Talk:Control of fire by early humans

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Robbins.clairem, Daleyhl. Peer reviewers: Surengunturu.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 18:25, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

what is the scholarly consensus here?

I did not have time to delve into this, but it seems the extreme positions are "1.4 to 1.8 Mya" on one hand, and "after 130 kya" on the other. These are certainly the termini post resp. ante quem, but what is the general consensus? It seems that there is "wide" support for controlled fire by about 0.5 to 0.8 Mya, but I am not sure. It is easy to cite all sorts of opinions, but it is much more difficult to work out the general gist of the opinions held by specialists. --dab (𒁳) 12:15, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

The first paragraph of "evidence" seems to cover the bases here, which you had a hand in making now. The original research that went into the creation of the article, at the time that I originally wrote it, suggested the 1.4 Ma as the earliest possible time that fire was utilized. I did not recall finding a specific time range accepted by anthropologists when writing this, and I no longer have access to journal databases.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 12:55, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

well, I think given the evidence, it would make more sense to classify the candidate sites by time period rather than by continent. The pre-1Mya sites in Africa and Asia, and they have a very similar (very low) confidence. The sites between 0.8 and 0.5 Mya seem to have a "reasonable" confidence, and then we should give a couple of sites from the Middle Paleolithic that are undisputed. Grouping this by continent or region, otoh, does nothing useful. --dab (𒁳) 13:42, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

I am sorry, what is this? This article relies heavily on James (1989). I have just looked at that article. Its entire point is, exactly as I had put it, that all evidence of the Middle and Low Pleistocene are very dubious and highly controversial. I have in fact put the article on its feet. As long as we quote James (1989), we'll have to represent the content of that article and not cherry-pick the claims the author discusses but leave out that he dismisses them. It is true that James (1989) is followed by a number of comments by other scholars that think his scepticism is overblown. If you want to make that point, kindly quote the authors that actually make that point. As far as I could see, nobody said James was outright wrong or mistaken, they just stated that "they feel" that James is being overly skeptical, without presenting any definite opinion of their own.

As I said, I have no opinion of my own here and I am merely trying to represent the references properly. However, no matter how misguided I may be on this, this edit summary establishes that you must be at least as misguided, as your claim flies direcltly in the face of the main source used for the article at present, James (1989). --dab (𒁳) 13:51, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry. I attempted to rewrite the article a bit, still using James' paper as the source which questions the earlier things but in a different tone. I wasn't aware that was against the rules. Read the paragraph again.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 21:54, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

this isn't about rules, it is about representing the sources we use properly. I am not throwing the wiki rulebook at you, I am merely trying to have the article adequately represent the skepticism for Lower Paleolithic control of fire that is also present in the sources cited.

Yes, there are claims for Lower Paleolithic control of fire. I am not sure on the status for the claims concerning 0.5 to 0.8 Mya. I am convinced that the claims concerning 1 to 1.8 Mya are highly speculative and have next to no support.

this is not a "consensus: yes or no?" question: Obviously there is a sliding scale of academic support from 0.1 Mya (undisputed, 100%) to 0.5 Mya (I don't know, 50%?) to 1 Mya (little support, say 10%?) to 2 Mya (0%, not claimed). --dab (𒁳) 12:28, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

ok, I have looked into this some more. Still only cursorily, so I do not claim to have a conclusive picture. But I have seen enough scholars calling anything before 0.5 Mya "sketchy" or "inconclusive" to ask you to stop using the indicative in Wikipedia's voice for any sites older than 0.5 Mya. Sorry, you cannot state

"At Koobi Fora, sites FxJjzoE and FxJj50 show evidence of control of fire by Homo erectus at 1.5 Ma BP"

in Wikipedia's voice. You cannot even say "according to James (1989)" here, which is the source used, because James cites this claim only to debunk it as unsubstantiated. James takes great care to say these sites show "evidence of fire", which is hardly the same as "evidence of controlled fire". If you want to cite a claim, make it explicit, as in

"Gowlett et al. (1981) claim controlled use of fire by Homo erectus 1.42 Mya at Chesowanja, Kenya. Isaac (1982) notes that the evidence for this claim is also consistent with uncontrolled bush fires.".

Ryulong, your tendency is clearly to exaggerate the evidence for early controlled fire. I won't pester you about the period 0.5 to 0.1 Mya, since my impression is that these have rather wide support, but I must insist that for anything preceding 0.5 Mya you stop using Wikipedia's voice for claims made by individual scholars and disputed by others. --dab (𒁳) 13:23, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

ok, re this, I have tried to do this in a spirit of collaboration, but you are clearly looking for an edit war. I have explained these tags here at great length. Stop using Wikipedia's voice for speculative claims that happened to appeal to you. Also, "James" isn't good enough as a reference. Kindly provide page numbers for the items you attribute to the article. Thanks. --dab (𒁳) 13:41, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm not trying to do anything. And I told you I don't have access to the article anymore. There is no neutrality issues. You are merely the one who thinks that any evidence on fire control from before half a million years ago is dubious. I have yet to see any new references added to this article to support any of the claims you are seeking to add to it.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 13:44, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

And let me remind you I wrote this article as an assignment for a university level course on human evolution. The sources I found were suitable at the time of writing. Obviously, more evidence would have come about but I did not go searching for it and I cannot go searching for it now. I do not know what you mean by "voice" but I am not trying to push any views here. I did research and I wrote this page up based on that research. Just because some of that resulted in claims from the Lower Paleo does not mean that I am trying to push this position. All I know is that the article is written neutrally and it is using as many references as I could find 2+ years ago.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 13:50, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

As of now, I do think the article is doing alright. Thanks. --dab (𒁳) 21:20, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

