levallois in the United States

[Minimalist]

Chert and flint are pretty hard, alright. I made a nice sharp flake by hitting two pieces of chert together in Texas a few years back. It shaved the hair off my arm painlessly.

[Digit]

cracks will split that rock eventually!

Eventually? In Wales the cutting of roofing slates was done as a roughing op, then the slates were stored on edge over the winter. The following spring they were nicely delaminated. Warming winters has stopped that and now they are split by hand, and subsequently are now thicker and heavier.
Frost action moves tonnes of rock each year, just take a look at any scree slope.
And the edges can be razor sharp!

Roy.

[uniface]

Not disputed.

But if the knappers of Dover in the 17th-19th centuries had tried that with their nodules of flint, their descendants would still be waiting for something to happen. Let alone for gunflints (an intentional, purposeful shape) to result.

[Rokcet Scientist]

C'mon guys! We've established that temperature changes can split rock/stone. And does all the time. But that time it takes is aeons! A bit too long for our cave forebears to wait for. And it never produces usable points, flints, and flakes. Of which by now thousands upon thousands have been found. Those usable points, flints, and flakes are the result of human processing, knapping. Manufacturing, if you will (mano á mano! I.o.w.: handiwork). A process easily repeated today, thus confirmed.

I.o.w., yes, temperature changes can split rock/stone, but that process has nothing to do with usable points, flints, and flakes! Can we drop it now?

[Digit]

But that time it takes is aeons!

In California a special crew dislodges rocks etc that have loosened above their highways on a annual basis!

I may take many years for a fresh face to 'spall', but once started the scree falls each year!
Ask a climber!

Roy.

[rick doninger]

C'mon guys, the tool industry you guys are hearing about is undeniable. I have it! My friend in Texas has it. Unless you have actually seen an industry and had at least some experience hands on there is no way to appreciate the technology. It takes thousands of tools to be able to make the claim to have found a definable, recognizable, stone age tool industry. It's not like it's something you can fake, not an entire tool manufacturing system that is based on a particular core design that produces a particular array of tools specific to those cores. AND you have identified scores of tool types made repeatedly apparrently for task specific purposes. Unlike a Clovis tool site where waste flakes abound, unlike all the later sites where waste is found everywhere these makers wasted nothing. They made tools on everything they struck it seems, resulting in the most amazing array of obviously knapped implements ever seen in the states for sure. I am confident we will have some dates eventually and I think there is going to be some bone evidence that will clinch the deal. If any one would like to see pics just email me at doninger@sbcglobal.net.
In the meantime, I would challenge those of the "club" to call our bluffs. We have what we say we have and it is what the preclovis hunters are going to find when they find it for sure. We have the reference assemblage. I have proposed this question before. If someone would like to post a lower to middle paleo tool type, such as is found abroad, I am confident we can match it from this assemblage. Levallois points, mousterian points, blades, burins, notches, chisels, hand axes, etc..........The American Early Man Tool Industry...........rick doninger.

[Minimalist]

I seem to recall Charlie mentioning that he would discard any stone which did not show 5 ( or maybe it was 6? ) separate flakes being removed. Even with that somewhat arbitrary qualification, he had a house full of the things.

That's asking a lot of Mother Nature.

[uniface]

Forgive my being tedious here : Intentional shaping, technological consistency and massive numbers are the icing on the cake.

The cake itself is that the nodules of chert/flint/etc. worked by early man existed close to (and on) the ground for (as currently believed) millions of years without cracking or splitting. The freezing-thawing hypothesis where early tools are concerned is self-evidently refuted by simply considering the observed characteristics of the material itself.

Chert artifacts are not found frost-split, anywhere. Fire pocked, yes ; frost split, no. Even after 10,000 years of freezings and thawings. That a few other lithic materials can be is as irrelevant as the ability of birds to fly is to my inability to do so.

[Minimalist]

Intentional shaping, technological consistency and massive numbers

Absolutely.

[Digit]

existed close to (and on) the ground

Much more likely underground and therefore more protected, and for the really early stuff you would have turn to central Africa. Not exactly known for a lot of freezing/thawing.
Then again how do you know that what we have is not simply a remnent with the rest having been lost to such action?

Roy.

[uniface]

Borderline silly. Ground freezes and thaws also. As do the rocks in it.

But unless said lithics are lying around on the surface, or outcropping (exposed), it doesn't get used because nobody knows it's there.

In any case possible, it's freezing and thawing.

And remaining intact. Over a longer time frame than simply millenia.

Flint/chert simply doesn't split from freezing and thawing, no matter how often repeated. If it did, the artifacts I used to find on habitation sites wouldn't have remained intact.

If you'd like to see for yourself, I'll gladly send you some to play with

[Digit]

Borderline silly. Ground freezes and thaws also. As do the rocks in it.

Only to a certain depth, known as the frost heave depth here. And how deep would that be in southern Texas, Central Africa, even here it's only about two inches max. Silly?
Thank you for your offer but I have my own supply to play with.
Not all stone tools are made of either Flint or Chert of course, not all stone tools even require an edge. My point was that stone falls from outcrops every winter, these can be used.

Roy.

[uniface]

Here they call it the frost line. And yes, silly. Reason : because people have lived from here in Pennsylvania (worst roads in the country due to the frequency and intensity of freezings/thawings) all the way up into the arctic. If you want an idea of whether f/t is a variable in breaking up flint, you go to where it f/ts. No ? It's been doing that here for as long as there have been people, and still no sign of it happening. Going to where it either doesn't happen or doesn't happen much is like looking for your car keys in the garage when you dropped them in the house.

This general field is so full of "could have" thinking I'm at a loss to comprehend it. My Grandmother could have assassinated President Kennedy. For that matter, there could be a Giant Squid living in Lake Erie. And the beautiful part is that, since it's impossible to disprove either supposition, the game (like the road) goes on forever. But I don't think it's entirely serious sometimes.

[Digit]

Why your fixation with Flint? I was talking, as I pointed out in previous post, 'stone'.
If the tool required no edge why flint? How many tools need an edge?

Roy.

[Minimalist]

Again, Dig, if someone really wanted to discredit the Levallois tool style they could design experiments to repeatedly freeze and warm rocks and measure the effect. That they have not done so merely indicates that they do not believe it themselves.