Cooking Makes The Man

"Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human" by Harvard prof Richard Wrangham explains that the switch to cooked food prompted all manner of important evolutionary changes.

Apes began to morph into humans, and the species Homo erectus emerged some two million years ago, Mr. Wrangham argues, for one fundamental reason: We learned to tame fire and heat our food.

“Cooked food does many familiar things,” he observes. “It makes our food safer, creates rich and delicious tastes and reduces spoilage. Heating can allow us to open, cut or mash tough foods. But none of these advantages is as important as a little-appreciated aspect: cooking increases the amount of energy our bodies obtain from food.”

He continues: “The extra energy gave the first cooks biological advantages. They survived and reproduced better than before. Their genes spread. Their bodies responded by biologically adapting to cooked food, shaped by natural selection to take maximum advantage of the new diet. There were changes in anatomy, physiology, ecology, life history, psychology and society.” Put simply, Mr. Wrangham writes that eating cooked food — whether meat or plants or both —made digestion easier, and thus our guts could grow smaller. The energy that we formerly spent on digestion (and digestion requires far more energy than you might imagine) was freed up, enabling our brains, which also consume enormous amounts of energy, to grow larger. The warmth provided by fire enabled us to shed our body hair, so we could run farther and hunt more without overheating. Because we stopped eating on the spot as we foraged and instead gathered around a fire, we had to learn to socialize, and our temperaments grew calmer.

There were other benefits for humanity’s ancestors. He writes: “The protection fire provided at night enabled them to sleep on the ground and lose their climbing ability, and females likely began cooking for males, whose time was increasingly free to search for more meat and honey. While other habilines” — tool-using prehumans — “elsewhere in Africa continued for several hundred thousand years to eat their food raw, one lucky group became Homo erectus — and humanity began.”

Clearly this piece should have run just before the Memorial Day barbecues, not right after them.

Comments

[bad]

I wonder what the first thing they cooked that tasted like chicken happened to be?

[elixelx]

Here's a question I always wanted to ask the Darwinists--how did the first man look at wheat and see bread?

[Kevin B]

So when EPA and Waxman-Malarky and the rest of the Eco-Taliban make the cooking of food a thing of the past, those of us with huge guts and hairy bodies who hate socialising will be at an evolutionary advantage then?

[matt]

writing from the People's Oceanside resort bunker across the Yellow Sea from our Korean socialist comrades, I must say that it was when the capitalist roaders seized control of the means of production of fire that the proletariat was chained to the hunter/gatherer dialectic, thus ensuring the domination of the ruling class as the workers were engaged in the struggle for survival as the yellow dog ruling class enjoyed the fruits of their labor. Obama told me so.

[cathyf]

One thing is for sure, though. The first person who figured out how to eat an artichoke was REALLY hungry!

[Original MikeS]

I don't know what was invented first. My guess would be throwing stones, then stone tools, then spears, then fire, then cooking. Of all these I think the spear was most important. A man with a spear moves from somewhere below the middle of the food chain up to the very top. So, suddenly every other creature became food for man.

[PD]

I've always thought raw food was vastly overrated. Now I know why.

[Thomas Collins]

The so-called theory of evolution, as it usually plays out in the popular literature, is a trust cue. If one "believes" (an interesting term for a supposed scientific concept) in evolution, one is marked as fit for polite company. If one questions evolution, one is branded a yahoo by polite society.

The simple fact of the matter is that, when measured by the usual standard of mathematical precision that most folks deem science, the ability to predict changes in coding in a cell over time is at an early stage of development. That fact certainly doesn't mean that the theory of evolution is "wrong," it simply means that the scope of the inquiry is so vast that evolutionary biologists may never get to the point of precise mathematical measurement of the changes of coding frequency that evolutionary biologists theorize are responsible for what is observed in the fossil records (compare the physicists' measuring of a particle's position from its momentum and its momentum from its position for a more "evolved," shall we say, mathematical model). I am not in any way denigrating Mendel's work with peas or the work done with fruit flies and other work done in evolutionary biology. I am also not denigrating the scientific abilities of evolutionary biologists. I am simply stating that many of evolution's "proponents" ought to be a little more modest in discussing their hypotheses.