Just to let you all know, as professional anthropologist (admittedly, i mostly do geology currently, and the human history of fire was not my specialty) I'll tell you that within the anthropological community there's not as much controversy as y'all are getting into right here; you guys are more impassioned than most of us anthropologists about this subject. i have never heard any anthropologist (not to suggest there are none; this subject isn't talked about too much, just cause it's not a hot topic, no pun intended) use the terms "dubious" or "highly speculative" when discussing human control of fire prior to the proliferation of anatomically modern humans (about 150,000-200,000 years before present). The questions start to arise from the interpretation of the evidence that we have at hand, evidence that is highly suggestive, but not definitive, that humans or human species controlled fire ~2 million years ago. We have found charred bones (in naturally occurring fires [volcanoes, lightning strikes, forest fires]the carcasses of animals burned alive are either burnt to ashes or only partially burned [the bones being protected by flesh]; forest fires do not suddenly gutter themselves as soon as all the flesh is burned up and expose/char bones) +1 mya, but was it the work of humans? Was it the work of genus Homo? Were anatomically modern humans even around? Is there some other natural phenomenon that could fit the evidence? The evidence means little when in vacuum; evidence has to be combined with other evidence for us to interpret. There’s no controversy here, you’re looking at it from the wrong angle: it’s not that we have an argument that we are looking for evidence to prove (human control of fire +2 million years ago), it’s that we have some very tantalizing evidence that seems to suggest hominids have been in the pyro game for a few million years. The way this is presented in the article is pretty good, but if you want an insider’s opinion, I’d edit this article in a more collegiate manner removing the suggestion that there’s a real controversy (while leaving some of the dissenting opinions of skeptics), and terms that evidence older than 400,000 years is "sketchy" or "dismissed" out of hand, in fact of point there's no evidence to suggest hominids DIDN'T have control of fire +400,000years. The consensus is more like: this is a non-issue: we know/have confirmed/have strong evidence for 200,000 years and some very suggestive evidence for everything over +1.4 mya (those sherds are pretty convincing).--Joe volcano (talk) 22:45, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

well, that's more or less the gist of what we figured, isn't it? The real question is, can you provide us with a reference on all this more recent than James (1989)? --dab (𒁳) 21:22, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

Fire and nutrition

What evidence is there for the statement Cooked foods provide humans with proteins and carbohydrates ? All omnivorous mammals obtain proteins and carbohydrates (and fats) from their diet very successfully. If they didn't they wouldn't survive. What fire and thus cooking did was to break down physically tough protein and carbohydrate making the food easier to eat and digest and also much quicker to eat and digest (and probably tastier). It has been suggested (although I doubt I can find the reference) that freeing up time spent eating was one enabling factor for the development of the human brain and thus the principal key attribute of human-kind. The later paragraph on Changes to diet partially explores this and is inconsistent with the earlier sentence. I propose that this sentence is changed to reflect the proper impact of cooking on food and the later section expanded. Any objections?  Velela  ^{Velela Talk}   22:48, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

The discussion of diet in this article is out of date. Much recent work has shown the consumption of plant foods long before the dates given in this article for the use of fire. Just searching the internet for "ancient hominid diet" brings up many references to recent scientific articles. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jraudhi (talk • contribs) 22:40, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

Grave errors

There were significant errors in a recent series of sentences I was forced to delete. 1 such sentence claimed that cooking made meat more digestible. In fact, studies have shown the exact, showing that meat protein is rendered LESS digestible by cooking:-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raw_foodism#Potential_harmful_effects_of_cooked_foods_and_cooking

Then there was the claim that cooking kills all parasites; Toxoplasmosis is a parasite that is not so easily destroyed by cooking, given that 1/3 of the world's population has it.Loki0115 5th december

The sources provided in the article state the exact opposite of what you are proscribing. If you are trying to promote a raw food lifestyle, then you are most definitely violating WP:FRINGE. I have undone your edits, but kept the counterpoint section you added.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 20:39, 5 December 2010 (UTC)

I suppose I should have been much clearer re specifying exactly what the inherent problems were with the above sentences I deleted and why I had to add other stuff.Incidentally, I am not promoting a raw food lifestyle. I am simply making sure that the pro-cooking data is as competent and sicnetifically reliable as the info on raw foods. And the info criticising Wrangham actually comes from non-raw sources such as eminent scientists, including 1 palaeo website which is anti-raw in its beliefs, beyondveg.com. Just a moment, you claimed that the sources I gave state the exact opposite that I was proscribing. That's ridiculous. If you claim that, you cannot seriously have read those articles in full, as in them there is plenty of data on why(and I quote from those references) "most anthropologists" "many anthropologists" etc. view Wrangham as "just plain wrong" or describe Wrangham as a mere "chimp researcher" etc.

• edit* I have now reworked the refs. They should be fine, thogh 1 or 2 seemed to have gone dead for some reason, previously. They discuss Wrangham's notions and do indeed back the points made in the article.

Here are my points re the rest of the stuff:-

1) The sentence:- "Cooked foods provide humans with proteins and carbohydrates" in the 1st paragraph. This is a very stupid sentence since raw foods ALSO provide humans with proteins and carbohydrates too. So that sentence is meaningless and leads nowhere. The 1st reference which supposedly backs the claims in the 1st paragraph is seemingly about entirely different subjects like Malthus.If one is going to claim that cooked foods helped people survive in colder climates one should have a solid ref backing this statement up - after all, the indigenous Arctic tribes, such as the Nenets and the Inuit, all eat high proportions of raw meats in their diet, which seriously contradicts such a theory re common-sense.

2) This sentence is also wrong:- "that allowed humans to proliferate by cooking food, and by finding warmth and protection". For such an extreme claim, at the very least one would need a solid scientific reference stating that the numbers of humans actually increased after cooked food was introduced.So far, the only evidence, to my knowledge, is that population increase occurred only once the Neolithic era was reached, well after cooking was ever invented.

3) Then there are problems with the following paragraph:-

"The cooking of meat, as evident from burned and blackened mammal bones, makes the meats easier to eat and easier to attain the nutrition from proteins by making the meat itself easier to digest.[21][22] The amount of energy needed to digest cooked meat is less than raw meat, and cooking gelatinizes collagen and other connective tissues as well, "opens up tightly woven carbohydrate molecules for easier absorption."[22] Cooking also kills parasites and food poisoning bacteria."

