> Hi Ed, > > My better-half has just brought back the latest "Scientific American" from > town. I don't know whether this was the source of your comments about > Tattersall's ideas about the origin of man's conceptual thinking some time > ago (Thu, 20 Dec 2001 13:19:25 -0500), but I've just been reading his article. > > I can't help but chuckle at some of the interpretations made by some of the > more refined anthropologists (such as museum curators). For example, the > drawings in the Lascaux caves are often considered to be proof of man's > religious instincts. Why can't they simply be drawings that they made in > order to teach their teenage sons various hunting strategies during the > dark winter evenings? (I'm not suggesting that early man didn't have > religious instincts -- far from it, I'm sure he did.)
My personal opinion is that they are works of art in the purest sense, but with religious significance, much like, say, a Botticelli Madonna. And as works of art, some of them are truly superb, ranking with the best graphic art anyone has ever produced. Hunters and gatherers did not teach their young by using diagrams or drawings. They took them hunting and gathering. > In the case of this Scientific American article, Tattersall's > intellectualising goes one step further -- ridiculously in my view. In his > caption to the illustration of the Lascaux aurochs on page 45, Tattersall > talks of the "wealth of abstract symbols . . . above the neck and back and > on the haunches." Well, I don't know about "wealth of abstract symbols". > There are just three stick-like things, all of which appear to be embedded > in the animals sides! To my limited mind, they are clearly atlatls -- > sprung hunting spears. These particular ones seem to be the early versions > of such where the springy launching stick is still attached to the spear > itself. (Later ones [requiring much more skill to throw] had separate > sticks and spears, the hunter retaining the launching part in his hand when > the spear was launched. Later still [10-15,000 years later] some genius > actually stretched a ligament or fibre between the ends of the springy > launching stick and launched a [short] spear from the ligament itself for > the first time. Hence the bow-and-arrow.) You may be right. Tattersall seems to enthusiastic about his work, and enthusiasts are known to get carried away. > My own view is that man's large brain (mainly the enlargement of the > frontal cortex) -- which is agreed by most neurophysiologists to be the > seat of foresight, patience, planning, and the restraint of action -- was a > product of the necessary disciplines that were involved in man's hunting > past, especially when hunting in a group. > > I think that the brain structures with the potential for abstract thinking > were laid down far further back than the rise of the hominids and early > man. Some scientists can now sing duets with birds in which the bird > listens and then responds, apparently 'meaningfully', with a different > phrase of their own (that is, not imitatively). The high-pitched squeaks of > baby mice (inaudible to our ears) to their mothers and siblings -- with > five or six "words" -- are considered to have a syntactical structure. And, > of course, it is well known that apes have a much enlarged lump on the > left-hand sides of their brains -- just where our verbal centre is. > > Despite Galileo, we are still reluctant to get rid of anthropocentric > thinking -- as evidenced by Tattersall's particular brand of theorising and > several others like him. Perhaps. Ed Weick
