This book examines the fossils of Homo erectus and suggests how Homo sapiens may have arisen.

This volume, the first in a series devoted to the paleoanthropological resources of the Middle Awash Valley of Ethiopia, studies Homo erectus, a close relative of Homo sapiens. Written by a team of highly regarded scholars, this book provides the first detailed descriptions, photographs, and analysis of the fossil vertebrates—from elephants and hyenas to humans—from the Daka Member of the Bouri Formation of the Afar, a place renowned for an abundant and lengthy record of human ancestors. These fossils contribute to our understanding human evolution, and the associated fauna provide new information about the distribution and variability of Pleistocene mammals in eastern Africa. The contributors are all active researchers who worked on the paleontology and geology of these unique deposits. Here they have combined their disparate efforts into a single volume, making the original research results accessible to both the specialist and the general reader. The volume synthesizes environmental backdrop and anatomical detail to open an unparalleled window on the African Pleistocene and its inhabitants.

Where did we come from? What were our ancestors like? Why do we differ from other animals? How do scientists trace and construct our evolutionary history? The Evolution of Our Tribe: Hominini provides answers to these questions and more. The book explores the field of paleoanthropology past and present. Beginning over 65 million years ago, Welker traces the evolution of our species, the environments and selective forces that shaped our ancestors, their physical and cultural adaptations, and the people and places involved with their discovery and study. It is designed as a textbook for a course on Human Evolution but can also serve as an introductory text for relevant sections of courses in Biological or General Anthropology or general interest. It is both a comprehensive technical reference for relevant terms, theories, methods, and species and an overview of the people, places, and discoveries that have imbued paleoanthropology with such fascination, romance, and mystery.

*Includes pictures *Includes online resources and a bibliography for further reading Most scientists believe the evolution of humans has a history as long as life itself. Anatomically modern humans and all other life that has existed on the planet first came about from the single-celled microorganisms that emerged approximately 4 billion years ago. Through the processes of mutation and natural selection, all forms of life developed, and this continuous lineage of life makes it difficult to say precisely when one species completely separates from another. In other words, scientists still debate when a human became a human rather than the ancestor species that came before. Around 1.8 million years ago, a third species of Homo appeared in the fossil record. H. erectus would have shared the landscape for a time with H. habilis and H. rudolfensis, but the fossils of H. erectus are not limited to eastern and southern Africa. Instead, they are found across Africa and parts of mainland and insular Asia. This is the first species of Homo to be found outside Africa (Rightmire 1993). Features of H. erectus suggest an evolution toward modern humans, and the features which separate H. erectus from the other Homo species are found in the skull. The size of the brain was approximately 900 cc, making it larger than the brain size of H. habilis. H. erectus would not have the largest brain capacity of the Homo genus during its existence, with the emergence of H. heidelbergensis approximately 800,000 years ago. The larger brain size may not matter much when the size of the brain is considered with the size of the body, which also increased. While the facial features of H. erectus would have made them noticeably different if they were alive today, their postcranial morphology may have been similar to modern humans. A key difference is the density or thickness of the bones; in H. erectus the limb bones are more robust, but otherwise they appear very similar to modern humans. The length of the hindlimbs in relation to the arms is similar to modern humans, which means that H. erectus may have been able to walk in a similar way. (Richtmire 1993: 57-84). This may or may not be linked with the widespread distribution of H. erectus. Perhaps more important for H. erectus than simply being able to walk out of Africa would have been the ability to adapt to changing climates and essentially modify the environment around them. Most notably, the major advantage that H. erectus would have had is the ability to control fire. This skill, which no other animal has mastered, helped H. erectus travel across the world, and it may date as far back as 1.7 million years ago to as recently as 200,000 years ago. Most scientists agree that H. erectus was able to control fire by at least 600,000 years ago, and anatomically modern humans were able to create and use fire 150,000 years ago. The early species of Homo would have been familiar with the effects of fire, from the devastation it could cause to jungle habitats to the rapid spreading wildfires of the savanna. These fires would have killed and burned animals that early Homo would have found while scavenging after a natural fire. Homo erectus: The History of the Archaic Humans Who Left Africa and Formed the First Hunter-Gatherer Societies examines how H. erectus evolved, and what their lives were like. Along with pictures of important people, places, and events, you will learn about H. erectus like never before.

