ZOOLOGICAL HISTORY:
The Study Of Accelerative
Evolution
Accelerative evolution began around 550 million
years ago with the emergence of a central nervous system. Accelerative evolution must end at latest
around the middle of this century.
Abstract
Accelerative evolution, with respect to a
neural network lineage, began around 550 million years ago with the emergence
of a central nervous system. This point is the first in a sequence of eight communication
revolutions, the most recent being the world wide web. These
points form the terms of a geometric progression, verging in the future around
the year 2048. Interspersed, somewhat
randomly, within the time interval between every pair of these successive
points there lies a period during which there was an ecological transition to a
new mode of sustenance. The most recent was
the transformation caused by industry and the next might have already
started. The next communication
revolution is predicted to occur around the year 2043 if accelerative evolution
has not ended before then. The alternating
sequence of communication revolutions and ecological transitions must end with
this event.
Introduction
An accelerative rate of change in relation to
history implies continuity in development.
The universe is estimated to be around 13 700
million years old, and life on earth, 3 800 million years old. Almost all present humans can be viewed as
being elements of a single communication system built upon a foundational level
of interconnected neurons. This neural
network has a lineage that descended from the first animals with a nervous
system.
It is suggested that the sudden appearance of
animals with forms representative of current bilaterian phyla during the Cambrian Explosion and their
rapid diversification ever since was caused by the emergence of a central
nervous system. In retrospect, there is
a trajectory emanating from this event which has displayed accelerative
evolution for the past roughly 550 million years.
This trajectory can be comprehended, before the
arrival of Behaviorally Modern Humans, by evaluating all tree branch nodes of
its genetic ancestry (with reference to current and extinct species) and then,
after the arrival of Behaviorally Modern Humans, by identifying the river trunk
and river tributaries of its cultural ancestry (with reference to current and
extinct societies).
The emergence of a central nervous system was
the first point in a sequence of communication revolutions. The time interval between every pair of these
successive points is around one tenth in duration of the previous time
interval. The sum of the geometric
series occurs around the year 2048. This
future date will be referred to as the communication climax (henceforth CC).
Interspersed within the time interval between communication
revolutions there lies a period during which there was an ecological transition
to a new mode of sustenance. These periods are somewhat randomly placed, as
if their initiation and progression were sensitive to natural and social
environmental circumstances.
The arrival of an animal body plan having
bilateral symmetry instead of radial symmetry promoted the reorganization of
neurons from a diffuse network to a concentrated network resulting in the
emergence of a central nervous system.
Theoretical Framework
0. Central
Nervous System
≈ .55
billion years before CC in the
last common ancestor (henceforth LCA) of current protostomes (for illustration, the
holometabolous insects are extremely successful members of this clade) and
current deuterostomes (for illustration, the jawed vertebrates are extremely
successful members of this clade).
Almost all current animal species are members of one of these two clades.
Nurturing of Offspring
Start - Protected embryonic development in the LCA
of current amniotes. Birds and animal clades collectively
described as reptiles descended from the sauropsid lineage, whereas mammals
descended from the synapsid lineage.
Finish – Supplemental nourishing provided by milk
delivered from teats in the LCA of current therian mammals. This clade includes the marsupials and
placentals, but excludes the only five remaining species of egg laying mammals.
1. Enhanced
Vision
≈ 55 million years before CC in the LCA of current primates.
A greater proportion of brain mass became devoted to visual perception,
and a lesser proportion, to olfactory perception. Finer depth perception provided by more converged eye orbits combined with
hands capable of grasping, and presumably concomitant developments in eye-hand
coordination, are very appropriate adaptations for the most likely primate
origin scenarios. These involve
specialization for leaping movements inside an arboreal habitat, catching
insects, or feeding on fruit located at the end of tree branches.
Controlled
Manipulation
Start - Opposable thumbs in the LCA of current
catarrhines (Old World anthropoids: non-American monkeys, and the apes). The precision grip aided feeding and the
power grip aided locomotion.
Finish – Manual dexterity in the LCA of current great
apes. For example, the building of orangutan, gorilla,
and chimpanzee nests demonstrates considerable sensorimotor coordination.
