Another possible example of caring behavior among Neandertals was their practice of at least occasionally burying deceased fellow hominins. From the period between 75,000 and 35,000 years ago, at least 59 intentional Neandertal burials at 20 sites have been found, mostly in southwestern France. Most of those interred were placed in a tightly flexed position, which some archeologists have interpreted as having had a symbolic, perhaps religious, significance. However, other archeologists noted that burials of flexed bodies may “have been purely for the practical reason that it required digging a smaller pit.” Some have also speculated that the Neandertal burials suggest a belief in an afterlife. However, the burial of a dead person may simply be done to protect the person’s body from being eaten by hyenas, bears, or other predators. As Brian Fagan noted, the Neandertal burials may have been “a convenient way of disposing of the departed, an essential defense strategy, especially in winter, for people living in caves often frequented by carnivores.” Ian Tattersall summarized the debate about Neandertal burials by suggesting that such an act represents “at the very least a strength of attachment between individuals that transcends anything seen previously: a gesture toward the buried that was far from obligatory for any but emotional reasons.” We will return to the discussion of Neandertal burials in chapter 5.9
A THEORY OF MIND
Providing care for another person suggests that you are able to share their emotional perspective, which is to say, to empathize with them. Empathy, then, requires an ability to get into the mind of the other person, to know what they are thinking and feeling. Psychologists refer to this as mind reading, or having a theory of mind, “an understanding that the behavior of others is motivated by internal states such as thoughts, emotions, and beliefs.” It is not merely being aware of the physical presence and intentions of another person; early hominins all had that ability, as do many animals, as when dogs and wolves submit to a threatening alpha male. By contrast, a theory of mind involves actually putting yourself into the other person’s mind. We read the mind of others not only by listening to what they say but also by observing their facial expressions, gaze, posture, and movements. By definition, an awareness of others cannot develop until an awareness of self has first developed, since you cannot understand the thoughts and emotions of another unless you are aware of your own, which is your point of reference. As described by Nicholas Humphrey, we can “imagine what it’s like to be them because we know what it’s like to be ourselves.”10
Child development studies illustrate how an awareness of others begins to develop in children at about age four and continues until age eleven or so. This awareness of others in children follows the emergence of self-awareness at about age two, as described in the preceding chapter. Chris Frith, a psychologist at University College, London, and one of the leading researchers in the field, defined theory of mind as when we believe that other people have minds like ours and “understand the behavior of these others in terms of the content of their minds: their knowledge, beliefs and desires.”11
A standard scenario used to assess whether a theory of mind exists in children is the Sally-Anne test. Using pictures or puppets, a child is shown Sally and Anne in a room with a ball, a covered basket, and a covered box. Sally puts the ball in the basket and leaves the room. While she is gone, the child sees Anne move the ball from the covered basket to the covered box. Sally then returns to the room, and the child is asked: Where will Sally look for her ball? In order to answer correctly, the child, who knows the ball is in the box, must understand that Sally holds a false belief that the ball’s location is in the basket because she did not see Anne move it to the box. This is called a first-order theory of mind; as will be described in the next chapter, theory of mind scenarios can become much more complex.
Until the age of four, almost all children say that Sally will look for her ball in the box where Anne moved it. Children up to that age are unable to distinguish what they know from what others know. Daniel Povinelli and Christopher Prince, psychologists at the University of Southwestern Louisiana, illustrated this difficulty as follows:
For example, sit across the table from a young 3-year-old girl and show her a picture of a turtle so that it is right-side-up from her perspective, but upside-down from yours. She will readily assent that you can see the turtle, and indeed, if you cover your eyes, she will readily acknowledge that you can no longer see it. But try as you may, you will have an extraordinarily difficult time getting her to understand that, from your perspective, the turtle appears differently, that is, upside-down. But less than a year later, this same child will demonstrate without hesitation her understanding that although the two of you are visually connected (or attending) to the same thing, your respective mental representations of the object differ considerably.
Starting about age four, children acquire an ability to put themselves into the mind of others. They then reply that Sally will first look for the ball in the basket, because that is where she left it and believes it to be. The acquisition of a theory of mind occurs at an earlier age in children who have older siblings and also in children whose parents more frequently use expressions referring to mental states when talking with them, thus apparently helping them to develop this cognitive skill.12
DO ANIMALS HAVE A THEORY OF MIND?
This raises the question of whether animals other than humans have an awareness of others’ thoughts. It is generally accepted that most animals do not. For example, a baby rabbit will try to hide when it sees an eagle overhead; the rabbit does so out of instinctual behavior, not because it puts itself into the eagle’s mind and speculates that it may be hungry.
