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[MUSIC]

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In the

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previous

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lesson, we saw

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that for more than 2 million years, earth
was populated by a number of human

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species, not just by one.
We also saw that all these human species

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were unimportant animals with only a small
impact on the ecosystem around them.

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Then about 70,000 years ago, something
changed.

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One particular human specie, our specie,
Homo sapiens, spread out of East Africa.

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Settled the entire world.

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Drove to extinction all the other human
species, and became the most powerful

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animal and most important animal on planet
earth.

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How did this happen?

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What is the sapiens secret of success?

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It is not easy to answer this

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question because Homo Sapians has actually
been around for

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much more than just 70,000 years and
previous

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to that date, it didn't do anything
special.

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Sapians living

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in East Africa, say about a 100,000 years
ago.

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Already looked just like us.

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They had bodies similar to ours.

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If you put them in jeans and t-shirts you

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couldn't tell the difference between them
and modern people.

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And if you took a dead body of a sapiens
from about one hundred thousand years ago

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and you gave a modern doctor, a modern anatomist to
dissect and analysis and

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look inside, look in it.

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He couldn't tell that there was anything
different between

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[UNKNOWN]

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bodies and our bodies.
Even the brains of people a

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100,000 years ago were the same as ours in
both size and

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external shape.
Yet, these archaic sapiens from a 100 to

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120,000 years ago, they did not produce.
Any

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sophisticated tool.
They did not accomplish any special feats.

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And they did not enjoy any marked
advantage over the other human

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species around like the Neanderthals or
the Erectus or a Homo Denisova.

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In fact, when some ancient sapiens
migrated for

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the first time to the Middle East about
100,000

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years ago, they were driven back by the
Neanderthals

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who were the local population in the
Middle East

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we have evidence.

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We found the remains of sapiens in various
sites in Middle East

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mainly around what is today Israel and
Palestine, and Jordan, and Lebanon.

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We have evidence that sapiens actually
reached for this, for the first

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time these areas about a 100,000 years ago
and not 70,000 years ago.

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And after some time the remains of the
sapiens

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disappear And we find, and we continue to
find only Neanderthal remains.

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So these leads most scholars to agree that
sapiens made the

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first attempt to migrate from East
Africa to towards

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the Middle East, about a 100,000 years ago
and during that first encounter

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between sapiens and Neanderthals, the
Neanderthals were better.

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They were more powerful, they were more
adaptive

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to the environment and they won.

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And the sapiens disappeared from the
Middle

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East and stayed only in East Africa.

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However, 30,000 years later, which is
about 70,000 years ago, something amazing

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happened to Homo sapiens and it then began
doing very special things not only

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in East Africa but spreading from there
and settling all over the world.

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The first amazing thing, the first
evidence we have, that something truly

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remarkable was happening to sapiens about
70,000 years ago is that,

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at that time, sapiens bands left Africa
for a second time.

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Not all the sapiens.

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Some sapiens stayed behind in East Africa.
But some sapiens bands

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around 70,000 years ago.

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Again, migrated from East Africa to the
Arabian Peninsula in the Middle East.

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And this time, they drove the Neanderthal
and all the other human species,

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not only for the Middle East but from the
face of the Earth.

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Droves them to complete extinction.

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Within a remarkably short time, sapiens
managed to settle not only

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the Middle East but also Europe, and

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Central Asia, and South Asia, and East
Asia.

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sapiens reached China and Korea about
60,000 years ago.

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About 45,000 years ago sapiens did
something even more remarkable.

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They crossed the open sea and landed in
Australia.

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A continent to which no previous human
species

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have managed to reach.
No, no previous species.

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No, no, no, not the Erectus, not the
Neanderthal.

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Nobody reached Australia until sapiens
landed on

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the Australian beach about 45,000 years
ago.

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Later on sapiens spread to another
continent which no previous human reached.

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Which is the continent of America.

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No previous human species reached America
before

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sapiens did it about 15,000 years ago, 15,
1, 5

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thousand years ago.
These were extraordinary achievements.

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because in order to reach Australia,
sapiens, they couldn't

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swim to Austrlia, they had to somehow
cross the ocean.

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And in order to reach America, sapiens
had first

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to find out how to survive in the very,
very cold arctic climate of

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Northern Siberia and Alaska, where
temperatures drop

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to minus 50 degrees Celsius in winter.

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Because this is how sapiens reached
America from Siberian Alaska.

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So in order to reach America, sapiens
coming from East

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Africa, first had to find out how you can
survive in

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Siberia and Alaska.
In order to settle all these places,

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Europe, Asia, Australia, America.
Sapiens had to adopt very, very quickly.

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Quickly in evolutionary terms, to
completely new ecological conditions.

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As you remember, sapiens evolved for the
first time in East Africa.

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And lived in East Africa

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for 100,00 or 200,000 years.
And sapiens were, was very well adapted to

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the warm climate of the African Savannah.
And to the other ecological conditions.

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To the animals of African savanna, to the
plants of

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African savanna, to the geography, to the
topography, and so fort.

