Human brain development: Homo Erectus (Introduction)

by David Turell , Thursday, December 04, 2014, 21:48 (3431 days ago) @ David Turell

Very old simple engraving on a shell by H. erectus:-http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/2014/12/03/worlds-oldest-engraving-upends-theory-of-homo-sapiens-uniqueness/-I'm not surprised at simple thought like this in H. Erectus:-"Now comes news that an even older, more primitive human ancestor—Homo erectus from Asia—showed signs of symbolic thought, too. Researchers have discovered a shell engraved with a geometric pattern at a H. erectus site known as Trinil, on the Indonesian island of Java, that dates to between 540,000 and 430,000 years ago. The find is at least 300,000 years older than the oldest previously known engravings, which come from South Africa.-"Detail of shell engraved by Homo erectus at Trinil
GEOMETRIC DESIGN engraved on this mussel shell is 300,000 years older than engravings from South Africa that were previously thought to be the oldest. Image: Wim Lustenhouwer, VU University Amsterdam -"Analysis of the engraving, made on a freshwater mussel shell, suggests that its maker used a shark tooth or other hard, pointed object to create the zigzag design. “The engraving was probably made on a fresh shell specimen still retaining its brown [skin], which would have produced a striking pattern of white lines on a dark ‘canvas,'” Josephine C. A. Joordens of Leiden University in the Netherlands and her colleagues surmise in their report, published online December 3 by Nature. (Scientific American is part of Nature Publishing Group.)-"Other shells from the site reveal that H. erectus opened them to eat their contents. And one specimen exhibits clear signs of having been modified to create a tool for cutting or scraping. It is the earliest known example of shell used as a raw material for tool manufacture, the authors say, and it may explain the lack of stone artifacts from this time period in Java: perhaps in the absence of good sources of stone suitable for making implements, H. erectus turned to shell instead."