The Mind in the Cave: Consciousness and the Origins of Art

by James David Lewis-Williams

Emerging from the narrow underground passages into the chambers of caves such as Lascaux, Chauvet, and Altamira, visitors are confronted with symbols, patterns, and depictions of bison, woolly mammoths, ibexes, and other animals.

Since its discovery, cave art has provoked great curiosity about why it appeared when and where it did, how it was made, and what it meant to the communities that created it. David Lewis-Williams proposes that the explanation for this lies in the evolution of the human mind. Cro-Magnons, unlike the Neanderthals, possessed a more advanced neurological makeup that enabled them to experience shamanistic trances and vivid mental imagery. It became important for people to "fix," or paint, these images on cave walls, which they perceived as the membrane between their world and the spirit world from which the visions came. Over time, new social distinctions developed as individuals exploited their hallucinations for personal advancement, and the first truly modern society emerged.

Illuminating glimpses into the ancient mind are skillfully interwoven here with the still-evolving story of modern-day cave discoveries and research. The Mind in the Cave is a superb piece of detective work, casting light on the darkest mysteries of our earliest ancestors while strengthening our wonder at their aesthetic achievements.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Art, Anthropology, Psychology, Prehistory, Science

320 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2002

About the author

Lewis-Williams had been interested in archaeology in his youth.[2] When interviewed on 19 February 2014 in his office at the Rock Art Research Institute (RARI) at WITS, Lewis-Williams related that in the early days of apartheid, there were very few English-speaking archaeology teaching posts available. One was held by John Goodwin at the University of Cape Town (UCT) and the other was held by Clarence Van Riet Lowe at WITS. These posts were in addition to several Afrikaans-speaking posts held at the University of Pretoria (UP)as well as a number of national museums. To major in archaeology was not an option for an undergraduate in South Africa at the time, and in 1952 Lewis-Williams enrolled for a BA at UCT majoring in English and Geography. After his graduation he taught English for twenty years, taking up a position at Selborne College and subsequently at Kearsney College. In the school holidays, Lewis-Williams was able to follow his passion for archaeology, organising field trips for the boys of Kearsney to explore the Drakensberg for rock art images. In 1964, while still teaching, he completed an Honours degree through the University of South Africa (UNISA) entitled Cove Rock: A study in coastal geomorphology. Several years later, Lewis-Williams met Professor John Argyle after giving a College Lecture in Pietermaritzburg. Argyle, who was professor of social anthropology at the University of Natal, suggested that Lewis-Williams do a master's degree under his supervision. Living comfortably in the grounds of Kearsney College, Lewis-Williams was not rushed to complete his master's. Eventually Argyle decided to pressure Lewis-Williams by upgrading his degree to a PhD which was finished in 1977 and published in 1981 as Believing and Seeing: Symbolic meanings in southern San rock paintings.

Reviews

[Jessica · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm pretty sure I would have been the person in the deepest cave, drawing cats.

[Diana · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Mind in the Cave: Consciousness and the Origins of Art [2002] – ★★★

A chaotic and repetitive account on cave art and its origin, which is also not as insightful as one would have hoped, focusing primarily on shamanism and altered states of consciousness.

The Mind in the Cave is by David Lewis-Williams, a South African archaeologist known for his research into South African rock art, and, in his book, he describes the most breath-taking cave art from the Upper Palaeolithic Period (examples found in the Cave of the Trois-Frères, France and in the Altamira Cave, Spain), tracing the way people thought about cave art through the ages and trying to theorise on the question why Upper Palaeolithic people made such art and what it represented for them. Although the book is engaging, with interesting case studies and beautiful illustrations, it is also problematic and only sporadically informative on the question of consciousness itself – its origin and how this relates to the first known cave art.

David Lewis-Williams makes it clear that art (as we define it now) started to appear in caves in the period of “Transition” (the period between 45.000 and 35.000 years ago), and it is during this period that Neanderthals gave way to Homo sapiens in Europe. The author also states that Neanderthals did not use their tools in such a diverse way as Homo sapiens, and did not borrow from Home sapiens such sophisticated rituals as certain burial techniques and image-making in caves. This is because Neanderthals possessed a different (inferior) “consciousness” capability. Thus, early Homo sapiens were the first ones to make “art” as we understand it.

All this is fascinating, but the author hardly touches on the topic of consciousness in these arguments, and approaches the topic from a rather odd perspective (it may be evident that he is no neuroscientist). It can be agreed that consciousness is a continuum, and that there are different levels of it, but, instead of focusing on self-awareness, memory, imagination or abstract thought as elements related to consciousness to explain first art-making, Lewis-Williams strangely talks about dreaming and its recall, which is a rather strange focus. The author’s musings on dreaming are also quite surprising as he provides certain explanations for dreaming as if they were undisputed facts, when, in reality, we still know very little why we dream and cannot say for absolute certain how the process of dreaming takes place. Lewis-Williams states categorically that dreaming is the product of a random neurological activity [2002: 123], without providing any evidence of this, and his explanation for dreaming does not take into account the simple fact that dreaming helps our learning or that we at times can find ourselves in a dream and are capable of controlling it (lucid dreaming).

Lewis-Williams’s other musings are even more startling. He states that altered states of consciousness can somehow explain cave art, which is an interesting thesis, but he also picks vivid dreaming and hallucinations as vital elements capable of explaining art, being capabilities of the first Homo sapiens (to which it may be replied that any cat can undoubtedly see vivid dreams, but it would not think of creating pictures of any animals on any walls). In that vein, Lewis-Williams does not attempt to answer the main question of the origin of consciousness when the first example of cave art appeared or elaborate on the link between the two (even though he clearly asks numerous times in the book this very question – how did human consciousness evolve?). To be fair, the author does venture an explanation for the consciousness origin by hinting that it might have evolved through a genetic mutation over a long period of time, but this is something little coming too late.