OK, I obviously went over the top re the removal of the "cooking kills parasites and food poisoning bacteria" as the toxoplasma parasite can apparently be killed off at pretty high cooking temperatures. However, the rest of the paragraph is flawed. For one thing the claim that cooking meat makes the proteins in meat easier to digest. This is easily countered by studies showing that cooking meat actually makes proteins in meat LESS digestible not more:- "Another study has shown that meat heated for 10 minutes at 130 °C (266 °F), showed a 1.5% decrease in protein digestibility.[99] Similar heating of hake meat in the presence of potato starch, soy oil, and salt caused a 6% decrease in amino acid content.[100][101]"

Now, from what I understand re wikipedia rules is that if there are solid scientific references backing both sides of a debate, then one cannot have sentences like the above where it is stated as absolute fact that "cooking makes proteins in meat more digestible".Now, I happily grant that cooking makes a few foods more digestible(grains come to mind among others) but it would be inappropriate and unscientific to state as an absolute fact that cooking makes meats more digestible in light of contradicting scientific studies stating the exact opposite; I am not sure re wikipedia's policies in view of seemingly solid scientific data favouring both sides of an argument, but I would imagine that either wikipedia expects a rephrasing of the above quoted sentences to "some scientist(provide name) suggests that cooking may improve the digestion of protein in meats", followed by a sentence stating that " some other scientist(provide name) suggests, instead, that proteins in meat are made less digestible by cooking. Or perhaps, to avoid cluttering up numerous articles with endless unnecessary debate-points, wikipedia expects both view to be removed? Perhaps someone can tell me what the score is, here.

Will now fix the wrangham mentions. Loki0115 6Th december.

• Please don't use the "according to" or "some other scientist(provide name)" constructions. The average reader is not going to gain an understanding of the important points if names of researchers are sprinkled into the article. Wikipedia has wikireferences for a reason. Abductive (reasoning) 12:47, 6 December 2010 (UTC)
• When the sources are in conflict, it is best to look for secondary or tertiary sources that review the controversy. Are there such? Abductive (reasoning) 12:47, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

The way I see it this article is about control of fire by early humans. Data on when cooking roughly appeared is partially relevant(although control of fire, as opposed to cooking, is far more important a subject to cover in this article, of course). However, scientific justifications either for or against cooking, really have no place here, IMO, and belong only in the cooking or raw foodism sections. If it is, oddly, considered OK to include comments on why cooking is better, then it is only reasonable to allow similiar mainstream scientific data that proves the exact opposite, as the case re cooking improving foods has by no means been proven for it to be made a statement of fact.

As for "Abductive"'s points, well, Richard Wrangham's points are included, despite him being a solitary scientist, so why not others? As for the secondary/tertiary sources, there has been little research on the subject. There are some studies showing benefits for cooking(such as regards removing antinutrients in grains) and numerous studies showing negative effects of cooking(some of which show that cooking makes digestion of meats more difficult, not less), as shown in the link below re refs:-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raw_foodism#Potential_harmful_effects_of_cooked_foods_and_cooking

If we are to be honest, food-science is so new that no one can reasonably state that the pro-raw or pro-cooked argument has been proven to the fullest. Which is partially why I consider that paragraph on the negative effects of cooking to be misleading as it contained sentences which claimed to be absolute fact, when the argument is still out. Plus, there is the irrelevance of justifying cooking when this is not the cooking article but the control of fire by humans, quite a different subject altogether.Loki0115 6th december 2010

Please sign your comments properly. Also, Wrangham's points are included because they support the general topic of this page. Arguments against the role of cooking in human evolution don't quite fit here and only really serve to say "Wrangham might not be right". But it's been a while since I've done any actual research into the matter of anthropology like this.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 19:53, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

Also, Richard Wrangham has an article and researches the invention of cooking, so mentioning him inline is appropriate. It's naming researchers inline who don't have articles that I object to. Abductive (reasoning) 12:54, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

The trouble is that there is already ample scientific evidence to show that Wrangham is wrong. I gave that example from beyondveg.com, backed by scientific studies, which showed that Wrangham's theories re cooking leading to bigger brains was wrong, and then there are all those 1,000s of studies done on heat-created toxins in cooked foods, such as advanced glycation end products. So that makes Wrangham's claims decidedly "fringe" beliefs. More to the point, this article is NOT about cooking but about the control of fire, which is a quite different subject.It would not be NPOV to include Wrangham's writings but not also include plenty of data confirming opposing views to Wrangham's.--Loki0115 (talk) 13:11, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

A good point. But even so, we should focus on what fire did to contribute to human evolution. Not saying eating raw food was better.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 19:14, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

You are missing the point again. The article is about the control of fire, not about cooking. The cooking article should be the one with mention of specific detailed benefits/disadvantages of cooking, along with the raw foodism page. Control of fire means things like bringing warmth, fending off predators, a quite different subject altogether. As for the info re criticising Wrangham it comes from scientists who are not affiliated with raw foodists in any way, so is legitimate as it does not per se promote raw foodism, it merely helps debunk Wrangham's more extreme views re cooking.--Loki0115 (talk) 23:40, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

I could go along with just vague, general mentions of Wrangham's claims re cooking leading to bigger brains followed by criticism of wrangham by mainstream anthropologists. But specific claims re cooking specifically improving digestion of meats when other scientific studies show the exact opposite(that cooking reduces digestion of meats) would involve bias.

Also, like another poster previously pointed out, the sentence in the intro which states that cooking provides carbohydrates and proteins(""Cooked foods provide humans with proteins and carbohydrates"") is particularly idiotic as raw foods also contain carbohydrates and proteins. This sentence has to be removed or it will make this page a laughing-stock for scientists.--Loki0115 (talk) 23:41, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

Should be something like "easier to digest proteins and carbohydrates". And cooking is at least a use of fire.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 00:12, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

At best, cooking is only a secondary subject of the article and should only be mentioned in passing.

