Adam’s curse is a bigger head extracted from here
Genesis 3:19 says: By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food.
It is fascinating that Adam is cursed with sweat. A Neolithic Johnny come lately Adam couldn’t be cursed with sweat because he already had the human sweating mechanism. Adam would say, “Big Deal, Big Guy! Have you seen what all humans have to do to earn a living here in the hot Neolithic summers?”
The rest of this section is from an old web page of mine on sweat. It is no longer up:
Dean Falk, one of the world’s leading authorities on hominid brains, advanced a theory in which the hominid brain could not grow any bigger than the cooling system attached to it. The theory originated from a comment by her mechanic. She writes:
" It was an ‘aha’ experience, if ever I’ve had one, and the weirdest combination of events led to it. First, the engine in my 1970 Mercedes needed major surgery. I took it to Walter Anwander (a whiz) in Lafayette, Indiana, who completely rebuilt the engine. One day, while enumerating the wonders beneath the hood (about which I definitely needed schooling), Walter pointed to the radiator and told me ‘the engine can only be as big as that can cool.’ I didn’t think much about it at the time. " (1)
The brain, like that engine, can only be as big as the cooling system it has. If the brain overheats, the brain is ruined just like overheating a car engine will ruin it. In the brain the blood acts as the coolant. The brain has several emissary veins which go from the interior of the skull to the skin of the face. These veins are part of the “radiator” system. When a person is cold, blood flows from the cranium outward in these veins. But when a person exercises and becomes overheated, the blood flow reverses and blood flows into the cranium. The reason for this reversal is that the skin of the face (the brow included) acts as a radiator, cooling the blood which then enters the brain to cool that organ. Some of the veins are preserved in the skulls of extinct hominids (and man) in the form of emissary foramina (a foramina is a hole in the skull (2). Thus a record of the size and number of emissary foramina are preserved in ancient skulls for anthropologists to examine. Falk notes:
" It was beautiful. For the past two million years, the increase in frequencies of emissary foramina kept exact pace with the sharp increase in brain size in Homo. Clearly, the brain and the veins had evolved rapidly and together. I saw that Cabanac’s letter was right and that I had unwittingly charted the evolution of a radiator for the brain in my earlier work on emissary foramina. As Anwander had said about my car, the engine can only be as big as the radiator can cool. Apparently, the same is true for heat-sensitive brains. "(3)
But emissary veins are only part of the cooling mechanism in mankind. Sweat is the reason that the facial skin cools and the cooling of the skin cools the blood destined for the brain. What do we know about sweat?
The human sweating system is unique among mammals. Bernard Campbell describes the function of sweat glands:
" The sweat glands fall into two groups: the apocrine and eccrine glands. The apocrine glands secrete the odorous component of sweat and are primarily scent glands that respond to stress or sexual stimulation. Before the development of artificial scents and deodorants, they no doubt played an important role in human society. In modern man these glands occur only in certain areas of the body, in particular in the armpits, the navel, the anal and genital areas, the nipples, and the ears. Surprisingly enough, glands in the armpits of man are more numerous per unit area than in any other animal. There is no doubt that the function of scent in sexual encounter is of the greatest importance even in the higher primates and man. "The eccrine glands, which are the source of sweat itself, have two functions in primates. Their original function was probably to moisten friction surfaces, such as the volar pads of hand and foot to improve the grip, prevent flaking of the horny layer of the skin, and assist tactile sensitivity. Glands serving that function are also found on the hairless surface of the prehensile tail of New World monkeys and on the knuckles of gorilla and chimpanzee hands, which they use in quadrupedal walking. Glands in these positions are under the control of the brain and adrenal bodies, and in modern man an experience of stress may produce sweaty palms.
"The second and more recently evolved function of the eccrine glands is the lowering of body temperature through the evaporation of sweat on the surface of the body. The hairy skin of monkeys and apes carries eccrine glands, but they are neither so active nor so numerous as in man. Modern man is equipped with between two and five million active sweat glands, and they play a vital part in cooling the body. The heat loss that results from the evaporation of water from a surface is enormously greater than that which could be expected to occur as a result of simple radiation. The fact that sweat contains salt necessitates a constant supply of the mineral if man is to survive in a tropical climate.
"It has been observed that like almost all mammals, primates sweat very little. Even hunting carnivores, such as dogs, lose heat by other means, such as panting. Sweating has evolved as a most important means of heat loss in man, a fact that is surely correlated with the loss of his body hair. The apparent importance in human evolution of achieving an effective means of heat loss indicates without doubt that early man was subject to intense muscular activity, with the production of much metabolic heat; he could not afford even the smallest variation in body temperature. With such a highly evolved brain, the maintenance of a really constant internal environment was a need of prime importance in human evolution. "(4)
With this need to dissipate heat in order to maintain a constant brain temperature, hair becomes a problem. Hair traps the sweat and hinders evaporation. Zihlman and Cohn relate:
" How might early hominids have dissipated the heat load generated internally, as well as externally from the sun? One way is through the skin. The skin of modern humans contrasts with that of other, nonhuman primates in four features: 1) humans have a great density (over two million) of functioning eccrine sweat glands over the entire body surface; 2) loss of the apocrine sweat glands has been associated with hair loss, and has occurred except in the ano-genital and axillary regions; 3) hair follicles are diffuse and hair shafts are noticeably reduced in size; 4) skin pigment ranges from dark to light.
