Generally speaking, about "Where do people come from?" The understanding of this issue-the origin of mankind-has gone through a long and tortuous historical process from myths and legends, religious theology to scientific argumentation.
In primitive times, due to the extremely low productivity, it is impossible for human beings to reveal the mystery of their own origins, thus producing many related myths and legends. What we are most familiar with is the legend that Nu Wa created man from the earth and God created man. Among all the myths and legends about the origin of human beings, the legend about God creating man in the Christian Bible is more systematic and has far-reaching influence. Adam and Eve were born, married and became the ancestors of mankind. This "God made man" is regarded as the golden rule by the Christian church, and no one can doubt it. So he ruled people's minds in European feudal society 1000 years.
/kloc-in the 9th century, with the development of capitalist production and the progress of science, great achievements have been made in embryology, comparative anatomy, paleontology, geology, anthropology and other disciplines in natural science, laying a solid foundation for scientific demonstration of the origin of human beings.
Preface:/kloc-In the 8th century, Linnaeus proposed that both humans and apes belong to primates. 1809, French biologist Lamarck published "Animal Philosophy", proposing that animals and plants are not fixed, higher animals originated from lower animals, and humans originated from apes. This debate opened the prelude to the scientific proof of human origin.
Logo: 1859, British biologist Darwin published the Origin of Species, put forward the theory of evolution, and put biology on the basis of science for the first time. 187 1 year, he published "The Origin and Sexual Selection of Human Beings", pointing out that human beings originated from animals, that human beings and apes share a common ancestor, and that human beings evolved from some extinct apes. This argument established the status of human beings in the animal kingdom and laid a scientific foundation for the final solution of the problem of human origin. But Darwin failed to explain a series of problems such as how apes evolved into humans.
The final solution: 1876, Engels published "The Leading Role of Labor in the Transformation from Ape to Man", which revealed the law of the origin of human beings and the emergence of human society from the viewpoint of dialectical materialism and put forward the theory that labor created human beings.
Second, the formation
Engels believed that apes originally lived in groups in tropical and subtropical forests. Later, some apes went down to the ground to look for food, and gradually learned to walk upright on two feet, while their forelimbs were liberated to use natural stones and sticks to collect plants and catch small animals, and finally developed into tools. The uprightness of the feet and the evolution of the hands have influenced a series of changes in the body structure, and the brain and sensory organs have become increasingly developed, and finally various characteristics of human beings have emerged.
He put forward three progressive scientific concepts about the origin and development of human beings, namely, "apes climb trees", "people in the process of formation" and "fully formed people". Tree-climbing apes refer to remote apes living in trees. People in the process of formation refer to creatures in the process of transition from apes to humans. Fully formed people are human beings who have already made tools.
Tree-climbing ape: At an uncertain time in the Oligocene of Tertiary, "there lived a highly developed ape. ..... they are covered in hair, have beards and pointed ears, and live in groups in trees. " This ape can walk on all fours, and can climb branches, pick fruits and build nests in the forest through "arm walking". In this way, their hands and feet are divided into some kinds, and their bodies are in a semi-upright state, which lays the foundation for them to walk upright on the ground. This is the internal factor for the development of ancient apes to human beings.
Representative: The earliest hominid fossils are protozoa (30 million years ago) and Egyptian ape-man (28 million to 26 million years ago)191and 1967 found in the Oligocene strata in Fayoum, Egypt. The late anthropoid ape is a forest anthropoid ape (23 million to 6.5438+million years ago, Miocene, some of which entered Pliocene), which was first discovered in the Miocene stratum of France (65438+0856), and later similar fossils were found in Europe, Asia and Africa.
Features: These ancient apes all have 32 teeth, and the arrangement order is similar to that of modern apes and humans. Anthropologists believe that they are the common ancestors of human beings and modern apes.
Man in Manufacturing: The transition from ape to man is mainly due to the change of external living conditions. From Miocene to the end of Pliocene, great changes have taken place in the climate and topography of East Africa and South Asia, resulting in the reduction of forest area and the emergence of swamps and savanna. Due to the change of external environment, some ancient apes were forced to search for food on the ground frequently. In order to meet the needs of life on the ground, a certain division of labor between hands and feet caused by ancient apes living in the forest was developed, thus starting a long transition from apes to humans. However, those apes that have not been affected by changes in the external environment continue to live in the forest and embark on a different development path from the above-mentioned apes, becoming modern apes that still exist today.
Representative: Forest Australopithecus was later divided into Great Ape, Siwanan Ape and Lamarck. Among them, Raemakers is close to human beings, so some scholars think that Raemakers may be the earliest creature in the transition from apes to humans.
Lamarcinopithecus (14 million to 7 million years ago) was first discovered by American scholar Lewis in 1932 in Keshan, Seevali, northern India. After the 1960s, similar fossils appeared in Tenenburg, Kenya, Ludabania, Pilgos and Sandir, Pakistan's Potwar Plateau and Lufeng, China.
Features: the snout is short, and the dental arch opens backward in an arc shape. The teeth are closely arranged and the canine teeth are smaller. It can basically walk on two feet and use natural tools such as stones and sticks. These characteristics are similar to those of human beings, showing a trend of transition from apes to humans. So in the sixties and seventies, many scholars thought Lamarcinopithecus was an early representative of the transition from apes to humans.
