Taming Fire

Odyssey: Adventures in Science
October 2009 pg 29-30

Fire, it might not mean much to you, but nearly 1 million years ago fire was the link to life. It gave light, heat and the power to cook things or boil to get rid of bacteria. But who found out about it and how? According to scientists the Swartkrans 1 million years ago found out about fire. But how did they do that. They probably saw fire somewhere else like from storms or bush fires and they probably tried to replicate that. First they probably put a stick on fire from another naturally made fire, from that they tried to make it with heat, because it burnt them so they thought it was heat. There is also one more thing beside using it for cooking and other stuff, they can wrap certain plants together and put it in the fire to get a smoke to repel mosquitos and other insects at night.

So today fire is replaced with stoves, heaters and other appliances, but millions years ago this was the universal heater, stove, alarm to keep other people away and boiler.

Last Human Standing

Today, there is only one human. But Thousands of years ago there were not only one kind of humans, but many.They were bigger stronger and they had bigger brains. So the big question is WHY. Scientists have to look back to the bones they found of Homo-Sapiens and other humans found. According to the Nova video, many factors helped us survive. One of these such factors can be migration, the moving of people to find more food and space to live might of explained a part of the story. The moving to other regions means different food and climate. Neanderthals had a diet of only meat, which is good for muscle but other nutrition is needed, also the Neanderthals lived in a region that has cold weather. Cold weather drains energy and not a lot of food is found. The climate and food could of helped Homo-Sapiens as they lived in a drier climate with more food. But these are not the only factors that could explain. The brain power of humans is also something discussed. The Neanderthals had a bigger brain, but the speech and memory would not have been better than ours. According to the video, the Parietal Lobe and Temporal Lobe (Used for memory and speech) would have been smaller due to the skull endocast. This would make a different complexion. Also the different brains would have resulted to different thinking and making of tools. Cro-magnons were the first sophisticated tool makers. The Neanderthals had not as sophisticated tools as the Homo-sapiens. The Neanderthals had to get up close and personal to the animal to kill it resulting to injuries and a low life rate for the species. But the Homo-sapiens could of made spears that can be thrown. But the Homo-sapiens did not only eat meat like the Neanderthals, they ate sea food which the Neanderthals could not do because of there thinking and weather. Homo-sapiens had to know the tides, the tides would be very different, they would be higher because the moon would be closer. One thing started, art and culture. The thinking made them think there was after life and curiosity also contributed.

So as you can see not only one factor made us survive, but many all together. The migration, food, climate, brain,skull, tools, hunting, culture would result to us surviving.

Miller, Jeanne "From Grunts to Grammer: The Evolution of Language". Odyssey 34-36. Print.

The humans before us just didn't start talking and speaking like you and me!!! They started with easy things like grunts. And not only did they just start that, a few changes to their body helped them too. According to Laitman, our Larynx had to take a change, the larynx had to move down to the deeper part of our throat. Now, unlike most animals, our larynx is lower not allowing us to swallow while breathing unlike other animals. But it gave us something else, we are able to release more heat because we can breathe through our nose and mouth. This means we could release heat faster meaning we can run longer distance for food. This change also enabled to make different sounds shaping the muscles in your throat and moving your tongue will make them. So being able to make different sounds grunts could of started as a kind of language. The passing of time the grunts changed more into words, thus making a language between same races of people. This communication would be used to plan how to hunt or teaching someone how to make a tool.

Communication is key to our everyday life, look around and you will see it every where. It started from grunts and now is on the internet or over telecommunication like phones.

On Our Own Two

Whitt, Stephen. "On Our Own Two." Odyssey: 26-28. Print.

Whats the difference when we walk and when Chimps Walk? well according to Stephen Whitt, "As Chimps walk on all fours, their spines angle up slightly, but are nowhere near straight up and down." This means that the spine is connected to the head and the hole which is called the foreman magnum connects the spine to head. The chimps walk on fours so it will be horizontal compared to us, our spines are directly underneath our head and connect underneath. The other reason is our head and how we balance it, unlike the chimp we don't have snouts, we have straight end where our nose goes. According to C.Owen Lovejoy we started to walk so we can carry food and give food to others. Others thought that depended on behavior too much and said that we started to walk bipedally so we could cross rivers and lakes.