"How might these features be interpreted in a functional and evolutionary way? There is the remarkable thermo-regulatory function of eccrine sweat glands. Sweating can deliver two litres of water to the skin surface in two hours and carry off almost 600 calories of heat. Hair tends to trap moisture, so that sweat evaporation is more effective with reduced hair. Interestingly, the number of hair follicles in humans is similar to that in chimpanzees and gorillas, but the much reduced size of hair shafts in humans gives a hairless appearance. "(5)
Why do we have hair on our head? Zihlman and Cohninform us:
" Hair retention on the head is probably important in protecting the scalp from the sun’s ultraviolet rays and may assist in stabilizing the temperature of the brain. Human populations are variable in the amount of body hair present, but in all of them the skin surface is hairless enough to permit efficient heat loss from sweating. "(6)
Radiatively, hair on the top of the head absorbs the solar heat and re-radiates most of it. An absorbing layer can reduce by half the amount of energy reaching the top of the skull.
When is it likely that mankind needed this cooling mechanism for heat removal? Probably fairly early. For modern men even moderate exertion on the savanna increases the heat production by 100% over the resting levels. Since Homo erectus was as large as we are(7), similar exertions on the plains would yield similar heating. Even the smallest Homo erectus has a brain which is over twice as large as that of the chimpanzee which can get by without sweating. Homo erectus would need to sweat. Since he needed to sweat, then he needed to be relatively hairless as we are.
If he were relatively hairless, then the Homo erectus who lived in Georgia (former USSR)(8) would have been ill-equipped to handle the winter temperatures below zero Fahrenheit which occur from time to time in that area. He would have needed clothing. Because of these considerations, Anthropologists like Brian Fagan were forced to conclude,
" For Homo erectus to be able to adapt to the more temperate climate of Europe and Asia, it was necessary not only to tame fire but to have both effective shelter and clothing to protect against heat loss. Homo erectus probably survived the winters by maintaining permanent fires, and by storing dried meat and other foods for use in the lean months. "(9)
This is a very human set of behaviors and Homo erectus was found in European Georgia 1.6 million years ago.
Johnny-come-lately Adam and Eve too late for Clothing
Because of the big brains, H. erectus, Neanderthals and H. Sapiens living in colder climates had to have clothing millions of years prior to Neolithic Adam and Eve. They were as hairless as we are, and they had bigger brains than we have. The Biblical account indicates that Adam and Eve didn’t know they were naked. Anyone in Neolithic times would have known they were naked. Late Adam and Eve just ignore everything said in the Scripture.
Neanderthals had to have clothing to live in glacial age Europe:
" The life of a Neanderthal band in the intensely cold environments of the Europe of 75,000 years ago can never have been easy. The means to survival were fire, some form of skin clothing and adequate winter shelter, and an ability to store food. It is probably no coincidence that some of the densest Neanderthal populations lay in the sheltered river valleys of the Perigord region in southwest France ."(10)
Further, there is good evidence that they sewed close-fitting clothing.
" In the Mousterian horizon of Combe Grenal, Professor Francois Bordes has recovered bone needles, indicating beyond doubt that classic Neanderthal men made tailored fur clothing. The severity of the periglacial climate would not have permitted men to survive unless they were capable of making sophisticated clothing. "(11)
Not only that archaeologists have found what certainly appears to be the remains of a Shaman’s cape,
" But the Neandertals’ true humanity revealed itself in the actions of their souls. At the 50,000-year-old site of Hortus in southern France, two French archaeologists in 1972 reported the discovery of the articulated bones of the left paw and tail of a leopard. Their arrangement suggested that the fragments were once the remnants of a complete leopard hide worn as a costume. "(12)
A lot of people don’t know the potential evidence that H. erectus was spread far afield from Africa by 1.8-1.4 million years ago. Tattersall reports the following controversial sites for Acheulean tools, which if they are correct, H. erectus was spreading abroad. Tattersall names the following places
13)
'Ubeidiya has yielded Acheulean tools dated to 1.4 Myr.
Longupo found stone tools dated at 1.9 Myr
Riwat Pakistan stone tools 1.6 Myr
Dmanisi mandible 1.8 myr
Since they have found several H. erectus skulls at Dmanisi since Tattersall wrote that, I would argue that the Dmanisi hominids also had to have clothing of some sort. We know that they too were hairless. The January average temperature of that area dips down to about 5 C below 0. A hairless man, like erectus or us, would freeze to death in such temperatures without clothing. Thus, we can say that some form of clothing has existed for 1.6 million years, at least.
