Is it at all possible there was a civilised species on Earth long before humans?

[Diche Bach]

Maybe it is safe to say that the bonobos _are_ a preceding civilization?

An Ape of Genius Part 2

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kPDg4W01EgY

An Ape of Genus Part 3

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVRsGcpmKYQ

An Ape of Genius Part 4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XF3VYGjL3Mo

[jwenting]

What about all those mountains of plastic we produce? This stuff will last a long time too.

actually, it won't. Most of it will biodegrade in a few years at most, the rest be corroded into particles too small to see with the naked eye in a decade or so and degraded not too long after.

And that's without getting burned in volcanic eruptions and forest fires, buried in landslides and crushed, then transported down into subduction zones and turned into magma in the mantle, etc. etc.

[magnemoe]

actually, it won't. Most of it will biodegrade in a few years at most, the rest be corroded into particles too small to see with the naked eye in a decade or so and degraded not too long after.

And that's without getting burned in volcanic eruptions and forest fires, buried in landslides and crushed, then transported down into subduction zones and turned into magma in the mantle, etc. etc.

Yes, however human civilisation produce an lot of hard to break down stuff, I guess most items of metal would be preserved at least well enough to show they was not natural if they ended up in an situation where bone would be fossilized. Now if you talk about ceramic and copper they last an long time, and both was used by the most ancient civilizations.

Add other stuff like stone tools or stone for building materials (few piles of rectangular stones in nature)

However main issue as other says is the lack of branches of animals who could become intelligent tool users.

[lajoswinkler]

If there ever was such a civilization it must've either existed very very long ago (talking permian times here) and/or never industrialized. If humanity would vanish this instant it is unlikely that any subsequent civilizations would manage to industrialize. We used up the easy oil, coal and metals. Since we had access to those resources it means previous civilizations never used them.

There was no time for them to evolve. As Diche Bach said, you can't have civilization if the members aren't encephalized enough. Look at dolphins. Their encephalization is significant, yet, compared to humans, they're like very retarded people (although skilled in swimming and playing). They don't have the morphological basis for anything more.

Ever heard of feral children? Standard human brains, yet empty. But with potential. Doplhins have no potential.

Earth has seen creatures such as Homo floresiensis. Small brains, tiny people who knew how to use fire and sticks to pound animals to death.

There simply wasn't enough time for other branches of evolutionary tree to yield enough neocortical matter. Perm has seen lots of weird animals and plants, but no civilization.

Today's apes obviously have the potential to evolve into highly sentient beings, but we're in the way. We're messing with them too much. Only if we cease to exist, they might have a chance. If they succeed, they'll find artifacts everywhere.

actually, it won't. Most of it will biodegrade in a few years at most, the rest be corroded into particles too small to see with the naked eye in a decade or so and degraded not too long after.

And that's without getting burned in volcanic eruptions and forest fires, buried in landslides and crushed, then transported down into subduction zones and turned into magma in the mantle, etc. etc.

Complete mechanical degratation will occur in a matter of millenia or more. Chemical degradation will take a loooooooooooong time for most artificial polymers.

Edited September 3, 2013 by lajoswinkler

[TheSaint]

I remember Larry Niven postulated in one of his stories that Earth was home to an advanced civilization of anaerobic lifeforms before the oxygen catastrophe. One of the other races they encountered still held a grudge against us for it.

[Kerbface]

These replies are all very interesting.

[Monkeh]

There was a race of intelligent, bipedal dinosaurs who were nomadic. They followd the great herds of roving plant eaters and hunted with spears and ropes made of vine leaves. They communicated and co-operated and lived in tents made from animal hide. They lived very much like the Mongols and so left no lasting trace of their existence.

Oh wait, that was in Evolution by Stephen Baxter. My mistake. Seriously though. Best book.

[Diche Bach]

Turkana boy, member of what they call Homo ergaster.

Same genus as modern humans, but different species. He died at about age 10 years around 1.5 million years ago near Lake Turkana in the Kenyan rift valley.

Couple different soft-tissue reconstructions of him . . .

They used to argue that he was 12 years old, and exceptionally tall for his age, and that he would've grown to be in excess of 1.85m tall. But somebody else redid his measurements and remodeled the growth trajectories and came up with only 1.63m.