As for the claim that "cooking makes it easier to digest proteins and carbohydrates", it is also somewhat false and completely misleading. As I showed re providing numerous scientific references above, there are scientific studies showing that cooking actually makes proteins less digestible, not more, http://www.beyondveg.com/tu-j-l/raw-cooked/raw-cooked-2a.shtml

Now, judging from the link I just quoted, it would be perfectly acceptable to state that "cooking makes starches more digestible"(as that is a unanimous notion within scientific circles) but it would be totally false to state as absolute fact that "cooking makes proteins more digestible" as this is a statement that is easily falsified by a casual look at online studies which show the exact opposite. Allowing such vague, falsely generalised unscientific claims would make wikipedia look really bad. --Loki0115 (talk) 12:31, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

How did they do it?

A central issue of control of fire is the specific procedures early humans used to keep the fire burning long enough to benefit from it. These are some possibilities:

1. A nearby lightning strike started a brush fire and one person made preservation of that fire a daily ritual. But this would require a constant supply of dry wood and lightning tends to be accompanied by rain storms which would quench the fire and make the firewood wet. Did the fire preserver build a canopy above the fire and fire wood?

2. Did the fire preserver live at a time and place where lightning strikes were an almost daily occurance? If the preserved fire burned out, wait a few days and pick up a burning ember again and again.

3. Maybe attempts to rekindle an extinguished ember resulted in the "rubbing two sticks together" technique. I tried this (and failed) when I was young and used a strung bow to rotate one wood stick rapidly against a wood base. Easier said than done.

4. How did primative people kindle and control fire in recent centuries before modern fire-making methods were taught to them? Greensburger (talk) 21:16, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

None of this is relevant to the article. And there is no such thing as "primative people" in modernity. There are societies that do not conform with the world's urban centers, but that does not make them primitive.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 19:48, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

The fossil record provides evidence of early human control of fire, and paleoanthropologists have no doubt debated how those early humans did it, without the benefit of matches, sparks, and lighter fluid. Theories, artifacts, and conclusions from the paleoanthropologists would be a welcome addition to this article. Greensburger (talk) 02:21, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

The questions you are asking are not relevant to the subject of this article and as this page focuses on prehistoric control of fire by hominids that are not members of H. sapiens there is no way to answer any of your questions anyway. This page is about the evidence supporting when fire was first artificially created and how it affected the cultural evolution of the species. It is not about how fire was retained, who retained the fire, how fire was used in societies with surviving oral or written records, or how fire is maintained by non-industrialized societies. Please ask your questions elsewhere.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 02:51, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

The subject of this article "Control of fire by early humans" makes all of the reporting questions relevant:

Who were the early humans who first controlled fire?

What kind of fire control methods did they use?

When did they start controlling fire?

Where did fire control first flourish?

Why did they find it necessary to control fire?

How did they develop fire control methods and

How did they control fire? Greensburger (talk) 20:15, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Answered in the article, unimportant and impossible to determine from archaeological remains, answered in the article, answered in the article for the most part, impossible to answer, impossible to answer, impossible to answer. Why do you persist in asking questions about why and how for a species that existed before there was written word? While these are good questions, they cannot all be answered based on the current evidence and analysis by anthropologists. Unless you can find a scientific paper that answers the questions that I believe are impossible to answer, please stop focusing on them.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 20:17, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

I came to this article looking for answers to the questions Greensburger asked. Maybe there needs to be a different article? Thomas144 (talk) 03:40, 13 January 2013 (UTC)

There is no way to possibly know how it was done because there is no archaeological evidence to show the techniques at hand. This is simply a descriptive article of what we know in the present and what can be inferred.—Ryulong (琉竜) 09:12, 13 January 2013 (UTC)

How about including a section that explains that there are no theories about how humans first learned to control fire and that nobody ever thought about this? Or that fire was a gift from God. Or are there any hypotheses? None? Thomas144 (talk) 13:58, 8 February 2013 (UTC)

When archaeologists find evidence of prehistoric fire making, they probably noted nearby artifacts such as sticks with burned ends and stones with indentations for the sticks, that indicate how their owners made fire. This article needs input from archaeologists or their students. Greensburger (talk) 16:12, 8 February 2013 (UTC)

The sort of article I would like to see would be similar to the one about the origin of the moon. Surely there must be theories about how humans ( or any animal ) learned to control fire. Thomas144 (talk) 12:52, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

It's not something that can be determined. We only have evidence that it happened. None of the other questions posed by Greensburger or yourself can be adequately answered with modern techniques. Now stop rehashing this shit months later.—Ryulong (琉竜) 12:56, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

If indeed no scientist has ever formulated a hypothesis about how early hominids controlled fire, the article should say so. But pretending that it is fundamentally unknowable is unscientific. Evidence can always be found or reinterpreted. --176.7.56.18 (talk) 08:03, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

source quality?

One of the major cites in the beginning of the article comes from an interesting website (dieoff.org), but it doesn't seem to take a scholarly approach to the question of this article itself, which is human ancestor fire control, rather the dieoff.org articles are all about peak energy and civilization collapse risks. The Price article only mentions control of fire in passing with no intention of being used as a source for information about fire control. Surely there must be actual anthropologists that have published meta-analysis of fire control evidence to provide a more informative, scholarly, overview. Am I wrong that this would be an improvement? If not then I'll seek some out. 66.108.199.84 (talk) 18:46, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

The Dieoff.org site is being used because they have published a scientific paper which is what is being used as the source. It is only a mention in passing, but it serves the purpose for the time being.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 19:47, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Understood. However, the Price article is from 1995 and it cites a paper from 1986 in passing to support fire 400,000 years ago. I'm going to seek out more recent information that's focused on the subject of the article. 66.108.199.84 (talk) 17:53, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

There are definitely more contemporary publications. It was chosen for its ease of access.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 19:26, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Major Issues

I notice that there is a dud claim that cooking allowed humans to proliferate. There is no evidence that cooking allowed humans to increase in numbers or to enter cold climates. For example, most Artcic tribes eat a huge amount of raw meats in their diet, thus casting serious doubt on the notion that cooking allowed people to live in colder climates.Loki0115 (talk) 08:19, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

These "arctic tribes" you talk about are modern humans who don't use fire at all. This article is about H. erectus. Not H. sapiens sapiens.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 17:55, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, but that's incorrect. This article is abut control of fire by homo sapiens sapiens as well, not to mention the Neanderthals. After all, the data points out that the advent of the control of fire could be as recent as 200,000 years ago, well within the homo sapiens sapiens range.

