Catching Fire : How Cooking Made Us Human

In the text, An Edible History of Humanity, Tom Standage provides his take on how the past was so deeply affected by food throughout the generations. The book approaches history in a different way altogether: as a sequence of changes caused, influenced or enabled by food. Standage explains that throughout history, food has not only provided sustenance but has also acted as the catalyst of societal organization, social change, economic expansion, military conflict, geopolitical competition and industrial development. As Tom Standage explains, since the time of prehistory to present,

From the early prehistoric society until now, we often heard the word “adaptation”, which means the process of changing something or changing our behavior to deal with new situations. The ways people adjust their natural environment varies according to time, place, and tribe. Foraging is common way of adaptation that people uses for most of human history; however because of the population pressure, some people adopt agriculture to fulfill their need. This essay, will discuss the positive and negative aspects of life in hunting and gathering societies compared to the agricultural societies based on Martin Harris’ article “Murders in Eden” and Jared Diamond’s article “The Worst Mistake in the History of Human Race.”

This section gave detailed explanation of how humans have changed from primates and how we are able to survive. DNA is what affects what our bodies can handle compared to what our primates could handle. Mankind is twice split off from apes and the mutation of the human apoE gene is what helps us be able to eat meat. A second mutation appeared 220000 years ago which helped humans be able to break down fats and cholesterol. DNA and the mutation of our genes is what helped us survive. This section also talks about extinction, and how Jean Leopold Nicolas Frederic Cuvier,one of the greatest naturalists believed in it, despite many people not believing in the impermanence of a species. William Buckland, a biblical geologist who

An Edible History of Humanity is a book written by Tom Standage. It was first published on in 2009 by Walker & Co in the English language. The book is divided into six parts covering twelve chapters. It talks about the civilization of man from Old Stone Age during hunting and gathering all the way to present-day day. In this book, Standage describes how the development of food production has contributed to the civilization of humans (Standage, 113). He also outlines the role of food in the existence of humankind. The main theme in this text surrounds’ the history of man painting food as the tool in industrial evolution, civilization and how it impacts wars, as well as ecological competition. Standage concludes that food is the key cause of

Our most useful tool we discovered was cooking. Cooking allowed us to eat many more things than we could originally. It removed the harmful bacteria and substances from food making them edible. The ability to cook is also the only tool humans have that other omnivores do not. This is often cited as evidence that humans entered a new ecological niche, “the cognitive niche,” as many anthropologists have labeled it. Pollan says it is this “term seems calculated to smudge the line between biology and culture” since cooking helped develop many cultures. It is this tool that altered the way our bodies digest food. With cooking we no longer needed to consume raw meat and other foods became safe to eat.

These findings insist on the idea that our ancestors evolved to be scavengers and gatherers because it was the only way to find nutrients. Early humans were required to search for food. Conditions required them to evolve in a way that the body stores energy, so when resources became scarce, they stayed healthy and could contribute to their community efficiently. Obtaining the ability to store energy in order for humans stay healthy was an extremely important factor. After our ancestors migrated out of East Africa, they evolved to wonder and scavenge for food. Now, humans are able to live comfortably in a single location. Compared to our ancestors constantly moving looking for food and shelter. (Jurmain et al. 350-351).

This evolution had also gifted these hairless primates with opposable thumbs on the hands at the ends of their appendages, which could be used as a truly unrivaled tool, to grasp and shape the world around them. Immediately, the primates fashioned clubs with which to brutally and mercilessly attack and kill one another; a tragic misuse of what they had been gifted. With more time, these beings continued onward to form families, tribes, and armies. Ceaseless consumption, breeding, and fighting led to the culmination of their evolution, Humanity. These beings, far more refined than any other, possessed not only sentience, but feelings and intelligence.

In 1966, a group of about fifty anthropologists met in Chicago for a conference that would later known as the “Man the Hunter” meeting. The meeting contrasted with earlier scholarship and presented a Hollywood approach to the topic of early man, one where our ancestors were strong, powerful, and in control of their environment. Anthropologists Sherwood L. Washburn and C.S. Lancaster (1968), both present at the conference claimed, “our intellect, interests, emotions, and basic social life—all are evolutionary products of the success of the hunting adaptation”. The book Man the Hunter that emerged from the conference forced a re-evaluation of human subsistence strategies and the role of the hunter in human

Early humans were stuck in their “ecological niche” and did not have the same evolutionary changes that humans now face in present time (Ridley, 3). Additionally, Ridley argues that cultural evolution explains the earlier extended static periods because the cultural evolution process was “to replicate, mutate, compete, select, and accumulate” (Ridley, 5). The culmination of the early human culture allowed for progress to occur, eventually allowing models like REM to fuel innovation. Specifically, humans began to understand the role of specialization in order for society to become more productive and resourceful.

Cooking is a vital, overlooked component necessary to accomplish every human’s basic fundamental needs to survive and reproduce. According to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, food is one of the factors that constructs the base of the pyramid’s physiological section (Myers 330). This section cannot be considered without its fundamental component, the act of cooking. Not only is this act executed in most human individuals’ everyday lifestyle, but has also increased their fitness in the course of time. In Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Humans by Richard Wrangham, Wrangham similar idea convinces me. Wrangham declares that it was fire and cooking that led to new crucial physical traits developed in humans. Whether fire was created as a

As typical prey species migrated and the cold brought on the loss of woodland for camouflage (Sorensen, B). Both humans and Neanderthals struggled for food. Volcanic eruptions were thought to have played a role in the extinction but evidence shows that Neanderthals were more resilient to natural disasters than previously thought. Humans themselves were a greater threat to Neanderthals than a volcanic eruption (Lowe J, Et Al) Humans had dogs which, as well as increasing food yield for humans, could be eaten themselves in times of emergency. Neanderthals were unable to adapt their hunting methods to the new conditions and so ate less becoming more susceptible to disease and eventually became extinct. Humans and Neanderthals were likely to have mixed but only on a small scale basis so humans likely did not actively clash with Neanderthals enough to directly cause their extinction. (Bradtmoller M, et al) It would be an exaggeration to claim dogs as the single cause for humans survival during this period but undeniably the dog gave humans a significant advantage over the

How we cook food has been one of the biggest changes. Prior to the 1950s, cooking was not about being creative or enjoying cooking, although some did; was a necessity required to live. For many people, there has been a shift in cooking; if a person does not wish to cook they do not have to. Cooking has become a more enjoyable task, it is not necessarily a requirement of survival. Unless a person was a

Understanding human evolutions is important for identifying the stages of humanity and for understanding how our societies have developed. When most of us think about human

The theories of human evolution may always cause a heated dispute. Each theory presents its own evidence proving

Human evolution is the gradual process in which people, or Homo sapiens, originated from apelike ancestors. Scientific evidence, particularly in the form of fossils and secondary remains, show that the physical and behavioral traits shared by all people evolved over a period of approximately six million years. Humans are primates. Both genetic and physical similarities show that humans and the great apes (large apes) of Africa, chimpanzees (including bonobos, or so-called “pygmy chimpanzees”) and gorillas share a common ancestor that lived between 8 and 6 million years ago. The volume of fossils found in Africa suggests that most evolution occurred there and is likely the place of origin for early humans. This brings to fruition the “out of Africa” theory, also called the “single-origin hypothesis.”