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"Cognitive archaeology"
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An Introduction to Cognitive Archaeology
Cognitive archaeology studies human cognitive evolution by applying cognitive-science theories and concepts to archaeological remains of the prehistoric past. After reviewing the basic epistemological stance of cognitive archaeology, this article illustrates this interdisciplinary endeavor through an examination of two of the most important transitions in hominin cognitive evolution—the appearance of Homo erectus about 2 million years ago, and the recent enhancement of working-memory capacity within the past 200,000 years. Although intentionally created stone tools date to about 3.3 million years ago, Homo erectus produced a bifacial, symmetrical handaxe whose design then persisted for nearly the next 2 million years. An enhancement in working-memory capacity may have been responsible for the relative explosion of culture within the past 50,000 years, which included personal ornamentation, highly ritualized burials, bow-and-arrow technology, depictive cave art, and artistic figurines.
Journal Article
Thinking as “Thinging”
We live and we think inside a world of things made and found. Still, psychological science has shown little interest in understanding the exact nature of the relation between cognition and material culture. As a result, the diachronic influence and transformative potential of things in human mental life remains little understood. Most psychologists would see things as external and passive: the lifeless objects of human consciousness, perception, and memory. On the contrary, my main argument in this article is that things matter to human psychology and should be taken seriously. Although things usually pass unnoticed, they are anything but trivial. Things have a special place in human cognitive life and evolution. We think “with” and “through” things, not simply “about” things. In that sense, things occupy the middle space in between what are usually referred to as mind and matter. Material-engagement theory provides a way to describe and study that middle space where brain, body, and culture are conflated.
Journal Article
Mark Making and Human Becoming
This is a paper about mark making and human becoming. I will be asking what do marks do? How do they signify? What role do marks play in human becoming and the evolution of human intelligence? These questions cannot be pursued effectively from the perspective of any single discipline or ontology. Nonetheless, they are questions that archaeology has a great deal to contribute. They are also important questions, if not the least because evidence of early mark making constitutes the favoured archaeological mark of the ‘cognitive’ (in the ‘modern’ representational sense of the word). In this paper I want to argue that the archaeological predilection to see mark making as a potential index of symbolic representation often blind us to other, more basic dimensions of the cognitive life and agency of those marks as material signs. Drawing on enactive cognitive science and Material Engagement Theory I will show that early markings, such as the famous engravings from Blombos cave, are above all the products of kinesthetic dynamics of a non-representational sort that allow humans to engage and discover the semiotic affordances of mark making opening up new possibilities of enactive material signification. I will also indicate some common pitfalls in the way archaeology thinks about the ‘cognitive’ that needs overcome.
Journal Article
Iconic origins of language? An essay review of Steven Mithen’s The Language Puzzle (2024)
This essay review explores Steven Mithen’s interdisciplinary approach to the origins and evolution of language in The Language Puzzle (2024). It focuses mainly on what I call his iconic vocal origins hypothesis. Mithen challenges the prevalent gestural origins hypothesis, suggesting instead that early prehistoric languages were predominantly vocal and iconic, with conventionalization – as characteristic of symbol use – emerging later. The Language Puzzle draws on research from archaeology, philosophy, computer science, developmental psychology, and many other fields, thus assembling a wealth of insights from various disciplines. While intriguing, Mithen’s suggestion that prehistoric languages may have relied on iconicity instead of conventionalization faces substantial problems, which are discussed in this review essay. In the final section, I also briefly review the important conclusion chapter of Mithen’s book, which contains an imaginative outline of how language evolved from the last common ancestor up until modern H. sapiens. My criticisms of the iconic vocal origins hypothesis notwithstanding, The Language Puzzle is a valuable resource for anyone interested in language evolution, and once again showcases Mithen’s wide-ranging expertise and masterful writing.
Journal Article
Technology led to more abstract causal reasoning
Many animal species use tools, but human technical engagement is more complex. We argue that there is coevolution between technical engagement (the manufacturing and use of tools) and advanced forms of causal cognition in the human (Homo) lineage. As an analytic tool, we present a classification of different forms of causal thinking. Human causal thinking has become detached from space and time, so that instead of just reacting to perceptual input, our minds can simulate actions and forces and their causal consequences. Our main thesis is that, unlike the situation for other primate species, an increasing emphasis on technical engagement made some hominins capable of reasoning about the forces involved in causal processes. This thesis is supported in three ways: (1) We compare the casual thinking about forces of hominins with that of other primates. (2) We analyze the causal thinking required for Stone Age hunting technologies such as throwing spears, bow hunting and the use of poisoned arrows, arguing that they may serve as examples of the expansion of casual cognition about forces. (3) We present neurophysiological results that indicate the facilitation of advanced causal thinking.
Journal Article
Integrating Archaeological Theory and Predictive Modeling: a Live Report from the Scene
Archaeological predictive modeling has been used successfully for over 20 years as a decision-making tool in cultural resources management. Its appreciation in academic circles however has been mixed because of its perceived theoretical poverty. In this paper, we discuss the issue of integrating current archaeological theoretical approaches and predictive modeling. We suggest a methodology for doing so based on cognitive archaeology, middle range theory, and paleoeconomic modeling. We also discuss the problems associated with testing predictive models.
Journal Article
What Can the Lithic Record Tell Us About the Evolution of Hominin Cognition?
This paper examines the inferential framework employed by Palaeolithic cognitive archaeologists, using the work of Wynn and Coolidge as a case study. I begin by distinguishing minimal-capacity inferences from cognitive-transition inferences. Minimal-capacity inferences attempt to infer the cognitive prerequisites required for the production of a technology. Cognitive-transition inferences use transitions in technological complexity to infer transitions in cognitive evolution. I argue that cognitive archaeology has typically used cognitive-transition inferences informed by minimal-capacity inferences, and that this reflects a tendency to favour cognitive explanations for transitions in technological complexity. Next I look at two alternative explanations for transitions in technological complexity: the demographic hypothesis and the environmental hypothesis. This presents us with a dilemma: either reject these alternative explanations or reject traditional cognitive-transition inferences. Rejecting the former is unappealing as there is strong evidence that demographic and environmental influences play some causal role in technological transitions. Rejecting the latter is unappealing as it means abandoning the idea that technological transitions tell us anything about transitions in hominin cognitive evolution. I finish by briefly outlining some conceptual tools from the philosophical literature that might help shed some light on the problem.
Journal Article
Oral Storytelling and Knowledge Transmission in Upper Paleolithic Children and Adolescents
The ways in which children learn in foraging societies differ from the classroom-based style of learning and teaching typical of industrialized societies in the West. This difference, however, has often been mischaracterized by anthropologists as an absence or rarity of direct teaching in foraging societies. In this paper, following Scalise Sugiyama (Evolution and Human Behavior 22:221–240, 2001), I argue that oral storytelling is a form of pedagogy in foraging societies that shares all of the key features of direct teaching including the signaling of an intention to share information, the identification of intended recipients of this information, and the transmission of knowledge that has applicability beyond the immediate context. I then review the evidence for storytelling/narrative in the Upper Paleolithic. Finally, I explore the implications of this form of teaching for skill acquisition and knowledge transmission in Upper Paleolithic children and adolescents.
Journal Article