Human Beginnings

“For, in fact, what is man in nature? A Nothing in comparison with the infinite, an All in comparison with the Nothing, a mean between nothing and everything. Since he is infinitely removed from contemplating the extremes, the end of things and their beginnings are hopelessly hidden from him in an impenetrable secret; he is equally incapable of seeing the Nothing from which he was made, and the infinite in which he is swallowed up.” – Blaise Pascal, Pensées 72 (1660)

Old Man came from the south, making the mountains, the prairies, and the forests as he passed along, making the birds and the animals also. He traveled northward making things as he went, putting red paint in the ground here and there – arranging the world as we see it He made the Milk River and crossed it; being tired, he went up on a little hill and lay down to rest. As he lay on his back, stretched out on the grass with his arms extended, he marked his figure with stones. You can see those rocks today – they show the shape of his body, legs, arms and hair…Old Man covered the plains with grass for the animals to feed on. He marked off a piece of ground and in it made all kinds of roots and berries to grow: camas, carrots, turnips, bitterroot, sarvisberries, bull-berries, cherries, plums, and rosebuds…

The History of World History:

Sacred History vs. Secular History

“Prehistoric” vs. Historical

Cities?Writing?Nations?

Sacred Prehistory: Eden, The Flood, The Tower of Babel

Secular Prehistory: Hunting-herding-agriculture-civilizationTribes-totemic societies-complex societies.Tribal headship-chieftaincies-states.Superstition-magic-religion.Camps-hamlets-villages-cities.

Conjectural History: Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Marx, Freud

The Cosmic Calendar

http://visav.phys.uvic.ca/~babul/AstroCourses/P303/BB-slide.htm

• Shark Teeth found on mountaintops• Charles Lyell. Principles of Geology. 1830’s.• First half of 19th century, excavating tools, jewelry, etc.

alongside the remains of now-extinct animals.• Lyell. Geological Evidence for the Antiquity of Man.

(1868)

The End of the “Short Chronology”

Problems with documents:• They are just one kind of trace.• They need to be contextualized.• They do not offer straightforward readings.

Excursus: Deep History of Human Sexuality

The Incompetence of Human Infants-Lack fine motor control for using tools and acquiring food-Our food gathering requires large brains

Long period of maternal investment

But also long period of paternal investment, given food-gathering.

Confidence in Paternity is important.

From Jared Diamond, The Third Chimpanzee.

Penis size as plumage? As threat?

Hidden Ovulation: Some theoriesEnhance cooperation and reduce aggression among males.

Cement bond between couples.

Meat-sharing motivation (cf. chimpanzees).

Motivate a more enduring bond from the male.

Evolved so females can manipulate males by confusing paternity.

Human birth is painful and risky, so this adaptation is a way for women to deceive themselves.

All humans living today share a common human ancestor dating back to 150,000 years ago and living in Africa.

But we share common ancestors with chimpanzees from 5 to 7 million years ago.

Brain Size?

Stone Tools

Homo habilis (“handy”) lived about 2.5 million years ago, chipping hand axes from stones.

He had a larger brain than earlier primates and demanded more nourishment.

“Lucy,” a relatively complete example of australopithecines (3 million BP), was part of a species that lived in family groups, walked on two legs, and by at least 2.5 million BP used tools.

Homo erectus (1.5 million BP) had a larger brain than we do and made tools and weapons from flint.

Homo ergaster and homo antecesor (800,000 BP) stacked the bones of the dead.

But were they the first humans?

In 1953 scientists discovered that a Japanese Macaque monkey had developed a new technique for washing sweet potatoes. Later she found a new technique to wash sand from wheat. She taught these to her children. Today her entire tribe uses these techniques.

In Kenya, in 1986, a group of male baboons died suddenly from an infection contracted from raiding a garbage dump.

After this, the normally aggressive, male-dominated and violent baboon group developed a new, less hierarchical power structure based on resolving conflict through mutual grooming.

They taught this new structure to “immigrant” male baboons.

Development of Cultural TraitsCultural traits can be produced according to blind selective processes (rather than genius). For example, the Clovis points, which may open up larger wounds, could have been kept as models only because they were recovered from dead animals.

Or, consider the practice of treating maize with lime. Not all cultural traits are adaptive (like drug abuse).

Even intentional actions become unintentional when they interact with unintentional consequences. For example: primogenture inheritance and agriculture.

Easter Island is a good example of an unadaptive cultural trait.

Neanderthals (homo neanderthalensis) coexisted with homo sapiens for 100,000 years, but they aren’t human. They were of a similar size to us, with slightly larger brains. They lived in the same kinds of societies, ate the same foods, made the same kinds of tools and jewelry. They buried their dead with signs of honor.

A. Human EvolutionAustralopithecus lived about 3 million years ago.

Homo habilis (“handy human”) lived about 2.5 million years ago.

Homo erectus (“standing upright”) lived about 1.5 million years ago.

Homo ergaster (“workman”) lived about 800,000 years ago.

Human MigrationsOut of Africa first around 100,000 years ago

Why?Rise in population due to use of fire in cooking

More types of food availableWar: competition for resources

Humans reach China: 67,000 years agoAustralia: 50,000 years agoEurope: 40,000 years ago

Migration to the Americas: around 15,000 years ago (?)

Land bridge across the Bering Strait as the last Ice Age ended

Multiple groups or one migration?

Clovis culture?

Mass extinction of 35 species of mammals around 10,000 years agoQuestions about date of the peopling of the Americas raised by archaeological investigations at:

Meadowcroft shelter Monte Verde in Chile

From Daniel Lord Smail & Andrew Shyrock. Deep History: The Architecture of Past and Present.

Scene from HBO’s True Detective