Still, pretty tall and well within the range of modern humans. Post-cranial anatomy is in large part, functionally human, though with MUCH more robust musculature (these guys probably would've made professional NFL linebackers seem like wimps).

ADDIT:

I remember Larry Niven postulated in one of his stories that Earth was home to an advanced civilization of anaerobic lifeforms before the oxygen catastrophe. One of the other races they encountered still held a grudge against us for it.

That is a _very_ interesting idea. Certainly if such a thing did exist, and assuming it was (a) not fully global in its extent; and ( did not leave 'permanent' evidence of its tools and structures [kind've hard to imagine] then perhaps such a fanciful idea could remotely be a tiny slim chance for the "pre-human civilized sentient being" the OP asked about.

Let me impress here though that, the chance of this having happened is extremely tiny indeed bordering on impossible for a couple of key reasons.

To my knowledge there are no multicellular eukaryotes that are fully anaerobic throughout their entire life cycle. I know that some relatively small parasitic animals (nematodes and the like) may live through a life cycle stage where they are anaerobic, but I'm not aware of any "fully" anaerobic multicellular eukaryotes. What this means is that, the functional possibilities for complex information integration between multiple cells, which is the foundation of a nervous system, would seem to be something that is beyond the possibility of an obligate anaerobe.

Obviously sentient life. as we think of it, cannot exist in a unicellular critter. Moreover a nucleated cellular structure, if not cells with LOTS of internal organelles is likely to be requisite for the sort of complex intra-cellular and physiogical processes necessary to 'host' a nervous system (much less an advanced neocortex integrated with older 'emotional' brain regions).

Some archae and (if memory serves some bacteria) form into 'colonies' these are really aggregations of symbiotic individuals. They exchange genetic material, and nutrients, but beyond that, I'm not aware of any sort of integration of their sensory apparatus. In sum, they do not even show much capacity for rapid, efficient, differentiated and directional exchange of information that is even remotely antecedent to a primitive neurotransmitter.

Edited September 4, 2013 by Diche Bach

[Awaras]

I remember Larry Niven postulated in one of his stories that Earth was home to an advanced civilization of anaerobic lifeforms before the oxygen catastrophe. One of the other races they encountered still held a grudge against us for it.

Arthur Clarke and Stephen Baxter had a similar premise in their book 'The Light of Other Days'. Near the end of the book, it turns out that all the life on Earth today evolved from microorganisms that came out of a capsule that was buried deep under the ocean floor. The capsule was placed there by a sentient race that evolved on Earth before the giant impact that created our moon, with the intention of allowing at least some form of life to survive the catastrophe.

Edited September 4, 2013 by Awaras

[Monkeh]

Oh yeah. Worm hole cameras and all that. Fun book. EVERYONE should be forced into reading Evolution by Baxter. Such a good read.

[lajoswinkler]

Robust musculature doesn't mean big muscles. When you're constantly hungry and your whole life is centered around trying not to die from wild animal attack, falling and hitting yourself and collecting food with low nutritional value, you look as natural as it gets. That means strong and small muscles, lean body. Big muscles aren't natural, never were. Put a jacked up person in the wilderness and, unless it dies from starvation, it will quickly lose all that tissue.

I bet these people could run and climb very fast, but not for a long time since you need fuel and, well... you've got berries and occasional animal meat if you got lucky... You try running when all you've eaten past week is tree bark.

And the illnesses... Wow. Tooth cavity and you're gone in a year when bacteria spreads through your blood. Cut your skin deeper and you're gone in a week.

Early hominids (and real humans) used to counter the huge mortality by massive breeding. It's basically a way for evolution to go faster. We've slowed things down almost to a halt, and diverted it into various paths that are shortlasting andprobably don't have a defined resulting vector.

Societies quickly became sophisticated, but the mortality stayed high, so that explains the low value of a single life thousands of years ago. It's probably why early civilizations were so cruel. When you've got a bunch of incredibly stupid people that breed like rats and everyone dies at age 35, caring about an unimportant individual is the last thing the bunch thinks about.

As for sentient anaerobic life, it's not going to happen.

There's no enough energy for the proper mobility, and without mobility there's not a chance of anything else.

I was thinking about a retrograde evolution where sentient life forms leave oxygen (in a weird set of events), but that would be accompanied by losing a lot of functions. Cortical matter simply requires lots of ATP. It boils down to basic chemistry.