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But once sapiens begins spreading over the
world, they had within a few thousand

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years To adapt themselves to complely new
conditons.

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The same sapiens, basically the same
sapiens, who lived for tens of

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thousands of years in East Africa,
suddenly you find them in Russia.

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You find them in India.

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You find them in New Guinea.

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And they had to adapt to living in the
very

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cold conditions of Russia or in the
jungles of New Guinea.

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Even though for hundreds of thousands

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of years, they have been adapting to the
very different conditions of East Africa.

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So, this is the first indication that
something truly amazing

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was happening to Homo sapiens beginning
about 70,000 years ago.

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And this is that sapiens suddenly spread.

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All over the world and not only spread all
over the world,

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but some how managed to adapt to
completely

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new ecological conditions within a very,
very short time.

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The second indication that something truly
amazing was happening to Homo

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sapiens about 70,000 years ago, was the
appearance of new technologies.

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one of the most important technologies to
appear, to start appearing around 70,000

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years ago is probably boats or other kinds
of sailing craft.

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As I mentioned earlier, around 45,000 or
50,000 years ago,

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sapiens for the first time, reached the
continent of Australia.

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Which no previous human specie has managed
to do.

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And it was a very, eh, eh, difficult thing
to

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do because in order to reach Australia
from Southeast Asia

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you some how had to cross the ocean and
it's

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a big, it's quite a big gap separating the
two.

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You couldn't swim there, even if you knew
that Australia is waiting for you.

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And how could you know that if you've
never been there?

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So most scholars estimate that around that
time

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45,000, 50,000 years ago.
Sapiens in Southeast Asia in what is today

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Indonesia, in the island of Indonesia.
They already developed some kind of

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sailing craft or boats or rafts and also
began developing a sea faring society.

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A society of people who were used to
sailing, to sailing on the sea.

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And this is how they reached Australia,
and later

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on reached other islands, like Japan and
Taiwan and

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so forth.

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So this was one very important invention
the boat or the sailing craft.

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Another very important invention, which we
begin to see in the,

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in archaeological record about 40, 50
thousand years ago is the needle.

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Now, this may not strike as you as a

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particularly revolutionary invention, the
needle, but the needle was actually

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one of the most important inventions in
the whole of, whole history of human kind.

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What was so important about needles.

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Well, well people were able to make all
kinds

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of, of cloth even before the invention of
the needle.

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Like Neanderthals, apparently also had
some kind of clothing.

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They killed a bear or they killed some,
some,

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and a deer and they took the skin or the

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fur and put it, put it on them to, to to
warm themselves This is something that

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previous human species could do.
But they could not sew things together.

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Because they didn't have needles and, and,
and it couldn't be done.

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Once sapiens invented needles, sapiens
were able to

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start sewing and making all kinds of, of
new things.

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New clothes especially thermal thermal
clothes.

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Which were made from layers of fur eh,
inter spaced with layers

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of skin sewn close together with the help
of needles, and

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they could start making all kinds of boots
and tents and, and things like this.

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And this was the key for the sapiens,
settlement of very cold

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areas like Siberia and Alaska.

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Even the Neanderthals were very well
adapted to living in ice age Europe.

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They were unable to move into Scandinavia
or into

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eh, Northern Siberia because it was too
cold for them.

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But sapiens was adapted to the hot
conditions of Africa

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did manage to settle Siberia because they
had the needle and

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they could sew these tents and boots and
thermal outfits and, and things like that.

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Another interesting invention that people
that sapiens

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probably made around that time is oil
lamps.

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small lamps made of stone or clay, in
which

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sapiens put the fat of animals that they
hunted.

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And then lighted it and they had a lamp.
And this is

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how they were able not only to crawl into

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all kinds of caves but also to produce
magnificent art.

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On the walls of the caves the famous cave
paintings.

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Well think about it, how could they, okay,

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they could crawl into caves even without
light.

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But, how to produce amazing pictures on
the walls.

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And what's the purpose of producing them
if you can't see them?

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Unless you have light.

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And these oil lamps, which arcahologists
have, have found the remains of,

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of a few of these oil lamps from 40,
50,000 years ago.

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Were the key to this artistic revolution.

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One of the keys to this artistic
revolution.

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aside from the invention of a new
technology.

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Like the oil lamp and the boat and the and
the needle.

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There were also, also constant development
of all technology.

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Like stone knives and spear points, and
hammers, and axes, and things like that.

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Previously, up to about 70,000 years ago

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we find that people, Neanderthals,
Erectus, were making,

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and also sapiens, were making exactly the

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same tools, exactly the same, say, spear
points

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for hundred of thousands of years without
change.

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From about 70,000 years ago onwards we
begin to see continuous change.

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In the technology of things like spear
points.

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Every few thousands of hundreds of years,
you have

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a new style of spear points or of knives.

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So this is another thing that, that

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happened, not only the invention of
completely

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new technolgy, but the continuous
improvement.

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Of all technology.

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During the same period, beginning 70,000
years ago.

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We also have the first evidence for art
and for jewelry.

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We find the first evidence for trade
between different bands.

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We'll speak about it later on.

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We find the first evidence for complex
societies.