Lewis-Williams’s other statements and examples would have sounded clever if they were also not so obvious and overused. For example, he states “one cannot notice a presentational image in a mass of lines unless one already has a notion of images” [2002: 183], a rather self-evident “insight”, and produces as an example a much over-used and well-known allegory of the cave, without even stating that it was recorded by Plato (the only person referred to in the text is Socrates). The author’s other statements are as obscure and self-important-sounding as he undoubtedly wanted them to be – “art-making, if and when it appears, is an active member of a dynamic nexus of interdigitating factors” [2002: 73] (the author fails to clarify), and “art and cosmos united in a mutual statement about the complex nature of reality” [2002: 149]. Other unsupported statements also emerge in the book, including “body decoration could not have evolved into the making of two-dimensional images of animals on cave walls” [2002: 90], and the chaotic nature of the narrative is evident when one considers that Lewis-Williams jumps frequently in his book from topic to topic, debating altered states of consciousness and why sleep was necessary one minute, and discussing The Iliad and Shakespeare in the next [2002: 190].

🐂 The Mind in the Cave’s main problem is summed up in one sentence in Lewis-Williams’s book – “the fascinating issues of consciousness, self-awareness, introspection, insight and foresight… remain, and they are not a destination of our present inquiry and can be circumnavigated” [2002: 105]. Arguably, our logic and rationality dictate that this inquiry is actually essential to the topic. Overall, The Mind in the Cave provides a good overview of cave artworks found mainly in France, as well as of speculations as to why ancient people made those artworks (the author brushes off the idea that art may be made for art’s sake). The book contains Lewis-Williams’s social (shamanic) interpretation of the art found in ancient caves, but touches only very briefly and unsatisfactorily on the central question or mystery that is considered to be one of the main ones in science – how consciousness could have began and how cave art may shed some clues that lead to an explanation.

[Tim Pendry · Rating 4 out of 5]

It may seem odd to give this book only four stars and yet give the older Bahn book on Ice Age art five - see http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11... - but there is a reason.

There is absolutely no doubt of the value of Lewis-Williams attempt to create a theory of cave art nor the insights that he provides into consciousness studies and what such studies may be able to tell us about the motivations and culture of palaeolithic homo sapiens.

The doubt derives from the same scepticism about what we can ever actually know that we recorded in our review of the earlier work. The data is too spread out over too great a length of time and is too represented by what can survive materially to allow any strong claims of knowledge.

All theory in this area tends to tell us more about our preoccupations than those of pre-historic man and woman, although one must concede that each intervention by the Academy does add something, a new angle to compare with the angles shown to us in the past.

But caution is inevitable, much as one should be deeply cautious about constructing theories of rampant matriarchalism from fat little stone ladies when textiles, wood carvings and body decoration have long since decayed, let alone social structures and micro-environments.

Yes, there are limitations on what might have been thought which arise from simple ecological truths and which do permit some analogy from current indigenous activity but modern indigenes are not ancient peoples – though, to be fair, Lewis-Williams does put in his own caveats here.

But the real warning signs that we may be jumping too far ahead in our thought processes lies in the closing words of the book.

The author quotes Julian Jaynes in his claim that we see a break in consciousness in the break between the Iliad and the Odyssey in order to make his own claim. Oh dear! What is it with academics who take textual history as human history?

Forget Jaynes. Lewis-Williams dumps text but replaces it with art, equally unwarrantably. There is no evidence of actual brain structures changing very much in thousands of years for the simple reason that brain structure is an evolved function and evolution is a slow and wasteful process.

Indeed, Lewis-Williams’ core argument depends on comparative consciousness studies that assume such long range structural similarities for them to make any sense - and yet here we have appeal to the sort of radical view of consciousness change that appeals to New Agers.

Neanderthals and Homo Sapiens will have had very different modes of consciousness because of their different speciation (meaning different brain structures) but we see no necessity for the nature of the sapient form to provide more than the fact of art rather than its precise forms.

This does not diminish the thesis that rock art forms have some derivation from altered states and that, possibly (which I find plausible), 'artists' and shamans could manipulate social conditions to their own benefit. Both those propositions are highly plausible.

I have no doubt that homo sapiens has heard ‘inner voices’ in the palaeolithic age but we are equally certain that those ‘inner voices’ are not of one kind that morphs into another kind over time but were as variant then amongst individuals as they are now.

The artistic impulse may just as likely then, as now, be much more complex in its relationship to so-called spiritual, magical and community impulses than we like to think. Lewis-Williams’ theorizing seems plausible but, I repeat, we should not be seduced into believing we know.

What we have to be careful of is assuming that the rock art we see and the social change being postulated is quite so neatly connected as the theory suggests. The truth – we do not, cannot and never will know. In some cases, they may be and, in others, not. Grand narratives are presumptuous.

Nevertheless, though perhaps a trifle intellectually confused at the end (simply pushing Jaynes back a few thousand years with no sounder evidence than Jaynes has for the claims he makes), this book is still highly recommended.

It is full of scholarly and intelligent material on a number of related issues – Western European cave art itself, consciousness studies, the history of archaeology and the rock art of Africa and the Americas. There is easily enough evidence to come to an independent view of one’s own.

[Kim · Rating 5 out of 5]

I couldn't put this down. It's fascinating.

[Hugh Miller · Rating 4 out of 5]

A hard read. If that scares you off, then don't bother. But this books repays the effort if you give it.

This looks at the development of human consciousness and art in the Stone Age people. Working with what little we have of theirs (cave paintings, tools, etc.), David Lewis-Williams works to broaden our sense of the psychology and experience of the neolithic people. The difference between these Cro-Magnon people (our ancestors) and the Neanderthals(not our ancestors) lies in the consciousness and neurological make-up. The origin of shamanistic trances and practices lies back here in the Stone Age.

As I said, a hard read, but I found it fascinating and went looking for more.

