Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by martyb on Friday March 16 2018, @02:44PM   Printer-friendly
from the Moog-want-spear...-Gork-want-axe? dept.

Signs of symbolic behavior emerged at the dawn of our species in Africa

More than 320,000 years ago in the Rift Valley of Africa, some early innovators adopted a new technology: They eschewed the clunky, palm-size stone hand axes that their ancestors had used for more than a million years in favor of a sleek new toolkit. Like new generations of cellphones today, their Middle Stone Age (MSA) blades and points were smaller and more precise than the old so-called Acheulean hand axes and scrapers.

These toolmakers in the Olorgesailie Basin in Kenya chose as raw materials shiny black obsidian and white and green chert, rocks they had to get from distant sources or through trade networks. In another first, they chiseled red and black rocks, probably to use as crayons to color their bodies or spears—an early sign of symbolic behavior. "This is indicative of a gear change in behavior, toolmaking, and material culture," says evolutionary psychologist Robin Dunbar at the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom, who studies social networks.

A trio of papers released online in Science today documents this remarkable technological transition. Although other sites have yielded MSA tools, the new, securely dated chronology nudges the transition back by at least 20,000 years, matching when our species, Homo sapiens, is now thought to have emerged. By analyzing artifacts over time at one site, the papers also show that these behaviors developed as climate swings intensified, supporting the idea that environmental variability drove innovation.

Related:

Environmental dynamics during the onset of the Middle Stone Age in eastern Africa (DOI: 10.1126/science.aao2200) (DX)

Chronology of the Acheulean to Middle Stone Age transition in eastern Africa (DOI: 10.1126/science.aao2216) (DX)

Long-distance stone transport and pigment use in the earliest Middle Stone Age (DOI: 10.1126/science.aao2646) (DX)


Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 1, Offtopic) by Runaway1956 on Friday March 16 2018, @04:27PM

    by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Friday March 16 2018, @04:27PM (#653658) Journal

    Mmmm. Funny, yet somewhat distasteful, and none of it untrue. We need to bludgeon the staff until they give us more mods to work with. What fits here, anyway? Damifino!

    Starting Score:    1  point
    Moderation   -1  
       Offtopic=1, Total=1
    Extra 'Offtopic' Modifier   0  
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   1