I find myself confused by the timelines, dates, places, and evidence in your post. Do you have a graphic that outlines your preferred timeline and perhaps compares it to others?
Additionally, what are your thoughts on the idea that there was not only a cultural "memetic" revolution but also a genetic one? After all, evolution didn't stop 40,000, 10,000, or even 4,000 years ago.
Recursive self-awareness evolved via gene-culture interaction in the last 50,000 years. From about 40,000-20,000 years ago, rituals related to second birth (spiritual or cultural birth) were developed, along with more complex culture (grammar, snake cults, shamanism). This package, where recursion was table stakes, spread around the end of the Ice Age. Stories about the beginning of time (Dreamtime, Eden, Prometheus) are about this transition and correspond with the start of the Holocene."
Making a graphic of different models would also be helpful. I'm sympathetic to gene-culture evolution for the formation of self being ongoing. There is current selection for ADHD and against schizophrenia, which both qualify. Or maybe we are slowly selecting for passing the mirror test at a younger age. I entertain a recent date for major selection on the Y Chromosome in this post: https://www.vectorsofmind.com/p/y-chromosome-bottleneck
What interests me is how you explain that you suggest that 50,000-30,000 years ago ancestor worship emerges as full-fledged language and religious narratives. Why does it take another 20,000 years before there is widespread evidence of religious practices and animistic gods? And where does the "I am" come in? Is sophisticated language conceivable without "I am"?
(Edit: I may try the ChatGTP timeline comparison again later.)
>Do you find any errors or is it more or less accurate?
In the chatGPT text? Yeah, there are plenty of hallucinations. My recommendation would be to download EToC v3.0 as a pdf an run that through chatGPT.
>What interests me is how you explain that you suggest that 50,000-30,000 years ago ancestor worship emerges as full-fledged language and religious narratives. Why does it take another 20,000 years before there is widespread evidence of religious practices and animistic gods? And where does the "I am" come in? Is sophisticated language conceivable without "I am"?
It's hard to talk timeline in the whole world, because different places were at different levels. It's common to claim that shamanism, totemism or ancestor worship emerged in Europe ~40kya. My claim is that rituals and ideas related to self-awareness developed in this milieu. "I am" could have existed before, but not as table stakes for participating in culture and probably not as seamless as it is now experienced. A language without "I am," and therefore without pronouns, would be deficient. Which is part of the interest in Piraha, which has a very simple pronomial system.
The question of why it took so long to develop or spread worldwide applies equally if the process was 400 kya or 40 kya. Things take time
"Books about human evolution often follow the format: …"
I've read so many (of these and other science essays extended into a book) I feel some version of GIT and forking a project on new 'this changes everything' lead or insight would be better than so many books being virtually identical for the first third of the book (okay if you have never read one before but after that what a waste of paper and bits).
Also, my obligatory reminder (of a wider-than "narrow disagreement")
(Yes, shamanism comes later than this, it's a doubling down (of many genres available) of the worlding urge, but then we have a North American predominance in academia so it a bit like thinking cave painting started in Europe because that where most of the researchers/population lived (looking for your car keys under the light effect). (I'd also add that the lack of doubled-down shamanism in Australia is mirrored in that, perhaps, the use of the term "creation myths" for dreaming stories is also too much back-formation, as they do not take place in the past. Songlines are responsibilities in ceremony, they do not take place in memory of the past, but as activation and maintenance of the world on country -- bit like a routine/rite to keep the grease and oil schedule on track on (social) machinery. As such, and in particular, the use of "creation stories" as "explanation"s is too much. Indeed knowing where one comes from is more about the context of the lives of ones ancestors than an actual origin (thought this too can always be double-down on when politically required).
TL;DR --- Social complexity yes -- socially negotiated / but 'religion' as cause for this -- no.
The worlding urge does not care about the form/genre nor the detail/beliefs/rites of the lived world. There is no gene for the name of god. Agency bias needs personal identity to riff off in a city life to create gods in their own image.
Merely that we feel we should -- do that type of stuff. No just-so story required, but the urge will make us feel there should be just-so stories anyways.... (as well as deontological moral frameworks -- same urge different outcomes in different contexts.)
Before 'the self' or 'the world' there was some blur of self/world that arose out of the egalitarian revolution of the paleolithic (empathy versus the primate social hierarchy fit for narcissists -- all the great apes have some element of this context). the blur self/world is an urge to organize 'the world" for "the self" (with others --- later these are not always close kin)
This is why I am taken with the Roman god of the threshold, Janus, the two-faced god looking in/out. We jitter between that which is the body and that with which we compose the body from (landscape/country/world) and across (world/society/polity/religion/morality).
