Questions and Comments on Stone Tools

Contents:

• Steel Axes
• Technology and Evolution
• Miscellaneous

Steel Axes

What is one advantage of a stone axe over a steel axe?

Can modern technology be introduced to a group such as the Yir Yoront without causing such disruptive effects, and when is it desirable to do so? In other words, should governments take a role in helping their ethnic minority groups catch up" to the industrialized world, and how?

The introduction of the steel axes in the Yir yont society although well intentioned comes from a very ethnocentric perspective which ultimately led to the disintegration of the community. I would be curious to know as to what technology can be proposed to solve this issue.

Technology and Evolution

At the very beginning, the development of technology was accompanied with physical and social changes in a human being (development of speech, hunting; changes in different parts of the body - teeth, brain, hand, and etc). Do invention and development of the modern technologies have any effect on modern people/societies? Are there only social changes? How can we measure it?

Due to the modern advances of medicine, natural selection plays less of a role in the evolution of humans today, as its not just the fittest that survive. In the future as more advances in medicine and health care are made, I expect the role of natural selection to decrease even further. Do you believe modern man is close to the endpoint of its evolutionary progress (particularly physical characteristics)? If not, in what ways could man continue to evolve (other than in intelligence)?

Miscellaneous

We discussed this briefly the first week of class, and the substitute lecturer touched on it as well: Are tools used by animals technology, and if not what makes flint knapping technology? Is it the improvement of stone tools over time that sets it apart?