Tevzadze, Gigi and Kikvidze, Zaal and Mikeladze, David and Solomonia, Revaz (2015) Lonely Neanderthal: Neurochemical Hypothesis for the Domestication of Animals and Plants. Kadmos. Journal of Humanities., 7.
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Abstract
Domestication in essence represents a set of interactions of humans with other species, in which behavior has a leading role. At the same time, recent findings from neurochemical research highlight the importance of opioid system to such interactions. The combination of these neurochemical mechanisms and the peculiar social behavior of Neanderthal males could facilitate interactions between humans and wild species, and this type of behavior could be adopted by our ancestors in Eurasia from Neanderthals. These facilitative interactions could later lead to domestications. We propose that domestication is an artificial, social and personal system of the repeated use of results from the behavior and existence of specific representatives of animal and plant species, often obtained by means of genetic selection, with the initial aim of producing a greater amount of endogenous opioids and related neurohormones in the human organism. The new perspective can help generate empirically testable predictions. First, it predicts that interactions with plants, similar to interactions with animals, will launch cascades of neurochemical changes in the opioid system and establish certain patterns of our behavior; this prediction can be tested with the same experimental approach as used in the case of animals. Second, significant differences can be found in the ethnographical records on the interactions with animals between the shaman sub-cultures of Africa and Eurasia.
Item Type: | Article |
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Subjects: | Q Science > Evolution H Social Sciences > H Social Sciences (General) Q Science > QI Neuroscience |
Divisions: | Institutes > 4D Research Institute |
Depositing User: | პროფ. გიგი თევზაძე |
Date Deposited: | 28 Jan 2016 07:43 |
Last Modified: | 28 Jan 2016 07:43 |
URI: | http://eprints.iliauni.edu.ge/id/eprint/3963 |
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