[Stephen Palmer · Rating 5 out of 5]

David Lewis-Williams’ 'The Mind In The Cave' is one of a number of attempts to imagine the psychology and condition of our prehistoric ancestors – and it’s one of the best. Though Steven Mithen’s 'The Prehistory Of The Mind' was an excellent and thought-provoking read, there was running through it an element of speculation that to my mind seemed a step too far. (Admittedly his 'The Singing Neanderthals' was somehow more reasonable…) Steven Pinker’s 'How The Mind Works' meanwhile took the recent plague of computational metaphors of consciousness way too far.

Lewis-Williams on the other hand anchored his speculation more firmly into his research into shamanic cultures and practices. A South African investigator into prehistoric rock art, his early paper 'The Signs Of All Times: Entoptic Phenomena In Upper Palaeolithic Art' courted the same controversy as that outsider imaginer of ancient times Richard Rudgley. But 'The Mind In The Cave' managed to wear its deep research lightly as it told a compelling tale of what we can learn from prehistoric rock art, and how we attempted to learn it.

The author perhaps didn’t intend to explain everything he discovered or observed, but I think he did get very close to that goal. Yet that might have been by accident, given that a second, similarly brilliant volume 'Inside The Neolithic Mind' appeared only three years later. This first book covers methodology, historical attempts to explain rock art, then symbolic, totemic and shamanic meanings, with the latter explanation being the favoured one. Cave walls are asserted as a kind of “membrane” between the physical world and the spiritual one universally imagined in past human cultures, with associated art explained as a variety of shamanic spirituality related to neuronal optical activity.

It is a brave man who ventures into the world of the prehistoric mind, given that no stone or metal tools directly mark our cognitive evolution, no buildings, post-holes or other marks in the soil give away the evolution of consciousness, and nothing can be said with certainty about rock art. But I do think we can nonetheless – by using the evidence of present day hunter-gatherer societies not least, as Lewis-Williams does – reasonably describe a lot about the development of the human mind from rock art. Many other authors have done so. In The Mind In The Cave, David Lewis-Williams made one of the most significant contributions to that difficult task. I don’t think he, or indeed anybody, will get all the details correct – how could we? – but the man deserves massive kudos for his ambition and his brilliance. Maybe it’s more likely that the art itself was reason enough for it to be brought into existence rather than any shamanic one-upmanship. Creativity, after all, is a self-sustaining human activity.

An outstanding book.

[Robert Frecer · Rating 2 out of 5]

Needlessly confusing. Lewis-Williams promises at the start of the book to give you very specific answers, so I expected to learn about prehistoric art from cave sites, but instead for the first 180 pages he proceeds to list a bunch of scientist biographies and an erratic critique of methodology. He seems to be interested in constructing a hodgepodge lattice of thoughts, sometimes picking and choosing from modern science (e.g. neurology) at other times, when it suits his desired result, reverting to Medieval ideas (e.g. theory of consciousness). Contradictions abound, e.g. when saying prehistoric tribes cannot be studied by analogy through present-day “primitive” tribes (p.46) but then using /Xam San people for just that in a whole dedicated chapter.

Hilariously, Lewis-Williams insists on anything that is “Marxist”, quotes Chomsky and denounces anything that is “Western”. I didn’t know that prehistory could get this political. Once you notice all of this, the book starts to feel like a being trapped in a corner with a conspiracy nut.

It comes then as a surprise that after 180 pages of babble, chapter 7 (“The Origin of Image-Making”) and after is a sane, complete and reasonable explanation of how the first images were made. Homo sapiens had modern minds capable of mental imagery; the first images were representations of these mental pictures, not of the animals and objects themselves. Cool theory - would have been better without the ballast.

[Monty Milne · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are many ways in which homo sapiens can enter an altered state of consciousness – whether through alcohol, magic mushrooms, ritual drumming, extreme fasting, intense meditation , or others – but the author shows that whatever the method, all peoples in all times and places have commonalities in their experience of the altered state. It is this common experience that enables us to understand and trace the themes in primitive cave art, even though this art may be separated by thousands of years or thousands of miles.

Broadly speaking, I found this convincing. For example, Lewis-Williams discusses the “pricking” sensations that people describe when they are in altered states, and links them with the many “wounded men” with “spears” sticking out of them – he suggests this is an artistic representation of that same “pricking” sensation that people had when they entered the cave in their altered state. There is a very good description of how entrance into Lascaux could facilitate and even induce this altered state. The scored lines on the cave walls are described as being made by people participating in what we would now describe as shamanic experiences. Shamanism is, effectively, both the earliest form of spiritual or religious belief, and arises out of that entry into an altered state which is universally available to human beings.

I have just a couple of caveats. The author gives far too much space early on to Marxist interpretations of cave art. He dismantles them (in essence, palaeolithic art is do with hierarchy not Marxist theories of materialism or utilitarianism) but gives too much respect to them in the first place. Also, I already have “Inside the Neolithic Mind” by the same author, which covers a lot of the same ground. And finally, I am not sure it is right to talk of the Neanderthals possessing “primary” but not “higher” consciousness. This seems to me to be presuming rather too much. If we ponder the question “How intelligent were the Neanderthals?”, recent research suggests that this is not a question we can answer with any degree of confidence. Especially when it depends what we mean by “intelligent” anyway.

Nevertheless an agreeable and fascinating few hours spent in the pages of this book, which almost led me into an altered state of consciousness myself, as I imagined what fun it would be to be a shaman, live in a cave and daub paint on the walls.

[Semih · Rating 5 out of 5]

Uzun süre önyargılı yaklaştığım kitap beni baştan aşağı yanılttı ve başucuna konacak denli özel bir yer edindi. Gerek anlatım diliyle, gerek gösterdiği kaynakça, gerek fikirleri dayandırdığı noktalar ile beni çok farklı bir dünyaya götürdü ve bilişsel düşünce üzerine yazılmış en kapsamlı antropoloji ve arkeoloji tabanlı kitaplardan biri olduğuna iknâ etmeyi başardı. Hiçbir sayfasında sıkılmadım ve uzundur bilmediğim şeylerle dolu çokça bilgi barının bir kitapla uyudum. P.S. Kitabın içindeki çizimlerin de oldukça güzel düşünülmüş ve destekleyici materyaller olduklarını belirtmeliyim.

