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Early Human Behaviour in Global Context
... As a result, approximately 50 -40 thousand years ago glottogenesis came of age. New cascades of evolutionary changes transformed lives of our ancestors by adding up a set of 'behavioral modernity' traits (Lindly et al. 1990;Roebroeks et al. 1992;Klein 1995;Sherratt 1997;Korisettar 1998;Klein 1999) to well-established ways of life during the so-called Human revolution (Mellars, Stringer 1989). It was the time for the so-called Great Leap Forward (Diamond 1989;Davidson 2003). ...
The article elaborates on substance-form aspects of integral communicative practices. Respective substance matters emerge with their shaping into formative and formal modes within the integral bio-social existence and experience of humans. Instrumentally modes help humans to shape or form their irregular substance matters into in-formed mental, behavioral and communicative practices.
The article outlines interpretations of respective transformations and processes from Aristotle, Descartes and Kant to Russell, Wittgenstein, Austin and theoreticians of ongoing cognitive and languaging revolutions. The rigid opposing of the ultimate substance/form abstractions provokes conceptual impediments that result in the notorious pseudo-Cartesian mind-body problem. It is possible to overcome it by refocusing on actual middle ground integral developments including actual psychosomatic and mental processes, human communicative interactions and their pragmatic activities. A promising way to do that is to develop intellectual instruments similar to accommodating Hjelmslevean distinction of content and expression planes or relatively integral substance-form complexes.
The article suggests a range of instrumentalities to methodologically reinterpret actual middle ground practices of languaging and language games. To that effect, it suggests a few complementary ways of their embedding and enacting, particularly new modes and procedures to conceptualize prerequisites and outcomes, externalities and affordances of the matching middle ground practices.
... These cognitive abilities, or capacities, are probably less than 100 thousand years old, which may be qualified as "embryonal" on the time scale of evolution, (e.g. Petraglia and Korisettar, 1998;McBrearty and Brooks, 2000;Henshilwood and Marean, 2003). In addition, this very thin layer of human achievement has necessarily been built on these "ancient" neural intelligence for essential survival functions. ...
AI is one of the most debated subjects of today and there seems little common understanding concerning the differences and similarities of human intelligence and artificial intelligence. Discussions on many relevant topics, such as trustworthiness, explainability, and ethics are characterized by implicit anthropocentric and anthropomorphistic conceptions and, for instance, the pursuit of human-like intelligence as the golden standard for Artificial Intelligence. In order to provide more agreement and to substantiate possible future research objectives, this paper presents three notions on the similarities and differences between human- and artificial intelligence: 1) the fundamental constraints of human (and artificial) intelligence, 2) human intelligence as one of many possible forms of general intelligence, and 3) the high potential impact of multiple (integrated) forms of narrow-hybrid AI applications. For the time being, AI systems will have fundamentally different cognitive qualities and abilities than biological systems. For this reason, a most prominent issue is how we can use (and “collaborate” with) these systems as effectively as possible? For what tasks and under what conditions, decisions are safe to leave to AI and when is human judgment required? How can we capitalize on the specific strengths of human- and artificial intelligence? How to deploy AI systems effectively to complement and compensate for the inherent constraints of human cognition (and vice versa)? Should we pursue the development of AI “partners” with human (-level) intelligence or should we focus more at supplementing human limitations? In order to answer these questions, humans working with AI systems in the workplace or in policy making have to develop an adequate mental model of the underlying ‘psychological’ mechanisms of AI. So, in order to obtain well-functioning human-AI systems, Intelligence Awareness in humans should be addressed more vigorously. For this purpose a first framework for educational content is proposed.
... Kleindienst's classification system (1961) resulted in the recognition of four variants that include three Acheulian and a single non-bifacial one: variant A: 40–60% bifaces, ''conventional Acheulian''; variant B: Developed Oldowan; variant C: equal proportions of bifaces and small tools; and variant D: bifaces with a high percentage of heavy duty tools (Ibid.). An additional type of variability is observed on a regional scale (e.g.,Gowlett and Crompton, 1994;Petraglia and Korisettar, 1998;Roe, 2001;Gamble and Marshall, 2001;Sharon, 2007). Most frequently, bifacial tools express this variability between Acheulian sites of different geographical regions through differences in tool size and morphology (Gilead, 1970;Crompton and Gowlett, 1993;Roe, 1968Roe, , 1994Roe, , 2001), the raw materials used (Sharon, 2007), the manufacturing techniques (hard vs. soft hammer; e.g.,Isaac, 1969), and other attributes. ...