Johnny-come-lately views of Adam and Eve simply ignore Genesis 3.
Moral choices, rationality, religion and Johnny-come-lately Adam
Genesis 2:16-17 You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.”
This simple statement says many things about man. It says that he knew enough to make moral choices. It also says he had to have an understanding of logic and consequences–that is, rationality. If Adam is a Neolithic farmer he is too late for the start of that as well. And that means religion. Logic and rationality are required for the production of a stone tool.
" The removal of an individual flake is a simple action requiring only minimal organisational ability. In order to manufacture all but the most rudimentary stone tools, however, flake removals must be related to one another in a fashion yielding the appropriate configuration or pattern. If a stone artefact presents a pattern of flake removals that could only have been organised by means of reversibility and/or conservation, then it must be concluded that the maker possessed operational intelligence. I will show that the later Acheulean artefacts from the Isimila Prehistoric Site present such patterns. "(14)
It took a lot of foresight, logic and rational thought, not to mention an aesthetic sense, to create the West Tofts hand-axe, the tool of H. erectus and archaic H. sapiens for about a million years or more. See picture.
“ Even the Lower Palaeolithic hand-axe makers showed interest in fossils. A hand-axe discovered at West Tofts, Norfolk, England has a mollusc shell prominently displayed in the middle of one of its sides. Obviously the maker of this tool had seen the fossil shell that lay embedded in the flint, but, more significantly, he must have worked around the shell in order that, when he had finished flaking the tool, the fossil would be in the centre. This is not the only hand-axe to have such a natural form of in-built decoration. Another, found at Swanscombe, Kent, England, has the fossil of a sea-urchin visible on its surface, and again all the indications are that this was both recognised and valued by the tool-maker. “(15)
Logic and rationality certainly preceded Johnny-come-lately Adam.
Conclusion
The late placement of Adam in history, the view preferred by many modern commentators makes an utter mockery of everything said in Genesis 2-3. Nothing said or proclaimed there is true. This should not be the view of people who think that the Scripture contains the way of Salvation. How can such a false book (in their view) really be trusted to tell us the metaphysical truths that we are unable to verify. If so much stuff that we can verify is false, what guarantee do we have that the theology and metaphysics of Scripture is real? This is why a historical reading of Genesis is necessary–it is necessary for the trustworthiness of scripture.
It is also intriguing to me that the ancient Hebrew writer would choose as a curse for man and woman, two different maledictions which can be caused by a single phenomenon–an increase in brain size. This single cause also would require the loss of hair and the subsequent need for clothing. There is no way that the Hebrew writer could have had the knowledge to purposefully construct this tale. Is this a fortuitous conjunction of statements or is it divine inspiration? I firmly believe God inspired the writer and while he didn’t understand it, we can today.
References
- Dean Falk, 1992 Braindance,(New York: Henry Holt and Co.) p. 156
2.Dean Falk, 1992 Braindance,(New York: Henry Holt and Co.) p. 153
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Dean Falk, 1992 Braindance,(New York: Henry Holt and Co.) p. 159
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Bernard Campbell, 1974. Human Evolution, (Chicago: Aldine Publishing). p 280-282
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Adrienne L. Zihlman, and B. A. Cohn, 1986, “Responses of Hominid Skin to the Savanna,” South African Journal of Science, 82:2, p. 307-308.
6.Adrienne L Zihlman,. and B. A. Cohn, 1988, “The Adaptive Response of Human Skin to the Savanna” Human Evolution, 3:5(1988):397-409. p404.
7.Ruff, Christopher B., 1993, “Climatic Adaptation and Hominid Evolution: The Thermoregulatory Imperative,” Evolutionary Anthropology, 2:2, p. 53-60, p 56
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Larick, Roy and Russell L. Ciochon, 1996, "The African Emergence and Early Asian Dispersals of the Genus Homo."American Scientists, 84(Nov/Dec, 1996).p 548-550
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Brian M. Fagan, 1990. The Journey From Eden, (London: Thames and Hudson) p.76
10.Brian M. Fagan, The Journey From Eden, (London: Thames and Hudson, 1990), p.83
11.J. B. Birdsell, Human Evolution, (St. Louis: Rand McNally, 1972), p. 283
12.James R. Shreeve, The Neandertal Enigma, (New York: William Morrow and Co., 1995), p. 52
13.Ian Tattersall, “Out of Africa Again…and Again?” Scientific American April, 1997, p. 60-67
14.Thomas Wynn, “The Intelligence of Later Acheulean Hominids,” Man, 14:371-391, p. 375
15.Richard Rudgley, Secrets of the Stone Age, (London: Century, 2000), p.
