Babylon Geek

A recent discovery indicates that the development of symbolic thinking in humans may be far older than previously thought, the BBC reported last week.

An animal bone found in a cave in northwest Bulgaria displays a number of parallel lines etched into its surface. Researchers who are investigating the cave insist that no practical action, such as butchering a carcass, can explain the marks.

"These lines were not from butchering; in this place (on the animal) there is nothing to cut. It can't be anything else than symbolism," [said] Dr Jean-Luc Guadelli, of the University of Bordeaux, France.

What makes that significant is that the bone was marked between 1.2 and 1.4 million years ago - while many researchers believe the capacity for true symbolic thinking arose only about 50,000 years ago. That makes the find quite controversial but also quite important if confirmed, since it would indicate that the ability for symbolic thinking, which underpins all of art, music, mathematics, and language, are older than believed and instead of emerging suddenly with Homo sapiens, likely developed in a different way.

Footnote: The dating was arrived by a technique called palaeomagnetism, which determines age via past reversals in the Earth's magnetic field, which can be detected in rocks.