The Acheulian Technocomplex exhibits two phenomena: variability and conservatism. Variability is expressed in the composition and frequencies of tool types, particularly in the varying frequencies of bifaces (handaxes and cleavers). Conservatism is expressed in the continuous presence of bifaces along an immense time trajectory. The site of Gesher Benot Ya'aqov (GBY) offers a unique opportunity to study aspects of variability and conservatism as a result of its long cultural-stratigraphic sequence containing superimposed lithic assemblages. This study explores aspects of variability and conservatism within the Acheulian lithic assemblages of GBY, with emphasis placed on the bifacial tools. While variability has been studied through a comparison of typological frequencies in a series of assemblages from the site, evidence for conservatism was examined in the production modes expressed by the reduction sequence of the bifaces. We demonstrate that while pronounced typological variability is observed among the GBY assemblages, they were all manufactured by the same technology. The technology, size, and morphology of the bifaces throughout the entire stratigraphic sequence of GBY reflect the strong conservatism of their makers. We conclude that the biface frequency cannot be considered as a chrono/cultural marker that might otherwise allow us to distinguish between different phases within the Acheulian. The variability observed within the assemblages is explained as a result of different activities, tasks, and functions, which were carried out at specific localities along the shores of the paleo-Hula Lake in the early Middle Pleistocene.
The appearance of Oldowan sites ca. 2.6 million years ago (Ma) may reflect one of the most important adaptive shifts in human evolution. Stone artifact manufacture, large mammal butchery, and novel transport and discard behaviors led to the accumulation of the first recognized archaeological debris. The appearance of the Oldowan sites coincides with generally cooler, drier, and more variable climatic conditions across Africa, probably resulting in a net decrease in woodland foods and an increase in large mammal biomass compared to the early and middle Pliocene. Shifts in plant food resource availability may have provided the stimulus for incorporating new foods into the diet, including meat from scavenged carcasses butchered with stone tools. Oldowan artifact form varies with clast size, shape, raw material physical properties, and flaking intensity. Oldowan hominins preferred hard raw materials with good fracture characteristics. Habitual stone transport is evident from technological analysis, and raw material sourcing to date suggests that stone was rarely moved more than 2-3 km from source. Oldowan debris accumulation was spatially redundant, reflecting recurrent visitation of attractive points on the landscape. Thin archaeological horizons from Bed I Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania, were probably formed and buried in less than 10 years and document hominin processing of multiple carcasses per year. Transport beyond simple refuging behavior is suggested by faunal density at some site levels. By 2.0 Ma, hominin rank within the predatory guild may have been moderately high, as they probably accessed meaty carcasses through hunting and confrontational scavenging, and hominin-carnivore competition appears minimal at some sites. It is likely that both Homo habilis sensu stricto and early African H. erectus made Oldowan tools. H. habilis sensu stricto was more encephalized than Australopithecus and may foreshadow H. erectus in lower limb elongation and some thermoregulatory adaptations to hot, dry climatic conditions. H. erectus was large and wide-ranging, had a high total energy expenditure, and required a high-quality diet. Reconstruction of H. erectus reproductive energetics and socioeconomic organization suggests that reproductively active females received assistance from other group members. This inference, combined with archaeological evidence for acquisition of meaty carcasses, suggests that meat would have been a shared food. This is indirectly confirmed by nutritional analysis suggesting that the combination of meat and nutritionally dense plant foods was the likely diet fueling body size increase and encephelization in Homo. Most discussion of Oldowan hominin behavior and ecology, including that presented here, is based on materials from a few sites. There is a critical need to analyze additional large, primary-context lithic and faunal assemblages to better assess temporal, geographic, and environmental variability in Oldowan behavior.