2. Observational
Learning
≈ 5.5 million years
before CC in the LCA of
current chimpanzees (our closest surviving relatives) and current humans
(descended from a lineage that was adapted for bipedal locomotion before the arrival
of the first human species). The
transmission of culture was now possible, initially commensurate with how novel
behaviors are adopted throughout a chimpanzee social group.
Technology
Start – Skilled use of hard stone objects as hammers for creating hand
held tools from stone objects with conchoidal fracturing properties in the LCA
of human species. These Oldowan culture
tools just had unifacial cutting edges.
Finish – Stone tools with bifacial cutting edges made
according to a geometric shape ergonomically suited for hand use in the LCA of
(Middle) Acheulean culture humans. It is
likely that humans could by now control fire.
3. Language
≈ .55 million years
before CC in the LCA of Homo
neanderthalensis and Homo sapiens (Anatomically Modern Humans). Homo
heidelbergensis, the putative
progenitor of these species, had a brain size
approaching that of current humans. It
appeared around this time with more advanced tool making techniques that
foreshadowed the subsequent skills of Neanderthals and Anatomically Modern
Humans. Neanderthals had the anatomical
features necessary for speech. They inherited the same version of the FOXP2
gene as current humans; mutations in this gene can cause speech and language
disorders. Neanderthals could initially successfully compete with Anatomically Modern Humans, inhibiting their
movement into Eurasia from Africa.
Cooperative Exchange
Start – The advertisement of a common inheritance
through the decorative use of red ochre pigment in the LCA of Homo sapiens
(Anatomically Modern Humans sensu lato). The cost of such customs is compensated for by
greater social cohesion. This unity could
have initiated the division of labor according to gender like past hunter-gatherers. The first Middle Stone Age tools materialized:
grindstones would have been useful for processing red ochre and gathered foods
and prismatic core blades better for processing structural materials and hunted
foods. The appearance of a gracile skeletal frame could be explained as a requirement for
greater mobility and athleticism, and neotenous traits, as a consequence of self-domestication. Red ochre was used symbolically by past
hunter-gatherers throughout the world.
Finish – The organization
of hunter-gatherer bands into a tribe through the exchange of beads in the LCA
of Homo sapiens sapiens. Beads are
a non-perishable and portable medium of exchange bestowed with a quantitative
value. Their accumulation can confer
authority on the holder, albeit in this context in a non-hierarchical society. Bead production is labor intensive suggesting
the achievement of a division of labor according to gender comparable to past
hunter-gatherers. Bead production
coincided with the appearance of regional diversification in culture. Their exchange would have facilitated the spread
of advantageous behaviors across a region wide network. Beads were important symbolic exchange items
for past hunter-gatherers throughout the world.
4. General
Intelligence
≈ 55 thousand years
before CC in Behaviorally
Modern Humans. They are associated with the
Later Stone Age in Africa and Upper Paleolithic in Eurasia. Intellectual abilities have remained fundamentally
unimproved upon ever since. These humans
spread with unprecedented speed across the world, expanding into almost all
terrestrial niches. Perhaps the content
and relative arrangement of sentences could now encode a ‘picture’. It is proposed that an impasse was reached at
this point: henceforth, continued accelerative evolution required human social
networks getting larger or developing stronger interconnections.
Agriculture
Start – Permanent settlements sustained by the cultivation
of cereals, in the Late Natufian culture of the Levant. This region acted as a corridor connecting
Africa to Eurasia. Subsequently, a
similar set of plant and animal domesticates would be exploited by communities
in the Levant and — where civilizations would later arise — in the neighboring regions of the Aegean, Anatolia,
Egypt and Mesopotamia.
Finish – Settlements capable of seeding urbanization,
in the Naqada II culture of Upper Egypt.
The Ancient Egyptian civilization originated from these Chalcolithic Age
communities. Ancient Egyptian is an
Afro-Asiatic language. The two most
likely scenarios are that either proto-Afro-Asiatic spread alongside farmers
from the Levant or spread in north-east Africa after farming had arrived there
from the Levant.
5. Writing
≈ 5.5 thousand years
before CC in Ancient Egypt
(Early Dynastic Period) as an information storage system. This recording method greatly aided long-term
memory through preservation and working memory through visual display. The first documents were pictorial, almost
without text.
