Some apes can use primitive tools. And according to this thread, some animals can cultivate plants for food. So what’s the “most basic” (interpret as you will – earliest, maybe?) achievement of human civilization that hasn’t been accomplished by any other animal species?
Writing? Metal working? Selective breeding of animals? Something else?
The wheel?
Trapping maybe?
I mean, certainly there are animals that use traps (like spiders), but I mean to specifically do so based on introspection rather than as an inhereted trait.
Or at least I would see this as being the next step up after having started using tools. I.e. setting up tools in a particular fashion in a particular place in expectation of it achieving a goal. I’m not sure if apes and monkeys can do this.
My vote is writing. That’s what’s basically turned us from a regular animal species where the best you can do is teach your young everything you’ve learned and been taught yourself, into a global supermind where everybody can build on the results of everybody before them. Well, not literally everybody, but hopefully my meaning is clear enough.
the vote. :dubious:
I’d like to combine chorpler’s and Si Amigo’s answers into something broader: The separation of idea from organism. An idea, a symbol, is something that can live beyond any one member of our species. That is what turned us into a hive mind first, and a global supermind later. Writing is a part of that, but there are many examples of societies (see Amazonian natives or African bushmen, for example) that do just fine without it. Sage Rat’s interpretation of trapping, i.e. setting it up with a goal in mind, is one example of symbolization in action.
The OP: "What’s the “most basic” achievement of human civilization that hasn’t been accomplished by any other animal species?"
-You think ‘The Big Idea’ came before fire and the wheel? :dubious:
Non-brutish survival… i.e. rationalizing.
Speech has to be up there. Obviously other animals can communicate via generated sounds in some fashion, but only humans have reached any level of abstraction.
Not being afraid of fire. All stems from this.
Conceptual thinking and communication.
Complex logic. Some animals may demonstrate that they can predict a simple event, like poking a stick into an anthill will provide a tasty treat, but that’s probably more accidental than logical.
Personally I don’t know. Peter Singer, the Australian bioethicist, has said quite a lot about this area and pretty much kick started the animal rights movement.
How about multi-component items? The wooden club with a stone head strapped on? Clothes? (They need preparation and needle and thread to make).
Wouldn’t items such as knapped stone blades and axes demonstrate similar technical ability?
If so, do we consider our recent evolutionary ancestors to be ‘human’?
I believe Homo erectus and * Homo ergaster* made stone tools out of shaped flint.
Neanderthals made clothing, complex tools and had burial rituals.
In the vernacular, human = H. sapiens. But any member of the genus *Homo *should be considered human.
I think the OP needs to rethink the use of “civilization” in that post. Do you really mean that you only want to consider things that humans have done since the dawn of civilization (no more than 10,000 years ago, max)?
Traditionally, the dividing line between the genus *Homo *and the preceding human ancestors was 1) increased brain size (above that of other apes) and 2) making of stone tools. #1 is purely biological, so probably doesn’t count. Note the use of “making” in #2, as distinguished from “using” stone tools-- which chimps do. That might be a bit arbitrary, though, since we know that chimps make tools from other materials (make = alter from its natural condition).
Yeah, I mean human beings, not necessarily human “civilization”. And anything of the genus homo counts, I guess.
I guess I see “complex reasoning” or “conceptual thinking” as abilities, not achievements (unlike, say, “writing”). Kind of like the difference between “being strong” and “lifting something heavy”. Although I can see how it’s kind of a fuzzy distinction.
Chronologically speaking, agriculture pre-dated writing, didn’t it? (Unless you count cave paintings and such.) And basic tools predated agriculture. So if I’m interpreting “most basic” as “earliest”, then maybe “constructing two-component tools.” (Just to check, are humans the only species that does this?) Although I’m not sure whether that pre-dated the use of fire.
Another thought: what about counting? I’d say animals have a sense of “more” or “less”, but are humans the only species that can count? (Although that may also be more of an ability than an achievement.) If counting isn’t unique to humans, maybe addition? (i.e., summing all the elements in two groups without having to re-count the total).
As far as we know, yes.
AFAIK, no other animals produce two-component tools. We don’t know exactly when fire was tamed or when two-component tools were invented, but I suspuect fire came first. We assume that the famous hand-axes made by H. erectus for about a million years were not hafted. We also presume that humans used fire long before they knew how to make fire. But using or making fire might be as good a candidate as any for the answer to your question, even if anthropoligists put the making of stone tools (about 2.5M years ago) as the threshold for being “human”.
Some animals seem to be able to count, but only up to about 5 or so. Chimps certainly can be taught to count and do basic arithmetic, but not for large numbers.
Haven’t chimps in captivity been observed to break flint to use the sharp edge? It’s not exactly the fine workmanship you’d expect from human knapping, but it’s the same principle.
The famous bonobo, Kanzi, has done this, but I’m not clear on whether he picked this up himself or if he was taught to do it by his human trainers.