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The stone ball tools in question are from the Qesem cave in Israel and dated to 400 to 200 thousand years before present. The 2 million in the headline must ref

by 205guy 6y ago

The stone ball tools in question are from the Qesem cave in Israel and dated to 400 to 200 thousand years before present. The 2 million in the headline must refer to other similar tools dated to earlier times but whose use couldn’t be determined. The cave was discovered in 2010 during roadwork. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qesem_cave https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qesem_cave The article describes how the researchers made replicas and used those to crush bones, which they did better than unshaped stones of similar size. The replicas also had marks after use similar to the original artifacts. I really like when scientists do this kind of validation. This article taught me about ancient humans; I did not know we had such archaeological evidence from them. I had heard that anatomically modern humans have been around for 100 thousand years, so art in Lascaux caves from 17,000 years was made by people like us (just pre agriculture and civilization), but I had no idea about humans 200,000 years ago using tools. For perspective, this cave was used (likely intermittently) by humans for 200,000 years, so 100 times the Christian Era or 40 times the span recorded history (oldest writing dating back to Egypt around 3rd millenium BC). But then it was unused, probably covered up and undiscovered for the same length of time until present.

wallflower 6y ago
> but I had no idea about humans 200,000 years ago using tools. You might be interested in Sapiens. https://www.amazon.com/Sapiens-Humankind-Yuval-Noah-Harari/dp/0062316095 https://www.amazon.com/Sapiens-Humankind-Yuval-Noah-Harari/d...
- travelbyphone 6y ago
  I’m just finishing reading Sapiens. Highly recommended!
cmrdporcupine 6y ago
Our genus has been using tools, or at least one particular kind of tool, for at least 2.6 million years. Check these out https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hand_axe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hand_axe
- 205guy 6y ago
  Yes, when I thought about it, early humans must’ve been using tools for much longer. I think what impressed me here were the details they were able to deduce: storing tools in a common place, how they probably used them, perhaps the pre-historic equivalent of a butcher shop. Also, it’s not as if exactly 100,000 years ago, humans turned modern. It was a long drawn-out transition, and perhaps some qualities came much earlier. Which makes me wonder what archaeologists consider as modern and how they arrived at that date. I’ll have to look for the Sapiens book recommended in the other comments. And thanks for that link, it’s really interesting. I particularly like the linked pages for John Frere and thunderstones, about how stone axes were found and considered in modern times. I find such historiography fascinating: the stone axes were thought to be from gods or fairies at first, then some early scientists started to make more rational guesses about their origin—another approach to deep time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderstone_(folklore) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderstone_(folklore) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Frere https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Frere https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_time https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_time
  - cmrdporcupine 6y ago
    What boggles my mind is that this particular stone tool, it's so attached to our genus that you could argue that it's a central part of our heritage. For almost two million years this particular tool was made, in similar ways. In some ways it defines us as a species. And yet we lost the knowledge only 10-20,000 years ago. I find that kind of sad. I wouldn't mind learning how to make one.
    - 205guy 6y ago
      When I went to the Maker Faire 5+ years ago, there was one small group of exhibits about making flint tools and other Stone Age implements (fiber cord, then you can make a bow drill and make beads, etc.). They were really trying to revive the ideas and methods hat you are talking about. I don’t have any contact info, but it should be on google somewhere. Somewhat related for the Bronze Age is the Clickspeing YouTube channel where the guy create bronze-working tools by hand and then uses them to re-create the Antikythera Mechanism. It is surprisingly complex, but he is meticulous and perfectionist with incredible results. Unfortunatel, he stopped posting halfway through, so I’m not sure what happened.
akiselev 6y ago
I believe the oldest writing comes from Sumerians, not Egypt.
- thaumasiotes 6y ago
  Subject to the caveats that (1) we can't necessarily identify something as "writing" or "not writing"; and (2) it's hard to establish accurate dates for things that happened 5-6000 years ago, they're roughly contemporaneous.
- 205guy 6y ago
  It seems to go either way, depending on the source, the consideration of “proto-writing,” and interpretation of date ranges: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_languages_by_first_written_accounts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_languages_by_first_wri...
irrational 6y ago
It still blows my mind that a human that lived 100,000 years ago was anatomically modern. I take that to mean that we could've taken one at birth and raised it in a modern home and it could've grown up to receive a physics PhD. In other words, a human 100,000+ years ago was 100% capable of understanding general relativity, or how to design and construct the Saturn V rocket, or any other modern STEM topic. What were we doing for all those years banging bones with round rocks? There must've been a lot of intellectually frustrated people.
- anon73044 6y ago
  >What were we doing for all those years banging bones with round rocks? Surviving! Man's conquest over Nature is a fairly recent occurrence.
- theelous3 6y ago
  > There must've been a lot of intellectually frustrated people. This is funny. As if they were just hanging around with the luxury to want to be challenged. They didn't live very long, their lives were harsh, they were probably banging out kids at an unbelievable rate. There's something just fantastically out of touch about your statement here. Very silver platter. Even now, there are much more intelligent people than you or I with no time or resources for intellectual pursuits, and following that, no particular drive either. If you're hungry and your living conditions are risky, you probably don't care about lacanian this or knot topography that. Much too busy.
  - throwaway_pdp09 6y ago
    You make a good point that too many current humans have the same problem, or lack motivation, but the silver platter/out of touch barb wasn't necessary. > banging out kids at an unbelievable rate That's not actually helpful. Some stats would be good. I did a quick search for number of offspring for the yanomami but found nothing.
    - lolc 6y ago
      I remember this little theory where in some ancient cultures children would be weaned around age six and the mothers would only become fertile again after that. I'm not sure how established the mechanicas are, but the theory says that hormonal pathways where breastfeeding causes infertility are activated by scant nutrition. It sounds like an effective way to adjust births to the available resources.
d0mine 6y ago
Animals can use tools https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tool_use_by_animals https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tool_use_by_animals