It's a fun idea for an SF, but will not happen in real life.

Edited September 4, 2013 by lajoswinkler

[TheSaint]

That is a _very_ interesting idea. Certainly if such a thing did exist, and assuming it was (a) not fully global in its extent; and ( did not leave 'permanent' evidence of its tools and structures [kind've hard to imagine] then perhaps such a fanciful idea could remotely be a tiny slim chance for the "pre-human civilized sentient being" the OP asked about.

Let me impress here though that, the chance of this having happened is extremely tiny indeed bordering on impossible for a couple of key reasons.

To my knowledge there are no multicellular eukaryotes that are fully anaerobic throughout their entire life cycle. I know that some relatively small parasitic animals (nematodes and the like) may live through a life cycle stage where they are anaerobic, but I'm not aware of any "fully" anaerobic multicellular eukaryotes. What this means is that, the functional possibilities for complex information integration between multiple cells, which is the foundation of a nervous system, would seem to be something that is beyond the possibility of an obligate anaerobe.

Obviously sentient life. as we think of it, cannot exist in a unicellular critter. Moreover a nucleated cellular structure, if not cells with LOTS of internal organelles is likely to be requisite for the sort of complex intra-cellular and physiogical processes necessary to 'host' a nervous system (much less an advanced neocortex integrated with older 'emotional' brain regions).

Some archae and (if memory serves some bacteria) form into 'colonies' these are really aggregations of symbiotic individuals. They exchange genetic material, and nutrients, but beyond that, I'm not aware of any sort of integration of their sensory apparatus. In sum, they do not even show much capacity for rapid, efficient, differentiated and directional exchange of information that is even remotely antecedent to a primitive neurotransmitter.

Yeah, I'm a physics guy, not a biology guy, but I recall the premise was that the GOE wiped out all but the simplest of the organisms and the intervening 2.4 Ga wiped out everything else. But, on the other hand, even in the story the characters involved thought that it might not be true, since the aliens that were telling the story were known for their tall tales. But still, an interesting idea for sure.

[Diche Bach]

True. It would've been a harsh life, and mortality from basic problems that modern humans in advantaged countries don't even blink at would've been serious.

But that doesn't mean that everyone in the human lineage prior to Hammurabi's Code was struggling to put on some muscle bulk.

For example Homo ergaster seem to have been profligate big game hunters. There are many skeletons that show healed trauma's and the guys that specialize in them put forth a pretty compelling argument that they were very effective at hunting some of the fearsome Pleistocene megafauna.

The muscle attachments show that they were wicked buff mofos; there is no question about that. Not quite as buff as chimpanzees but, the central value in the range of muscle power for adult male Homo ergaster was likely at or above the range of the average NFL linebacker. I choose that position because they are a pretty optimum tradeoff between power, speed and agility. Not as fast wide-receiver, not as powerful as a lineman or a fullback, not as agile as a quarterback, but a nice happy medium.

Even pre-agricultural paleolithic modern humans were way more buff than their descendants who settled down to agricultural lifestyles some few thousand years later. That was probably as much to do with diet, and lifestyle and less to do with genetics as in the earlier hominins.

Edited September 4, 2013 by Diche Bach

[lajoswinkler]

Well if a species manages to find a nurturing spot on Earth, with easy to catch meat, it can happen (sort of), but the population still can't be very large. There's always a trade off which stems from thermodynamic laws. It's what ecology actually is all about. (not treehugging)

There is no way there was ever a species that looked like today's people who abuse steroids. There were species, like H.erectus, that had a more buffed skeleton and relatively more muscle than others, but I guarantee you that the Earth never saw that tiny fraction of abusers we have today, mostly in the West. It's simply not natural.

Edited September 4, 2013 by lajoswinkler

[Diche Bach]

Well, I'm no expert in muscle biology, so I can't really say you're wrong. However, I know that some of my former colleagues have published extensively on paleolithic peoples musculature and my understanding is that the take-home is that: Europeans between 12,000 and 50,000 years ago (modern humans) were _much_ more muscular and robust than modern populations. Whether that means that they exceeded even the musculature of the _most_ muscular modern humans I cannot say.