One of the dominant environmental parameters that of lndia's political, cultural economic development is monsoonal rainfall. Any variation in monsoonal rainfall has an impact on human cultures in India and the the possibility of climatic change in the future due to global warming is of serious concern. Historical disciplines like history, archaeology, geology and palaeobotany can provide data for understanding the the long term record of past climatic change, which is needed for building predictive models of how climate might change in the future. We can also study the impact of climatic change on human cultures of the past. In the past two decades considerable effort has been made to study palaeoenvironmental changes in parts of Pennisular and coastal regions of India. In this paper summarize some of the important geoarchaeological and geomorphological research of the last decade related the Late Quaternary period.
Mammalogy provides exceptionally fertile grounds for advancing evolutionary theory, because its data base spans from diverse researches on living forms to a rich fossil record. I illustrate this by integrating interdisciplinary evidence and hypotheses in the habitat theory, including: 1) the context of paleoclimatic changes, and how species' distributions responded to them; 2) geographical biases in turnover rates of species; 3) the turnover-pulse hypothesis; 4) breadth of resource use as a cause of phylogenetic turnover rates. Preliminary tests using the late Neogene records of the Americas and Africa suggest that major aspects of the Great American Interchange have parallels in the African record, as predicted by the habitat theory. Comparable forces may have operated in both cases. The habitat theory of the Great American Interchange differs from the traditional emphasis on the effects of interspecific competition.
This article uses Piagetian genetic epistemology to characterise the intelligence of later Acheulean hominids. In particular the Piagetian concepts of reversibility and conservation are used to assess the spatial concepts used by the hominids who manufactured the artefacts from the Isimila Prehistoric Site, Tanzania. It is concluded that these artefacts required the organisational abilities of operational intelligence and that, therefore, the hominid knappers were not significantly less intelligent than modern adults. Such a conclusion indicates that increasing intelligence has not been a significant factor in cultural evolution for at least the last 300,000 years. Concluding that later Acheulean hominids employed operational thought also suggests that such cultural realms as kinship and cosmogony may have been more complex than archaeologists have heretofore imagined.
Studies of fossil hominid bones and analyses of nuclear and mitochondrial DNA in living human populations provide different ways of studying human evolutionary history. In the early 1970s these two approaches yielded conflicting answers to the question of when the first hominid ancestor emerged; a dispute which has subsequently been resolved as a result of the finding of more complete fossil specimens. In the 1980s, controversy has centred around the origins of modern humans. Did modern humans appear first in Africa and spread throughout the world, replacing earlier, non-modern populations? Was there interbreeding between recent or modern people of African origin and long-existing populations elsewhere? Or did the modern human form arise in parts of the world outside Africa? The evidence for different hypotheses is described and evaluated, and the way pointed towards a reconciliation between the conflicting claims of the three or four factions in this controversy on modern human origins.
Recent finds of hominid fossils and associated archaeological remains throughout the world are reviewed, and their significance for our understanding of human biological and cultural evolution assessed. Gaps in current knowledge help establish priorities for future research.
Statistical and microscopic studies of ethnographic Australian Aboriginal stone tools reveal patterns which correlate significantly with the known uses, techniques of manufacture, and native classification of these tools. Statistically, the most significant correlation occurs between the angle of the working edge of the tool and the classification and function of the tool. Steep-edge flakes are classified as purpunpa and serve as woodworking scrapers, while flakes with acute edge-angles are classed as tjimari and are used as knives for cutting skin and tendons. Microscopic study has further revealed that woodworking scrapers show a distinctive pattern of use-wear. Some trial comparisons are also attempted between ethnographic Aboriginal woodworking scrapers and Quina-type scrapers of Bordes' Quina-Ferrassie facies of the Mousterian in order to suggest the value of comparing ethnographically known tools with archaeological specimens.
Current models of hunter-gatherer adaptive strategy indicative variability with latitude (gathering predominant in the tropics, fishing in the mid-latitudes and hunting only in the high latitudes). This article questions the adequacy of the ethnographic data on which predictions about hunter-gatherer subsistence behaviour in some tropical environments are based. As an alternative, the pattern of covariability between plant community structure, large mammal biomass, and rainfall in equatorial regions is used to predict high levels of hunting in certain low latitude environments. The present distribution of animal protein-dependent pastoralists in tropical Africa supports this model. Large mammal hunting may have been of greater significance in the adaptive strategies of prehistoric savanna hunter-gatherers than in those of ethnographically-observed tropical hunter-gatherers. -Author