by 205guy 6y ago

wallflower 6y ago

> but I had no idea about humans 200,000 years ago using tools. You might be interested in Sapiens. https://www.amazon.com/Sapiens-Humankind-Yuval-Noah-Harari/dp/0062316095 https://www.amazon.com/Sapiens-Humankind-Yuval-Noah-Harari/d...

travelbyphone 6y ago
I’m just finishing reading Sapiens. Highly recommended!

cmrdporcupine 6y ago

Our genus has been using tools, or at least one particular kind of tool, for at least 2.6 million years. Check these out https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hand_axe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hand_axe

205guy 6y ago
Yes, when I thought about it, early humans must’ve been using tools for much longer. I think what impressed me here were the details they were able to deduce: storing tools in a common place, how they probably used them, perhaps the pre-historic equivalent of a butcher shop. Also, it’s not as if exactly 100,000 years ago, humans turned modern. It was a long drawn-out transition, and perhaps some qualities came much earlier. Which makes me wonder what archaeologists consider as modern and how they arrived at that date. I’ll have to look for the Sapiens book recommended in the other comments. And thanks for that link, it’s really interesting. I particularly like the linked pages for John Frere and thunderstones, about how stone axes were found and considered in modern times. I find such historiography fascinating: the stone axes were thought to be from gods or fairies at first, then some early scientists started to make more rational guesses about their origin—another approach to deep time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderstone_(folklore) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderstone_(folklore) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Frere https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Frere https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_time https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_time
- cmrdporcupine 6y ago
  What boggles my mind is that this particular stone tool, it's so attached to our genus that you could argue that it's a central part of our heritage. For almost two million years this particular tool was made, in similar ways. In some ways it defines us as a species. And yet we lost the knowledge only 10-20,000 years ago. I find that kind of sad. I wouldn't mind learning how to make one.
  - 205guy 6y ago
    When I went to the Maker Faire 5+ years ago, there was one small group of exhibits about making flint tools and other Stone Age implements (fiber cord, then you can make a bow drill and make beads, etc.). They were really trying to revive the ideas and methods hat you are talking about. I don’t have any contact info, but it should be on google somewhere. Somewhat related for the Bronze Age is the Clickspeing YouTube channel where the guy create bronze-working tools by hand and then uses them to re-create the Antikythera Mechanism. It is surprisingly complex, but he is meticulous and perfectionist with incredible results. Unfortunatel, he stopped posting halfway through, so I’m not sure what happened.

akiselev 6y ago

I believe the oldest writing comes from Sumerians, not Egypt.

thaumasiotes 6y ago
Subject to the caveats that (1) we can't necessarily identify something as "writing" or "not writing"; and (2) it's hard to establish accurate dates for things that happened 5-6000 years ago, they're roughly contemporaneous.
205guy 6y ago
It seems to go either way, depending on the source, the consideration of “proto-writing,” and interpretation of date ranges: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_languages_by_first_written_accounts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_languages_by_first_wri...

irrational 6y ago

It still blows my mind that a human that lived 100,000 years ago was anatomically modern. I take that to mean that we could've taken one at birth and raised it in a modern home and it could've grown up to receive a physics PhD. In other words, a human 100,000+ years ago was 100% capable of understanding general relativity, or how to design and construct the Saturn V rocket, or any other modern STEM topic. What were we doing for all those years banging bones with round rocks? There must've been a lot of intellectually frustrated people.

anon73044 6y ago
>What were we doing for all those years banging bones with round rocks? Surviving! Man's conquest over Nature is a fairly recent occurrence.
theelous3 6y ago
> There must've been a lot of intellectually frustrated people. This is funny. As if they were just hanging around with the luxury to want to be challenged. They didn't live very long, their lives were harsh, they were probably banging out kids at an unbelievable rate. There's something just fantastically out of touch about your statement here. Very silver platter. Even now, there are much more intelligent people than you or I with no time or resources for intellectual pursuits, and following that, no particular drive either. If you're hungry and your living conditions are risky, you probably don't care about lacanian this or knot topography that. Much too busy.
- throwaway_pdp09 6y ago
  You make a good point that too many current humans have the same problem, or lack motivation, but the silver platter/out of touch barb wasn't necessary. > banging out kids at an unbelievable rate That's not actually helpful. Some stats would be good. I did a quick search for number of offspring for the yanomami but found nothing.
  - lolc 6y ago
    I remember this little theory where in some ancient cultures children would be weaned around age six and the mothers would only become fertile again after that. I'm not sure how established the mechanicas are, but the theory says that hormonal pathways where breastfeeding causes infertility are activated by scant nutrition. It sounds like an effective way to adjust births to the available resources.

d0mine 6y ago

Animals can use tools https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tool_use_by_animals https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tool_use_by_animals