Other obvious points:-

The 1 scientific reference given is extraordinarily unscientific, and some of the previous statements given did not even appear in the reference at all. For example, there was that claim on the wikipedia page that cooking allowed humans to proliferate, yet abundant evidence shows that the human population did not really begin to expand until the Neolithic era, remaining stable through the Palaeolithic era. The reference did state that humans proliferated once fossil fuels were introduced, but that has nothing whatsoever to do with cooking. Plus, the reference gave no scientific evidence to support the notion that control of fire allowed hominid expansion into colder climes. Indeed, some studies I know of re Neanderthals suggest that they were fully adapted to colder,Ice-Age climates before they ever discovered fire.Loki0115 (talk) 19:12, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

While that may be, it is contra to the subject of this article. This page is about the control of fire. We do not need to discuss what prehistoric humans such as Neanderthals or proto-Inuit or proto-Sami peoples did without fire because this page is about fire only. Whether or not raw food consumption existed is unrelated to the coverage of this page.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 19:21, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Also, as I stated many times, the publications were chosen for ease of access and for the coverage of the subject when the bulk of this was written in 2008. Some new things may have come about, the content you are suggesting we add has nothing, that I can tell, has nothing to do with the article. If your only issue is how the first paragraph is phrased, you are making a mountain out of a molehill. And it appears that from your editing history that you are trying to push a raw foods point of view. If that is the case, you should stop changing this article to downplay the fact that people have for hundreds of thousands of years used fire to cook their food.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 19:28, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

First of all, you have made some errors of assumption. I am not remotely against the notion of cooking having been invented hundreds of thousands of years ago, I accept that as scientific fact. All I was against was the incorrect statement on this wikipedia page that cooking allowed humans to "proliferate". The reference did not provide any proof of this, the text of the ref merely stated that humans proliferated in numbers once fossil fuels were discovered and used by humans. I had already read previous data off-line which suggested that the number of humans in palaeo times was relatively stable, so I wanted a ref to provide solid opposing scientific data.Same applies to any suggestion that cooking or fire allowed hominids to live more easily in Arctic areas - a solid scientific ref should be provided for that claim too. That's all.

Ah I see that you have actually changed the wording of the 1st paragraph so that those 2 points I made above have been addressed. I have no issue whatsoever with the resulting paragraph, now that it's been fixed/changed:-

"The control of fire by early humans was a turning point in the cultural aspect of human evolution that allowed humans to cook food and obtain warmth and protection. Making fire also allowed the expansion of human activity into the colder hours of the night, and provided protection from predators and insects." Loki0115 (talk) 22:02, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Re biased pro-cooking claims:-

Since Ryulong appears to have deleted, wholly unnecessarily, several needed deletions, here, in the wrangham cooking thread, a few refs etc. , are more such needed refs which debunk the notion that cooking makes meat easier to digest:-

http://www.beyondveg.com/tu-j-l/raw-cooked/raw-cooked-2a.shtml

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1897402

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/food.19870311007/abstract

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/food.19870311007/abstract

Loki0115 (talk) 06:33, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

Your claim of a "pro-cooking bias" are unfounded because this article is in part about cooking. There is no point to omit information on cooking or claim that raw food is better on this page because fire cooks food and cooking is an inherent aspect of almost all human cultures and this page is about how fire changed humanity. Fine, you can disagree with Wrangham, but that does not mean that you have the right to remove reliably sourced information about his ideas.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 22:37, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

There is some bias. I note that , previously, some worthwhile data I inserted was removed by you, until you appear to have found that it was actually factually correct and needed to be inserted, to avoid mistaken conclusions. Also, I did not insert pro-raw info at that other stage, I merely deleted biased pro-cooking info that was directly in contradiction of various scientific studies, showing the exact opposite. Stating something as incontrovertible fact when it is in obvious dispute is not in accordance to Wikipedia guidelines. Plus, I note that the pro-cooking refs were somewhat questionable, anyway.Loki0115 (talk) 06:46, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

You have yet to provide these contradictory scientific studies. And I guess the article does have a pro-cooking bias because fire cooks food and this page is about fire. If you have more contemporary sources, provide them, but removing information just because some members of the scientific community disagree with it is not going to improve this page.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 17:41, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

Actually, I already have provided those contradictory studies(re cooking making meat less digestible) a little further up. Here they are yet again, the 1st link talks about the 2 studies linked below:-

http://www.beyondveg.com/tu-j-l/raw-cooked/raw-cooked-2a.shtml

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1897402

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/food.19870311007/abstract

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/food.19870311007/abstract

More studies re cooking making foods less digestible:-

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9754405

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/6438285

Loki0115 (talk) 20:08, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

But can you tell me why discussing raw food has anything to do with prehistoric man's use of fire?—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 20:46, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