Elephants have been observed performing what appear to be empathetic acts toward other elephants, but it is unclear whether this represents a theory of mind. In one instance, “a male elephant was observed for several hours providing care to a dying companion by trying to force him to stand when he fell down and bringing him water to drink.” In another instance, “a drowning elephant calf was saved when the matriarch and another adult female climbed into the lake, positioned themselves on each side of the calf, and, using their tusks and trunks, lifted the calf to safety on the shore.”13
Baboons are examples of animals that apparently have some awareness of self but do not have a theory of mind. They “distinguish clearly between ‘me’ and ‘not me’ … [and] identify strongly with their matriline.” They are able to keep track of the hierarchal status of their troop and their own relationship with its various numbers. They have sophisticated social and communications skills. However, according to researchers who have extensively studied them, baboons appear to lack awareness of the emotions or knowledge of other baboons: “Baboons’ theory of mind might best be described as a vague intuition about other animals’ intentions.… We cannot yet conclude that baboons regard other baboons—even tacitly—as intentional beings with goals, motives, likes and dislikes.”14
Whether or not great apes have an awareness of others’ thoughts has been widely debated. It is well known that chimpanzees and gorillas can deceive others. Jane Goodall and other primatologists have described multiple instances of chimpanzees intentionally misleading other chimpanzees regarding, for example, food supplies. They have also described examples of chimpanzees helping other chimpanzees who appeared to be in distress. And in an impressive display of apparent empathy, when a three-year-old boy fell unconscious into the outdoor gorilla yard at the Chicago zoo, a female gorilla, while holding her own baby, picked up the boy as well, then carried him to the enclosure’s doorway so that zoo staff could easily reach him and take him to safety.”15
But does such behavior represent a true theory of mind, or is it rather learned behavior based on past experience? For example, if I do “x,” he will do “y,” and I will get all the bananas. Although the question is still being debated, there appears to be a consensus among researchers that chimpanzees and perhaps other great apes have “the beginnings of the elements of a theory
of mind,” “the rudiments of one,” or are said to be “hovering on that crucial theory-of-mind boundary.” One research group summarized the findings as follows: “We feel safe in asserting that chimpanzees can understand some psychological states in others.… But at the same time it is clear that chimpanzees do not have a full-blown, human-like theory of mind.” Another group of researchers pretended that chimpanzees had acquired a theory of mind just long enough to deny that they had one and wittily let them answer the question for themselves:
Yes, we share with you a psychological system that is able to knit these behaviors into novel and productive strategies that serve to fulfill our goals and desires. And it is true that our emotions, mannerisms, and reactions are much like your own. We even possess a self-concept that offers us an objective perspective on our own behavior. But what ever gave you the idea that we have a theory of mind? Why do you want to believe so desperately that we are able to construct a self–other narrative like you? After all, it was your lineage, not ours, that tripled the size of its brain during the past 5 million years. It was your species, not ours, that constructed the idea that there are unobservable mental states that mediate behavior. And thus it is you … not us, who are in the position of reinterpreting ancient behavioral patterns in terms of mentalistic notions—notions that never even occurred to us.16
WHEN A THEORY OF MIND IS IMPAIRED
The ability to think about what others are thinking—a theory of mind—would have presumably provided a major evolutionary advantage to any hominin species that acquired this skill. In food acquisition, for example, a hunter with a theory of mind could think about the strategies being used by other hunters and devise novel approaches that might be more successful. A warrior with a theory of mind probably would better predict what his enemy was going to do. A trader with a theory of mind might more accurately ascertain the minimum price acceptable to the seller of goods. And in reproduction, a man or woman with a theory of mind would be more likely to successfully seduce their partner. Indeed, the art of seduction—and passing on one’s genes—focuses in part on thinking about what the other person is thinking and wants.
