[HN Gopher] Fire and Homo Naledi
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       Fire and Homo Naledi
        
       Author : wallflower
       Score  : 48 points
       Date   : 2022-12-02 13:25 UTC (9 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (worldofpaleoanthropology.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (worldofpaleoanthropology.org)
        
       | edgyquant wrote:
       | Anyone else find this stuff the most fascinating, but choose
       | startups/tech because of the money? My hope is I can accumulate
       | enough before I'm 40 so that I can spend the rest of my days
       | traveling the globe studying history/anthropology.
        
         | belugacat wrote:
         | A dangerous path. The act of accumulating in itself might
         | deeply change who you are, such that by the time you've reached
         | your original goals new mirages have clouded your eyes.
         | 
         | If you want to do something, do it now.
        
           | coyotespike wrote:
           | This was my reasoning when I was younger. Now I think it's
           | sometimes true but not always.
           | 
           | Lots of people do sacrifice financial success for other
           | passions, some of them regret it and some don't. And lots of
           | people put passions on hold and then do return to them once
           | they have financial independence or at least a stable career
           | to return to, and they're very happy with that choice.
           | 
           | Nothing wrong with having many goals, including a secure life
           | financially. My youthful self didn't really need to fear
           | losing my soul so much, basically :)
        
         | pigscantfly wrote:
         | Absolutely -- if money were no object, what I'd like to do most
         | is go back to school and get a doctorate in archaeology.
        
         | googlryas wrote:
         | Same. But you don't need to wait. You can take a sabbatical, or
         | take time off between jobs, or save up a few weeks vacation, or
         | even find relevantish sites near you that need help and
         | contribute on the weekend. Most people who say "I'll do X when
         | I'm older" just keep working because that's what they've been
         | doing for the past few decades instead of continually indulging
         | their passions.
        
         | cgh wrote:
         | My first degree was anthropology, with an emphasis on human
         | evolution. I was accepted to a masters program when things in
         | my life changed and I finally realized the importance of money.
         | So I returned to school and finished my almost-complete comp
         | sci degree. Luckily I've loved programming since I was a little
         | kid so it worked out well. After I'd worked for a while, I did
         | exactly what you suggested and took a three month trip to check
         | out various ancient sites that I'd studied in school.
        
           | AlotOfReading wrote:
           | Pretty similar story to my own, except that I never bothered
           | with the comp sci degree. The compensation/funding story for
           | archaeology was so bad that at one point I was essentially
           | living in my car/tent. I thought hard about how much I wanted
           | to endure next 5-7 years like that while I went through the
           | academic hierarchy to get to a reasonable standard of living
           | and decided tech was a much better alternative. Now I enjoy
           | it from a safe distance as a tourist and vicariously through
           | former colleague's stories.
        
         | ch4s3 wrote:
         | There's a long history of people engaged in commerce being more
         | interested in books, culture, travel, and so on.
        
       | gumby wrote:
       | > After losing 55lbs, Dr. Lee Berger himself made it into the
       | Dinaledi chamber,
       | 
       | Such an odd sentence. It's is quite tantalizing yet no more is
       | said about the weight loss. Was he obese or was the entrance to
       | the chamber particularly narrow (I suppose _someone_ had to have
       | previously entered else why would they try?). Did he simply come
       | back later or was the weight loss specific to this effort?
        
         | rnk wrote:
         | Yeah, I came for the anthropology, but I stayed for the weight
         | loss ideas of the dreamy Dr Berger. Please share your weight
         | loss tips! (if only this was anthropology teen dream edition).
        
         | zasdffaa wrote:
         | It was exceedingly narrow to the point that the first cavers
         | chosen there were small women iirc.
         | 
         | Pic of them halfway down
         | https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2015/09/homo-nal...
         | plus article.
        
         | Schattenbaer wrote:
         | My understanding is that it is extremely narrow in places.
         | 
         | See this video for instance:
         | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5KV42ilLJeM
         | 
         | There is also a virtual exploration app available, search for
         | "Dinaledi Chamber app" or similar.
        
         | nroets wrote:
         | Probably intentional weight loss.
         | 
         | Most of the excavation work was done by women:
         | https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground_Astronauts
        
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       (page generated 2022-12-02 23:01 UTC)