As for evolution vs. intelligent design, the most that can be said, and the most that anyone may ever be able to say from the point of view of natural science, is that there is no controlled experiment that has been devised that will resolve the question. However, saying that there is not a controlled experiment to address a question should in no way suggest that said question is unfit for human discussion.

[Jane]

Matt,

What is the mood there?

[bad]

At what point did they worry about whether or not they were fat...

[daddy]

Matt,

I think you need to slowly step away from the Kim Chee.

[peter]

How hungry do you think the first person to eat an oyster was? I mean, without tabasco, lemon juice, and horseradish.

[Lesley]

I recall reading in Alan Moorehead's "The Blue Nile" about a tribe in Ethiopia who carefully cut the hide of a living cow, took whatever portion of meat they wanted, and then replaced the hide over the open wound.

The funny thing is, I don't remember whether those clever Ethiopians cooked the meat or ate it raw afterwards.

[Boatbuilder]

TC-Very well said. I "believe" in evolution. I don't believe that it explains everything; or that it explains much of what its most enthusiastic believers claim. (I suppose that goes for almost any belief-oriented philosophy--i.e. religion).

Here's a question--why haven't other species evolved to develop the same or similar survival advantages that humans have? A dolphin with an opposable thumb, for example? (Am I just demonstrating my ignorance?)

[DrJ]

I am not in any way denigrating Mendel's work with peas

You do know that he fudged his data to make his theory work better, don't you?

[JM Hanes]

TC:

What I love are the explanations of human behavior that are based on the pseudo "science" of "evolutionary psychology."

[PaulL]

The paper claims "nothing less than a new theory of human evolution."

BS. My anthro prof lectured on much the same thing 20 years ago, but thankfully with a lot less flights of fancy. The effects of fire and diet on man have certainly not been overlooked.

[larry]

Bad-I wonder what the first thing they cooked that tasted like chicken happened to be?

Does this bear skin make my butt look big?

[PaulL]

Boatbuilder,

Why aren't we as good as chimpanzees, who have four opposable thumbs?

[Boatbuilder]

Paul--Ya got me. But I'm pretty sure we're way ahead of the chimps because they went with takeout and fast food, and never learned how to make a good risotto.

[JM Hanes]

PaulL:

It didn't seem like anything that remotely resembled news to me either, however interesting it might be.

I suddenly find myself remembering a decade old Time magazine cover which announced that science had finally proven that babies were, indeed, little human beings.

[PaulL]

Interesting, JM. Has TIME ever confirmed that babies start out really really small as fetuses?

[Barry Dauphin]

Huamns share 98% or so of genes in common with chimps. On the one hand, it shows how much like us chimps are. On the other hand it's one hell of a 2%.

[JM Hanes]

I couldn't say PaulL, because I think it was right about then that I stopped reading Time. I had the scoop on babies pretty much figured out as a mother already.

[daddy]

I hate Typepad's guts.

[daddy]

I hate Typepad's guts.

[Strawman Cometh]

"carefully cut the hide of a living cow"
I heard it as a "special pig"

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Here's a question I always wanted to ask the Darwinists--how did the first man look at wheat and see bread?

I'm completely at a loss how this has anything to do with Darwinism, but ground grain+water+heat will be something we'd call bread. Puffy bread, you have to wait a little while so yeast gets started.

[daddy]

Instapundit linked this">http://althouse.blogspot.com/2009/05/mary-roach-says-lot-of-surprising.html">this story yesterday from Ann Althouse showing that Fetuses in the womb masturbate, so I guess that proves they're fully human. And did I mention lately that I hate TypePad?

[Strawman Cometh]

"You do know that he fudged his data"
Mendel may have had a minor case of confirmation bias, but his experiments were reproduced. His transgressions, if any, do not rise to the level of fraud as Mann, Hansen, et al.

[Thomas Collins]

DrJ, I am aware of that, but I am not facile enough in the math to figure out the probabilitiy that genetic drift (I think that's the term, although my bio ended at introductory genetics) should have resulted in a different proportion of types of peas appearing over generations from what was reported by Mendel.

