
The Children of Anaxagoras: Did hands make us human? - diodorus
https://www.laphamsquarterly.org/roundtable/children-anaxagoras
======
nopassrecover
Perhaps a tangent, but the article opens with a claim that the Indonesian rock
art is conclusively the oldest art of Homo sapiens, but strangely overlooks
the art of Indigenous Australians which is at least as old, and perhaps a
further 10,000 years older.

------
pmiller2
There’s a lot of fuzzy argumentation here. Hands undoubtedly make tool use
easier, but simple tool use has been observed in corvids and dolphins, but
there’s no sign of world domination by crows and aquatic mammals. Likewise,
monkeys and non-human apes have hands and have been observed using tools, but
they are certainly not human. Even raccoons have hands.

What makes us human is the combination of intelligence and tool use.

~~~
about_help
The more the brain is used the better it gets. I would look at this as a co-
evolutionary trait. Hands help brain, brain helps hand. Without hands it would
be hard for the brain to be useful. Maybe thats why octopuses are so smart,
they can manipulate their environment.

------
unit91
No.

> then the LORD God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into
> his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.
> _Genesis 2:7_

~~~
maaark
Really? Proselytizing on Hacker News of all places?

~~~
pavel_lishin
I'd wager that statistically, it's not more or less effective than standing in
the subway with a pamphlet in your hand.