Money
Start – Central government control of the most
important store of value, in the Ancient Egyptian Empire.
With the conquest of Kerma the Nubian gold supply was finally secured. The
territorial consolidation and expansion that followed included the
incorporation of Canaan. This region was
within the sphere of influence of Mesopotamian states where silver was the most
important store of value. Subsequently — after the Bronze Age collapse — Iron Age Canaanite
speakers were of central importance to intercontinental commerce: Hebrew tribes
had control over the most important trade route connecting Egypt to Mesopotamia
and Phoenician city states were paramount in trade across the Mediterranean
Sea.
Finish – Establishment of a central mint for issuing gold
and silver coinage, in the Roman Empire.
This was one of many administrative reforms that occurred in a
relatively short period of time following the birth of the imperial government
and concurrent with the onset of ‘Pax Romana’ – an era of relative peace
and prosperity. Greek culture had a
dominant influence on Roman culture. The
Greek alphabet descended from the Phoenician alphabet, as did the Aramaic
alphabet. For illustration, Greek became
widespread as the lingua franca of the Greek Macedonian Empire and Aramaic became
widespread as the lingua franca of the Persian Achaemenid Empire.
6. Printing
Press
≈ .55 thousand years
before CC in the Holy Roman
Empire as an information broadcasting system. Latin was still a lingua franca across Western
Europe despite the collapse of the Western Roman Empire. Affordable copying of documents was made
possible by mechanizing the process using movable type and a press. Prior to this point, a major input of culture that
had flowered in Maghreb Islamic states arrived into Western Europe, mostly through
Spain. This not only included developments
made by Arabic speakers, but also a revival of Greek texts and the relaying of
advancements originating from China and India.
A dominant influence probably would have resulted if it had not been for
physical geographic barriers and the geopolitical barrier of Western Christian
states where coinage issued from central mints had reappeared.
Industry
Start – Manufacturing as embodied by the factory
system at the Cromford Mill for spinning cotton, in the British Empire. The switch from Latin as the language of
scholarship in England, to English, had occurred only relatively recently
before.
Finish – Mass production as embodied by the moving
assembly line at the Highland Park Plant for building automobiles, in the
United States of America. These English speakers would have a dominant influence on the rest of the world.
7. World
Wide Web
≈ 55 years before CC in the global community as an information
access system. These hypertext-linked
documents distributed across computers connected by internet telecommunication became
popular with the debut of the Mosaic web browser.
Discussion
The complexity arising from each communication revolution onwards is accordingly mirrored in behavior or, with
the emergence of general intelligence in Behaviorally Modern Humans, in
knowledge and the arts.
An examination of ecological transition time
periods will reveal within them a very significant concentration of key events
(including advancements in communication) that initiated new developmental pathways. During these intervals, a transformation
occurs in anatomical organization (accordingly mirrored in behavior) or, after
the emergence of general intelligence in Behaviorally Modern Humans, in
economic organization (accordingly mirrored in knowledge and the arts).
An extrapolation of the retrospective
interpretation so far presented can give an insight into the future, but
it is not advisable to make excessively detailed future
predictions considering the unpredictability of such events in the past.
Assuming accelerative evolution has not already
ended, the next communication revolution is predicted to occur around the year
2043 based upon a simplistic calculation: 1993 (debut of Mosaic web browser) +
50 = 2043. When taking into
consideration the potential for greater affluence around the world it seems likely
that accelerative evolution could continue to this point, but it would require the
completion of an ecological transition before then. It is possible that this transformation might
have already started as the earliest starting point of previous ecological
transitions has passed relative to the current time frame.
At some point the time required to raise a new
human generation will present a biological limit preventing accelerative
evolution. If another ecological
transition occurs – during an interval within a 50 year period - it will be the
last because another cannot be completed in the subsequent time frame – during
an interval within a 5 year period.
Therefore, if another communication revolution occurs it will also be
the last.
Slowing world population growth could be viewed
as a potential impediment to accelerative evolution. It could also instead be construed as the
effect of optimal system responses. It
is probably not coincidental that world population is likely to plateau around the
middle of this century.
Tanwir
Wazir-Khaksar
28 September
2013, Glasgow