Also, I'm not so sure that it is necessary to use exogenous steroids to achieve maximum musculature for a modern human. It may make it easier, but I'm not sure that the 'range of possibility' is necessarily widened using such drugs. Anyway, we're getting a bit off topic now. Maybe start a new thread on it!

ADDIT: just as a point of reference. Chimpanzees are 4 to 5 times as strong as a human and much faster too.

"Chimps are incredibly strong and fast so humans are easily overpowered."

Indeed, chimpanzees have been shown to be about four times as strong as humans comparable in size, according to evolutionary biologist Alan Walker, formerly of Pennsylvania State University.

Research suggests the difference in strength between the two lies in the muscle performance.

In chimps, the muscle fibers closest to the bones -- those deemed to be the source of strength of both chimps and humans – are much longer and more dense, so a chimp is able to generate more power using the same range of motion, Ross of the Lester Fisher Center said.

Also, unlike humans, chimpanzees have less control over their muscles. As a result, sometimes chimps use more of their muscle strength than necessary, according to Walker's theory, published 2009 in the journal Current Anthropology.

Edited September 4, 2013 by Diche Bach

[MarkusA380]

Well, there is a tiny problem with this theory: We know how the evolution "happened", although we still have gaps in the timeline. But, another civilzed species (which isn't humanoid) would have taken an own evolution, which would have left much evidence on earth. Such a species doesn't just "appear" somewhere and leave some tools as evidence.

But there was another civilzed spezies here on earth, but it was humanoid: The Neandertal.

It was wiped out by the humans which are known to have landed on the moon. Us.

[MarkusA380]

Yes, it's quite possible that the first humans with language were women.

And... neanderthals buried their dead about 130,000 years ago, before modern humans did. Homo habilis constructed and used tools about 2.5 million years ago. Homo erectus a million years ago could control and light fires, build campfires, and probably built semi-permanent shelters.

Even some monkeys use tools.

[Diche Bach]

Monkeys definitely are proficient tool users and even do it spontaneously in the wild, i.e., not under experimental conditions provoked by humans. But the following experiment is amazing in showing just what some species are capable of

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LThJWvJ2YNI

Octopii and various birds _use tools_

spontaneous sequential tool use by a crow

ADDIT: just to elaborate a bit further. It is quite clear that a number of monkey species are capable of transmitting and maintaining simple cultural traditions

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-euMlL9O1Kc

Wild Chimpanzees have extensive inter-population cultural differences

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ghocsuXVVU

Edited September 4, 2013 by Diche Bach

[magnemoe]

Robust musculature doesn't mean big muscles. When you're constantly hungry and your whole life is centered around trying not to die from wild animal attack, falling and hitting yourself and collecting food with low nutritional value, you look as natural as it gets. That means strong and small muscles, lean body. Big muscles aren't natural, never were. Put a jacked up person in the wilderness and, unless it dies from starvation, it will quickly lose all that tissue.

I bet these people could run and climb very fast, but not for a long time since you need fuel and, well... you've got berries and occasional animal meat if you got lucky... You try running when all you've eaten past week is tree bark.

And the illnesses... Wow. Tooth cavity and you're gone in a year when bacteria spreads through your blood. Cut your skin deeper and you're gone in a week.

Early hominids (and real humans) used to counter the huge mortality by massive breeding. It's basically a way for evolution to go faster. We've slowed things down almost to a halt, and diverted it into various paths that are shortlasting andprobably don't have a defined resulting vector.

Societies quickly became sophisticated, but the mortality stayed high, so that explains the low value of a single life thousands of years ago. It's probably why early civilizations were so cruel. When you've got a bunch of incredibly stupid people that breed like rats and everyone dies at age 35, caring about an unimportant individual is the last thing the bunch thinks about.

Yes, homo sapiens is more slender build than previous humanoids. Might be that all the body mass was overkill, might be that better organisation and throwing weapons made it little likely that you would end up in a wrestling match with an moose, that would be an situation you would want body mass badly.

For diseases, not so much, was not enough people around to be many diseases. Also no high birthrate, kind of problematic if you are nomadic and kids require a lot of work to raise and would not be useful hunters until they was teens.

Farming changes this around, you wanted many kids as they was cheap labor, you wanted to live closer together both for protection and to exchanging services. Main downside was that it was far harder work than hunting but it would be to many people for that to work.

