Evolution of Imagination

By Andrey Vyshedskiy

Imagination is at its core a biological function, achieved through natural selection as any other. Many animals may possess the capacity for imagination, but it is clear that only humans possess the propensity for deliberate, responsive, and reliable type of imagination. However, why this is the case remains a mystery. The answer to this requires careful examination and analysis of the natural forces that shaped the evolution of our hominid ancestors’ brains. How does the physical system of our brain voluntarily produce infinite novel mental images? What is it about the human brain that gives it this unique ability? Which of our mammalian, primate, and hominid ancestors possessed the capacity for this voluntary imagination? What natural forces pressured these species into developing voluntary imagination? What happened to all our hominid ancestors and evolutionary cousins? If you’ve ever wondered these questions, you will find answers within these pages.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Feb 15, 2023
• ISBN: 9781329543942

Book preview

EVOLUTION

OF

IMAGINATION

ANDREY VYSHEDSKIY

Published by MobileReference

Copyright © 2023 Dr. Andrey Vyshedskiy

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author except for brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

ISBN: 978-1-329-54394-2

Audience

The book is written in easy-to-read engaging style. No previous knowledge in psychology, paleoanthropology, or neuroscience is necessary.

Front cover

Lion-man statuette carved out of mammouth-tusk, H 31 cm

Site: Hohlenstein-Stadel-cave in the Lone valley, Asselfingen, Baden-Württemberg, Germany

Upper Paleolithic period, approx. 40 000 years old

Inv. Ulmer Museum Prä Slg. Wetzel Ho-St. 39/88.1

Photo Thomas Stephan © Ulmer Museum, Ulm, Germany

Contents

Title

Contents

Foreword

Chapter 1: Evolution of imagination

1. From bacteria to mammals

2. Acquisition of involuntary constructive imagination by mammals

3. Acquisition of categorically-primed spontaneous imagination by primates

4. Acquisition of voluntary imagination by genus Homo

5. Summary of Chapter 1

Chapter 2: Selected for imagination: evolutionary forces 6 to 2 million years ago

1. Human genesis

2. Detect predators from afar

3. What does it mean to have the best visual system?

4. Primates have better vision than other mammals

5. The lateral prefrontal cortex improved in hominins

6. Summary of Chapter 2

Chapter 3. Evolution to revolution: evolutionary forces 2 million to 70,000 years ago

1. Speech acquisition

2. New hunting techniques

3. Frequent change of campsite

4. Quality of stone tools manufacturing

5. Increased social complexity

6. Summary of Chapter 3

Chapter 4. Consequences of modern imagination acquisition 70,000 years ago

1. Acquisition of full language

2. New weapons and animal traps

3. Genocide and evolutionary bottleneck

4. Exponential increase in population and diffusion out of Africa

Book conclusions

Acknowledgments

Abbreviations

Bibliography

About the author

Foreword

Imagination is at its core a biological function, achieved through natural selection as any other. Many animals may possess the capacity for imagination, but it is clear that only humans possess the propensity for deliberate, responsive, and reliable type of imagination. However, why this is the case remains a mystery. The answer to this requires careful examination and analysis of the natural forces that shaped the evolution of our hominid ancestors’ brains. How does the physical system of our brain voluntarily produce infinite novel mental images? What is it about the human brain that gives it this unique ability? Which of our mammalian, primate, and hominid ancestors possessed the capacity for this voluntary imagination? What natural forces pressured these species into developing voluntary imagination? What happened to all our hominid ancestors and evolutionary cousins? If you’ve ever wondered these questions, you will find answers within these pages.

I have been fascinated with the neurological basis of imagination since I was nine years of age and have studied the evolution of imagination since I was twenty four. Through years of undergraduate and graduate training I was driven by a question of the physical representation of mental images. I kept researching the subject after graduate school when I was teaching at Boston University and co-founded several successful start-up companies. At every possibility I discussed the ideas of mental imagery with friends and acquaintances – both scientists and non-scientists. I learned that while imagination is of interest to many people, most are confused about its neurological mechanisms, evolution, and even its definition. This book is written for you. It uses plain language and does not require any in-depth knowledge of neuroscience or psychology.

In this short book, I follow the evolution of imagination from its humble beginnings in the mammalian neocortex 200 million years ago and beyond; from the first mammals’ involuntary dreaming to the voluntary imagination of modern humans. I must first address the greatest fallacy of natural philosophy: the assumption of the evolutionary permanence of imagination. This anthropomorphic assumption trapped many philosophers of both antiquity and modernity. For example, in a single paragraph Charles Darwin uses both voluntary imagination and involuntary dreaming as examples of imagination and draws a conclusion that animals possess the same power of imagination as humans: The imagination is one of the highest prerogatives of man. By this faculty he unites former images and ideas, . . . and thus creates brilliant and novel results . . . Dreaming gives us the best notion of this power. ... As dogs, cats, horses, and probably all the higher animals, even birds have vivid dreams ... we must admit that they possess some power of imagination ¹. While dogs, cats, horses, and humans conjure up novel images in their dreams, the neurological mechanism of involuntary dreaming imagination is fundamentally different from voluntary imagination. This book will dispel the concept of the evolutionary permanence of imagination and will paint a simple picture of evolving neurological mechanisms of imagination. We will follow the evolution of imagination from involuntary dreaming in placentals and marsupials 140 million years ago to the acquisition of categorically-primed spontaneous imagination by primates 70 million years ago and then move to attainment of voluntary imagination by humans, marked historically by the first stone tools manufactured 3 million years ago. I will conclude my analysis with the cognitive revolution 70,000 years ago that brought in modern human imagination.

Chapter 1: Evolution of imagination

1. From bacteria to mammals

Our planet formed around 4.5 billion years ago ². The first evidence of bacterial presence on Earth has been dated to around 3.5 billion years ago ³. Eukaryotes, members of the life domain, in which genetic material is contained within a separate organelle called nucleus, evolved around 1.5 billion years ago ⁴. The first neural network evolved in jellyfish-like animals around 700 million years ago ⁵. Neurons of vertebrates were organized into the brain and the spinal cord around 525 million years ago ⁶. Dinosaurs evolved around 240 million years ago ⁷ and mammals evolved around 233 million years ago ⁸. Since the beginning of mammalian evolution and up to 65 million years ago dinosaurs roamed the surface of the planet and would quickly eat our small furry ancestors ⁹. Early dinosaurs, however, were cold-blooded and like modern day cold-blooded reptiles could only move and hunt effectively during the day when it was warm. The solution stumbled upon by mammals in order to avoid predation by dinosaurs was to hide underground during the day ¹⁰.

Not much food, though, grows underground. To eat vegetables and insects, mammals had to travel above the ground. However, the only time when mammals were able to safely forage above the ground was at night. To move at night, mammals evolved warm-bloodedness ⁸. Importantly, there was a significant consequence for being warm-blooded: mammals had to eat about 10-times more food than dinosaurs per unit of weight in order to maintain their high metabolism and to support their constant inner body temperature around 37°C ¹¹.

Additionally, to maintain their high metabolism, mammals had to significantly increase their sleep duration (the brain’s high metabolism generates a lot of waste that needs to be washed away during sleep) ¹². That further reduced the time available for foraging. Collectively, our mammalian ancestors had to find 10-times more food during their short waking time, and they had to find food in the darkness. How did they accomplish this task?

To optimize their foraging, mammals developed a new system for efficient memorization of food locations: binding a navigational system to sensory features of the landscape. Features of landscape were encoded in the neocortex; navigation was encoded in the entorhinal cortex around the hippocampus, and the