As should already be rather obvious, we are not discussing raw food, we are talking about the effect of cooking in food, re cooking making food more or less digestible. Incidentally, I have no problem with that first paragraph in the last section, as it is rather beyond dispute, and the 2nd paragraph is fair enough even if that theory is just guesswork at this stage and under some dispute in the scientific field, but that last paragraph is clearly biased in favour of Wrangham. The online reports on Wrangham often mention that "most other anthropologists" or "many anthropologists" view Wrangham's notions as unproven and just fringe beliefs, I even recall one or two online articles where Wrangham himself admits there is no solid evidence to back up his claims. Therefore giving undue weight to Wrangham's fringe views is inappropriate. Loki0115 (talk) 21:29, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

Wrangham discusses cooking, so it is what we discuss here. Whether or not he is write or wrong is not my goal to discover. The goal is a discussion of when Homo made their own fires, what they used it for, and how it affected the development of the genus.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 23:15, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

The fact is that Wrangham's views are fringe views, which is made clear in numerous online articles about him. Wikipedia insists that no "undue weight" is given to fringe views. So, if Wrangham's views are to be described, then the viewpoint of most of the other anthropologists in the field, who view Wrangham as being completely wrong, must also be included. Not doing so would lead to readers falsely concluding that Wrangham's view was a mainstream one. Loki0115 (talk) 23:50, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

Okay, if they are fringe views, why should we provide information that is contradictory to the content of the article and discuss eating raw food when we can instead find better sources concerning cooking?—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 00:11, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

The view of cooking being responsible for human evolution is in itself a fringe view, with wrangham being the "least worst" of the lot as regards providing evidence for that theory, as well as wrangham being the only truly notable proponent of that theory. So there are really no "better" sources concerning cooking and its supposed beneficial effect on evolution. Plus, as I have now made clear several times already, we are NOT remotely discussing eating raw food, we are solely talking about the benefits and disadvantages of eating cooked foods, which is an etirely different subject altogether. If you include data on the benefits of cooking re human evolution and digestion, then so as to avoid obvious bias and to maintain integrity of wikipedia- npov etc, you must also include data on how cooking affected human evolution in a negative way and how cooking harmed human digestion.Loki0115 (talk) 08:28, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

Brace

I just noticed a major error in that last paragraph. Loring Brace, is claimed to favour the idea that cooking led to bigger brains in the last 200,000 years. However, I came across a relevant paragraph in an interview of Wrangham which shows that Loring Brace is actually completely opposed to the notion that cooking led to bigger brains:-

"The problem with his idea: proof is slim that any human could control fire that far back. Other researchers believe cooking did not occur until perhaps only 500,000 years ago. Consistent signs of cooking came even later, when Neandertals were coping with an ice age. “They developed earth oven cookery,” says C. Loring Brace, an anthropologist at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. “And that only goes back a couple hundred thousand years.” He and others postulate that the introduction of energy-rich, softer animal products, not cooking, was what led to H. erectus’s bigger brain and smaller teeth." taken from:-

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=cooking-up-bigger-brains

Kindly remove the claim re Loring Brace, under the circumstances. I will, at a later stage, include mention of studies showing that cooking makes proteins in meat less digestible, in line with whatamidoing suggested. Loki0115 (talk) 21:46, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

I may have written it wrong, but Brace states that the cookware is too late in the line to affect brain development. I will rephrase it. And also, is that point about meat being less digestible important to the discussion of human control of fire, or are you just trying to find counterpoints to the discussion of cooking in relation to fire?—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 23:09, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

So far, the claims re cooking making proteins more digestible were stated as absolute fact, even though this is heavily disputed. Therefore it is necessary to provide data which shows that there is disagreement here to avoid readers drawing a false conclusion re the solidity of the data. Also, for obvious reasons, data on any claimed benefits of cooking clearly belong in the cooking section, not in this page, as control of fire is a more general subject. Plus, if you claim that mentioning the benefits of cooking is important to the issue of the control of fire, then, clearly, it is also perfectly valid to include similiar data on the disadvantages of cooking, how it led to malocclusion etc.Loki0115 (talk) 23:53, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

Loki0115 (talk) 23:45, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

Well, the article is supposed to be in part about cooking. Everything you have been suggesting is that we put focus on the consumption of raw foods and remove any information concerning Wrangham's cooking hypothesis. There should be a middle ground.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 00:11, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

Both of your above claims are incorrect, to put it mildly. As I stated before, I have not suggested writing about the consumption of raw foods, merely that if info on the benefits of cooking are provided, that info on the disadvantages of cooking should be provided as well, for balance. This per se has nothing to do with the consumption of raw foods, but everything to do with the effects of consumption of cooked foods. As for the Wrangham claim, again, I have never suggested removing all info concerning Wrangham's cooking hypothesis, I merely have made it clear that since Wrangham's views are repeatedly mentioned in online articles as being merely fringe views definitely not held by most other anthropologists, that the opposing mainstream view should be mentioned as well, in addition to Wrangham's claims. So far, a lot of undue weight has been given to Richard Wrangham on this and other pages, in some cases making it misguidedly seem as though Wrangham's views were incontrovertible facts, and this conflicts with wikipedia policy.Loki0115 (talk) 10:44, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

It just does not make sense to me to discuss the deleterious aspects of cooking on a page that's about the use of fire.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 20:44, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

Look, you are trying to make claims that cooking contributed to human evolution or made human lives easier re digestion etc. - fair enough. But then it is necessary, for balance reasons, to include info on how cooking hindered human evolution and made human lives more difficult re digestion etc. I mean, either cooking is considered part of the control of fire subject(in which case info on the positive and negative aspects of cooking must be included to avoid bias/undue weight) or it isn't considered part of that page, in which case all the pro-cooking and anti-cooking data should be removed altogether. To be quite honest, I tend to the latter view as the issue of the control of fire is a much larger subject than just cooking. Cooking already has its own wikipedia page(in which, incidentally, both the positive and negative aspects of cooking are extensively discussed). Control of fire should only really address things like the discovery of fire, the range in which it is said to have occurred, evidence thereof, how strong or shaky it is etc.whatamidoing seems to be of a different opinion, though, and wants both pro-cooking and anti-cooking data included.

