From Complex Techno-behaviour to Complex Attention Through the Genes of the Precuneus

Abstract Previous palaeo-neurological work suggested that the human precuneus evolved differently in Homo sapiens, compared to Neanderthals, and that this brain region may be important for both the extended visuospatial abilities and attention necessary for Pleistocene bowhunting. Here I use Kalahari ethnographies to provide insight into bowhunting as a complex techno-behaviour with many aspects interacting in nontrivial ways, requiring a range of attention types in succession or simultaneously. As an inter-disciplinary heuristic exercise, I use genes with non-synonymous changes at high frequency in H. sapiens compared to Neanderthals and Denisovans to explore previous suggestions about the evolution of the precuneus and its role in complex, bimanual techno-behaviours—requiring both hands doing different things at the same time whilst focussing attention across a distance—such as bowhunting. The preliminary results suggest that aspects of complex attentional control and unique genetic expressions in the H. sapiens genome may have been involved in the expansion of the human precuneus. This expansion, contributing to the globularisation of the human cranium, may have started by ~ 160 ka in Africa, reaching current human ranges by ~ 100 ka. Since then, we see a noticeable increase in the complexity of H. sapiens socio-technical systems, together with continued globularisation until ~ 35 ka. Especially our ability to focus on a task or stimuli for a long time whilst ignoring distractions (sustained and executive attention) and focussing on visual information in a spatiotemporal context (i.e., visuospatial attention) may have been strongly developed in human precuneal attention.