Boatbuilder, what coding changes in the cell result from what environmental factors (so that features such as opposable thumbs and the ability to body slam in World Wide Wrestling develop) is a subject on which I can't claim expertise. Are any JOMers aware of any attempts to quantify these adaptations over time?

JM Hanes, I'm sure that evolutinary psychologists are thoughtful folks, and speculation is certainly one of the elements of scientific inquiry, but I agree that some of the evolutionary psychology thinking does resemble flights of fancy.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

As for evolution vs. intelligent design, the most that can be said, and the most that anyone may ever be able to say from the point of view of natural science, is that there is no controlled experiment that has been devised that will resolve the question. However, saying that there is not a controlled experiment to address a question should in no way suggest that said question is unfit for human discussion.

I don't think that's quite true: since, clearly, we can't construct an experiment that would either confirm, or disprove, the existence of a designer who didn't want to be confirmed, I'd say it's something that can't be discussed scientifically.

We clearly can discuss it, though, since we just have.

[DrJ]

his experiments were reproduced. His transgressions, if any, do not rise to the level of fraud as Mann, Hansen, et al.

I claimed no fraud, but the modern replicates were unable to achieve his results. For a good reason: the genetics were more complicated than he let on.

[JM Hanes]

TC:

Evolutionary psychologists have got to be "thoughtful folks" by definition, since their work consists almost entirely of speculation based on reverse engineered assumptions. It doesn't just resemble flights of fancy.

[bad]

Be Gone

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Are any JOMers aware of any attempts to quantify these adaptations over time?

TC, look into cladist taxonomy. There actually is a very tight — not completely without holes, but tight — organization of speciation as a taxonometric tree based on genetic differences.

[bad]

LOL Larry

[boris]

Seems like a good opportunity to reprise a joke:

So anyway a blank slate psychologist and an evolutionary psychologist were having lunch at the university cafeteria. As the blank slate psych paged through the latest issue of “Blank Slate” he said “Hmmm it seems a new study has determined that men tend to marry women with a greater than chance similarity to their own mothers. Clearly the nurturing and care provided in infancy caused the young males to imprint on a template provided by maternal example as the ideal woman which affects their perception of similar women later in life. Perhaps by evoking an emotional response harkening back to the comfort of the womb and later the experience of nourishment at her breast.”

To which the evolution psych responds “Crikey mate are you on acid ??? A lotta boys just inherit their dad’s taste in women. Say are you going to finish those fries ?”

[PD]

Never thought I'd see a thread here that might lead into discussion of synapomorphy.

[PeterUK]

Yoiu have Clarice Feldman commenting here for how long and you just noticed?

[Crimso]

"compare the physicists' measuring of a particle's position from its momentum and its momentum from its position for a more "evolved," shall we say, mathematical model"

Resulting in (or from) a branch of physics that will confound your brain to the point of wishing your ancestors had never discovered cooking, and that all of that extra brain energy was still being used on digestion.

[Daddy]

TM,

I am glad to know that it is Cooking That Made Us Human. That is a big load off, because this week Professor Grandin tells
us in her book that that Animals Make Us Human, and last week Professor Shepard told me in his book that Animals Made Us Human.
I was sort of Okay with the animal theory as long as it was puppy dogs making us human and not kitty-cats, but at least it was better than Professor Bickerton's
unglamorous theory that Language Made Us Human.
Bickerton's book though was at least sexier than Gribbin's Theory, How Climate Change Made Us Human,
though not near as sexy as Miller's Theory that run amuck Sexual Choice Made Us Human.

Anyhow, now that it has been determined to be Cooking that Made Us Human, this is not just a big relief to me but must also be a big relief to Professors Tattersall, Leakey, Lewin, and Gridley, all of whom have recently written books titled some variety of "What Made Us Human?" after wonderingly staring at the monkey in the mirror.
And at least, so far, none of them suggested Art or Music or Arithmetic which
are only responsible, (if you believe book titles), for creating the world or the universe, not for making us human.

