Reading Comprehension

PT108 · S4 · P4 · Q22 Darwin/Taphonomy

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Darwin's conception of early prehistoric humans as confident, clever hunter-gatherers has long dominated anthropology.

Topic

The traditional vs. revised view of early prehistoric humans' lifestyles—were they bold hunters or cautious scavengers?

Framework

Challenge Position

Main Point

Recent research, especially via taphonomy, challenges the classic view that early humans were confident hunters and instead suggests they were more likely cautious scavengers. The Most Valuable Sentence appears in the last paragraph:

P1: The Traditional View and Its Flaws

For a long time, people (influenced by Darwin) thought early humans were clever, capable hunters. But this idea was shaped by how fossils were discovered and by mistaking the lifestyles of modern hunter-gatherers for those of prehistoric humans. This led to misinterpretations and overlooked important differences in technology and environmental challenges.

P2: New Ways of Understanding the Fossil Record

Developments in fields like taphonomy (the study of how bones become fossils) have started challenging the old “hunter” narrative. Taphonomy helps researchers ask whether bones were left by human hunters, predators, or natural events, and helps distinguish between marks made by tools and those made by animal teeth.

P3: Applying Taphonomy to Early Fossils

Researchers applied taphonomic analysis to fossils nearly two million years old. By looking at the tiny marks on bones, they found that tool marks didn’t always line up with joints as you’d expect from skilled hunters, and tooth marks from carnivores were sometimes beneath tool marks—suggesting humans showed up after predators had eaten their fill.

22.

It can be inferred from the passage that the author would encourage the anthropologists mentioned in the final sentence of the first paragraph to do which one of the following types of research on modern hunter-gatherer societies?

apply the methodologies of taphonomy
Out of Support Window
Nothing in this answer connects to this final sentence of the 1st paragraph. The author never complained that these anthropologists weren't using taphonomy. It's a bit of a weird suggestion, too, since with modern hunter-gatherer societies we don't have to scan their piles of bones looking for clues based off indentations. We can just directly observe them.
23% picked this
investigate the similarities of life-styles
Out of Support Window
Nothing in this answer connects to this final sentence of the 1st paragraph. The author wants the researchers to investigate the similarities/differences between the life-styles and environments of modern hunter gatherers and those of prehistoric hunter-gatherers. This answer is talking about comparing modern hunter gatherer societies to other modern hunter-gatherer societies.
13% picked this
Correct
contrast the competition for food
Why this is right
This connects with the final sentence of the 1st paragraph, which wanted anthropologists to consider differences in environment between modern hunter-gatherers and prehistoric ones. One way that a modern hunter-gatherer's environment might be importantly different from a prehistoric hunter-gatherer's environment is in terms of what large animal predators are there. The presence of large animal predators could not only pose a direct threat to the humans (because these predators might prey on humans), but it also means that humans and these predators are both competing for large animal prey. The old hunter-gatherers, our emerging understanding tells us, would sit back and let a large animal predator kill a big animal. Then the humans would run in after and scavenge what meat was left from carnivore kills. That's not a viable strategy in modern hunter-gatherer societies if there aren't large animal predators around to be causing large animal carcasses that can be scavenged.
Skill tested: Inference · how this choice captures the passage's function is the move to repeat next time.
45% picked this
examine the life-styles of hunter-gatherer
Out of Support Window
Nothing in this answer connects to this final sentence of the 1st paragraph. The author never complained that these anthropologists weren't looking at hunter-gatherer societies from the 1900s (or 1800s, depending on when this was written). The author complained that these anthropologists weren't looking at important differences between modern societies and prehistoric ones, hunter-gatherer societies that existed many thousands of years ago.
12% picked this
analyze how the world's increasing
Contradicted
The author did want anthropologists to take better account of the increasingly sophisticated strategies being used by modern hunter-gather societies. But since we refer to those societies as nonindustrial, they aren't eligible to be affected by changes in the world's industrialization. Their societies exist in a bubble that doesn't resemble industrialized modernity. If this answer said, "analyze how modern hunter-gatherers' increasing sophistication makes their survival strategies different from those of prehistoric societies", it would be good.
7% picked this

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