There’s a Giant Hole in Human History

About this Video

• Video Title: There’s a Giant Hole in Human History
• Channel: Michael Button
• Speakers: Michael
• Duration: 00:13:15

Introduction

This video explores the significant gap in our understanding of human history. The speaker, Michael, argues that the currently accepted narrative of human progress, focusing primarily on the last 5,000 years since the invention of writing, overlooks the vast majority (99%) of human existence. He challenges the traditional view by presenting evidence suggesting that early humans were far more intelligent and sophisticated than previously thought, potentially possessing knowledge and skills we've lost over time.

Key Takeaways

• The "Giant Hole": The video highlights the massive gap in our historical understanding, encompassing 99% of human existence before written records. This period, largely characterized as the Paleolithic era, is poorly understood due to the limited and often perishable nature of archaeological evidence.
• Early Human Intelligence: Evidence suggests that early humans (including Homo sapiens and other hominids like Neanderthals) possessed advanced cognitive abilities, including symbolic thought, demonstrated through cave paintings, burial rituals, and sophisticated toolmaking. The notion of a sudden "cognitive revolution" is challenged.
• Recency Bias: The video argues that our understanding is skewed by recency bias, leading us to undervalue the achievements of earlier humans due to the lack of readily available evidence.
• Lost Knowledge and Practices: The video proposes that early humans might have possessed advanced knowledge of astronomy, landscape, and possibly altered states of consciousness, contributing to their understanding of the world. These practices might have been crucial to their societies but are now largely lost or misunderstood.
• Environmental Factors and Loss of Evidence: The video considers how environmental changes (e.g., sea-level rise, desertification) and natural disasters, along with disease and warfare, could have wiped out evidence of advanced pre-historic civilizations.