Bu detayları biraz açmak ve kıvırdığım sayfalara bir göz atmak istiyorum.

Şimdi kitaba geri dönünce farkettim ki kıvrılacak sayfa sayısı çok fazla olduğu için bir yerden sonra kıvırmayı bırakmışım. Bu; kitabın her sayfası oldukça değerli demek.

Önce üç mağarada bulunan çizimler ve kazmalar üzerinden yola çıkılan anlatı Leroi-Gourhan'ın Erkek-Dişi-Hayvan-Simge sınıflandırması ile incelenmeye başlanıyor. Akabinde evrimsel sürecin tarihöncesi dönemde hangi aralıklarla nerelerde etkin şekilde benzerlik göstermiş olabileceği, daha doğru anlatımla, tarihöncesi kültürlerin nerelerde ortak olarak görüldüğünün incelemeleri yer alıyor. (Kitap neredeyse açıklamalı bi bilimsel makale). Sonrasında simgesel dil gelişimi, imge oluşturma, gömü gelenekleri, beden süsleri, incelikli taş alet teknolojileri gibi zihinsel süreçlerin özünü anlamaya yönelik tartışmalar geliyor.

Görsel halüsinasyonlara dair deneysel sonuçlar kitap boyunca bizi takip ediyor ve entoptik olaylar duvar resimlerindeki birçok örüntüyü açıklamak amacıyla kullanılıyor. Laboratuar araştırmaları ise oldukça şaşırtıcı. Denekler tarafından çizilen şekiller neredeyse mağaralarda bulunanlarla bire bir örtüşmekte.

Sonraki bölümde -yazarın başka kitaplarda da yazdığı San Kaya Sanatı- ve kabilelerin evren görüşleri üzerinden oluşturdukları resim geleneğinin izlerini takip ederek antropolojik bilgilerle bulunan resimlerdeki bilgileri eşleştirmeye ve benzerlikleri/farklılıkları bulmaya çalışıyoruz.

Kitabın en çarpıcı noktalarından birisi -benim için- San Kaya Sanatı'nda resme/imgeye dokunmanın da resmi görmek kadar önemli olduğunun vurgulandığı 149. sayfaydı. Hâlâ günümüz dini ritüellerine kadar erişen kutsala dokunma aksiyonu o dönem kaya sanatındaki resimlere bir şeyle sürekli dokunularak parlatılmış olması, cila etkisinin görülmüş olması üzerinden okunuyor. Daha da çarpıcı olanı, el izlerinin bir iz bırakmaktan ziyade dokunma ritüeliyle direkt bağlantılı olduğu savunuluyor. Çok çok orjinal bulduğum bir fikir. Orjinal olmasını ise şimdiye kadar karşılaşmamış olduğum bir düşünce olmasına bağlıyorum.

Sadece San dini ve sanatı değil Kuzey Amerika şamanları üzerinden de şamanik ritüel uygulamaları tartışılıyor. Metaforların açıklanmaya çalışıldığı 163-164. sayfalar yine çok değerli bakış açıları sağlıyor. Mağaralara girme ayinlerinin kutsal olanı penetre etme ve cinsel uyarımla ilişikili olması ya da boğulma ve su altına gitme durumlarının kutsal güç ile bağlantısının tartışıldığı gibi diğer cihetlerden de metaforların incelendiği okunabilir.

Çatlaklara yerleştirilmiş kuvarslar bulunmuş kısımların doğaüstü güçlerle ilişkilendirilmesi yine enteresan detaylardan birisiydi.

"Bizim gördüğümüz şeyler ile onların gördükleri şeylerin aynı olduğunu düşünmekten kaçınmalıyız"

Alıntı: Üst düzey bilinç, düşünen bir öznenin kendi hareketlerini ve ilgilerini tanımasını kapsar. Kişisel olanın ve şimdiki zamanın yanı sıra geçmişin ve geleceğin de modelini bünyesinde toplar... Bizim insan olma sıfatıyla, ilkel bilince ek olarak sahip olduğumuz şeydir... Biz bilinçli olduğumuzun bilincindeyiz... Anımsanan şimdiki zamanın tahakkümü nasıl kırılabilir? Yanıt şudur: Simgeselbelleğe, toplumsal iletişim ve aktarmaya ilişkin yeni yöntemlerin gelişmesiyle. En gelişmiş biçimiyle bu, üst düzey bilincin bizim türümüzde geliştiği alamına gelir. İnsanlar dile sahip olan tek tür olduğu için bu, üst düzey bilincin bizim türümüzde geliştiği anlamına gelir... [Üst düzey bilinç] toplumsal temeli olan bir benlik oluşturma, dünyayı geçmiş ve gelecek bakımından modelleme ve doğrudan farkınad olma yetilerini kapsar. Bu yetenekler simgesel bellek olmadan gelişemez... Aynı türden başka bireylerle etkileşim sonucu elde edilen simgesel ilişkilerin uzun süreli depolanması, benlik algılaamsı için kritik öneme sahiptir.

sf.179'da uykunun tehlikeli bir çevrede hayatta kalma şansını azaltması ve uykuda düş ve protein üretimi ile ilişkili kısım yine oldukça ilgi çekiciydi. Bu, Kurtuluş Projesi kitabındaki uzaylının uyku ile olan ilişkisini anımsattı çokça. Evrim heryerde! Başka hayvanlar da düş görseler de bunu birbirleri ile paylaşamazlar. Buda bizim simgesel bir ortak dil kurmayı sağlar, düş görmeyi toplumsallaştırır.

Resimlerin çevrelerinde hiçbir doğal unsurun bulunmaması, ağaçlar, çayırlar, nehirler... Onları doğal bağlamından koparır ve havada uçuşan, serbestçe dolaşan zihinsel imgeler haline getirir. WOW. Tespite bak.

Peyote ile alakalı deneyimlerin daha detaylıları için Carlos Castenada kitaplarına dönmem gerekiyor...