It is very difficult for us, as modern Homo sapiens, to imagine what hominins were like before they acquired an awareness of others’ thoughts. Thinking about what others think, know, believe, or desire is an integral part of being human, the essence of our daily gossip and entertainment, including movies, plays, and the ubiquitous comedies and soap operas on television. An awareness of others’ thoughts and feelings is also a prerequisite for empathy, for without an awareness of others’ thoughts there can be no empathy. In The Modular Brain, neurologist Richard Restak noted that damage to the prefrontal cortex may impair an awareness of others and thereby reduce us “to an almost subhuman level of functioning … devoid of what I consider our most evolved mental ability: our capacity to empathize with others.”17
There are several human conditions in which the awareness of other people’s thoughts is impaired. Foremost among these is autism; individuals with autism are said to have a “special difficulty with those situations in which it is necessary to take into account what someone else knows or expects.” British psychologist Simon Baron-Cohen has called this deficit in autistic children “mindblindness.” Giving the Sally-Anne test to children with autism illustrates the deficit. Among normal four-year-old children, 85 percent correctly answer that Sally will look for the ball in the basket, where she left it, rather than in the box where Anne moved it. Among children with autism, however, only 20 percent respond correctly. They have difficulties putting themselves into the mind of Sally and understanding that she holds a false belief. Autism is thought to be caused by damage to several brain areas, including the prefrontal cortex.18
Another human condition in which awareness of others’ thoughts is impaired is antisocial personality disorder; individuals with this disorder lack empathy, often commit criminal acts, and constitute the majority of individuals in jails and prisons. Neuroimaging studies of such individuals have reported abnormalities in many brain areas, including the anterior cingulate, insula, and inferior parietal area. Accidental damage to the prefrontal area can also result in an impaired awareness of others. The classic example usually cited is Phineas Gage, who in 1848 had an iron bar penetrate his frontal lobe. Before the accident, Gage was said to have been “quiet and respectful.” Afterward, he was described as being insensitive to other people’s feelings and as being “gross, profane, coarse, and vulgar to such a degree that his society was intolerable to decent people,” although more recent information about his later life suggests that the change in his behavior was not as stark as has usually been portrayed. Intentional damage to the prefrontal cortex such as occurs in surgical lobotomies, which were once done for individuals with severe mental illness, also commonly resulted in “a decreased awareness of the feelings of other people.” Such individuals were described as being “tactless, apparently neither observing nor caring about the effect of their remarks upon their hearers,” and behaving in a manner “characterized by a sometimes shocking lack of inhibitions and absence of consideration toward others.”19
THE BRAIN OF ARCHAIC HOMO SAPIENS
Based on their caring behavior, it seems probable that Neandertals, and perhaps other species of Archaic Homo sapiens, had developed a theory of mind. If that is true, how would their brains have differed from those of their predecessors? Based on studies of their skulls, it is evident that the brains of the Neandertals were not only significantly larger than those of Homo erectus but also shaped differently. Specifically, according to British anthropologist Christopher Stringer, Neandertal brains had “a taller brain case and expanded parietal lobe.” Other researchers have confirmed that Neandertal brains exhibited “a striking advance in the parietal area.”20
In recent years, neuroimaging studies have been carried out on human volunteers to identify brain areas that are activated by various theory of mind tasks. Subjects have been asked to respond to questions such as the following while the activity of their brains was being assessed: “A man who has just robbed a bank is running down the street and drops a glove. A policeman, unaware of the robbery but seeing the dropped glove, calls to the man to stop so that he can retrieve the lost glove. The robber then puts his hands up and confesses to the robbery. Question: Why did the robber do this?”
The results of such studies vary somewhat depending on whether the person is asked to think about another person’s thoughts, beliefs, desires, or emotions, but the overall brain activation pattern is remarkably consistent, as shown in figure 3.1. It includes the temporo-parietal junction and parts of the frontal lobe (anterior cingulate, insula, frontal pole, and the medial frontal cortex).
The temporo-parietal junction (TPJ) consists of the inferior parietal lobule (BA 39, 40) and adjacent posterior superior temporal area (BA 22). Anatomically, these areas are remarkably similar, and “most authors agree that it is practically impossible to determine the boundary between the parietal and temporal cortices” at the temporo-parietal junction. The posterior portion of the superior temporal area is especially interesting, since it includes the Wernicke speech area, usually on the left side, and an extensive association cortex. Thus, this part of the brain interprets the speech of others and, in the adjacent association cortex, puts the words into a broader context of other things known about the speaker. This is the essence of reading another person’s mind.21
The acquisition of theory of mind in evolving hominins was probably also facilitated by the continuing development of white matter connecting tracts. The uncinate fasciculus would have been part of this development, since it connects the insula and prefrontal cortex to the superior temporal area. Another important connecting tract for the development of a theory of mind would have been the arcuate fasciculus, often regarded as the fourth part of the superior longitudinal fasciculus discussed in chapter 1. The arcuate fasciculus is a major connecting pathway between the lateral prefrontal ar
ea and the superior temporal area and temporo-parietal junction as well as other parts of the temporal lobe. Comparative studies of the arcuate fasciculus in humans and chimpanzees have reported that “the organization and cortical terminations of the arcuate fasciculus were strongly modified in human evolution.”22
Imaging studies have demonstrated the importance of the temporo-parietal junction for a theory of mind. For example, a study of twelve volunteers who were asked to think about other people in a story reported that “the right temporo-parietal junction (RTPJ) was recruited selectively for the attribution of mental states.… The RTPJ is highly specific to the attribution of mental states.” Another study of twenty volunteers who were asked to think about individuals in family photos reported that the right TPJ was “uniquely engaged during the elaboration of ToM [theory of mind] events.” A summary of such studies concluded that the right TPJ “is specifically involved in theory of mind.” Especially intriguing was one study that reported that the right inferior parietal area was associated with an awareness of others, whereas the left inferior parietal area was associated with an awareness of self, suggesting a possible brain lateralization for self and other awareness.23
Evolving Brains, Emerging Gods Page 7