The 'worlding' is an extended phenotype (the cocoon) but it is social, the bits of the cocoon are made up of social interactions not bits of sticks, it's made up of things we make and made-up, and glue together with our agreements and expectations, it includes the umwelt of our band/tribe and once this is done, then it can be extended yet again to include other songlines/bands/tribes that join up across a continent (umwelten um umwelten), evenif they are just trading song and rtesponsibilities and not actual trade goods -- software (social and technological) is traded first, with a few literal token gifts like ochre, and hardware later.
The self is "interior phenotype" (when doubled-down on, i.e. reified into a thing) i.e. the 'soul'.
Neither the self nor the world exist outside of that social fabric, they are co-evolving social fictions that allow Homo sp. to survive. It took the long ages of the paleolithic to accrue into what we see today post-agriculture in complexity, and I suspect there was no one time when it first appeared, but ebbed and flowed with the ages, and whether it occurred 10K or 50 K or 150K years ago is nothing compared to the last million years of multiple tiny populations "having a go" (the Neandertals' were particular small over a huge area -- that later, one tiny group "dominates" is more likely a fluke of good 'branding' than a god-like grant of "good genes" .
I am not sure 'when' is at all important compared to the fact that it happened.
>Neither the self nor the world exist outside of that social fabric, they are co-evolving social fictions that allow Homo sp. to survive.
Wonderfully put.
>I am not sure 'when' is at all important compared to the fact that it happened.
For me it's important because if it's recent (10kya, or maybe 40kya), then some of the transition can survive in myth, and the transformation to fully human has to be largely cultural or a gene-culture interaction where culture selects for certain genes after it spreads. Hence my interest identifying what is essentially human and then looking for the earliest traces (and the most recent traces where it is mysteriously missing).
The Seven Sisters dreaming track or songline crosses the entire continent of Australia west to east. Across the hardest deserts, negotiating responsibilities for country and law, across tribal/country and language groups. https://cdhr-projects.anu.edu.au/songlines/resources/index.html
The song is country, repeating the song re-creates. What does it explain?
I find myself confused by the timelines, dates, places, and evidence in your post. Do you have a graphic that outlines your preferred timeline and perhaps compares it to others?
Additionally, what are your thoughts on the idea that there was not only a cultural "memetic" revolution but also a genetic one? After all, evolution didn't stop 40,000, 10,000, or even 4,000 years ago.
From my FAQ (https://www.vectorsofmind.com/p/faq)
"What’s the TLDR?
Recursive self-awareness evolved via gene-culture interaction in the last 50,000 years. From about 40,000-20,000 years ago, rituals related to second birth (spiritual or cultural birth) were developed, along with more complex culture (grammar, snake cults, shamanism). This package, where recursion was table stakes, spread around the end of the Ice Age. Stories about the beginning of time (Dreamtime, Eden, Prometheus) are about this transition and correspond with the start of the Holocene."
Making a graphic of different models would also be helpful. I'm sympathetic to gene-culture evolution for the formation of self being ongoing. There is current selection for ADHD and against schizophrenia, which both qualify. Or maybe we are slowly selecting for passing the mirror test at a younger age. I entertain a recent date for major selection on the Y Chromosome in this post: https://www.vectorsofmind.com/p/y-chromosome-bottleneck
What interests me is how you explain that you suggest that 50,000-30,000 years ago ancestor worship emerges as full-fledged language and religious narratives. Why does it take another 20,000 years before there is widespread evidence of religious practices and animistic gods? And where does the "I am" come in? Is sophisticated language conceivable without "I am"?
(Edit: I may try the ChatGTP timeline comparison again later.)
>Do you find any errors or is it more or less accurate?
In the chatGPT text? Yeah, there are plenty of hallucinations. My recommendation would be to download EToC v3.0 as a pdf an run that through chatGPT.
>What interests me is how you explain that you suggest that 50,000-30,000 years ago ancestor worship emerges as full-fledged language and religious narratives. Why does it take another 20,000 years before there is widespread evidence of religious practices and animistic gods? And where does the "I am" come in? Is sophisticated language conceivable without "I am"?
It's hard to talk timeline in the whole world, because different places were at different levels. It's common to claim that shamanism, totemism or ancestor worship emerged in Europe ~40kya. My claim is that rituals and ideas related to self-awareness developed in this milieu. "I am" could have existed before, but not as table stakes for participating in culture and probably not as seamless as it is now experienced. A language without "I am," and therefore without pronouns, would be deficient. Which is part of the interest in Piraha, which has a very simple pronomial system.
The question of why it took so long to develop or spread worldwide applies equally if the process was 400 kya or 40 kya. Things take time
Thank you!
"Books about human evolution often follow the format: …"
I've read so many (of these and other science essays extended into a book) I feel some version of GIT and forking a project on new 'this changes everything' lead or insight would be better than so many books being virtually identical for the first third of the book (okay if you have never read one before but after that what a waste of paper and bits).