Chauvet'deki el izleri üzerinden yürüyen anlatı bir noktada pozitif el izlerinin boya ile kayaya mühürlenmesi ve boyanın da 5. bölümde anlatıldığı üzere sadece boya olarak görülmemesi gerektiğini, bu sayede kayanın ötesindeki alemle irtibat kurulmak istendiğini belirtir. Neden el izlerinin basılması için mağaraların en derinine gidilmesinin kitapta muallak olduğu düşünülse de ışık-gölge teorisi bence hâlâ geçerliliğini korumakta.

Lambalar ve hayvanların karanlığın içinden birden somutlaşması etkisi...

Sanatçıların, toplumun geri kalanıyla iletişim kurmak amacıyla "motif dili"ni kullanmış olma olasılığı. (Yine günümüz hristiyanlık öğretisinin doğuşunda uygulanan yöntem akla geliyor)

Bütün kitabın belki de rasyonel bir insan için oldukça rahatsızlık verici mistik anlatısı son paragraftaki cümlelerle daha evrensel bir fikirle bütünleştiriliyor.
"Şamanizm ve tuhaf bir ruhlar âlemine ait görüntüler, avcı-toplayıcı topluluklarda işe yaramış,hatta muhteşem sanat yapıtları ortaya çıkrmış olabilir; bundan bugünkü dünyada işe yarayacakları veya bugün hâlâ kişisel koruyucu hayvan ruhlara ve yeraltı dünyalarına inanmamız gerektiği sonucu çıkmaz. Boğalar Salonu'na girdiğimizde, onları yaratan dinsel inançları ve rejimleri yeniden benimsemek veya onlara teslim olmak istemeden de soluğumuz kesilebilir."

Harika...

[Anneliese Tirry · Rating 3 out of 5]

***(*)
Toen ik afgelopen zomer voor de tweede keer de grotten van Pech Merle bezocht, was ik niet enkel opnieuw onder de indruk van het talent van de vroege Homo Sapiens Sapiens, maar had ik ook een bijzondere ervaring bij één van de tekeningen. Het was alsof ik de blik van de schilder op mij voelde rusten. Ik was daarvan danig onder de indruk. Nu heb ik wel vaker grotten met pre-historische schilderingen/gravures bezocht, maar deze ervaring was wel erg intens.
Een reden voor mij om nog eens een (non-fictie) boek te lezen over deze bijzondere periode.

In een vroeger boek dat ik las, The Cave Painters, ging de auteur ervan uit dat deze mensen de dingen schilderden waar ze ontzag voor hadden. Mammoeten, bisons, beren, ... grote dieren die je niet quasi dagelijks kan vangen zoals pakweg een konijn of een hert.
Lewis-Williams besluit, na het overlopen van verschillende theorieën en methodieken, dat de schilderingen in de grotten het werk zijn van Sjamanen die hun hallucinaties schilderden waar ze ze tijdens hun trance hadden gezien, namelijk op de muren van de donkere grotten waar ze naar die andere staat, die andere wereld, de wereld van de geesten waren geweest.
Om dit te staven trekt hij ook parallellen met de Sjamanen uit Zuid-Afrika en Noord-Amerika waar je gelijkaardige schilderingen vindt van recenter datum. De hallucinaties verklaren volgens de auteur ook die paar tekeningen van gekwetste/dode mensen die je in de grotten vindt, wat je ziet is waar ze op hun lichaam de pijn tijdens de hallucinaties voelen.
Ook interessant is de verklaring van de opbouw van de grotten, de grote ruimtes voor de gemeenschappelijke "vieringen", de kleine moeilijk te bereiken plaatsen voor de uitverkorenen.
Lewis-Williams poneert ook dat hier het begin is van de klassenmaatschappij, van het sociale onderscheid dat sedertdien enkel maar gegroeid is.
Waarom maakten de Neanderthalers dan geen muurschilderingen? Waarom werden hun doden enkel als bij toeval begraven? Dit heeft te maken met het soort brein. De Neanderthaler had een "primair brein" dat het toeliet om in het heden te leven, de Homo Sapiens echter had (en heeft) een secundair brein, wij kunnen een parallelle wereld oproepen, beelden benoemen met taal, denken in verleden en toekomst, er zijn meer en andere verbindingen in onze hersenen.
Kon de Neanderthaler de Homo Sapiens min of meer kopiëren bij het verfijnen van hun gebruiksvoorwerpen, het beschilderen van muren konden ze niet, ze hadden geen oog voor een parallelle wereld, ze misten het godsbesef. Vergeet hierbij ook niet dat de periodes van beide mensensoorten elkaar toch 10.000 jaar overlapt!
Terug naar het boek; dat werd geschreven in 2002, ondertussen staan onderzoek en wetenschap 16 jaar verder, er werden sedertdien ook nieuwe grotten ontdekt in de Pyreneeën. Terwijl de auteur van dit boek stelt dat Neanderthaler en Sapiens zich niet vermengd zouden hebben om zich voort te planten, weten we ondertussen dat we allen tussen de 1 en 4% Neanderthaler zijn (en dat kan alleen maar door ...).
Ik vind ook dat er net iets te veel methodiek uit de doeken wordt gedaan in dit boek én dat de auteur wel erg overtuigd is van het Sjamanisme.
Verder vind ik geen verklaring voor de vrouwelijke silhouetten (steeds in combinatie met een tekening van een mammoet) in de grotten van Pech Merle, of waarom er een vis is afgebeeld onder 1 van de paarden. Vissen werden bijna nooit afgebeeld!
Ik heb véél bijgeleerd, bvb dat de meeste Neanderthalers "uitgestorven" zijn 35.000 jaar geleden, maar tot 27.000 jaar geleden hield er nog een kleine enclave stand in de buurt van Gibraltar. Of, dat de Neanderthalers er al waren 160.000 jaar voor de Sapiens, wij hoeven ons dus niet superieur te voelen, ook onze tijd zal voorbij gaan.
Volgend citaat van 1 van de onderzoekers die in het boek worden aangehaald wil ik nog graag delen, omdat dit zo mooi beschrijft wat ik ook voelde, waarover ik vertel in het begin van deze veel te lange bespreking:
"Alone in that vastness, lit by a feeble beam of our lamps, we were seized by a strange feeling. Everything was so beautiful, so fresh, almost too much so. Time was abolished, as if the tens of thousands of years that separated us from the producers of these paintings no longer existed. It seemed as if they had just created these masterpieces. Suddenly we felt like intruders. Deeply impressed we were weighed down by the feeling that we were not alone, the artists' souls and spirits surrounded us. We thought we could feel their presence, we were disturbing them."

