The Evolution of Man | 287 



great lack of reasoning power but because of some other factor that 

 inhibited the development of speech or the regular utilization of 

 tools, or the reduction of inter-male aggressiveness. The "invention" 

 of rudimentary culture started a selective trend that led eventually 

 to man's large brain; the large brain did not just mysteriously de- 

 velop and then discover culture. 



Cultural and biological evolution cannot proceed independently. 

 Indeed, from the very beginning of culture, man's evolution has 

 been characterized by the interactions of biological and cultural 

 evolution. The existence of culture put a selective premium on cer- 

 tain types of brains; the evolution of the brain permitted an expan- 

 sion and enrichment of the culture. Such interactions were certainly 

 very important during the transition period from the Australopithe- 

 cines to Homo sapiens, but they are still very much with us. Before 

 going further into such interactions, however, we shall consider 

 some characteristics of culture and some features of cultural evo- 

 lution. 



One of the outstanding characteristics of human cultures is their 

 tremendous diversity. Human beings speak some 2,800 different 

 languages, describe their genetic relationships with each other with 

 myriad complex kinship systems, believe in a great diversity of gods 

 and spirits, are organized into groups which practice every degree 

 and kind of governmental control, and fill their everyday lives with 

 galaxies of taboos concerning everything from forms of salutation to 

 shapes of wine glasses. This cultural diversity is by no means super- 

 ficial; indeed, people of different cultures often have very basically 

 different world views. This difference is frequently reflected in the 

 language of a culture, and in a very real sense, as discussed in Chap. 

 13, the language creates the world view. 



Language differences are among the most important of all cul- 

 tural isolating mechanisms. Communication of information about 

 complex phenomena may be exceedingly difficult within a culture 

 (as almost any teacher will gladly testify), but between cultures 

 with widely different languages the problems are immense. The 

 reader is invited to contemplate the difficulties of explaining even a 

 simple word such as "also" to an Eskimo if there are no dictionaries, 

 a shared third language, or even the certain knowledge that an 

 equivalent concept exists in his mind. The intricate and highly 

 developed language of the Eskimos does not have a structure con- 

 gruent with that of our language. 



In spite of their great diversity, however, many similarities may 

 be observed among cultures. Some form of religious belief is virtu- 

 ally universal. It has been suggested that these beliefs are based on 



