The Origin of Bipedality

“An examination of hypotheses explaining the evolutionary shift from quadrupedalism to bipedalism. The core of the talk is a critical analysis of renowned biological anthropologist Dr. C. Owen Lovejoy’s 1981 paper The Origin of Man, which argues that monogamy and male provisioning in early hominids drove the evolution of upright walking. The talk compares his hypothesis with other leading explanations, including postural feeding, thermoregulation, energetic efficiency, and mosaic habitats, and evaluates it against the fossil evidence.