So when someone asks you how and where did we come from don't say "Monkeys".

Who's Who Among the Early Hominins?

Susman, Randall. "Who's Who Among the Early Hominids?" Odyssey Oct. 2009: 22-25.
Print.

Have you ever wondered, " When, where and how did we originate". According to Randall Susman, " The fossil record of early hominid evolution shows primitive (ape-like) and advanced (human-like) features. This supports DNA evidence of our close relationship to the African apes. The earliest hominids include Sabelanthropus, Orrorin and Ardipithecus." This shows that we originated and started to get bigger brains and start to walk about 6-8 million years ago or even earlier. Randall and other scientists put us in a group called "Homo-Sapiens". As of Dictionary.com, Homo-Sapiens is the meaning of "the species of bipedal primates to which modern humans belong, characterized by a brain capacity averaging 1400 cc (85 cubic in.) and by dependence upon language and the creation and utilization of complex tools." There are other species that are Human-like that are not in the homo-sapien group, these species are more ape like and they survived unlike some Homo-Sapien species that did not survive unlike the apes and us. The Homo-Habilis is the first known species to make tools out of different materials and manipulate the tool in a way the would make it better, for example taking a rock and breaking the edge to make it jagged and sharp for cutting use.

These other Human-Like species mean that we today are smarter and able to walk, we surely are descendents from them in some way and for the better.

Why We Study Human Origins?

Why We Study Human Origins
By Randall Susman
Calliope:Exploring World History

"Anatomically, African apes and humans were similar, more similar in fact than apes were to monkeys"- Thomas Henry Huxley.

Article Summary: Reading the magazine copy we got I saw that a lot of scientists have different perspectives to one another, this would give other ideas to the question of where we came from, when we began and why or how we began. Thomas Huxley has given us a clue from his quote from above that we broke off from some kind of ape branch as well as others did. But why are we the only ones here now and others died out? Charles Darwin comes into play when he makes a theory of evolution.Evolution means "The gradual development of something" -Google. This states that we somehow adapted and developed to the surroundings to make our lives easier, an example of this is that we would live close to food and water resources. But the main thing that still boggles scientists minds today is that how we started to walk. These people have made multiple theories but a few of them are known and make sense; the first idea is the theory that we started to walk because we wanted to take fruits from trees and to see over tall grass, but after debates the other group of scientists stated we started to make tools with our hands and that it is more energy efficient to walk on 2 legs (bipedal). But the last question remains, " How are we different from apes?" The question is answered by the skeleton of us and the apes, our pelvis is shaped of bipedal walking but the apes is for more 4 legged walking. The other difference is the skull of the head, our skull is made to look forward when on 2 legs but an apes has eyes higher because of the walking of 4 legs.
As long as the people that are eager to learn our humanity investigate we will get closer to the final answer.

3 Theories of Stone-Henge

Historians have different views and understandings of things. That's why we have multiple theories of certain historical artifacts. Stonehenge is an example of that, many theories backed up with other evidence. One of the many theories of stone-henge was that it was a healing place, it would have rituals with music and the stones would intensify the sound when bouncing off the the stones.This was supported by a few scientists coming to stone-henge and playing different frequencies of sound in the middle and out-side of stone-henge. The results show if you play in the middle the sound will be higher there. The second theory, kind of same to the first is that stone-henge marked an ancient burial site, this theory was supported by the evidence found around stone-henge that was human remains. These remains had mini stones around them.And the third absurd theory was that this was a landing site for aliens, there is no hard evidence but there is a theory also in Egypt with the hieroglyphs. There is no sign of writing so the theory revolves around how would a human move 5 tone stones hundreds of miles? So as you can see we have different perspectives which gives the power to find multiple theories to something to give us a better chance of finding the true answer.