I am sorry though to say goodbye to the Puppy Dog theory as, like Elvis, I am partial to Hound Dog's. So let
me ask you TM, does your book say that we cooked and ate puppy dogs? If so, then the animal theory might still apply.
Better yet, if your book says that we used the Puppy Dog to help catch and cook whatever we ate, then both theories
could still be true. And then we probably had to say something to Fido like "Sic
'em boy", which would make the Language theory true also. And if we spiced that up a little bit by by saying, "Sic 'em
Fido, 'cause momma needs a new pair of fur-lined crotchless panties in this climate changing environment", then all the theories in those "What Made Us Human" books might still be true, and all rolled
up into one hedonistic Neanderthal Bar-B-Que!

I'm excited about this idea. It's fun to be out there on the cutting edge. Reminds me of Mark Twain's quote about science:

"There is something fascinating about science. One gets such wholesale returns of conjecture out of such a
trifling investment of fact."

[Thomas Collins]

Thanks for the link, CHACO, to the discussion regarding the use of modern molecular biology on taxonomy.

OK, now, here's a challenge for the mathematicians, natural scientists, theologians, soothsayers and other flora and fauna of the JOM cosmos. Has anyone been able to devise a method to predict which one of TM's posts will stay on topic largely throughout the post, which ones will develop one or more OTs, some or all of which may overwhelm the topic of the TM post, and which ones stay on the general topic but stray from the specific subject (for example, this one seems to remain generally on aspects of evolution but doesn't necessarily stick to cooking vs. eating raw food). I am always amazed how the threads evolve in different manners.

[maryrose]

TC:
Any Scooter Libby post always stayed on topic'

[boris]

"Has anyone been able to devise a method to predict ..."

Many deterministic systems can not be predicted because the underlying mechanisms are chaotic in nature. Climate, evolution, and blog posts are prime examples.

[PD]

Wow. Daddy's practicing his narciso-style carriage returns.

[Extraneus]

Yes, but you have to admit his "Sic 'em Fido, 'cause momma needs a new pair of fur-lined crotchless panties in this climate changing environment" theory does hold water.

[Original MikeS]

Seems to me that early men were constantly experimenting and engineering. They spent a lot of time playing with fire, banging rocks together, and messin' with their food.

Was that because of the barbecue?

[PD]

Of course. The search for a better barbeque is a significant spur to technological development.

[bad]

Extraneous!! ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

[Original MikeS]

The search for a better barbeque

I suspect that was the major recruitment tool of the Roman Legions. "We'll pillage a few towns, grab some local girls and have barbeque."

[Original MikeS]

The search for a better barbeque

I suspect that was the major recruitment tool of the Roman Legions. "We'll pillage a few towns, grab some local girls and have barbeque."

[Original MikeS]

The search for a better barbeque

I suspect that was the major recruitment tool of the Roman Legions. "We'll pillage a few towns, grab some local girls and have barbeque."

[Original MikeS]

Whoa. All I did was click the perv view. There was a sound like a freight train and ...

[PD]

perv view? Please, this is a family blog.

[JM Hanes]

daddy:

LOL! You and the mixed metaphor crowd have provided no end of welcome entertainment today.

Twain sums up nicely I think, although when it comes to puppies, I believe even TM would defer to Glenn Reynolds!

[Crimso]

"Was that because of the barbecue?"

They probably invented George Dickel first, thereby explaining their subsequent behavior.

[JM Hanes]

boris:

...and I got a kick out of your joke too!

[Laura]

Daddy,
that was one heck of a riff. Best laugh I've had all day, probably closer to a month.

[JM Hanes]

Whoa. All I did was click the perv view. There was a sound like a freight train and ..

and? and? ... you found yourself hurtling backward in time while all of human history passed before your eyes until you reached the very moment when prehistoric fuse ignited primal barbie for the first time and ...

[bad]

perv views, crotchless panties, and lectures in orgasms.....

I ♥ JOM

[narciso]

let me guess; "Altered States; the Gourmet edition" The question I would ask is what drove us to cook the food, if our higher order faculties were so undeveloped. Can't be instinct.