As for sentient anaerobic life, it's not going to happen.

There's no enough energy for the proper mobility, and without mobility there's not a chance of anything else.

I was thinking about a retrograde evolution where sentient life forms leave oxygen (in a weird set of events), but that would be accompanied by losing a lot of functions. Cortical matter simply requires lots of ATP. It boils down to basic chemistry.

It's a fun idea for an SF, but will not happen in real life.

Here we agree, anaerobic life would be energy poor, not also mobility but our brains use a lot of energy.

[Diche Bach]

One more entertaining video pertaining to the question of "what is human?"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbpRJaJ_tc8

[SargeRho]

I don't think so. There does not appear to be any species with sufficient brain mass before primates, cephalopods and cetaceans. And the latter two don't seem to have ever build a civilisation.

[lajoswinkler]

Well, I'm no expert in muscle biology, so I can't really say you're wrong. However, I know that some of my former colleagues have published extensively on paleolithic peoples musculature and my understanding is that the take-home is that: Europeans between 12,000 and 50,000 years ago (modern humans) were _much_ more muscular and robust than modern populations. Whether that means that they exceeded even the musculature of the _most_ muscular modern humans I cannot say.

Also, I'm not so sure that it is necessary to use exogenous steroids to achieve maximum musculature for a modern human. It may make it easier, but I'm not sure that the 'range of possibility' is necessarily widened using such drugs. Anyway, we're getting a bit off topic now. Maybe start a new thread on it!

ADDIT: just as a point of reference. Chimpanzees are 4 to 5 times as strong as a human and much faster too.

You don't have to be an expert in anything, let alone in such narrow field.

I agree on "more robust". No doubt about that. Reaching steroid monsters is impossible, trust me. Human body can not tolerate such metabolism without artificial boosting.

When meat-boulders such as The Rock talk about "all natural", they fu*king lie. People lie. Fact of life.

Yeah, chimps have incredibly powerful jaws and can pull quite a bit of weight around. I'd never tease one. I would even be scared to come near an adult male chimp. They're crazy.

Yes, homo sapiens is more slender build than previous humanoids. Might be that all the body mass was overkill, might be that better organisation and throwing weapons made it little likely that you would end up in a wrestling match with an moose, that would be an situation you would want body mass badly.

For diseases, not so much, was not enough people around to be many diseases. Also no high birthrate, kind of problematic if you are nomadic and kids require a lot of work to raise and would not be useful hunters until they was teens.

Farming changes this around, you wanted many kids as they was cheap labor, you wanted to live closer together both for protection and to exchanging services. Main downside was that it was far harder work than hunting but it would be to many people for that to work.

Here we agree, anaerobic life would be energy poor, not also mobility but our brains use a lot of energy.

I was not referring to microbe epidemics per se. (my English needs fine tuning, disease, illness, sickness, oh well)

The fact is that early people were plagued by various things, from microbes to sand erosion of their teeth, from cancer to arthritis. Not all were nomades, at least not all the time. There were communities, too.

I doubt early hominids cared about birth control, and infanticide is a popular strategy. Baby is delivered and someone throws it away or it's clubbed to death and eaten.

[magnemoe]

I was not referring to microbe epidemics per se. (my English needs fine tuning, disease, illness, sickness, oh well)

The fact is that early people were plagued by various things, from microbes to sand erosion of their teeth, from cancer to arthritis. Not all were nomades, at least not all the time. There were communities, too.

I doubt early hominids cared about birth control, and infanticide is a popular strategy. Baby is delivered and someone throws it away or it's clubbed to death and eaten.

Yes, but I guess disease would be far less of an killer than it became later then humans became common. Think situation was pretty much like for larger predators today, humans had much of the same ecological niche.

One easy way to reduce birthrates is to breast-feed a long time, this is an common practice in some cultures. Disposing of the baby was done however it had moral issues and births are pretty taxing for homo sapiens and neanderthals, for early humanoids they probably did it pretty much as chimps and other great apes.

[DaveofDefeat]

There are the Neanderthals.

[Kryten]

Neanderthals can't really be argued to have been another species, given as it's now pretty undisputed that we absorbed their population rather than displaced it. It's probably best to think of them as a particularly divergent race.