The Gladiator school in vienna

I just read that a gladiator school was found just out of the city in Vienna. What fascinated me was that it was about 2 Walmarts. And that this one was the only one of this size; it had rooms under the school which were small and big. Also it being close to the Danube taught me that early civilizations needed to be close to a lake or river to get water.

How do Historians Learn about the Past?

Have you ever thought how historians come to a theory? Do they just guess? No they don't, historians use things called sources, sources are things that give evidence to a certain thing. Historians first have to find these sources through, excavating or other ways. But what do they do after they find the sources? They put them in two categories; written and non-written. Written sources can be; diaries, books, newspapers, ads, poems and others. Non-written sources are like artifacts, example; pots, paintings etc. But what happens after that? The historians look for three thing; validity, reliability and date of origin. Date of origin mean when it as made, reliability means how reliable is it, example; who is it made by etc, and validity; is it impartial or to biased.

In the past, where did humans tend to settle and why?

Humans settled in places around the world, they chose there place according to their need and wants. Of course there needs would be their shelter,food and water. They need to find a region that is going to suit there food and shelter need, so humans would settle close to lakes,rivers for water but not too close in some regions because of mosquito's carrying Malaria and other diseases. There region must have some kind of habitat for them to make a shelter (eg. Egyptians close to the Nile would use mud from that river to make there huts or wood supplies).The region must also have a specific food source for them to live off, (eg. Close to fresh water river would maybe have salmon or they could farm if the place they settled is flat or they could be close to trading lines).Lastly they need water(eg.Rivers, Lakes or filtration of water that is not drinkable also trading would work.)

So as you can see our ancestors needed A reliable food source,water and shelter, these factors made the humans settle in places

Shelter made out of materials from habitat

What is "History" and why do we learn it?

What is history?

I learned in class that history is the past and what major event,person or idea came to place. History also needs to do with religion and colonies that settled around the world. We study the history of how those colonies survived and what they did.

Why do we study history?

We study history so we an understand where we came from and how we evolved, what we did right and wrong. We also study history for signs of disasters that wiped out settlements and might happen in the future. Ideas also come in to play because they can be put in the future of other things.

"If you want to understand today, you have to search yesterday" Pearl Buck

PSA

A Public Service Announcement is a campaign that make ads to aware the public (like an advertisement for a product) to raise the awareness of something like an issue or threat. For example a PSA could be about the global warming and how we need to go green or the caps will melt and the sea is going to rise. It also can be used to aware the public of a serial killer or a flu. They can give you pointers so you don’t get infected like sneezing in a handkerchief. They (the campaign) also warn about let’s say video game ratings and too much television. The PSA also makes ads to help other countries, like Haiti they make an ad and they tell you to donate. Public Service Announcements are important because they inform the public and they can make the public help and they help the public. If there was no PSA, the people would not be informed and they could not prevent diseases and the charities would not get as much money from the public. Also there would be no relief for other countries like JAPAN in the earthquake

Glogster

Story of the supermarket!!!!!

Have you ever thought what it would be like being a pineapple in a supermarket???? So read to find out the mystical wonder.

Hello my name is Piny, I am from Australia and I am a pineapple. I got to this store by the truck, boat and plane. So…. Where did you come from? (As Coco explains a hand takes him). Oh well looks like someone did not take me again.

I am staying and starting to get spoiled. I wish someone could come and buy me from this cold boring place. OH MY GOD a person is reaching to get me yes, yes and as I said yes again I was thinking of a paradise with other fruit and beaches, I open my eyes and I see a hand go right past me. As I was recovering from my disappointment a hand tugged me and slammed me in a trolley. I come to a big table and the person puts me through this fascinating red light and then a beep sound plays. The person takes me and puts me in a bag and then twirls me in a dark scary place with other foods, including Coco. We stop with a screech of a tire and a bang. We are put in different places; I went in the big and scary one. As I look around the super chilled place I see bodies that have been cut in places. In my head I was trying to figure out “what sick person would do this”? As I finished that sentence I got pulled and put on a wooden thing with scratch marks and it felt really rough. My last thought was what would happen to me then a flash with a swipe came to cut me.

As I woke up I found myself in a stinky place and I changed completely, Oh well