[Thor Nordahl · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting book with an ambitious aim: to explain the origins and cultural function of cave art - a prehistoric practice with unknown purpose that arose independently on several continents during the upper paleolitic. The author is probably correct in broad strokes, that is, cave art had some religious purpose and was related to a belief in a spirit world that interacted with the real world and could be accessed by performing certain rituals, many of them through states of altered consciousness. However, one of his main assumptions, namely that cave art was incomprehensible to neanderthals has been falsified by the discovery of cave art that predates homo sapiens, meaning it has to have been made by neanderthals.

[Jacques Coulardeau · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cro-Magnon’s Shamans were Women
HOMO SAPIENS & SHAMANISM IN THE CAVES, WOMB-MEMORY & FEMALE SHA-WOMEN
DAVID LEWIS-WILLIAMS, THE MIND IN THE CAVE, 2004-2016

This book – David Lewis-Williams, THE MIND IN THE CAVE, 2004-2016 – often presented as the main modern approach of shamanism, to which everybody working on this topic is referred, is crucial, from beginning to end, though not fundamental because of the very traditional approach of Homo Sapiens society only considered from 70,000 years ago, at the most. From the very start, this is going to weigh heavily on what the author says. He starts with four questions:

“Does the human brain construct spaceships and the human mind fashion unseen forces and spirits?
What is the difference between brain and mind?
What is intelligence and what is human consciousness?
How did early people reach a stage of evolution that allowed them to make and understand pictures?” (page 18).

Note the four question marks cover six questions, and those six questions contain the main blocking shortcoming of the whole book. Just to start the discussion we have to say that the brain constructs nothing because to construct something you need to design it and then to work with hands and machines to produce it. The design involves the brain, but more than the brain it involves the mind and cooperation between human beings, hence communication and social organization. This implies the powerful presence of language. Then I would restate the second double question first and as a triple question: “What are the phylogenic and psychogenetic relationships between the brain (and the whole nervous system), the mind and language?”

This implies his questions are in the wrong order, hence they are rhetorical. The first question then appears as absurd as I have suggested: the brain constructs nothing because of what I have said and the mind does not fashion unseen whatever on its own. Without language, the mind cannot even develop as the construct of the brain it is. Language is the second reciprocally simultaneous construct of the brain, along with the mind. The brain can only discriminate patterns and memorize them in brain machine code. It is the fact that man has the articulatory ability to produce articulated language that enables the mind to identify the patterns with words and hence to enter a rich communicational socially constructed situation that enables the phylogenic collective emergence of concepts that are to be psychogenetically integrated and assimilated by every individual to be able to converse, communicate. The first double question is senseless.

Having dealt with this set of three questions we can shift to the second set of three questions. Intelligence is nothing at all. There are hundreds of forms of intelligence and all animals have a certain level of intelligence, even if it is not the same in a shark and in a vulture, though for those two there is a similarity. Human beings, thanks to the two virtual constructs of the mind and language are able to conceptualize and that’s what has to be considered: the conceptualizing power of man in general (it increases from age to age) and of each individual and this time it increases with the age of the subject and it can be applied and developed in very different domains. A farmer has little to do with mathematical conceptualization but he has a lot to do with what mathematicians are not required to possess: the conceptualization of nature, its cycles, the role of the farmer, how he or she can use, influence, divert and even change the normal functioning of nature, be it only by watering what needs to be watered in his or her fields.

But it is obvious consciousness has nothing to do with intelligence by definition. A dog is conscious of his suffering when it is beaten up by its master. A wolf is conscious of its suffering when its paw is taken in a wolf’s trap but it is also able to gnaw at its paw, increasing the suffering it is able to control and dominate so that it can gnaw off its paw and run away; escape. The question of consciousness is a false question. A child of six who tells “lies” about an adult is not telling lies at all for himself. What he says is his way to either defend himself or to express his desires concerning the adult, including by the way the desire to be beaten up by the father or the mother who hate lying. The child is always telling the truth, but his or her truth is not THE truth in front of supreme authorities, and even so is that truth real truth? Is someone who is saying all the tame “God bless you!” conscious that it is a mental tic that has no ground of truth at all? Of course not. For those who say that, the President of the USA first of all, they are conscious that it is THE truth in their religious frame of mind or that it is the only possible demagogical flattering caress they can use with their audience who is more or less entirely trapped in this tic that is of course entirely conscious in the words used, the tone used, the intonation used and they will not play on any of these dimensions. If they do, they know and are conscious they are changing the meaning and they may get some violent reactions from people around them. Religious irony is not what religious fundamentalists are ready to easily accept.

If we want to approach such questions we have to wonder the knowledge the cognitive mind using language which is a cognitive tool, has been reached at this or that moment by an individual in his or her life. Just like Socrates in Plato proves that a slave boy can be MADE conscious of some geometric truth, you have to learn something, hence to enter a cognitive procedure to eventually dominate some knowledge of which you may be, or have been, conscious. A lot of things learned in life become habitual, tic-like and we are no longer conscious of it though we go on doing it. We walk without really being conscious that each step is a salvaged fall.