[bad]

Forest fire, narciso

[Jim Rhoads a/k/a vjnjagvet]

I've always wondered what the point is of crotchless panties. It just seems like it's easier to go without the panties in the first place. And probably more comfortable. But then, I've never tried them.

I know if anyone has the answer, it will be a JOMer.

[comatus]

"how did the first man look at wheat and see bread?"

According to the work of Dr. Solomon Katz at the University of Pennsylvania, he didn't. He saw beer. Bread (with agriculture, storage vessels, walled cities, microbiology, and yes barbecue) are sort of by-products.

But you still gotta answer me this: why is what in Germany called a braumeister, in England called an alewife? Because I think these cultural-evolution types, going back a couple of centuries now, are the same kind of guys who used to go out in the garage to smoke a pipe and do woodworking: they're trying to fantasize a life away from women. Step One in every one of their Make Us Human tales involves ejecting women from the hunt and leaving her with the kids. They make some pretty elaborate theories to show why this must have been so, yet neither early skeletal remains nor genetic evidence bears it out. Their little specialty is quite a--how does one say it?--sausage fest. I think they say precious little (emphasis on "precious") about human origins, and an awful lot about their own, er, childhood.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Never thought I'd see a thread here that might lead into discussion of synapomorphy.

Or even the chance to use the word.

(Okay, I admit it, I had to look it up.)

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Has anyone been able to devise a method to predict which one of TM's posts will stay on topic largely throughout the post, which ones will develop one or more OTs, some or all of which may overwhelm the topic of the TM post, and which ones stay on the general topic but stray from the specific subject (for example, this one seems to remain generally on aspects of evolution but doesn't necessarily stick to cooking vs. eating raw food). I am always amazed how the threads evolve in different manners.

I suspect that the probability of post n+1 differing in topic from post n is exponentially distributed with λ small. So instead of brownian motion, you have an appearance of phase change.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

perv view? Please, this is a family blog.

Yeah, you should be ashamed of yourself.

(Link?)

[Charlie (Colorado)]

perv views, crotchless panties, and lectures in orgasms.....

Come again?

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Step One in every one of their Make Us Human tales involves ejecting women from the hunt and leaving her with the kids.

Do you know any women? Or kids?

There is an interval in which the women are tied tightly to the kids during nursing, which goes on for quite a while. I'm honestly not aware of any hunter-gatherer societies who don't separate the tasks that way, and I know I've read things on Neanderthals suggesting, based on archeology, that they took it even farther, with fairly separate male and female bands, and occasional frat parties.

[JM Hanes]

"Has anyone been able to devise a method to predict which one of TM's posts will stay on topic..."

Strikes me as about as hopeless a task as trying to estimate with any certainty just how much salad you need to make for a dinner party.

[daddy]

"Step One in every one of their Make Us Human tales involves ejecting women from the hunt and leaving her with the kids."

I am very reticent to recommend books about such nutty, touchy topics, but for an alternate view focusing on the Female role as a driver in human evolution, may l cautiously suggest The">http://www.amazon.com/Descent-Woman-Classic-Study-Evolution/dp/0285627007/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1243490349&sr=8-2">The Descent of Woman by Brit Science writer, Elaine Morgan. I have tons of time to read and am not a fiction guy, so I wind up reading bunches of these very forgettable Pop-Science books as they come along. Morgan is dated, but writes very well and is fun, and what I especially enjoy about her is her poking holes in the dominant theories of the African Savanah Male as the driver of evolution. She herself is an Aquatic Ape Disciple, so now I feel as if I've confessed to a murder simply by mentioning her, but I truly enjoy how Daniel">http://www.amazon.com/Darwins-Dangerous-Idea-Evolution-Meanings/dp/068482471X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1243491394&sr=1-1">Daniel Dennett, big Evo-Biologist & Atheist Philosophy Prof, and Richard Dawkin's colleague, loves her Aquatic Idea, and a few times in his books mention how when he brings her idea up to the heavy hitters like Dawkins or his arch-rival, the late Stephen. J. Gould, etc, that none of them know how to refute her arguments and they don't even want to engage in the discussion. This I find hilarious, so all that being said, if you're stuck at the beach and sick of Clive Cussler, etc, perhaps take a stab at Elaine. Her very short The">http://www.amazon.com/Scars-Evolution-Elaine-Morgan/dp/0285629964/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1243491994&sr=1-1">The Scars of Evolution is quick and a very fun read, and probably the one you would feel the least like wringing my neck about after having wasted a couple valuable poolside hours.

