Human Intelligence and Cultural Evolution

2 years ago
11 mins read
Arnaud Frich. Centre National de Préhistoire. Ministère de la Culture et de la Communication

Although the question of when modern man first appeared in its most primitive form seems to be an answered question, in fact there is no fully agreed answer.

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Arnaud Frich. Centre National de Préhistoire. Ministère de la Culture et de la Communication

Fossil and DNA records indicate that anatomically modern Homo sapiens evolved about 300,000 years ago. However, archaeological excavations — tools, man-made artifacts, cave paintings, etc. –, — are much newer than complex technology and culture, behavioral modernity, etc.; It shows it evolved between 50,000 and 65,000 years ago.

Considering both data, then we can say that the first Homo sapiens was not completely modern. Still, different data points to different things. While skulls and genes give information about brains; handmade items provide information about culture. It seems our brains probably modernized before our cultures.

“The Great Leap”

For 200,000-300,000 years after the first appearance of Homo sapiens, tools and handmade items were surprisingly simple. But it was still slightly better than Neanderthal technology, but it remained simpler than that of some native American modern hunter-gatherers. From about 65,000 to 50,000 years ago, advanced technology began to appear, involving more complex weapons such as springs, slingshot-like tools, simple fishing rods, ceramic materials, pointed tools for digging.

People exhibited conceptual art narratives that demonstrated artistic talent and imagination, such as horse paintings drawn on cave walls, goddess paintings, idols in the shape of lion heads. While a flute made of bird bone points to music; The arrival of humans in Australia 65,000 years ago shows that our ancestors mastered sea voyages.

This sudden advancement in technology is called the “great leap forward”, which reflects the evolution of a completely modern human brain. But fossil and DNA records show that human intelligence became modern long ago.

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Brassempouy Venus, 25,000 years old. Image Source: Wikipedia

Anatomical Modernity

The bones of primitive Homo sapiens, 300,000 years old, were first seen in Africa, and the brains of our primitive ancestors were the same size or larger as our brains. They were followed at least 200,000 years ago by Homo sapiens, which we would call anatomically modern, and their brain shape became modern in at least 100,000 years. At this point, people’s brains had a size and shape similar to ours.

Assuming the brain was as modern as the box that kept it in it, our African ancestors could theoretically explore relativity, build space telescopes, write novels, games and love songs. Because their bones show they’re just as human as we are.

Because the fossil records are very fragmented, the fossils give only a minimum date. Human DNA points to even older origins for modernity. By comparing genetic differences between DNA in modern humans and ancient Africans, it is estimated that our ancestors lived between 260,000 and 350,000 years ago. The fact that all living people are descendants of these people shows that we inherit the fundamentals of our species and our humanity from them.

All subgenre , bantu, Berber, Aztec, Aboriginal, Tamil, San, Han, Maori, Eskimo, Irish, share some strange behaviors that are not found in other large tailless monkeys. All human cultures form long-term bonds between men and women to care for children. We sing, dance, produce art, comb our hair, wear jewelry on our bodies, do makeup.

He builds shelters; we use fire, we use all this skillfully by producing complex tools. We are forming large multigenerational social groups that range from dozens of people to thousands. We’re working together to fight and help each other. We teach, we tell stories, we trade. We develop moral judgments and laws. We think of the stars, our place in the universe, the meaning of life, what happens after death.

The details of our tools, fashion, family, morality and mythologies vary from tribe to tribe and culture to culture, but all living people exhibit these behaviors. This suggests that all these behaviors, or at least the capacity necessary for these behaviors, are innate. These common behaviors unite all people. All this is about man and has a common ancestral history.

We inherited our humanity from people in South Africa about 300,000 years ago. It is not impossible for everyone, by chance everywhere, at the same time, to become “full man”, starting 65,000 years ago, but a single origin is much more likely.

Network Effect

Archaeology and biology may not seem to have reached consensus, but these two disciplines actually address different parts of the human story. Bones and DNA shed light on the evolution of our brains, giving information about the hardware we have; instruments reflect the complexity of the brain, culture, software.

Just like improving your computer’s operating system, culture can evolve, even without intelligence. People in ancient times didn’t have smartphones or could not perform spaceflights, but when we study philosophers such as Aristotle and Plato, we can see that they took very clever approaches to many subjects. This creates a puzzle. If Pleistocene hunter-gatherers are as intelligent as we are, why has the culture been so primitive for so long? Why did we need hundreds of thousands of years to invent springs, sewing needles, boats? And what’s changed?

Probably more than one thing has changed. First, our ancestors migrated out of Africa, invading more of our planet. However, we encountered climates, food, hazards and other human species native to the Middle East, the Arctic, India, Indonesia and these regions. Innovation was needed to survive.

Many of these new territories were much more suited to living than the Kalahari or congo. The climates were milder, and the migrating Homo sapiens also left behind diseases and parasites native to Africa. All this allowed the tribes to grow. Larger tribes also meant more heads, more manpower and better the ability to master innovative ideas to produce and remember. Populations have been driven by innovation.

This triggered feedback loops. As new technologies emerge and spread; The number of people may increase further, which again means accelerating cultural evolution.

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Middle Stone Age technology. Image Source: The Conversation

The numbers stird the culture; culture increased numbers, accelerated cultural evolution, ultimately pushed human populations to leave their ecosystems behind, destroyed megafauna and forced the evolution of agriculture. Finally, agriculture led to an explosive population growth that culminated in the civilizations of millions of people. Now cultural evolution has become a hyperprint.

Handmade works reflect culture, and cultural complexity continues to evolve. That is, what makes cultures complex; not only intelligence at the individual level, but also interactions between individuals and groups that make up the groups. Like connecting millions of processors to the network to make a supercomputer, we have increased cultural complexity by increasing the number of people and the connections between them.

So over the last 300,000 years, as our societies and our world have evolved rapidly, our brains have gradually evolved. We’ve increased our numbers to almost 8 billion, spread all over the world, reshaped the planet. We did this not by adapting our brains at the individual level, but by changing our cultures. And much of the difference between our old, simple hunter-gatherer societies and our modern societies reflects the fact that the connection between us is greater.

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Pamela R. Travers