In the late stage, Australopithecus was the representative (from 5.5 million years ago to 6.5438+0 million years ago). After Australopithecus appeared in Raemakers, Raemakers was a creature that could be determined in the process of transforming from apes to humans. It can be divided into at least three types, namely, australopithecus africanus (slender species), Australopithecus robustus and Australopithecus bowman, which is stronger than the robust species. 1974, American scholar D.C. Johnson and others discovered a female fossil of about 20 years old, and the whole skeleton was preserved by 40%, that is, "Ms. Lucy" Johnson named these fossils as Australopithecus Alpha species.
Characteristics: The physical characteristics of Australopithecus are close to those of human beings, with parabolic dental arch, much smaller incisors and canine teeth than apes, no prominent canine teeth and no backlash; The thumb can hold the other four fingers, and natural tools can; The pelvis is wider than that of apes, indicating that they can walk upright; The skull is longer and taller than most chimpanzees, and the average brain capacity is close to 500 ml. Although it is much smaller than human beings, its structure is more complicated and it may have the ability of language.
At present, most anthropologists believe that human beings developed from the slender Australopithecus. The main features are: prominent mandible, no chin, low flat skull, backward forehead and brain capacity of 600 ml. This shows that it has a further development compared with the morphology of forest apes.
The transition from apes to humans is gradually completed in the state of the body. The group of people formed is what Marx and Engels called "group" and Lenin called "primitive group". This group is probably very small. In this group, blood relationship is the bond, there is no family organization, group marriage, promiscuity, hybridization, no marriage at all, only mother, no father.
The transformation from apes to humans, from Lamarck 6.5438+0.4 million years ago to the appearance of fully formed humans more than 3 million years ago, has almost experienced a long history of more than 6.5438+0 million years, which is in the early and middle period of Paleolithic Age, roughly equivalent to the low stage of uncivilized anthropology.
Third, apes are different from each other.
So, how did apes evolve into adults? What role did labor play in the process of human formation?
Engels pointed out that labor created man himself. The decisive step in the transition from apes to humans is to walk upright. Because of the need of survival, apes who went down to the ground were forced to use natural tools such as stones and sticks to find food and defend against enemies, while their feet were often used for walking, so that they could gradually walk upright. Because walking upright makes the division of labor between hands and feet fixed, hands can freely engage in other activities. This completed a decisive step from ape to man. In the process of long-term use of natural tools, people in the process of formation "can constantly acquire new skills, and the greater flexibility gained in this way is inherited and increased from generation to generation." In this way, after tens of millions of years, the molded human hand has finally developed into a perfect human hand capable of making tools. So the hand is not only the organ of labor, but also the product of labor.
The evolution of hands, feet and upright walking has prompted a series of changes in other organs of the body. As a result of walking upright, the head gradually changes from leaning forward to vertical, so that the spine supports the head, providing conditions for the brain to expand into a sphere and expanding the field of vision. At the same time, in the long-term collective labor, people in formation often need to echo each other and exchange ideas with each other. Therefore, their larynx is gradually transformed, and their oral organs are gradually adapted to the needs of occurrence, and they can emit clear syllables, thus producing the original language. Therefore, "language comes from labor and is accompanied by labor".
Because of labor and language, the brain of apes has gradually become the brain of human beings. Engels pointed out: "First, labor, then language and labor become the two main driving forces. Under their influence, the brain of apes gradually became a human brain. " In the process of ape brain developing into human brain, the sensory organs serving it are becoming more and more perfect. Thus, the instinctive consciousness of apes gradually developed into human consciousness. All this shows that human brain, sensory consciousness and abstract ability are all products of labor. To sum up, labor played a decisive role in the transformation from apes to humans.
In the process of transforming from apes to humans, with the formation of human hands, vocal organs and brain marrow, language and consciousness appeared, and finally the purpose of manufacturing production tools was achieved. Therefore, human finally broke away from the animal kingdom and became a real person. Engels regarded the ability to make tools as the main symbol of human formation, and called this kind of person who can make tools a "fully formed person".
To annotate ...
The Age of Ignorance: American sociologist and ethnologist H Morgan divided the primitive society into four stages according to the progressive view of "survival technology". In the book Ancient Society, it is divided into the age of ignorance, the age of barbarism and the age of civilization. Among them, the period of ignorance can be divided into three stages: low stage, intermediate stage and advanced stage. The low-level stage (140,000 to 3 million years ago) began in human infancy, and finally it was the stage of eating fish and using fire. In the next stage, fish and fire were finally eaten to collect wild plants for a living, so segmentation appeared; In the intermediate stage, the bow and arrow was finally invented; The invention and use of pottery in the advanced stage (50,000 to10.5 million years ago) finally established an organization. Savage era began with the invention of pottery, and finally appeared words, marked by the emergence of primitive agriculture and primitive animal husbandry. The lower stage is the Neolithic Age, the intermediate stage is the Bronze Age, and the advanced stage is the Iron Age. The symbol of civilized times: human beings have families, and private ownership is the origin of modern countries.
refer to
1. World History * Ancient History * Volume 1. Wu, Qi. Higher education press.
2. A General History of the World * Volume I, Seventh Edition *, translated by Stavri Anoos, Wu, Liang, Dong and Wang Chang (open reading). Peking University Publishing House.
3. History of Ancient and Medieval World * Volume I, Second Edition, edited by Link Zhu, Higher Education Press.