In which direction?
That is – is it certain that our increase in brain size didn’t result in us killing off the large animals, instead of the other way around?
I didn’t think it was currently possible to be that exact about the timing.
I understand the need for simplifying a complex argument, but can we stop saying absolutes like XXX led to larger brains?
First, it’s difficult, though not impossible, to sort out XXX led to larger brains from larger brains led to XXX.
Second, XXX is multiple to indicate that singular X did not do it. A community of inputs, needs, challenges, and opportunities on the environmental level created a variety of bodily responses through selection and favorable mutations that included the development of larger brains.
Nor is the increase in size a sudden phenomena. A chart of brain size* shows that the slope of increases has remained steady for 2.5 million years.
* I know the page talks about a “sudden” increase from 800,000 - 200,000 years ago but the chart itself doesn’t back that up. Lay a ruler on the screen and the top sizes are all on the ruler’s edge from 2.5 million years ago on. And the writers there lay the cause of their “sudden” increase to climate change, a factor not even being discussed here.
I strongly suspect that once we hit a certain point, reproductive success became significantly affected by skill with speech; and that things snowballed from there.
However, we have no way of knowing when we started using language in a significantly different way than our ancestors did, let alone what the immediate effects were; so it may be impossible to either prove or disprove how much this may have been a factor.
I also suspect that a major contribution to human brain growth was sexual selection. Like the peacock’s tail or the Irish elk’s antlers, we developed an unusual characteristic and then leaned into it, because women are attracted to smart men.
Yes, that was what I meant by speech affecting reproductive success. But reading your post, it occurs to me that that factor might have an effect even without speech, to the extent that there were other ways of indicating brains. The one who remembered where the water was in the last drought, for instance; or who figured out that the herd had to come through that particular narrow spot; or who figured out how to carry live coals (any of whom, of course, may have been female; though I suspect that as sexual selection the women may have been more likely to have been selecting for brains.)
???
The main point is that meat - protein - whether small medium or large, is far more concentrated nutrition than collecting wild plants - and often, less seasonal. The brian needs a large amount of the nutrition/food energy we consume. Wild plants, before they were bred for size, would have been a lot of work to collect to obtain a comparable volume of food. The original version of what is now an ear of corn (maize) was smaller than a thumb, Presumably, wheat was similar to any other grass. Potatoes started off small. Bean, peas… Wild grapes are significantly smaller than specially cultivated ones. etc.
So a species that started down the path to adding more and more meat to their diet would be better fed and able to support larger brains.
Hunting large animals was probably easier - chase the herd, which humans excelled at - harry them until some start to feel th lack of water and grazing, maybe injure one and the rest of the herd leaves it behind. Then, surround it and like a apck of wolves, keep attacking from all sides until it was killed. Chasing down smaller animals probably required more cunning, as they wouldn’t travel in packs so much (a herd of rabbits)? Same goes for birds - you need more interesting weapons or be very skilled with throwing stones.
I for one don’t believe our switching to hunting small game was the only cause for increased human brain size, only that is was one probable cause—maybe the primary cause; maybe not.
Dietary changes (including eating more animal fat and protein, as well as the benefits of cooking meat to make it easier to digest and absorb nutrients) is another probable factor.
Environmental changes (including the rapid climate change that occurred between 800,000 and 200,000 years ago) is another probable factor.
Increased social interactions as early humans lived in larger and more complex groups is yet another probable factor. Language, cooperation, and a developing theory of mind requires bigger brains.
Maybe further research will clarify whether all or some of these factors are responsible for us getting smarter. Maybe there are additional factors that haven’t been considered yet. Right now we have some research to point us in the right direction (s), but much is still supposition.
Then again, it is amazing what people will value: Surströmming, Hákarl, Igunaq, Kiviak, even the humble Nattō. Technically not putrified, but fermented. But of legendary awfulness to most palates.
Then again, who doesn’t like a nice ripe Stilton?
Sometimes I think there is a Rule 34 of food.
I still remember my first encounter with frying up lump of Belachan to make a Laksa base. That was both eye opening and eye watering. But with a fabulous result.
The above fermented meats were no doubt born of necessity. And invented by essentially modern humans. But it must have taken a serious level of desperation for that first questioning bite.
Feast and famine. Fat, tender meat has always been prized. Tongue, beaver tail, a fat Buffalo cow on the prairie. Older folks lose teeth, can’t chew as well. But then, when game disappears, as it is wont to do at times, now what?
The early explorers, sea faring adventures, antarctica, the polar expeditions. Several have had a rough time of it. I seem to recall Lewis and Clark expedition were reduced to eating (at various times) their moccasins (new, not used!), numerous dogs (Capt. Clark declined) as well as their horses now and then. Many explorers have had to do the latter with great regret. How can you shoot your faithful steed?? They also mixed up flour with water, into a kind of gruel, when nothing else was available. One of the largest expenditures on the expedition was a relatively new creation called “Portable soup”, kind of a bouillon rendered down from hundreds of gallons of beef stock. Lewis wisely kept it in reserve, and only broke it out when things were extremely dire. By all accounts it tasted nasty, and everyone hated it. But they didn’t starve, either.
