How to Use bipedalism in a Sentence
bipedalism
noun-
As such, any links to our own bipedalism look much less clear-cut.
—Vivien Shaw, Quartz, 14 Dec. 2019
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Don't let the illusion of bipedalism and tiny arms fool you.
—Gemma Tarlach, Discover Magazine, 7 Apr. 2017
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More than 85 percent of the chimpanzees’ bipedalism events occurred in the trees.
—Sarah Kuta, Smithsonian Magazine, 15 Dec. 2022
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Our own bipedalism--like much of the rest of our biology--has deep roots.
—Carl Zimmer, Discover Magazine, 22 Nov. 2011
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Other maladies may be traced back to the origin of bipedalism.
—Adrian Woolfson, WSJ, 31 May 2021
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One of them is a project to investigate the origins of bipedalism.
—Quanta Magazine, 27 Feb. 2019
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The point where the spinal cord had joined the skull was too far forward for a knuckle walker, indicating bipedalism.
—Quanta Magazine, 10 Nov. 2015
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The ability to move around on two legs, known as bipedalism, is a defining feature of modern humans.
—Han Yu, WSJ, 2 June 2023
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The idea that a third hominin species—in the same time and place as A. afarensis, at that—was evolving for bipedalism on its own branch of the family tree is a fascinating one.
—Kiona N. Smith, Ars Technica, 6 Dec. 2021
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But new research shows that wild chimpanzees walk upright in trees far more often than on the ground, suggesting bipedalism could have first evolved up high.
—Daniel Leonard, Scientific American, 1 Mar. 2023
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The first scenario places fur loss within a few million years of the origins of bipedalism, when our ancestors were merely 3 to 4 feet tall, with chimpanzee-sized brains.
—Bridget Alex, Discover Magazine, 13 Aug. 2019
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One of the key traits that separates hominins from apes is bipedalism, or walking upright on two legs, freeing the arms to throw spears, pick berries or carry children.
—Jason Daley, Smithsonian, 5 July 2018
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Early species were adapted to climbing as well as bipedalism; later species had more specialized diets of tough, fibrous food.
—National Geographic, 30 Jan. 2020
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Evidence of bipedalism began with previous studies of the skull.
—Brian Handwerk, Smithsonian Magazine, 24 Aug. 2022
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Evolution gave human ancestors big brains and bipedalism, among other attributes that our species has retained to this day.
—NBC News, 12 Aug. 2019
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The fossil, of a female hominin species that lived about 3.2 million years ago, supported the evolutionary idea that bipedalism preceded an increase in brain size.
—Eric Berger, Ars Technica, 3 Aug. 2022
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Moreover, the additional analysis of the chimpanzees' bursts of brief, bipedal movement strengthened the team's conclusion that our ancient ancestors' full-time bipedalism could’ve been born amongst the trees.
—Sam Walters, Discover Magazine, 16 Dec. 2022
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But new fossil records contain footprints displaying clear signs of bipedalism, according to the scientists who studied them.
—David Grossman, Popular Mechanics, 24 Apr. 2018
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Thus, perhaps dinosaurs making the transition from bipedalism walked in such a way, too—walking on their palms with hyperextended fingers.
—Sarah Lewin Frasier, Scientific American, 1 June 2015
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All modern birds can trace their origins to theropods, according to paleontologists, with features like plumage, bipedalism and egg-laying common to both groups.
—Aylin Woodward, WSJ, 21 Dec. 2021
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The origin of human bipedalism has long been a hot topic among paleoanthropologists.
—Brian Switek, WIRED, 14 Aug. 2009
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Other research during this dinosaur renaissance, looking at the inflexibility of its hand and wrist, revealed that Iguanodon spent most of its time with four limbs on the ground, but was capable of some bipedalism.
—Gemma Tarlach, Discover Magazine, 10 Apr. 2017
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In fact, by observing the chimpanzees living in the thin, patchy forests of Tanzania’s Issa Valley, Stewart and a team could investigate whether the openness of the ancient terrain brought on the transition to bipedalism among our ancestors.
—Sam Walters, Discover Magazine, 16 Dec. 2022
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The findings contrast with a prevailing theory about human bipedalism—walking on two feet—known as the savanna hypothesis.
—Sarah Kuta, Smithsonian Magazine, 15 Dec. 2022
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However, his team’s data does not bear that out, instead suggesting that more open environments were not a catalyst in encouraging bipedalism, said Piel.
—Jack Guy, CNN, 14 Dec. 2022
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Four years later Mary Leakey found 3.6-million-year-old hominin footprints at Laetoli, Tanzania, providing the earliest evidence of bipedalism.
—Tim Flannery, The New York Review of Books, 13 May 2021
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But not all experts have agreed that the Sahelanthropus skull definitely suggested bipedalism.
—Brian Handwerk, Smithsonian Magazine, 24 Aug. 2022
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Explaining bipedalism Rudapithecus lived during the Miocene, a moderately warm period that ended between 8 million and 5 million years ago.
—NBC News, 30 Sep. 2019
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If two different species were walking upright on the landscape at the same time, that suggests different simultaneous experiments in bipedalism — complicating the conventional view of human evolution as strictly linear.
—Christina Larson, Anchorage Daily News, 2 Dec. 2021
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For example, orangutans use clambering, upright or horizontal climbing, suspensory swinging, and assisted bipedalism (walking upright using hands for support).
—Vivien Shaw, Quartz, 14 Dec. 2019
Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'bipedalism.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
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