The hominin fossil record documents a history of critical evolutionary events that have ultimately shaped and defined what it means to be human, including the origins of bipedalism; the emergence of our genus Homo; the first use of stone tools; increases in brain size; and the emergence of Homo sapiens, tools, and culture. The Earth's geological record suggests that some evolutionary events were coincident with substantial changes in African and Eurasian climate, raising the possibility that critical junctures in human evolution and behavioral development may have been affected by the environmental characteristics of the areas where hominins evolved. Understanding Climate's Change on Human Evolution explores the opportunities of using scientific research to improve our understanding of how climate may have helped shape our species. Improved climate records for specific regions will be required before it is possible to evaluate how critical resources for hominins, especially water and vegetation, would have been distributed on the landscape during key intervals of hominin history. Existing records contain substantial temporal gaps. The book's initiatives are presented in two major research themes: first, determining the impacts of climate change and climate variability on human evolution and dispersal; and second, integrating climate modeling, environmental records, and biotic responses. Understanding Climate's Change on Human Evolution suggests a new scientific program for international climate and human evolution studies that involve an exploration initiative to locate new fossil sites and to broaden the geographic and temporal sampling of the fossil and archeological record; a comprehensive and integrative scientific drilling program in lakes, lake bed outcrops, and ocean basins surrounding the regions where hominins evolved and a major investment in climate modeling experiments for key time intervals and regions that are critical to understanding human evolution.

The study of human evolution is advancing rapidly. New fossil evidence is adding ever more pieces to the puzzle of our past; the new science of ancient DNA is completely reshaping theories of early human populations and migrations. Bernard Wood traces the field of palaeoanthropology from its beginnings in the eighteenth century to the present.

A Buzzfeed Gift Guide Selection “Few books on the biological and cultural origin of humanity can be ranked as classics. I believe [this] will be one of them.” — Edward O. Wilson At the time of its publication, How Language Began received high acclaim for capturing the fascinating history of mankind’s most incredible creation. Deemed a “bombshell” linguist and “instant folk hero” by Tom Wolfe (Harper’s), Daniel L. Everett posits that the near- 7,000 languages that exist today are not only the product of one million years of evolution but also have allowed us to become Earth’s apex predator. Tracing 60,000 generations, Everett debunks long- held theories across a spectrum of disciplines to affi rm the idea that we are not born with an instinct for language. Woven with anecdotes of his nearly forty years of fi eldwork amongst Amazonian hunter- gatherers, this is a “completely enthralling” (Spectator) exploration of our humanity and a landmark study of what makes us human. “[An] ambitious text. . . . Everett’s amiable tone, and especially his captivating anecdotes . . . , will help the neophyte along.”— New York Times Book Review

The Rise of Homo Sapiens: The Evolution of Human Thinking presents a provocative theory about the evolution of the modern mind based on archaeological evidence and the working memory model of experimental psychologist Alan Baddeley. The book explains the mystery of the disappearance of the Neandertals and the ascendancy of modern Homo sapiens - and whether this was at the expense of the Neandertals. The Rise of Homo Sapiens has been written to introduce scientists and students to the fascinating interface between the worlds of archaeology and cognitive science, and argues that the evolution of modern thinking occurred in two major leaps; the advent of Homo erectus over 1.5 million years ago, and a final enhancement of working memory capacity sometime within the last 200,000 years. The authors argue that highly ritualized burials, personal ornaments, cave art and highly creative figurines, and age and gender divisions of economic labor, all of which were characteristic of Homo sapiens about 30,000 years ago, were clearly products of their cognitive functions, e.g., central executive functions. Neandertals, living at the same time, had virtually none of these cultural products despite larger brains! This is the first book to explain elaborately how thinking differences between Homo sapiens and Neandertals may have accounted for the ultimate demise of Neandertals. Cognitive archaeology is a quickly growing discipline yet archaeologists have been slow to adopt current theories, models, and findings within contemporary cognitive science. The Rise of Homo Sapiens will serve as a unique introduction and primer into both disciplines.

The discovery of the Nariokotome Homo erectus skeleton, a milestone in the history of paleoanthropology, is fully documented in this book. Beautifully illustrated, it takes us into the field and the laboratory, and into the far reaches of prehistory, to show us what the fossilized remains of a young boy can tell us about our beginnings.

A world of categones devmd of spirit waits for life to return. Saul Bellow, Humboldt's Gift The stock-in-trade of communicating hypotheses about the historical path of evolution is a graphical representation called a phylogenetic tree. In most such graphics, pairs of branches diverge from other branches, successively marching across abstract time toward the present. To each branch is tied a tag with a name, a binominal symbol that functions as does the name given to an individual human being. On phylogenetic trees the names symbolize species. What exactly do these names signify? What kind of information is communicated when we claim to have knowledge of the following types? "Tetonius mathewzi was ancestral to Pseudotetonius ambiguus. " "The sample of fossils attributed to Homo habzlis is too variable to contain only one species. " "Interbreeding populations of savanna baboons all belong to Papio anubis. " "Hylobates lar and H. pileatus interbreed in zones of geographic overlap. " While there is nearly universal agreement that the notion of the speczes is fundamental to our understanding of how evolution works, there is a very wide range of opinion on the conceptual content and meaning of such particular statements regarding species. This is because, oddly enough, evolutionary biolo gists are quite far from agreement on what a species is, how it attains this status, and what role it plays in evolution over the long term.