Well, it seems I am away for a month. However, in some weeks, i will return to address a number of the glaring inconsistencies in the last part of the article.Loki0115 (talk) 21:45, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

But do you have anything that says it hindered human evolution, or do you just have information that cooking food doesn't make it easier to digest?—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 22:03, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

Of course, I do. Some scientists have shown data indicating that cooking led to malocclusion and other dental health problems in humans, for example.-

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn7035-human-dental-chaos-linked-to-evolution-of-cooking.html

I also have plentiful scientific info and studies showing how cooking has led to numerous human health problems as well as poor digestion of foods.

I will have to address this issue in a months time, though as I am now abroad.Loki0115 (talk) 08:20, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

As Ryulong points out, unless this material comes from research on human evolution, to add it would violate NOR. This article must be based on sources by researchers on the topic - physical anthropologists and archeologists for the most part. Slrubenstein | Talk 19:03, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Well, I'm back. I should add that the above article I mentioned refers to the viewpoints of 2 anthropologists , so is perfectly valid. I will add in mention of their viewpoints soon. What I find disturbing, though, is that Wrangham's claims re cooked food supposedly being more digestible than raw food are not valid for inclusion either - I mean, not only is that to do with food-science rather than evolution per se, but Wrangham is merely an anthropologist, not a food-scientist.Loki0115 (talk) 19:29, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Again, this article is in part about cooking. So it does not make sense to say "cooking bad, raw good".—Ryulong (竜龙) 19:44, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

This is not remotely valid an assumption. Either one should include data on how cooking is good and cooking is bad as regards human evolution, or one should not include any data at all on the benefits or disadvantages of cooking re evolution. To do other than that would inevitably involve a great deal of bias and seriously violate wikipedia guidelines. And, like I made clear a dozen times before(!), this is NOT an issue of cooked versus raw, but on the effects, positive or negative, of cooking on human evolution.Loki0115 (talk) 20:20, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

But do you have articles that put forward evidence that cooking negatively affected the path of human evolution? Or do you merely have raw foodist publications that say "cooking bad, raw good" and people who disagree with Wrangham's claims?—Ryulong (竜龙) 20:22, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes, of course. The article I previously cited comes from New Scientist magazine http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn7035-human-dental-chaos-linked-to-evolution-of-cooking.html , and New Scientist , of course, not a raw foodist publication, and the article covers evidence that cooking negatively affected human evolution. It also refers to a study by the anthropologist Peter Lucas who has written some books on the subject as well.Loki0115 (talk) 20:49, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

That's not a peer-reviewed publication.—Ryulong (竜龙) 22:31, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Irrelevant, really. The article comes from an eminent UK Science-oriented magazine, it refers to one of Peter Lucas' studies and there are various book-chapters by the same man in peer-reviewed books, and mentions the viewpoints of 2 anthropologists. Oh, here is a peer-reviewed thesis on human dentition in the Paleolithic, overall done By Ungar, but also with a chapter by Peter Lucas re the evolution of human dentition in the Palaeolithic era. Loki0115 (talk) 07:43, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

It's been incorporated.—Ryulong (竜龙) 07:56, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. I have added an extra point made by Lucas and others that cooking led to teeth growing smaller. Loki0115 (talk) 14:25, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Okay, but please indent your comments. Treat it like a threaded comment tree.—Ryulong (竜龙) 18:57, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

"Raw Food Not Enough to Feed Big Brains" source

Maybe it's just me, but the paper by Suzana Herculano-Houzel seems to contain some flawed reasoning.

Humans have more brain neurons than any other primate, about 86 billion, on average.

If a primate could consistently feed at the estimated limit of 10 h/d, it would still be limited to a body of 95.2 kg to afford a relative brain size of 2% (in which case, its brain would have 108 billion neurons).

• The calculations are based on 10 primate species, their average weight, number of neurons, estimated energy usage and observed feeding times. This resulted in a formula that gives the feeding time in function of weight and brain size.

For the four largest species, the observed and calculated times correspond quite well, although observed values are always lower than predicted. This is presented as somehow confirming the validity of the model.

However, looking at all ten species, there are two who have more neurons than the next (larger) primate on the list. They are also the two where the formula performs worst. For the common squirrel monkey the predicted value was 2.6 times the observed value (3h30m vs 1h20m), for the Tufted Capuchin the result was 1.4 times the observed value. As far as disproportionately large brains is concerned, the common squirrel monkey would be the best example with its 3.2 billion neurons and body weight of 0.72 kg (other species: 0.6 billion and 0.37 kg; 1.5 billion and 0.78 kg; 3.8 billion and 3.1 kg; 3.2 billion and 4.5 kg; 3.8 billion and 5.3 kg..), and it's obvious that for such cases the formula is hopelessly inaccurate.

Although the earlier addition of raw meat to the diet of earlier hominins may also have contributed to increase its caloric content, raw meat is difficult to chew and ingest, whereas cooked meat is easier to chew and has a higher caloric yield.

• Is there any evidence that the time difference between chewing and ingesting uncooked versus cooked meat is larger than the time it takes to build a fire and cooking the meat first??

Finally, cooking food would not explain how they achieved the control of fire, something that likely requires a large brain in the first place.

