ALAN ALDA: While the Neanderthals were clinging to their simple hand axes, our African ancestors were moving on to more complex tools.

I’m visiting the campus of Stony Brook University, where John Shea teaches a class he calls Primitive Technology.

Like most beginners here, my first attempt at stone-age technology certainly justifies the description “primitive.”

JOHN SHEA We find these primarily in sites with Neanderthals.

ALAN ALDA Neanderthals…I see… well fine!

ALAN ALDA (NARRATION) But as early as 100,000 years ago a very different stone-age technology starts to turn up in African archeological sites. It’s a multi-part throwing spear, complete with a finely crafted point, a wooden haft that has to be fashioned to accommodate the tip... and string made from plant fiber or, in this case, animal sinew.

JOHN SHEA In a real one we’d have a lot of glue in there. We’d have to use fire and pitch or something like this. If you can get this thing moving fast, fast enough to achieve a deep penetration, you can kill the animal without putting yourself at risk. And this is the origin of projectile technology. All this stuff builds up to a weapon that allows humans to use it against a target is far enough away that they face no threat of retaliation.

ALAN ALDA (NARRATION) Unlike a stone-age mammoth, a plastic Bambi doesn’t offer much of a threat of retaliation. So it’s a good target for me to practice on, using a spear thrower to improve both speed and accuracy.

JOHN SHEA There you go, OK you’ve annoyed it.

ALAN ALDA (NARRATION) John Shea argues that the complexity of a weapon system like this requires an inventiveness and resourcefulness that is a clear indication that the Human Spark is at work in those who made and used it.

ALAN ALDA Got it. Look over there!

JOHN SHEA How long have you been doing this? Four and a half minutes. With a little practice you should be able to put all your spears into this area right here. And that’s a good shot, that’s a heart and lung shot that will cause the animal to die quickly.

ALAN ALDA (NARRATION) The throwing spear is clearly an improvement over the hand axe, but an ice age mammoth would still have been a formidable target. Just like Randy White, John reasons that sophisticated technology alone would not have been enough.

ALAN ALDA I see why you need a whole tribe here. It takes a village.

JOHN SHEA It takes a village!

ALAN ALDA You think there’s anything about this particular tool that throws light on social interactions? I mean did this require more strategy or more cooperation?

JOHN SHEA Absolutely. A person hunting big dangerous animals by themselves with a weapon like this would be dead. This idea that you throw a spear and it hits the animal and drops dead, nonsense, it doesn’t work that way. A hunter who was using this sort of thing would have to work as part of a group, coordinated, they would have to decide who is going to shoot first, who is going to shoot next, what they’re going to do when the animal runs this way, when it runs that way. This kind of technology takes planning and cooperation. And planning and cooperation take language. There’s so many contingencies, I can’t imagine this technology functioning without the prior existence of language just like you and I are using right now.

ALAN ALDA (NARRATION) Language, of course, must be central to the Human Spark. But unlike stone tools or decorative beads, words evaporate, leaving behind nothing for archeologists to find. Still, if John is right in arguing that complex weapons like these throwing spears could only have been used effectively by people who could talk to each other, then we’re looking at some form of language as early as 100,000 to 150,000 years ago. That’s when these spearheads first started showing up in Africa.

JOHN SHEA My hunch, language was present when these weapons developed. And then there was a feedback process. Language enabled more complex use of these weapons and then the weapons maybe put people in a position where they had to discuss more complex things. You know they were hunting bigger and more dangerous animals. Then you’ve really got to decide what are you going to do if I miss and the animal decides to try and kill us all?

ALAN ALDA Yeah.

JOHN SHEA You don’t want to be around a pissed off mammoth.

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