Caveman Project - Research Paper Example

?Caveman When consider our daily lives individuals oftentimes fail to recognize the significant contributions that were made in terms of human ingenuity and evolution. Early man, while sharing the same mental capacity, desires, and strength, faced tremendously different challenges when attempting to accomplish even daily tasks. This essay considers the lives of ancient cavemen, and demonstrates the difficulties and complexities they faced when attempting to accomplish a variety of these tasks. In the contemporary social environment human beings have grown accustomed to a variety of amenities that did not exist thousands of years ago. In contemporary times one need consider the nature of production when it comes to tools and similar devices. When an individual needs to buy a hammer or screwdriver, it’s well-known that they only must venture to the department store and purchase it. Today there is large-scale means of production, wherein all individuals collaborate through contributing wood, metals, and assembly, all of which is combined in large-scale industrial factories throughout the world and then shipped to regional areas for purchase. This means of production should be compared to the means of production that existed four-thousand years ago during the lives of cavemen. During this period cavemen, in a means to construct tools had to go through a wide-variety of challenges and tasks. Indeed, for a caveman to finally develop a stone tool it was truly an accomplishment and an object to be highly valued. Consider a scenario wherein a man four-thousand years ago would have had to have gone through to develop a stone tool. While in contemporary times humans have a general understanding of shelter and safety when they enter public, pre-historic man didn’t enjoy these luxuries. For a caveman to first procure the necessary materials to construct a stone weapon or device they had to find an optimal time to search in the wild for the materials. Oftentimes this might involve organizing a group of individuals to search throughout nature themselves. As one can imagine this can become a somewhat cumbersome task that is not quite as direct as getting into the car and driving to Wal-Mart. Once one has organized this group and found the optimal time to go into the wild to find materials, they must then do so and hope that they are able to find the right aspects of what they are searching. These materials might involve stones, wood, or materials for basket weaving. As these materials exist in the wild as raw and not broken down to manageable portions, the individual must then transport them home so that they can be broken down and converted into useable tools and devices for production. For instance, if one is attempting to make a spear they must first ensure that the stone they procured from the journey was grinded down to a level where it could be attached to the spear. During this process if the stone is chipped or broken to a too large extent, then the entire process of gaining the materials must be accomplished again. In terms of fashioning the spear, one must also attend to the wood part. Rather than simply buying wood from a store, the individual must find a tree or sticks that have been discarded. This is a harder task that might be originally assumed as the wood must be of considerable strength and be able to withstand the blunt force pressure of hunting. In the process of combining the spear and the stone arrow they must be done so with incredible delicacy as a mistake in this department will surely cause the entire process to be have to gone through again. It’s worth noting in these regards that one must recognize the artistry and skill of the cavemen, as it takes more than brute force and knowledge to construct such weaponry. While cavemen are generally thought of as brutes, it’s clear that in order to find subsistence and survival they must also have a variety of subtle and fine-tuned skills. One of these skills one can consider is the nature of basket weaving. Baskets were a central aspect of pre-historic life, as they allowed individuals to transport foodstuffs and materials from one region to another. Still the actual production of these objects was one of great challenge and skill. As elucidated above, individuals must first collect the materials to construct these objects, which is a laborious process unto itself. In terms of basket-weaving the proper palm-fronds must be gathered and then taken back to the village or area of gathering. At this point the caveman must go through an elaborate process of construction where they are interweaved within each other to form a structural whole. While this occurred four thousand years ago, one recognizes that the skills involved in this process are advanced to the point that most individuals today would be at a loss for the means by which they are accomplished. In considering the nature of this, one is drawn to the closeness that these individuals lived with their immediate surroundings and how this necessitated a greater understanding and appreciation for the earth. While today we believe that we have achieved a modicum of progress, its not difficult to argue that despite the challenges that these pre-historic peoples faced, that in fact the reality of their existence may have been truer to form or to earth and ultimate happiness. In conclusion, it’s clear that cavemen had to endure a wide variety of trials and tribulations to accomplish tasks in their daily lives. Some of the most pervasive such challenges came in the way of fashioning tools that could be implemented in daily tasks. This essay has explored the challenges these individuals faced in accomplishing these matters. In these regards, it has demonstrated that the primary means to which individuals achieved these aims was through hard work and a laborious and what many would deem cumbersome process of collection. Ultimately, these small actions would add up to contribute to progress that would advance this society to the contemporary state in which we now exist. Read More