Alternative uses of primates and carnivores in the reconstruction of early hominid behavior

Abstract

A common approach to the reconstruction of early hominid behavior is the comparative study of living species. Some practitioners of this approach have strongly emphasized the use of carnivores while others have argued for the exclusive use of nonhuman primates. This paper takes the position that the interrelationship of primate and carnivore studies with respect to the reconstruction of early hominid behavior offers four possibilities. One is that the primate evidence is more useful and another is that the carnivore evidence is more useful. A third possibility is that primate and carnivore studies may supplement each other, i.e., taken separately, each body of evidence points toward the same conclusion. The fourth and most interesting posibility is that primate and carnivore studies may complement each other, i.e., taken together, they illuminate different aspects of a single hominid behavior pattern. It is argued that all four of these possibilities are applicable to the reconstruction of early hominid behavior, depending on the particular behavior pattern or research problem under consideration. This contention is supported with a series of examples. It is concluded that arguments favoring primates or carnivores should give way to discussions of how best to coordinate the data from these two valuable sources of inference about early hominid behavior. © 1980.