The Evolution of the Human Brain: How It Differs from Our Ancestors and Why?
The Evolution of the Human Brain:
How it Differs From Our Ancestors and Why?
The human brain is a feat of evolution: it has allowed humans to have complex thoughts, conscience, build tools, create fires, and much more. Humans did not acquire this simply by chance. Evolution throughout our ancestral past has shaped and moulded the human mind to its state. The earliest of ancestors, including apes, had very small brains, but as evolution progressed, so too did the human brain. The rapid progression of human intelligence has been attributed to environmental changes causing humans to change with their surroundings for survival. This lead to the expansion of specific areas of the brain, vastly differing maturation of humans compared to our ancestors, changing genetics, which is just some of the changes that has occurred in humans. In this present paper, the changes and reasons as to the changes of brain over the course of human evolution are investigated. Research into this topic shows studies similar correlations with respect to one another, with the majority of sharing and overlapping in many opinions on this topic. Majority of research discussed has fairly been recently conducted within the last decade, and virtually all were conducted by western or European researchers.
The most discernible change in the human brain is its absolute size. The average brain of the modern human is up to four times larger than of our earliest ancestors. Currently, the average fully grown adult Homo sapiens is approximately 1200 to 1600 cubic centimetres and weighing three pounds. In comparison, the earliest trace of human ancestors, the Australopithecus clan had brains slightly greater than apes, around 400 cubic centimetres. Anatomically the Australopithecus were bipedal akin to humans, but intellectually akin to primates, which suggests that bipedalism preceded the growth of the brain on the timeline of human evolution. The next ancestors, Homo habilis had an increased cranial
How it Differs From Our Ancestors and Why?
The human brain is a feat of evolution: it has allowed humans to have complex thoughts, conscience, build tools, create fires, and much more. Humans did not acquire this simply by chance. Evolution throughout our ancestral past has shaped and moulded the human mind to its state. The earliest of ancestors, including apes, had very small brains, but as evolution progressed, so too did the human brain. The rapid progression of human intelligence has been attributed to environmental changes causing humans to change with their surroundings for survival. This lead to the expansion of specific areas of the brain, vastly differing maturation of humans compared to our ancestors, changing genetics, which is just some of the changes that has occurred in humans. In this present paper, the changes and reasons as to the changes of brain over the course of human evolution are investigated. Research into this topic shows studies similar correlations with respect to one another, with the majority of sharing and overlapping in many opinions on this topic. Majority of research discussed has fairly been recently conducted within the last decade, and virtually all were conducted by western or European researchers.
The most discernible change in the human brain is its absolute size. The average brain of the modern human is up to four times larger than of our earliest ancestors. Currently, the average fully grown adult Homo sapiens is approximately 1200 to 1600 cubic centimetres and weighing three pounds. In comparison, the earliest trace of human ancestors, the Australopithecus clan had brains slightly greater than apes, around 400 cubic centimetres. Anatomically the Australopithecus were bipedal akin to humans, but intellectually akin to primates, which suggests that bipedalism preceded the growth of the brain on the timeline of human evolution. The next ancestors, Homo habilis had an increased cranial
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