The Cradle of Humanity: How the Changing Landscape of Africa Made Us So Smart

256 Pages·2017·4.17 MB·English

by  Mark Maslin

The Cradle of humaniTy

T h e C r a d l e

o f H u m a n i t y
How the changing landscape
of Africa made us so smart
M a r k M a s l i n
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dedicated to Professor martin Trauth without whom none
of this work on human evolution would have been possible.

Foreword
The Cradle of Humanity is an important contribution to the exten-
sive literature on the subject of human evolution. Sadly there is no
absolute truth to be offered as to what and who became what and
who; any number of interpreters have published their views, and
sometimes even their arguments and reasons for holding such
views. The point that emerges is that data have yet to be found,
some may never be found, but each year, the aggregate of know-
ledge is more and more persuasive. We humans are indeed the
result of biological evolution and those facts exist in museums
and research collections. i stress this because even now in this
century, countless allegedly learned men and women, active in
science, speak of the ‘theory of human evolution’. Surely—a nd
this book fully attests to this—the evidence for evolution such as
the fossils, dates, archaeology, and countless re-evaluations lead-
ing to refinements in the data sets are now so comprehensive and
consistent that the idea of the ‘theory’ can be discarded entirely
and permanently.
The multidisciplinary fields of investigation are primarily con-
cerned with the analysis of the facts of evolution. for example,
how much can investigators learn regarding why, when, and how
our evolution has happened? We know for example that we had
small-brained early ancestors and later, larger brained ones. The
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foreword
relationship between body mass and brain size grew over several
million years. This is known, but why and in which populations
is yet to be fully understood. Today we are fully bipedal and we
use our hands (in conjunction with our brains) to manipulate
objects rather than using them to support our bodies. upright
posture puts huge strains on the human frame (back problems,
hip joints, etc.) and yet it is clearly advantageous. What pressures
in the environment led to the shift from four legged to two legged
locomotion? explanations abound, but the fact is it happened,
and this is important. Similarly, the question of the role that
speech played in our becoming us: when, why, and where? These
are questions which are important. Was the process gradual
or rapid?
Professor mark maslin does not dwell in depth on these and
many other evolutionary milestones concerning us, but what he
has done, and this makes the book so interesting, is to put our
evolution into a larger picture—a context that is increasingly
understood but seldom talked about in popular texts. for many,
the relationship between our place in the earth’s history and the
history of our planet itself makes the story so much more accept-
able. The third, fourth, fifth, and sixth chapters deal with our
earth and its history. The chapters discuss temperature gradients,
ocean currents, rainfall patterns, and much more on a global
scale. many will find the account explaining mountain building,
lifting, plate tectonics, and their impact or influence on ecology,
changes in vegetation, and sedimentation useful when thinking
about why, over time, life forms have had to change. most of this
discussion is written to explain africa, and in particular east
africa’s special circumstances for favouring, or one might say
driving, human evolution.
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foreword
i have found that many of the concerned questions that have
been put to me over forty years of public lecturing are now
answered in this one book. This is of great value to students and
the broader swathe of public interest. That maslin’s account is in
some chapters different from other books should not be a worry
for the reader; it illustrates the complexities of science and the
inevitable debates arising from a variety of ideas to explain the
hard facts. There are countless fossil specimens now known that
simply make doubting our evolution an exercise in self delusion.
read this excellent narrative and see for yourself.
richard leakey, frS
4 march 2016
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