Archives for: June 2009, 08

06/08/09

Permalinkby 08:10:07 am, Categories: Commentary - OpEd, 302 words   English (CA)

Human evolution: Pottery older than we thought?

by Denyse O'Leary
ARN correspondent

Okay, okay, you always wondered where your great aunt got that perfectly awful stuff. But that's not what we are talking about here.

Haim Watzman tells us (NatureNews, 01 June 2009), "Earliest evidence for pottery making found: Fragments from a Chinese cave push back the dawn of the craft by more than 1,000 years":

Shards of pottery dating back 18,000 years have been unearthed in a cave in Hunan province, southern China.

The manufacture of ceramic pots and other items is generally associated with the change from Paleolithic hunter-gatherer societies into sedentary Neolithic communities, which began about 10,000 years ago in the eastern Mediterranean. But pottery manufacture began considerably earlier in East Asia, during the late Paleolithic. Until now, the earliest previous finds in East Asia were dated to 15,000–16,000 years ago.

Well, the basic idea isn't difficult. Clay grows very hard when subjected to intense heat, and most other methods of producing a waterproof container are much more labour intensive. So I wouldn't be surprised if the craft turns out to be older still.

Also, just up at The Mindful Hack:

Neuroscience: Measuring the impact of moods on information in visual cortex - help for depression?

An event I did not happen to attend: British atheist graces Toronto

You are your genes? Oh, maybe not ...

Woman turns brain tumour into art?

For all go to The Mindful Hack The Hack is my blog on issues in neuroscience, psychology, and spirituality.

Toronto-based Canadian journalist Denyse O'Leary (www.designorchance.com) is the author of the multiple award-winning By Design or by Chance? (Augsburg Fortress 2004), an overview of the intelligent design controversy. She was named CBA Canada's Recommended Author of the Year in 2005 and is co-author, with Montreal neuroscientist Mario Beauregard, of The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul (Harper 2007).

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