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Societies comprising hundreds of people,
and not just dozens of people.

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And we find the first evidence of
religion.

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As an example look at this remarkable
ivory

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statue made by sapiens in Germany about
30,000 years ago.

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What do you see?
You see a lion man or lioness woman.

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It's, it's a bit difficult it would tell
the gender.

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But it's very clear that the body of
whatever is depicted in the statue.

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The body is human.

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Whereas the head is the head of a lion or
a lioness.

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This is one of the earliest pieces of
evidence.

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Not only for art, but also for the ability
of sapiens to imagine things that don't

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really exist.

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There weren't any lion man alive in
Germany about 30,000 years ago.

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There was nowhere that the artists who
have made

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this statue could have seen a lion man.

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Lion men only existed only in the fertile
imagination of sapiens.

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How to account for this wave of invention,
new inventions and

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changes, and technological revolutions.

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How to account for the sudden appearance
of art and religion and

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the new political structures and perhaps,
above all, how to account for the

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quick spreading of sapiens over the entire
world, the extinctions of the other

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human species and the settlement of new
territories like Australia and America.

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Well, most scholars believe

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that all these achievements were the
result

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of a revolution in sapiens' cognitive
abilities.

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What are the cognitive abilities?

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Well, cognitive abilities are the
abilities to

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communicate, to remember to learn, to
think.

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These are all the cognitive abilities.
It seems that sapiens who lived

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100,000 years ago in East Africa, they may
have looked exactly like us.

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And they may have had brains the same size
and shape external shape as our brains

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but they had very different, more limited,
cognitive abilities.

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They could not talk and think

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like you and me.

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They, they talk and they thought in some
way but in

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a much more restricted and less
sophisticated way than you and me.

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In contrast the people who drove the
Neanderthals to extinction

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about 30,000 years ago, the people who
settled the continent

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of Australia for the first time, and the
people who

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calmed the Stael lion man, already
talked and thought like

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you and me.

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They did not talk and think in English,
they had their own language but

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in, in the basic abilities of thinking and
talking, they were like you and me.

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The disappearance of new ways of talking
and thinking, between about 70,000 years

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ago and about 30,000 years ago, is called
the cognitive revolution.

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The first

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big revolution of history basically the
revolution that started history.

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Prior to the cognitive revolution humans
were no different from any other animal.

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They had biology and not history.

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History begins with the cognitive
revolution.

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Now how to explain this revolution.

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After all, there was as I said before,
there was no big change in the body

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of sapiens.

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there was not even any significant change
in the

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size or in the external shape of the
sapiens brain.

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So how to account for the fact that
without any any change that

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we can see in the body or the brain,
suddenly there appeared amazing

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new cognitive abilities.
Well, scholars, most scholars,

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believe that there must have been some
relatively small change.

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In the internal structure of the brain,
not in the size or external shape but in

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the internal structure of the brain that
led

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to all the big revolutions in sapiens'
abilities.

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Perhaps, this is just a theorist
speculation.

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We don't have any firm evidence, but it's
the best speculation we have.

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Perhaps there were some relative,
relatively

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small genetic mutation that caused two
parts

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of the brain, which were previously

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separate separated to connect to each
other.

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And this resulted in all the new amazing
cognitive abilities.

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Now, it's just a theory.

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We don't really know it for sure because
there are no

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frozen brains from 50,000 years ago and
100,000

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years ago that we can compare to each
other.

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But it's the best theory we have at the
present.

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If we accept this.

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That there was some small change in the
internal structure of the brain.

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how to account for it?

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Or more precisely, how to account for the

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fact that this, remarkable change happened
to sapiens.

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And not to Neanderthals or Denisovans or
some

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other human species or some other animal
species.

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As far as we know it was pure chance that,
that might well have been the result of

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some tiny biological reaction in sapiens
DNA that lead to the, to the mutation.

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And if this tiny biochemical a, a, a

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reaction did not take place, then human
may

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well have remained insignificant animals
to this day or

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the world today might have been governed
by Neanderthals.

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And the sapiens would've become extinct.

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So we don't really know, we don't have a
good answer why this

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change happened to sapiens and not to
Neanderthals.

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And also, we don't have a very clear
theory about what was the biological and

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the more logical factors that lead to the
whole cognitive change.

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But this is less important for our
purposes.

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What is very important for understanding
human history

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is to understand what exactly was the
change in sapiens cognitive abilities.

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What was so special about the new way in
which sapiens

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thought and talked?

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What was so special about the new sap,
sapiens language?

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This is what we will discuss throughout
all

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the next parts of the this entire lesson.

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We'll try to understand what is so special
about the way that we sapiens think and

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talk and how is it different from the

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way all other animals and Neanderthals and
chimpanzees

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think and talk.

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In other words, these, all the other
sections of this lesson will be

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dedicated to understanding what is so
special about our language.

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In order to answer this question.

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In the next segments, we will discuss not
only the world of the Stone

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Age but also the world today, which is
more familiar to most of you.

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In order again to understand what
is so special about our language that has

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made us the masters of the world

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[MUSIC]