The last question is the object of the book but once again he is going to, as we are going to see, cheat on the merchandise by declaring conditions that are not considered in their phylogeny. According to the author, Homo Sapiens must have full control of fully developed modern language and he states it is around 70,000 years ago that this happened, and note his singular “language.” This and only this is absurd. It is after the last migration out of Black Africa has occurred that he considers these linguistic conditions that he does not describe at all are fulfilled. There are three migrations out of Black Africa, the first one around 200,000 years ago to Northern Africa, the Nile Valley, Crete (with no future) the Levant but to come back around 80,000 BCE and to go back later only after 35,000 BCE. This migration gave all the Semitic languages of this zone and these languages are first articulation languages but communication is full and complete. The second migration took place around 120,000 years ago or slightly earlier and occupied Asia where they found the Denisovans and they spread all over the world with their Denisovans genes in the North from Siberia to Alaska and in the south to Australia (45,000 BCE) New Zealand, Polynesia, Easter Island, and South America. All those languages are of the isolating group (Tibetan Chinese, Burman Tibetan, or other regroupings) and those that derived from there due to migrations to Indonesia and the South Pacific. They all are second articulation languages but communication is full and complete. The third migration is the one that concerns the author. It happened around 70,000 BCE in two waves: the agglutinative wave first going to the Middle East where they met Neanderthals and then moved to Neanderthal territory in Europe. That’s the only one the author considers. The second wave around 50,000 BCE will go to the Middle East but will stay on the Iranian plateau to come down from it after the Ice Peak around 15,000 BCE, to the west to give Sumerian and all Indo-European languages, and to the east to ancient disappeared civilizations in Turkmenistan and then to Pakistan, India and these are the Indo-Aryan languages that pushed the Dravidians down who were of the previous migration. This third migrations gave rise to all third-articulation languages, agglutinative or synthetic-analytical. This is of course sketchy (check my publications on the subject).

The author’s approach neglects fundamental facts. First, Homo Erectus migrated a long time before from Black Africa to the Middle East and Central Asia where they evolved into Neanderthals and Denisovans. The Homo Erectus who stayed behind evolved tin Homo Ergaster in Africa and these will evolve into Homo Sapiens some 300,000 years ago. All the monkeys, big apes, hominids and hominins had communication systems based on calls up to Hominins and with Hominins it got to some richer code that enabled, even before the development of the three-articulation languages of ours, them to coordinate their collective actions, to plan and design some vast migrations across continents and to, little by little since it was becoming more and more difficult, devise ways to manage “premature” non-autonomous children for several years in great numbers to be able to expand, meaning bring three children to full normal adult life (life-expectancy 29). These Hominins, after the big apes, had to have a communication system developed enough to enable all that and to know that if they wanted three individuals reaching full adult age per woman they had to accept each woman in procreating age to deliver at least ten children, one every eighteen months and these children had to be breastfed for at least one year if not eighteen months. If the author had thought of that he would have understood that the Marxist reference of Max Raphael was misplaced. The point was not the urgency of producing the means to eat, drink and survive as physiological individuals but the means to survive as a species involved by their ancestors and by themselves in a vast expansion of that species and in migrations far from the nest, always farther from the nest. […]
Full review at
https://medium.com/@JacquesCoulardeau...

[Kecia · Rating 5 out of 5]

First of all, I now want to reread my books on cave art. David Lewis-Williams (DLW) in "Mind in the Cave," has given me a lot to rethink, and I want to compare ideas with the fresh set of eyes he has given me. I also have "Dancing at the Edge of Death: The Origins of the Labyrinth in the Paleolithic" yet to read, which should also be amazing.

A few thoughts:

1. DLW quotes Levi-Strauss with praise for his ideas about myth, which include a) that myth contains dualistic themes such as light:dark, divine:human, etc. and b) that "the purpose of myth is to provide a logical model capable of overcoming a contradiction," with which DLW agrees and adds, "myth is ultimately fated to fail."

I disagree with both of these problems in Levi-Strauss. Non-dualism, in fact, is a hallmark of myth, demonstrated by the impossibility of reconciling mythic cosmos, even those relatively contained. The Hebrew creation myths are an example. There are two in the Bible, and they seem exclusive, yet are simultaneously integrated into the Christian mythos, apparently with acceptance by even the most fundamental of literalists. The Norse creation myths have the same "problem"; two, different myths providing different, though not dualistic or opposed, ways of understanding origin. Obfuscation and ambiguity are the mythic norm.

Second, the purpose of myth is not to provide a logical model--of anything. If it were, it would always fail, as DLW stated. However, there are no criteria for failure, so it is impossible to fail. On the contrary, myth has no purpose, in that it's not an entity that decided to instruct or enlighten. Myth is, and the reader (or listener) makes it what it is, much as DLW argues for the cave art, although the idea eludes him because he has failed to understand myth.

2. DLW says the silliest thing. He writes concerning the interactions between H. sapiens and H. neanderthal, "When there was conflict, it seems likely that it was the Homo sapiens men who killed the Neanderthal men and ravished their women."

What?!

First, he has no evidence of meetings between the two species except for the fact that they have been shown to co-exist in Europe over a period of time. Second, he ignores the fact that Neanderthal was more robust and not stupid. Third, he assumes the two species would recognize each other as potential rivals and/or mating objects. This third one seems ridiculous. Imagine for a moment that Neanderthal is as intellectually dissimilar as he claims in the book. Also, we know that the two species were morphologically quite dissimilar. If they were to come across each other by chance, it is possible they would view each other as, for example, a gorilla and chimpanzee would today. Why assume the chimpanzees would kill the male gorillas (assuming they could) and rape the female gorillas? More likely each group would make wide detours to avoid confrontation with the other.

3. DLW will come back to this interaction between Neanderthal and H. sapiens many times, because he uses it to explain the relatively rapid flowering of cave "art" in Europe. I can't buy it for at least one of the reasons above, that I don't know of evidence describing how the two groups would have reacted to each other (and DLW doesn't provide any).

The other reason I don't buy it is because DLW assumes that Neanderthal's consciousness is so alien to H. sapiens (on a par with animals who do not possess memory of their dreams) that they cannot form ideas about an afterlife. I will agree that Neanderthal was probably as different to H. sapiens as DLW says, but we don't know in what manner he was different. Yet, he claims the impetus for the "revolution" was due to this deficiency of Neanderthal, a psychology H. sapiens supposedly understood and which affected H. sapiens so greatly as to make him feel superior (DLW calls it an "inescapable conclusion") and, therefore, crawl deep into caves to begin illustrating his "superior" abilities of memory and imagination.

