What Allowed Humans To Rule The World?
why did we get superior brains
Why does history begin with the cognitive revolution and not before?
The cognitive revolution marked homo-sapiens’s separation from the rest of the animal kingdom. Our actions could no longer be understood through biology. Using biology to explain why we build statues to gods doesn’t tell us anything. We can reduce the situation down to the atomic level and we won’t be any closer to understanding the relevance of a statue or art.
For example, you can’t understand a soccer game by just studying the atoms of the grass and the molecular interactions between the ball and your foot. That wouldn’t make the rules, goals or relationships on the field any clearer.
The same holds true for all human history after the cognitive revolution. Before that, everything we did fell under the field of biology.
What changed in the cognitive revolution that allowed humans to become the world’s new masters of creation?
We developed the ability to understand and describe fictions. This means we don’t just say “food here!” or “lion there!”, we say “the spirit of the lion protects us”. You can’t SEE the spirit of the lion. It’s a fiction that became ‘real’ because we all believed it. The same is true of all political ideologies, religions, laws and even money. By having shared fictions, we could cooperate more broadly.
Two people who have never met but both believe that g-d’s son came down to earth and died for our sins can trust each other and build a church together. Or raise money for a religious charity. Or even start a war.
Two people who believe in the fiction of “a country” will fight to the death to protect it. In purely physical terms, that “country” is just a piece of land. It is the fictions surrounding the land that give it meaning.
Consider Amazon, which employs around 1.5 million people. What is Amazon? If you destroy all its warehouses does it still exist? Yes. If all their employees quit at once, would it still exist? Yes. If all its shareholders passed on, would it still exist? Yes. SO what is Amazon? It’s a ‘legal fiction’.
Having these fictions has allowed humans to innovate faster than ever. We use these fictions to increase cooperation and move society forward. (but Noah… what’s society? exactly!)
Without large-scale cooperation, we’re eerily similar to chimpanzees. Up to a group of 10, we look pretty damn similar in our social structures and interactions.
Why did the cognitive revolution happen? Why did our brains develop the ability to talk about fiction and not other species’s brains?
Because we got lucky! We have no good explanation for HOW it happened except for chance. What’s more important is understanding the repercussions.
Question of The Day
What does fiction mean to you? What is real?
Your Biggest Fan,
Noah “BogNerd” Sochaczevski