Humans born without legs: how would they thrive?
or, Anatomically Correct Weebles
A group of behaviorally modern humans was cut off from the rest of the earth-like planet millennia ago. (Myths hold that the separation occurred four to five ka BP, once humankind had developed cattle ranches, brass, writing, and cities. Archaeology is inconclusive about this separation date; it may have been far earlier.) Due to a founder mutation, their descendants' legs do not develop, and the body ends at the hip. Otherwise, they stay close to normal human physiology, or at least as close as photographer Kevin Connolly and gymnast Jennifer Bricker do. They typically walk on their fists and bottom with a symmetric swing-through gait, placing both fists and swinging the torso between the arms at roughly 1 m/s.
Would it be plausible for these people to remain at the apex of the food chain or otherwise thrive long enough through hunter-gatherer to reestablish agriculture and develop industry? If so, how might they adapt? If not, what technological level would they have to reach before the separation for them to continue to thrive, and how would a founder population of four husband-and-wife pairs carry the knowledge of this technology?
I'm aware that they would need to solve at least the following problems:
- escaping danger or finding a meal when they can't run quite as fast as baseline humans
- carrying things, especially offspring
What other problems might be worth mentioning?
A real-world analog might be deafness in Martha's Vineyard, where people worked around the impairment by inventing a sign language.
1 answer
Per Robert Harvey's suggestion, I've made a community wiki for near-answers found in "disposable" comments.
Rowanas wrote:
Running wouldn't be much of an issue. While their stride would be shorter, running on the palms of the hand shouldn't be much more difficult then running on the balls of the foot. The legs are somewhat designed for it, but a change like that would encourage very strong arm muscles and powerful shoulders, which would probably make a variety of tasks much easier than we're used to, especially climbing and building.
Compared to us, these people would have nearly the same access to levers, but a vastly more powerful frame and also a significantly lower centre of gravity than we enjoy, which would put them at a massive advantage in a variety of physical tasks. Climbing would scarcely even need a harness, because climbing hand over hand would be no major thing. I've seen a paralypmic athlete climb up a rope like he was abseiling (YouTube link pending, but see Paralympian Paul Nunnari Strong 30m rope climb, or Wheelchair Legless Rope Climb and Nawid und Art Rope Climb Wheelchair - Suprfit.TV where they actually carry their wheelchairs up the rope), and an entire society like that would take that as a baseline. Pulling tall crops down to hacking height wouldn't even be a challenge.
In an answer about bipedal aliens, TechZen wrote:
If you only need one limb touching at a time and you don't actually run fast, say you live in a tree or a cluttered ground environment, then you really only need two limbs for basic support and motion. One leg supports while the other provides control. The other two can be tasked to other things like manipulating the environment.
Or one butt and one hand, with the other hand free. Or sit on the ground or on a branch with the back against the trunk, with both hands free. From here it's a short step to weaving baskets to carry things.
0 comment threads
0 comment threads