Homo sapiens neanderthalensis (left) and Homo sapiens sapiens (right) |
The Genus Homo |
Australopithecus and Kenyanthropus
were hominid, but they were not closely enough related to Modern Man (Homo
sapiens) to be included in the same genus. About 2 million years ago,
there evolved a small hominid about half the size of Modern Man. Its hands
were much more like ours and its feet were virtually the same. Its jaw was
less prominent and a more rounded and thinner skull is evidence of a larger
brain mass and greater intelligence. The first fossils of this hominid
were found by Louis S. B. Leaky in the Olduvai Gorge of Tanzania. It was the first
evidence of our modern genus and was named Homo habilis, which is
Latin for "Able Man" (Homo=man; habilis=able). Homo habilis was
named so because the artifacts found with the fossils were rudimentary stone
tools that had been created from rocks. There have been many people that
think Mankind to be an herbivore because of his mouth and tooth structure along
with his lack of claws. But Mankind has never used his mouth to drag prey
to the ground, killing it with tooth and claw. The use of stone tools, knives and spears, allowed
man to kill animals for food and protection. With artificial teeth and
claws, Homo habilis could cut hides, scraping the meat from them and the bones.
When someone says, "Man is an herbivore.
Look at his teeth", you may quickly respond, "Man is a
carnivore. Look at his hands and his mind!". It does not take a
great deal of intelligence to stalk a plant. Asking a chimpanzee will not
get the answer one would expect from a man. Mankind began
the evolution into a carnivore, at least, 1.5 million years ago. This
evolution probably began prior to 3.5 million years ago with the fish eating of
our water bound ancestors. He
retained the ability to eat plants for energy, but not the ability to survive
upon them totally as a chimpanzee can. Mankind is an omnivore that requires a diet based
around meat and animal products. Man's appetite mechanism evolved to be controlled
by saturated fat intake.
Homo habilis
was only about 3.5 feet tall, with extremely long arms. He was much
smaller than the Australopithecines, but with his ability to create
weapons, Homo habilis is most likely responsible for the extinction of the
Australopithecines. With the change of diet and new need for size and
strength, Homo habilis was extinct by 1.6 million years ago. He had evolved
ever larger with the smaller and less intelligent members being killed.
Life on earth was crossing an amazing evolutionary hurdle. The greatest carnivore of
history had begun walking the earth. An animal which depended upon his
mind to manipulate and transform the randomness of the natural world to
fit its need. The first hominids of the genus Homo were upon the
earth.
The new member
of the genus was nearly as large as Modern Mankind and its intelligence was
quickly growing. Developing even better tools and weapons, the only
hominid to inhabit the earth between 1,000,000 B.C. was Homo
erectus.
Mankind's curiosity had led him to using and testing fire as a tool when it was
made available naturally by occurrences such as lightning. It had existed
naturally about him for millions of years, but Homo erectus was the first to tame
fire. At first they surely captured it from a natural source and
maintained it and nurtured it. Soon they developed the ability to create
it. Taming of fire, or the ability to create and maintain it, is a
wondrous feat of the mind. It gave Mankind the ability to defend itself
against predators with burning branches, allowing him night operations and the
ability to cook and create even more complex items requiring heat. They were able to hunt mammoths
with their better weapons and, as they spread into the cooler regions of earth
with fire, they began to travel in bands and often lived in caves and other forms of natural shelters. During the ice age of
their period, the ocean levels dropped exposing the continental shelves.
Homo erectus spread from the area of southeast Africa throughout Europe, Asia,
and the Indonesian Islands that were not surrounded by water at the time.
Mankind had begun living in groups, larger than the family, tamed fire and lived
in sheltered areas.
Hominids have lived with and around fire for at
least 500,000 years. They depended upon it. After 500,000 years of
exposure to "second hand" smoke, hominids have evolved, not only a
resistance to any possible damage, but a dependence upon it to kill airborne
bacteria and viruses. The hominids are not susceptible to the small
amounts of poison and highly destructive molecules in smoke, but volitant
microbes succumb easily. Smoke has protected man from the spread of
disease for many years. Now that modern man has curtailed the existence of
"second hand" smoke in public places, the respiratory disease rate has
grown as never before in history. Our skyscrapers become harbors of
volitant microbes and cities are full of "sick buildings".
