Human Evolution: Culture, Labor, and Technology

Key Concepts

• Culture: Information acquired through social learning.
• Human Culture: A set of socially acquired information, transmitted through language.
• Hominization: The process that enabled the human species to evolve from its earliest ancestors to Homo sapiens sapiens.
• Humanization: The process that leads full-bodied hominids with anthropomorphic or human form to become men.

Factors Influencing Human Evolution

• Discovery of fire
• Manufacture of tools
• Agriculture and livestock
• Social organization
• Trade
• War
• History

Labor and Technology

• Labor: A productive activity that is a conscious and intentional manipulation and modification of nature to obtain what is necessary to survive. (Everything we do in exchange for a salary.)

Features of Labor

• Uniquely Human: No other living thing intentionally and consciously manipulates the environment to obtain what it needs.
• Relational: Through work, humans relate to nature, technology, and other legitimate appropriations.

• Technique: The ability to modify the environment to one's advantage, as embodied in designing, building, and using tools to assist in action.

Features of Technique

• A Subject's Adaptation to the Environment: Technique did not evolve because it provided an advantage; actions came about through natural evolution.
• An Environmental Adaptation to the Subject: The human being is the only living being with the technical capability to modify the environment and make it more favorable.
• Activity in Constant Development: New procedures are invented based on existing techniques, replacing those that become outdated as new, more effective ones emerge.

• Technology: A set of procedures and resources of great complexity and sophistication that have characterized techniques since the 18th century.

Advantages of Technology

• Efficiency and Productivity: It seeks the maximum output.
• The Humanization of Working Conditions: With machines, less effort is required at work.
• Increased Free Time: Thanks to machines, people have more free time while producing the same quantity of product as without machines.

Disadvantages of Technology

• Overproduction and Consumerism: More stock is produced than can be sold, promoting consumerism (people are encouraged to buy more of what is manufactured).
• Dehumanization and Alienation: Work performed by an operator is often limited to pressing a button or pulling a lever.
• The Illusion of Free Time: Some thinkers initially believed technology would lead to more free time, but later philosophers argued that people who do not work simply become consumers.
• Unemployment: Thanks to machines, fewer employees are needed, with only one person potentially doing the work of repairing the machine.