Complex, inventive, novel brains may have appeared suddenly

Sep 26, 2011 09:06 GMT  ·  By

New evidence appears to support theories suggesting that the human brain – with is ability to create new things, invent and reinvent itself – appeared no later than 75,000 years ago, in a sudden event. A new study is bound to reignite the scientific debate already raging on on this issue.

At first, the proposal that the human brain evolved to its current capability levels suddenly was considered a rogue theory in the international scientific theory. In more recent time, archaeological evidence has been mounting to support the idea, providing it with solid foundations.

University of Colorado in Boulder (UCB) archaeologist John Hoffecher says that the first signs of a more intelligent brain appeared about 1.6 million years ago, when distant ancestors began fashioning hand axes out of stone.

These events occurred about 900,000 years after hominids learned to walk upright, thus freeing their hands for other uses – carrying weapons, food, infants and so on. Hoffecher believes that creating these tools represented the first external representation of internal thoughts in our distant ancestors.

Over the past 3 million years, the human brain exhibited a 300 percent increase in size. By 75,000 years ago, historical records reveal that our ancestors created perforated shell ornaments, polished bone awls and simple geometric designs. This indicates a breakthrough in brain development.

“With the appearance of symbols and language – and the consequent integration of brains into a super-brain – the human mind seems to have taken off as a potentially unlimited creative force,” the team leader explains, quoted by Daily Galaxy.

Discoveries such as this one also go a long way towards confirming what Stephen Hawking has been saying about humankind entering a new stage of evolution. If we take a close look at the time frames involved in evolution thus far, his proposal begins to make sense.

It took our species millions of years to evolve bipedalism and a working brain, and then to improve on its mental capabilities. In more recent times, both DNA mutation rates and intelligence capabilities have increased considerably, and will continue to do so for the near future.

Hawking has been arguing for quite some time that we are entering a new stage of evolution, in which humans will accelerate their development to rates never encountered before in history. The outcomes are anyone's guess, experts believe.

“I think it is legitimate to take a broader view, and include externally transmitted information, as well as DNA, in the evolution of the human race,” Hawking concludes.