The innards of the small intestine, sort of fried in bear grease, was considered a great delicacy, Lewis described the recipe in great detail. As far as raw meat, well it’s all what you’re used to, I guess.
Lewis also observed and recorded in 1805 a grisly spectacle after a particularly long stretch of no game in an area, the word went out a couple of the hunters in the party had finally been successful with a couple deer. Great Joy in Camp!, he said that immediately several of the locals took off at a full sprint for miles, and they absolutely disassembled the animals, and actually fought over raw entrails just exactly as a couple dogs would, a race to see who would get the lions share of intestine. Sort of a primitive “push ‘em up stick”, by squeezing the intestine the contents can dispensed, more or less, although it makes a mess. I guess that’s what napkins are for. If it’s all the same, I’d care not to ever get that hungry.
Large game like a Mammoth would have been excellent, because when jerked or dried, a single animal is probably enough for the whole Clan to make it through the winter, or near enough. Fats are the great bugaboo in survival. Lean, dry meat alone on an extended basis is toxic. Thus we see things like Pemmican, a combination of pounded meat, fat, and berries or similar. Very long lasting and sustainable nutrition.
But meat was often aged, and mat was kept without refrigeration in the Goode Olde Days (admitedly, not for very long). Shogun was the first time I read about letting meat “hang” to tenderize it (he forgot about it and it eventually did start to stink). I presume that is what scavenging himans would find from recent big game kills they ran across.
True, our endurance is not entirely unique (horses, oxen), but few animals can sustain lengthy exertion because their fur prevents heat dissipation. There’s also a hypothesis out there that our relative lack of hair comes from swimming in the ocean to hunt/collect sea creatures. Not sure how much traction that one has though.
Or our ability to throw things, like rocks or spears. I think this is entirely unique to humans, or at best some of the highest order apes. You don’t have to chase down small fast prey if you can take it out from a distance. Small game requires more prep and cooking since there’s relatively more fur, feathers, or other inedibles, and it goes cold fast.
I read an article decades ago (so I won’t vouch for the accuray of either the article or my memory) that they found that ancient hunters of large animals suffered similar injuries as rodeo riders.
Killing large animals would be far more dangerous than small game.
The point is most herd animals - horses, cows, goats - graze and have a fairly large torso in relation to their legs; humans have almost half their weight in two legs and the associated musculature. Plus, those herd aminals need to constantly graze to get enough nutrition. So a pack of humanscapable of marathons and tag-teaming the herd can wear them down more efficiently. This also demonstrated that thinking and planning can be an efficient addition to the hunt.
The natives of the North American plains used to stampde buffalo (bison) over a cliff, using a series of hunters alongside the path who would wave and yell to funnel the herd in the right direction. I recall someting about Australian aborigines using a similar technique.
Yes, but humans with rocks and pointy sticks can hurt a large animal progressively from a decent distance, unlike wolves and such who have to stick their braincase within kicking distance to do serious damage.
The other point would be that more interesting fast and effective-at-a-distance weapons (i.e. bow and arrow, spear thrower (atl-atl) etc. would be more effective against more solitary small game.
As explorers, Lewis and Clark had only experience with black bears, of the eastern United States variety. Lewis nor anyone else in the party had ever seen a grizzly bear. In one of the classic “just you wait” moments in writing history, Lewis goes on at length at one point in the journal about the different nations or tribes along the Missouri who get ready to do battle with the grizzly bear. It was pretty much exactly like when they went to war against another tribe. Lewis shrugged off all the advice, assuming they couldn’t be that big of a deal, besides no bear is a match against a modern 1803 infantry company. Oops.
Not all of them, but chimps do, it contributes only around 2% of their diet.
Humans likely developed ceramics a long time before they developed pots, they were used for figurines and weights before any trace of potsherds. So it wasn’t a new tech when they did make the jump to pots. The earliest known pots (Chinese and Japanese) weren’t exactly delicate and airy, but they weren’t necessarily all that bulky and fragile.
Some of the oldest pots are from just such a culture.
Kilns are a later invention (and many cultures never got to them - African pottery is often pit-fired and very good for all that)
Nomadic herders who chiefly use milk for sustenance can have quite good pottery. Pottery production can be a batch-type operation as opposed to a continuous production.
The major advantage of pottery is (a) cooking and (b) it is pest proof (with a good lid). (and I suppoe (c) it can hold liquids safely). The big challenge for seasona food sources is keeping safe enough food for a significant part of the year. A common tactic was drying and/or salting. I imagine drying meat for an extended time in thin strips has roughly similar breakdown to cooking it, especially if dried over a fire. (Smoked meat).
Yeah I’d say that your average hunter gatherer would get far more advantage (in terms of extracting more calories) from cooking plants than cooking meat. Especially considering that, unlike us, they weren’t eating plants that were the results of millennia of selective cultivation to make them calorific and easily consumed by humans.
You’re talking about the aquatic ape theory, which is really awesome but not taken seriously.
Due to evolution, that’s a circular effect. People who prefer the flavor of cooked foods will be less likely to die from food-borne pathogens, thus passing on their preference to their progeny in greater numbers.
The food doesn’t taste better - taste is subjective, flies like the flavor of raw poop - we’re just evolved to prefer cooked foods.