Couldn't find any in-depth reviews of the paper, but Wrangham has commented that the paper fails to take changes in the diet (more meat) into account. Ssscienccce (talk) 03:14, 12 July 2013 (UTC)

Flint and steel

I removed a video of what appears to be a Dutch man in some clothing of a past era starting a fire with a piece of flint and a steel implement around his fingers. Nothing in the article suggests that the "early humans" had pieces of steel that they used with pieces of flint to start fires, so it seems anachronistic, irrelevant and misleading. Maybe there was a meteorite somewhere and some cavemen tore off pieces of it to use starting fires, but where is the ref? And how common could it have been? A video of someone starting a fire with a bow drill and wood might be useful, if there is any source suggesting that this was a method used by "early humans." Edison (talk) 15:04, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

Sentinelese people

According to the article here on Wikipedia, there's no evidence that the sentinelese people is able of producing fire. Could this be a proof that the homo sapiens developed the ability to control fire much later than other ominids? --79.7.35.154 (talk) 02:46, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

The Sentinelese are examples of modern humans (even though they are culturally behind the rest of the world) are therefore not covered by this article.—Ryulong (琉竜) 04:08, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Abbreviations and unusual units of time

I just read this article and found it a bit disturbing that time is given in Mya and that there are a number of technical terms like „TL dating" which are not explained. Would it be possible to change units and add some explanations to make the text more accessible for non-experts?Lucentcalendar (talk) 08:23, 14 May 2015 (UTC)

I would like to suggest that for this article (all all other Wikipedie) that consitant units of measure be used throughout. In this article, I find units stated variable as: P1: 125,000 years (OK) 0.2-1.7 million (no units) P2: 400,000-200,000 million (no units) 1.42 Mya (?) 1.7 Ma (? again) Etc. All should be consistent. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Emu23 (talk • contribs) 16:35, 15 December 2015 (UTC) Emu23 (talk) 16:37, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

I'm confused by the use of Mya. I have to assume it's the term used by the experts in this and related fields. However, unless the use of it provides a helpful use to the lay-reader, I really think using years for the relevant units of time would be much preferred. If Mya is to be kept, a very short explanation as to why this unit is used could be included in the article to help our readers. --bodnotbod (talk) 13:39, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

... to add... The wikilink to Mya didn't appear to be working as intended, so I hope I've fixed that now, which should help. I feel silly now that I didn't realise that it simply means "million years ago". Now I have to wonder if I'm just a lot more dense than the average reader will be or whether Mya is likely to confuse the majority. --bodnotbod (talk) 13:46, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

Gibberish at the end

That wierd sentence about 'small less small tough' needs to change. I'd do it, but I don't want to mess up the meaning. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.15.168.179 (talk) 22:53, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

Incorrectly implied accuracy

"Recent findings strongly support that the earliest controlled use of fire took place in Wonderwerk Cave, South Africa,1.0 Mya.[4]" That sentence implies that we think literally the first time any human controlled fire was in that specific cave at that specific date, which is obviously silly. The chances that the specific first time fire was controlled would leave evidence for us to find are remote. Instead, this sentence should say that the earliest evidence of controlled fire was found in that cave, and it dates back to approx. 1.0Mya. Leperflesh (talk) 06:44, 18 November 2016 (UTC)

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on Control of fire by early humans. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20130820225555/http://anthro.palomar.edu/homo/homo_4.htm to http://anthro.palomar.edu/homo/homo_4.htm

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true or failed to let others know (documentation at {{Sourcecheck}}).

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 18 January 2022).

• If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
• If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 07:27, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

Notification that I only checked one of the references (and found it wanting)

People looking at the history of the article may note that I have put an inline "not in reference given" tag. I just want to do my best to inform later editors and readers that I only checked one particular reference, so it is certainly not to be thought that I checked the references throughout and found the rest to be OK. Also note that if a reference text follows my comment here (as it does at the time of writing) it must relate to something further up the talk page and is not related to my message here. --bodnotbod (talk) 15:26, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

Replacing references

We have a reference that's used 17 times:

James, Steven R. (February 1989). "Hominid Use of Fire in the Lower and Middle Pleistocene: A Review of the Evidence" (PDF). Current Anthropology. University of Chicago Press. 30 (1): 1–26. doi:10.1086/203705. Retrieved 2012-04-04.

It seems a little old. I plan to replace it with better ones as the opportunity arises.

Zyxwv99 (talk) 05:27, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

Still 16 times. Suggested reading: doi:10.1073/pnas.2101108118. --Rainald62 (talk) 20:33, 22 May 2022 (UTC)

Uncited frequency of wildfires in a savanna vs. in a dense forest

In the section "Control of fire", there is an uncited sentence that seems accidentally off to me:

One was a change in habitat, from dense forest, where wildfires were rare and potentially catastrophic, to savanna (mixed grass/woodland) where wildfires were very rare and of lower intensity

My problem is that clearly there is an attempt at parallelism but the parallelism is broken:

• Dense forest
  • wildfires rare
  • wildfires potentially catastrophic
• Savanna
  • wildfires very rare
  • wildfires of lower intensity

If the environmental change were as important as it claims to give Homo erectus experience with fire, I'd expect wildfires to be more common in the savanna, not more rare. Are savannas less wildfire-prone than dense forests? Is this substantiated somewhere?

--73.128.71.14 (talk) 01:27, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

You're right. Dense forests are already prone to wildfire, and grasslands (particularly dry savanna grass) is highly susceptible to wildfire, so early human interactions with fire would have increased rather than decreased. Also, didn't a major expansion of grasslands in lower latitudes occur 1 to 2 mya during the ice ages?   User:Dunkleosteus77 |push to talk  18:15, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

Landscape scale fires started by early humans were intentional

Evidence is unfolding that early humans' use of fire included accelerating the fire regime on a landscape scale. Developments related to landscape-scale fire management are happening in geology (patterns of fire-induced magnetic susceptibility on a landscape scale), cultural anthropology (charcoal enrichment on a landscape scale means people organizing culture around fire-regime acceleration), and soil science (dawning recognition of fire as a soil-forming factor in chernozems as evidenced by charcoal enrichment at levels unanticipated by soil carbon modeling). Paleorthid (talk) 16:40, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

How fire was made

Female voice 41.223.119.44 (talk) 19:48, 9 March 2023 (UTC)

Overstatement

Evidence for the "microscopic traces of wood ash" as controlled use of fire by Homo erectus, beginning roughly 1 million years ago, has wide scholarly support.

"Has wide scholarly support" but the citation on both is one site, which is referred to by both papers. You'd have to source multiple sites in order to come to "wide scholarly support." --KimYunmi (talk) 13:34, 30 May 2023 (UTC)