By 200,000
B.C., Homo erectus was extinct. Once again the type of hominid that had
evolved even more intelligence and strength were left. The first fossil
evidence was found in a German valley called the "Neanderthal".
"Neanderthal Man" or Homo neanderthalensis was so closely like modern man that
scientists have placed him in the same species. He is now considered Homo
sapiens neanderthalensis because it is thought that interbreeding occurred.
I do not feel that the ability to interbreed should be used to define
species. There are far too many different species in the animal world that
can interbreed and produce fertile young. These F1 offspring often develop genetic incompatibility problems which shorten their life
spans, rather than providing hybrid vigor. When animals exhibit the
systemic structural differences that neanderthalensis shows in comparison to Homo
sapiens sapiens, they should be placed in their own species. Not
as simply a color deviation, these vast differences are exhibited between
neanderthalensis, the
sub-Saharan Negroid, and the rest of the Homo sapiens as a body. I feel
there is genetic evidence for three distinct species.
The Neanderthal Man slaughtered and eventually
destroyed the remnants of Homo erectus. It seems that competition, between
the forms of hominid, leads eventually to the destruction and extinction of the
previous versions. Neanderthal Man was the first to bury his dead.
Old individuals that could not have survived without the care of others were
found in graves, which meant that some family groups cared for their
elderly. The bodies were often covered with flowers and buried with
food. This leads to the conclusion that Neanderthal was probably the first
hominid to develop a religion and avoid the fear of death and oblivion with
faith in the afterlife. Neanderthal was probably the first hominid with
religion.
Homo sapiens
sapiens appeared about 50,000 B.C. and soon this sub-species began the slaughter
of the other. It is thought that H. s. neanderthalensis was extinct by 30,000
B.C. Art may have begun with H. s. neanderthalensis. It continued with
H. s. sapiens along with religion and other social forms that make up the body of
civilization. Homo sapiens was so successful that he spread beyond the
bounds of erectus and even made it to Australia on a land bridge during one of
the ice ages. Domestication of animals and plants soon followed.
Permanent settlements required the domestication of animals to feed the
population. Otherwise, the animals in the area would be killed off and no
reasonable source of food would remain. Once animals were domesticated,
there was then a shortage of vegetation to feed the animals. Plants were
soon domesticated to give an excess of animal food for the cold months.
The first animal to be domesticated by man, was man himself. It is Homo
sapiens sapiens that exists today.
The varying
intelligence and other mental attributes of Homo sapiens' races have given rise
to many various cultures, societies, and advancements. It is the very nature of
Mankind and the use of the only survival attribute provided by evolution and the
natural world, that is the subject of this book. Mankind is not born with
fangs and claws to subdue prey. Mankind is not born with the ability to
survive in nature, without the volitional use of his mind. He must
manipulate nature to his purpose. It is the nature of man. To stop
Mankind from doing that which he must do to survive, is to destroy nature more
blatantly than allowing Mankind his manipulation. Nature is not a static entity
that can be managed in a steady-state by incompetent environmentalists that have
only a vague sense of its true dynamic character. The growth of intelligence came
with a price that we pay today. Overcoming the primitive mind is the next
step in Mankind's evolution. This last step is the subject of this
book. Let us now turn to the evolution and use of Mankind's only given tool ...
his Mind.
Chronological Summary of
Hominid Evolution
[all dates are expressed in years B. C. - Evolution is not necessarily linear (the fossils may be from various groups)]
4,000,000
Australopithecus Evolves
Bipedality
3,500,000 Kenyanthropus Evolves
2,000,000 Homo habilis Evolves
Stone Tools
1,700,000 Homo erectus Evolves
1,600,000 Homo habilis Extinct
1,000,000 Australopithecus and
Kenyanthropus Extinct
500,000 Fire ; Shelter ; Social
Groups
300,000 Homo sapiens
neanderthalensis Evolves
200,000 Homo erectus Extinct
Religion
50,000 Homo sapiens sapiens
Evolves
30,000 Homo sapiens
neanderthalensis Extinct
20,000 Art ; Bows and
Arrows ; Oil Lamps
12,000 Animal Domestication
8,000 Plant Domestication (Agriculture - to feed animals)
7,000 Pottery
6,000 Linen ; Rafts ; Sickles
5,000 Irrigation ;
Scales
4,000 Copper ;
Sundials
3,600 Bronze
3,500 "Age
of Reason" Science is separated from
Religion
