in a few areas besides our brains. Ofcourse, our brains are our greatest advantage but not our only one, and one might also argue that our brains are just another area for sexual competition that happen to have given us a few short-term advantages. 8,000 years isn't a long time, and that's pretty much the limit that we've been on top of the food chain. Brains aren't the perfect tool for survival anyhow. Einstein had what's considered to be one of the finest brains in history, and he paved the way for the atomic bomb.

[Corwin]

HoneyBadger said:
Well, I won't disagree that humans are weaker than a bear, have worse vision than an eagle, breed more slowly than a rat, etc. But my point is that in some ways, we can compete against animals, and even are superior in a few areas besides our brains. Ofcourse, our brains are our greatest advantage but not our only one, and one might also argue that our brains are just another area for sexual competition that happen to have given us a few short-term advantages. 8,000 years isn't a long time, and that's pretty much the limit that we've been on top of the food chain. Brains aren't the perfect tool for survival anyhow. Einstein had what's considered to be one of the finest brains in history, and he paved the way for the atomic bomb.

You've missed by several orders of magnitude. Try 200.000+ years rather than 8000 years, beginning at least at the Middle Paleolithic Era. 8000 years ago people were already living in the large settlements, having relatively advanced agriculture knowledge and irrigation systems, were hunting other species to extinction, et cetera, et cetera.

The example of horse + man being overrun by man was mentioned by Kristoffer, not me. My reply regarding horses was addressing that scenario.


As for atomic bomb - it is rather irrelevant to the discussion of human anatomy. But since you've mentioned it - it could be argued that since the invention of atomic bomb there was not a single major conflict for the last 60+ years between powers who had nuclear weapons. While before that there were two World Wars in the previous 25 years in which almost hundred of millions people died, and countless major wars before that.



Although what any of this has to do with Helheim, I have no idea...

[HoneyBadger]

I think we can safely say we've gone off-topic...ooops.

The presence of the atomic bomb-as opposed to those types of "conventional" wars that were being fought before 1945-allows for complete non-survivability of all major forms of life on Earth. It's not the fact that it has probably saved hundreds of millions of lives-It may well have done so, and I'm glad that it was invented, personally. It still remains a singular non-survivable technology if used to it's full potential. Biological weapons would most likely not affect all species, they might wipe out humans but not life on earth. Nanotechnology might have that non-survivable factor in it's prime, but we're no where near that now.

As for Pheidippides, aren't myths wonderful? Still doesn't outdo the Zulu who were 19th century.

As far as the neolithic age, we were top predators for the last 200,000-250,000 years, but I wouldn't say that we were firmly established as the ultimate top of the food-chain until we started to form permanent settlements and could really influence our environment-after all, the cave bear successfully kept us out of large swaths of territory for a long time. In modern times, so has the Tzitsi fly (I hope I spelled that right), but in that case, it's inevitable that we have or will push into those areas. A major plague or natural disaster could have wiped us out before, or another animal-Neanderthal for instance-could have taken our place, or we could have not survived the last ice age. Things that keep us on top are communities, agriculture, and advanced toolmaking. Until we had those, our position on top of the food chain was precarious. I'll concede that we may have been THE top predator for the last 20,000 years, but I still think the last ice age could potentially have wiped us out.

[krpeters]

Corwin said:The reason we got to the top of the food chain and become dominant lifeform on this palnet, despite being rather weak race, is our brain, which helped us to overcome all these weaknesses. One might argue that humans developed intelligence exactly because they were so weak, and they needed it to survive competing against better prepared species and hostile enviroment.

Wow, we're way off topic.

Anyway, you have it backwards. We became so physically weak because, thanks to a larger brain, we discovered we no longer needed claws, fur, etc. "Devolution" in action, a trait which is not needed atrophies. In 1000 years I predict most people will be nearly blind.

But there are a few human physical traits which still exceed those of most animals... vision is an obvious one, and endurance is a big one too. (What use is having a disciplined brain capable of focusing on tracking the same animal for several days if your body can't keep up?)

In the tortise vs. hare race, humans are the tortise, and we win every time.

[Wick]

HoneyBadger said:He definitely did it in armor as far as I know,

He probably didn't do it at all. Check
Pheidippides in Wikipedia

[NTJedi]

I have also heard how people in africa would hunt deer with a spear by chasing down the deer until it fell from exhaustion. Now that's real hunting.