Glossary
culture suggests some of the transitional stages between afÀ uent foraging
and early forms of agriculture.natural selection: Key idea in the modern understanding of how living
organisms change, developed in the 19th century by Charles Darwin; Darwin
argued that tiny, random variations in individuals may increase or decrease
their chances of survival; those whose chances are enhanced are more likely
to pass on their genes to their offspring so that, eventually, more and more
individuals will inherit the successful variations; over long periods of time
such tiny changes lead to the emergence of new species; the central idea
(paradigm) of modern biology.Neanderthals: A hominine species that appeared within the last million
years in Europe, the Middle East, Central Asia and southern Russia; genetic
evidence suggests that the human and Neanderthal lines diverged from
c. 500,000 years ago; though Neanderthals used more advanced stone
technologies than Homo erectus/ergaster, it seems unlikely that they were
capable of symbolic language; the last Neanderthals lived c. 25,000 years
ago in Western Europe.Neolithic era: “New Stone Age,” from about 10,000 years ago; the era in
which agriculture ¿ rst appeared.neotony: An evolutionary process in which juvenile features of the
ancestral species are preserved into adulthood; humans can be regarded as
neotenous apes because brain growth continues for much longer than in
apes and we preserve into adulthood the À at faces and relative hairlessness
of young apes.net primary productivity (NPP): That portion of energy from sunlight
which is used by photosynthesizing organisms and therefore enters the food
chain and becomes available to support the biosphere in general; the energy
income of the biosphere.neutrons: Electrically neutral subatomic particles present in the nuclei of
most atoms; unlike protons, the number of neutrons in a given element can
vary slightly, giving rise to different “isotopes” of each element.