‘Genius in a Bottle’ Prompted Writing Challenge

The Edge of Civilisation

GiaB writing prompt #2–25

Photo by on

Our evolution
as a species, rested on
the edge of a blade.

Despite advanced limb dexterity and functionality, early humans are thought to have fed the way animals did prior to the invention of tools — by the sampling of edible material directly into the mouth.

600,000 years ago, the early human species experienced the last dramatic upward shift in brain size, which was representative of a higher number of neurons and a more complex network of connections. The resultant increase in contextual processing is believed to be behind a significant uptick in cognition, leading to more sophisticated behaviours, notably the employment of tools.

Paleoanthropologists have identified among the surge in tool usage, the presence of the earliest bladed edges, crafted from stones with a cryptocrystalline structure like flint, which chip in planes thereby providing a bladed edge where two planes meet obliquely. The most famed stone edge in human record is that of obsidian, the two planes of which meet at such a fine edge that obsidian blades are used to make scalpels for micro surgery, and are reputed to be capable of splitting an animal cell and…