[PeterUK]

When Ug come back from the hunt he finds Mrs Ug wearing a full mink outfit,hat coat and shoes.
"Where did you get those",asked Mr Ug ,suspiciously.

"Off the Ogs at number",she raised her hand and pointed to her little finger."They are infested with the things"
"Yes but why would they give that"Said Ug
"well you remember all those little things I made out of chicken bones,the ones you said were useless and I may as well put them round my neck on a thin bi of leather? Well I did".
Women had invented shopping.

[sbw]

I find as little compelling in extreme, preachy feminism as I do in extreme, preachy masculinism. Rather, I find the anger in both to be alternately pathetic and funny.

Each gets in the way of today.

[bad]

Crotchless panties had a very practical use when women wore long dresses with many layers, stockings and petticoats, etc. Crotchless panties allowed them to relieve themselves without partially undressing.

I forget where I learned that...

[Original MikeS]

...when prehistoric fuse ignited primal barbie for the first time and ...

Yes. Yes. Don't stop...

[matt]

if you had to use bombsight toilets, crotchless panties would be quite in order for both males and females.I am finding this here in China.

As to the mood, no one knows. The Party tells you what your mood will be. I did get to watch the coolest propaganda movie at 0400 hrs. Comrade Wang was the best potato masher thrower, and got it in the basket the first time. He then used his kung fu grip in the hand to hand competition and counseled the other good commies on their rededication to Marxist Leninist principles and Maoist correct thought.

The comrade Lieutenant, who was drifting towards capitalist roadism, realized his error and threw himself on the evil grenade thrown by the running dog imperialists. Everyone sang the East is Red and marched over the bodies of the pointy headed capitalists. Obama had a walk on.

[matt]

the first barbeque was probably when a lightning bolt hit a mastodon or saber tooth tiger..same with the origins of fire is my guess. The origins of burnt fingertips came next.

BTW, saw Nancy Pelosi's 737 on the ground at Beijing this afternoon.Unfortunately, I couldn't get out of my plane and let the air out of her tires.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Dammit, it seems like everyone gets to go to China but me.

[comatus]

CharlieColo, the current theorizing seems to run that Neanderthal women did hunt with the men, and in that lay their downfall. And that's just the sort of ghey proto-Victorian allboy theorizing that makes anthropology an amusing read. I belong to a hunting family and teach other people's children how to shoot and hunt, so fie on your implications and your frat parties. When you "leave" the children and women "behind," you get a different kind of children. And women. And men.

My son is your state rifle champion. No, literally.

[bad]

Congratulations to your son, comatus. Way to go.

[Jim Rhoads a/k/a vjnjagvet]

bad, I knew I could count on you. And you came through again. But why wear panties at all under those circumstances?

[georg felis]

Does this the Tofu and bean sprout eating leftists will eventually de-evolve back into prehistoric slime?

I'm Hoping for a Change.

[bad]

Jim, I can't remember all of the details or where I learned what little I recall, but it was presented by a proper lady historian. Mr. bad and I behaved beautifully ....until we were alone. Then we hooted and howled and discussed numerous possibilities.

[Josh, Great Chefs]

@ cathyf

How about the first person to eat Lobster? How do you hold that up to your face and think you could bite into that?

Probably had to smash it against the rocks a few times back when they first discovered it...

[bad]

Okay, huge correction here. Mr. bad reminds me we learned about split crotch panties, not the afore-mentioned crotchless panties.

[cathyf]

Yeah, right, that's the sort of detail he would keep track of, eh?

[andycanuck]

Don't go, Tom! Don't go! It's a cookbook! It's a cookbook!

[matt]

I was told the Emperor Chin, who united China, had slaves whose sole jobs were to try new foods. Here, Wang, try this, as they shoveled a pickled aardvark nose down his throat. If the subject survived, they put it on the menu.