Our Ancestral March of Science

Oligarchs come and go, but the march of science continuously moves humanity forward.

Fitting the DNA spiral onto the bridge in Pittsburgh
really resonates with me.

There were over 600 science marches on Earth Day - Saturday April 22, 2017. A couple million people marched to remind citizens from Australia to Japan, from South Africa to London, from DC to LA that scientists were among the first to sound the alarm on climate change and to begin proposing solutions. The fossil fuel industry is on its way out no matter how much the Dumpster and his anti-science posse try to save it. Clean energy jobs are the wave of the future.

It's a little hard to see, but there were marches in every US state.

I’ve been working for the past seven years on Eve’s Imprint, a history/science/art project of mammoth proportions. The further I go the more I appreciate the interaction of these fields of knowledge and the huge debt we owe to our ancestors for advancing all of them.

Human Evolution

Fire and Stone by LiDoña Wagner

Hominids who preceded Homo sapiens had awesome powers of observation that led to the creation of fire and the development of stone tools. Further up the human evolutionary chain, Homo erectus observed animals devouring one another and got into the game. Someone observed what happened when fire met with animal meat. Others discovered how much easier this meat was to digest; cooking came on line.

Fertility goddess figurine found in Israel. 

During the early stages of Homo sapiens evolution, being in attune with nature was a life or death attitude. Our ancestors venerated the earth, sea, and sky. To honor and encourage earth’s fertility, they created “goddess” figurines that imitated the contours of the earth. These were carried and placed ritually in areas where they hoped a fertile earth would provide the plants, seeds, and nuts required in their diet and that of the animals they followed.

Don't you just love the way this person added
a knitted brain to her pussy hat?

The protein in meat and fish led to a healthier Homo sapiens population and enhanced brain capacity. Population increases led to the necessity of wider range of movement to acquire the food they required. From an original language of clicks and grunts they developed enhanced communication skills. Communicating within a larger band of Homo sapiens led to even greater powers of observation.  

Initial Migrations

Following Herds/Fishing the Sea by LiDoña Wagner.

Two cultures grew up, an inland culture of following herds of animals and a coastal culture of following schools of fish. The fishing culture was the first to leave Africa 75-70,000 years ago. Our fishing ancestors followed the coast from Africa into Southwest Asia (Southern Arabia, Iran, Pakistan, India). Some of these first migrants stayed in Southwest Asia and took up animal hunting along with continuing their fishing culture. Some bands of Homo sapiens continued to follow the coast into Southeast Asia (Myanmar, Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam).

During the time that Arabia was green, numerous migrations
passed through every part of the peninsula. 

20,000 years later, during a time of glacial melt that made the Sahara into vast grasslands, Homo sapiens from the inland culture followed grazing animals north along the Nile valley and into northern Arabia. Hunters and gatherers in what was then a green Arabian peninsula observed that some areas provided more plentiful plants and animals. They began building traps in which to capture and slaughter whole herds. Homo sapiens in Arabia became so adept at this that they completely eradicated the Iranian Giselle.

Satellite image showing ancient hunting trap in Arabia.

Learning from Mistakes

Some of our scientific ancestors figured out that eliminating entire animal species was not a long-term survival strategy. In present-day Iran, Homo sapiens began domesticating goats and sheep to attain a sustainable slaughtering rate. While hunting and gathering remained important sources of food, a new occupation of herding and guarding goats and sheep emerged.

Isn't it wonderful how this former Iranian hunter
became a guardian of his herd of goats?

An ongoing supply of meat, milk, and hides led others to experiment with using not only leather hides but also wool from the backs of sheep. These new developments were essential in order to exist in the colder climate of Iran’s mountain ranges.

As populations expanded and various bands of Homo sapiens split up, reunions and gatherings of various bands became important not only for news of former members, but also for exchanging ideas and discoveries. And of course trade developed for items one had not acquired in one’s own geographic area.

Stone sickle found in Syria.

Homo sapiens had long observed that the animals they hunted knew how to find and follow water. Our ancestors who wandered north through the Levant (Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, Syria) and contemporary Iraq observed that greater vegetation grew in the wetlands near water sources. They developed stone sickles for harvesting grains that grew plentifully there. Later some band of Homo sapiens discovered how to forge mud into clay tablets. The very first communal record keeping appears to have been accounts of trading deals. But that comes later in the story.

Sharing Knowledge

Throughout all their movements, creative Homo sapiens recorded memories and events on stone. They made stone objects and chiseled images on boulders. They painted on the walls of caves. We will never know exactly what these images mean. Were they messages to former band members? Were they markers of the most propitious path to take? Were they memorials of a loved one now deceased? Were they objects of veneration and ritual life? Perhaps they were all of this and more.

I don't have a date on this wall art in Arabia. Obviously abstract
symbols were being used. They look like precursors to scientific formulas.

In ancient times, there were no borders or boundaries. Bands of Homo sapiens roamed at will and gathered together at agreed-upon seasons. Pre-agriculture, many bands gathered at a place in what is now southern Turkey. They built what is believed to be the very first ceremonial site at Gobekli Tepe.

In 2011 National Geographic called Gobekli Tepe (hill)
in southern Turkey the birth of religion.

Using large stones, Homo sapiens built concentric circles for seating. At the center and within the walls, they erected monolithic pillars. On the pillars they carved animals and human figures. Wall paintings from the region depict ceremonies in which Homo sapiens wore animal skins and danced with musical instruments. Painted on the wall of a nearby shrine is what is thought to be the oldest discovered map.

Wall painting at Catal Huyuk in southern Turkey appears
to be village below erupting mountains, 6000 BC.

Some time in the shift toward herding in addition to hunting and gathering, objects of veneration began changing from feminine fertility figures to animals and most prominently, the bull. It seems that as Homo sapiens gained control over the animals they had once merely followed, they began to take themselves very seriously. Control over the earth replaced co-existing with it.

Isn't it interesting how the raging bull continues to threaten humanity?

Fast forward to the end of the twentieth century when Homo sapiens began to realize that, like the animals they had once followed and then eradicated, the earth’s sustainability and thus that of Homo sapiens has limits. A new age has dawned in which Homo sapiens must use our powers of observation and analysis to assure survival of both Homo sapiens and the planet upon which it depends. Science is taking us there.

I love the way some signs combined Hillary's slogan
with an image of Gaia, Mother Earth.