![]() Consequently, the behavior of any living members of any species, at any given time, reflects the operatingĬharacteristics of separate parts of the body in general, and (for Washburn), of the brain and musculoskeletal system in particular.Ģ. The brain and the musculoskeletal systems, as organs, evolve just as organisms themselves do, by modification of structure and function over time. Washburn's thesis actually contains three distinct assertions:ġ. Man began when populations of apes, about a million years ago, started the bipedal, tool-using way of life. Interacting complex, with each change in one affecting the other. From the evolutionary point of view, behavior and structure form an From the short-term point of view, human structure makes human behavior possible. It follows that the structure of modern man must be the result of theĬhange in the terms of natural selection that came with the tool-using way of life. Now it appears that man-apes-creatures able to run but not yet walk on two legs, and with brains no larger than those of apes now living-had already learned to make and use tools. This specific assertion was made by anthropologist Sherwood Washburn, writing in Scientific American, just as the first reports of a tool-using hominid (Homo habilis) in East Africa were circulating. At the time of her discovery there had already been a few tentative suggestions that the modern human brain might have evolved as a consequence of the increase in tool use among She was the first anatomically bipedal human ancestor to be discovered,Īnd she had an un-apelike hand and a chimpanzee-size brain. Twenty years of careful research on her species have solidified her claim to primacy. Sensation not only in the anthropological world but with the public at large. ![]() The best known is Lucy, who lived some 3.2 million years ago in Hadar (in eastern Africa) and whose discovery created an enormous THE EARLIEST DIRECT HUMAN ANCESTORS were the australopithecines, "southern apes" of Africa who walked upright. ODD ARRANGEMENTS AND FUNNY SOLUTIONS ARE THE PROOF OF EVOLUTION-PATHS THAT A SENSIBLE GOD WOULD NEVER TREAD BUT THAT A NATURAL PROCESS, CONSTRAINED BY HISTORY, FOLLOWS PERFORCE. BUT IDEAL DESIGN IS A LOUSY ARGUMENT FOR EVOLUTION, FOR IT MIMICS THE POSTULATEDĪCTION OF AN OMNIPOTENT CREATOR. OUR TEXTBOOKS LIKE TO ILLUSTRATE EVOLUTION WITH EXAMPLES OF OPTIMAL DESIGN-NEARLY PERFECT MIMICRY OF A DEAD LEAF BY A BUTTERFLY OR OF A POISONOUS SPECIES BY A PALATABLE RELATIVE. Intelligible speech can be produced by human beings with the pathological defects of the vocal apparatus, and there are human languages that substitute whistles or clicks for speech.How Its Use Shapes the Brain, Language, and Human Culture To some extent, chimpanzees should be able to use a medium of communication designed for human vocal anatomy. ![]() Many human tools and mechanical devices are designed for the human hand, yet chimpanzees can learn to use these with great skill. A chimpanzee can never communicate by speech because of anatomical defects in its vocal apparatus. In choosing an appropriate medium for communication with a chimpanzee, one must first consider carefully why a medium based on vocalization cannot be appropriate. If an animal, such as a chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) is capable of developing a system of two-way communication of its own, the place to observe this can be in well-established wild bands. The study of language has come to lose much of the mystique that it once had. It is difficult to study language on the same objective terms as other types of behavior. Language is the most important result of the evolutionary developments that distinguish human beings from other species. This chapter discusses two-way communication with an infant chimpanzee.
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