Also, my obligatory reminder (of a wider-than "narrow disagreement")
that
(art/religion/polity/drama/performance/rites/ritual/prayer/ceremony/culture/morality)
are all outcomes of the worlding urge and their various forms and specialties of notice or practice, are the result of specialization and confabulation that a increasingly complex economy (agriculture) and thus society (city-ish numbers) allow. see https://www.academia.edu/40978261/Why_we_should_an_introduction_by_memoir_into_the_implications_of_the_Egalitarian_Revolution_of_the_Paleolithic_or_Anyone_for_cake
(Yes, shamanism comes later than this, it's a doubling down (of many genres available) of the worlding urge, but then we have a North American predominance in academia so it a bit like thinking cave painting started in Europe because that where most of the researchers/population lived (looking for your car keys under the light effect). (I'd also add that the lack of doubled-down shamanism in Australia is mirrored in that, perhaps, the use of the term "creation myths" for dreaming stories is also too much back-formation, as they do not take place in the past. Songlines are responsibilities in ceremony, they do not take place in memory of the past, but as activation and maintenance of the world on country -- bit like a routine/rite to keep the grease and oil schedule on track on (social) machinery. As such, and in particular, the use of "creation stories" as "explanation"s is too much. Indeed knowing where one comes from is more about the context of the lives of ones ancestors than an actual origin (thought this too can always be double-down on when politically required).
TL;DR --- Social complexity yes -- socially negotiated / but 'religion' as cause for this -- no.
The worlding urge does not care about the form/genre nor the detail/beliefs/rites of the lived world. There is no gene for the name of god. Agency bias needs personal identity to riff off in a city life to create gods in their own image.
Merely that we feel we should -- do that type of stuff. No just-so story required, but the urge will make us feel there should be just-so stories anyways.... (as well as deontological moral frameworks -- same urge different outcomes in different contexts.)
>Agency bias needs personal identity to riff off in a city life to create gods in their own image.
When do you think the personal identity emerged? Is this the same as the worlding urge?
Yes I am now suspecting so. Worlding = selfing.
Before 'the self' or 'the world' there was some blur of self/world that arose out of the egalitarian revolution of the paleolithic (empathy versus the primate social hierarchy fit for narcissists -- all the great apes have some element of this context). the blur self/world is an urge to organize 'the world" for "the self" (with others --- later these are not always close kin)
This is why I am taken with the Roman god of the threshold, Janus, the two-faced god looking in/out. We jitter between that which is the body and that with which we compose the body from (landscape/country/world) and across (world/society/polity/religion/morality).
The 'worlding' is an extended phenotype (the cocoon) but it is social, the bits of the cocoon are made up of social interactions not bits of sticks, it's made up of things we make and made-up, and glue together with our agreements and expectations, it includes the umwelt of our band/tribe and once this is done, then it can be extended yet again to include other songlines/bands/tribes that join up across a continent (umwelten um umwelten), evenif they are just trading song and rtesponsibilities and not actual trade goods -- software (social and technological) is traded first, with a few literal token gifts like ochre, and hardware later.
The self is "interior phenotype" (when doubled-down on, i.e. reified into a thing) i.e. the 'soul'.
Neither the self nor the world exist outside of that social fabric, they are co-evolving social fictions that allow Homo sp. to survive. It took the long ages of the paleolithic to accrue into what we see today post-agriculture in complexity, and I suspect there was no one time when it first appeared, but ebbed and flowed with the ages, and whether it occurred 10K or 50 K or 150K years ago is nothing compared to the last million years of multiple tiny populations "having a go" (the Neandertals' were particular small over a huge area -- that later, one tiny group "dominates" is more likely a fluke of good 'branding' than a god-like grant of "good genes" .
I am not sure 'when' is at all important compared to the fact that it happened.
>Neither the self nor the world exist outside of that social fabric, they are co-evolving social fictions that allow Homo sp. to survive.
Wonderfully put.
>I am not sure 'when' is at all important compared to the fact that it happened.
For me it's important because if it's recent (10kya, or maybe 40kya), then some of the transition can survive in myth, and the transformation to fully human has to be largely cultural or a gene-culture interaction where culture selects for certain genes after it spreads. Hence my interest identifying what is essentially human and then looking for the earliest traces (and the most recent traces where it is mysteriously missing).
I guess for my purposes it is not required, in the general schema.
The Seven Sisters dreaming track or songline crosses the entire continent of Australia west to east. Across the hardest deserts, negotiating responsibilities for country and law, across tribal/country and language groups. https://cdhr-projects.anu.edu.au/songlines/resources/index.html
The song is country, repeating the song re-creates. What does it explain?
Is survival an explanation?
https://www.nma.gov.au/exhibitions/songlines