Becoming Human: Last Human Standing

 

 

Everything started from small group of early humans, about 600 individuals.  As time passed things evolved, and for a certain period of time four different kinds of human being where living in the same period of time.

Neanderthals lived during cold times and they were the most advanced people on Earth. What made them the most advanced was the capacity of surviving any weather, especially cold ones. Also, apart from that, their brain was bigger than ours. Neanderthals are known to be the closest to us, though we never interbred with them.

We were and are the only ones to survive because we were more dominant. And we had a developed way of thinking. We started to think more when H. sapiens changed their diet (due to other things). Their diet made them healthier and that let them have a more developed mind; with a developed mind we (Homo sapiens and Cro magnos) our knapping (tool making) was more sophisticated.

From Grunts to Grammar: The Evolution of Language

Homo habilis was probably the first hominin who started to speak. Which means approximatly 2.5 million years ago.  The author includes: "Just as important as the brain in language development are changes in the larynx (the voice box). The larynx contains the vocal cords that allow us to produce sounds from our throat." that can tell us that through time, eventually, our voice box has changed. So, as we started to change also our larynx did. Dr. Laitman a professor of anatomy at the Mt. Sinat School of Medicine in NYC says: "The larynx disengaged from the back door of the nasal cavity. The disengagement would have radically changed the way our ancestors breathed, swallowed and made sounds."

Mouth breathing isn't common in mammals but we do. It maybe started when our ancestors started to hunt. Mouth breathing led more oxygen in and out the lungs. Maybe we started using language/speech the way we do now. Dr.Conkey, director of the Archaeological Research Facility declares: "Humans or hominins have been making stone tools for probably 2 million years, so it's unlikely that complex language had to exist for that. We have strong primate heritage of learning by imitation. Chimpanzees and many other nonhuman primates don't need complex language to learn such things as washing food, picking up a hammer stone and cracking nuts, and even --- in the case of chimpanzees ---  stripping leaves off twigs and using them to fish termites out of a termite hill." that means that to have tools we somehow needed to communicate. This conclusion could be the result of the same tool in different areas. Though, we're sure that 35,000 to/or 40,000 years ago language was used.

On Our Own Feet

    

On Our Own Feet (print magazine article)

By Stephen Whitt

Odyssey: Adventures in Science

          October 2011

          pg. 26 – 28

Our origins, how we evolved are all a mystery to us. We have evidence but it is hard to connect everything together and we still need more evidence. Though scientists after questioning themselves have come to a conclusion, not everything happened at the same time. As an example, upright walking developed before our brains (physically) did. Another question after how and when we stood upright is, why did we stand up in an upright position? Stephen Whitt in his writing stated this: “C. Owen Lovejoy, a scientist at Kent State University in Kent, Ohio, believes he knows. Lovejoy has developed one of the best known controversial theories of upright walking. We started walking, he says, to free up our hands and arm for carrying food to our mates, by sharing food we made it possible for one parent to focus on raising children. This, in time, led to more complex, learned behavior, and finally to the modern human brain”. However this is only one theory on how we evolved to an upright position and started walking.

This article also talks about our ancestors, and not theories on our ancestors. For example, many people err when they say that monkeys and chimps are our ancestors. Both of us (monkey and us) have a common parent; Australopithecus and apes. Having Australopithecus as a common ancestor doesn’t mean we are connected to monkeys (general, including chimps). Many people get confused when comparing us and chimps; what we have in common with chimps is the skull.

Differences and similarities:

US	CHIMPS
Flat face	The face sticks out
Bigger brain case	Small brain case
Foramen magnum – horizontal, straight	Foramen magnum – angled-up
So as you can see, before interpreting scientists need theories and physical evidence. Whitt, Stephen. "On Our Own Two Feet." Odyssey: Adventures in Science (2009): 26-28. Print.