Favism and Malaria: A Model of Nutrition and Biocultural Evolution

Human origins research has had a long history of vigorous debate. Recent discussion has been no exception, the more so perhaps as the strands of evidence — anthropological, archaeological, and now molecular-biological — are sufficiently diverse that not many can be well placed to deal fairly with them all. Here issue is taken with Foley's cladistic view of human evolution, and with the ‘Garden of Eden’ hypothesis of a single source in Africa for modern human populations.

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Human Nature and Biocultural Evolution

Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science ◽

10.1007/978-3-319-19650-3_2895 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 3881-3884

Author(s):

Bruna Da S Nascimento ◽

Anthony C Little

Keyword(s):

Human Nature ◽

Biocultural Evolution

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The aboutness of language and the evolution of the construction-ready brain

The Oxford Handbook of Human Symbolic Evolution ◽

10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198813781.013.7 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Michael A. Arbib

Keyword(s):

Cultural Evolution ◽

General Property ◽

Homo Sapiens ◽

Biocultural Evolution ◽

Manual Skills

The chapter presents the hypothesis that early Homo sapiens were language-ready in the sense that they had brains that could have supported language had it already been developed, but were not yet language-using. Informed by data from comparative neuroprimatology, the approach sees protolanguage emerging from complex recognition and imitation of manual skills via biocultural evolution, while cultural evolution alone supported the emergence of language from protolanguage. This approach supports the view that the Homo sapiens language-ready brain had the more general property of being construction-ready, and that this made possible the emergence of drawing and painting through later cultural evolution.

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