Did DLW toss this strange idea in because he required a cause-and-effect for this issue of the flowering of cave art? How did it advance his thesis that shamanism was the basis of cave art? He showed he can support his thesis without grasping at superior consciousness straws, but maybe he felt the revolution worked against his arguments and, therefore, he wanted to shore up his chain of logic? I don't know.

4. Three of many online references suggesting that Neanderthal possessed a consciousness UN-like that proposed by DLW, who claims they were incapable of remembering their dreams or forming a concept of an afterlife. If he's right, he needs to show the evidence.

Rethinking Neanderthals, 2003, Smithsonian Magazine

Oldest Discovered Burial Site

Karen Armstrong, Myths and the Modern World, 2005

5. I thought he did an amazing job of providing and explaining the evidence for shamanism as the "creative" force of rock art. There were many aha! moments for me, and I came away with a sense of "things falling into place," which a good hypothesis should provide. The "membrane" analogy worked well for him, and the reader is led to understand how this necessitated the touching of the membrane and to accept it. In contrast, the idea of the caves as "art for the sake of art," looks shallow indeed, and DLW's shamanism hypothesis fits in many (if not all) the ways that a sympathetic magic explanation does not fit. Although I pointed out at a little length where I thought the book (and hypothesis) was weak, the greater part of the book is well worth reading. It contained thorough evidence (for laity like me) and stellar interpretation.

6. I would love to leave these ideas with a good deal of praise for this book, but there was one more odd misstep by the author. At the end, he added this strange disclaimer that while shamanism may have worked for these early people, he felt it had no place in the modern world. What that had to do with ANYthing at all is beyond me. Better to do his research and let others decide their own spiritual paths.

[Benja · Rating 5 out of 5]

SINOPSIS:

Ensayo estudio sobre el arte paleolítico, sobre todo el parietal (pintado en las paredes), en donde el autor desarrolla sus ideas y teoría de cómo y porqué se realizó este tipo de arte, su sentido y significado.

COMENTARIO:

La obra es realmente muy interesante y está muy bien argumentada. Realiza un estudio espléndido sobre el arte paleolítico y todos aquellos aspectos que le sirven para apuntalar su teoría, que a la postre resulta muy atractiva.

Su teoría se basa principalmente en que las obras del paleolítico superior, realizadas por el homo sapiens, fueron hechas relacionadas con lo que se llama estado de conciencia alterada.

Para ello argumenta en muchos aspectos. Uno de ellos es que la mente del homo sapiens del paleolítico superior, supone que es igual que la nuestra y por lo tanto la estructura mental del homo sapiens y del hombre actual es la misma, con lo que tendríamos los mismos estados alterados de conciencia. Pero el autor va más allá, pues para dar más énfasis a esta teoría, llega a decir que la mente homo sapiens es muy diferente a la mente del neandertal. Esto, que en cierta medida parece tan obvio, le hace llevar su postura a un extremo del que yo no estoy de acuerdo. Y es que afirma que la estructura mental del neandertal es en cierta medida "inferior" a la del homo sapiens. Tal como lo expone, parece que piensa que el neandertal era tonto o algo parecido. Le niega su capacidad de creencias religiosas y de crear arte. Bien es cierto que sus manifestaciones religiosas y artísticas son menos espectaculares que las del homo sapiens, pero de ahí a deducir la incapacidad religiosa o artísticas me parece llevar el tema a un extremo un tanto insólito. Y más teniendo en cuenta que a mi modo de ver no aporta nada a favor del homo sapiens el que el neandertal pudiera o no realizar arte o que lo realizara en imitación al del homo sapiens. En suma, que para ensalzar el arte del homo sapiens no era necesario denigrar la figura del neandertal, que a mí me simpatiza tanto.

En relación a esto (que la estructura mental de homo sapiens y la del hombre moderno es la misma) se alinea su estudio sobre los estados alterados de conciencia del hombre moderno. Así de esta forma, analiza estos estados alterados de conciencia en los hombres actuales. El estudio es bastante amplio y me resultó muy llamativo encontrar que los hombres actuales a los que se les somete a estado de conciencia alterado de forma provocada, describen visiones y pintan estas visiones adquiriendo una semejanza realmente asombrosa con muchas de las pinta el hombre prehistórico, sobre todo aquellas que representan formas geométricas (espirales, cuadrados, puntos, cuadrículas, etc.) Quizás sea cierto que el paralelismo, sobre todo en las figuras animales como por ejemplo los bisontes de Altamira o los caballos de Lascaux, distan un tanto de ser exactos. Pero coincido con el autor en que ahí hay un indicio de por donde puede ir el sentido de estas pinturas.

Otro de los pilares de esta teoría está en el estudio de tribus, culturas o civilizaciones actuales que mantienen una forma de vida muy cercana a la que se supone que pudieron llevar nuestros antepasados. El estudio de esta forma de vida de las tribus actuales (los San! de África y otras tribus de los indios norteamericanos) se centra sobre todo en su carácter religioso-chamánico.

Estas culturas chamánicas se caracterizan en que para conectarse con el mundo mágico entran en éxtasis o lo que ahora se llama en estado de conciencia alterado, usando a menudo varias técnicas como son los conocidos ritmos repetitivos de sus danzas o en buscar lugares aislados y amparados por un ayuno voluntario, entran en estos estados alterados de conciencia.

Es llamativo que estas culturas toman a la roca, la piedra como un medio para conectarse con sus mundos mágicos. Tal es así que los San! apoyan sus manos en las rocas para a través de ellas poder llegar a sus mundos mágicos usándolas como una especie de vía espiritual para ello. Y digo que es llamativo porque eso nos recuerda a las manos pintadas en las cuevas de muchos de estos homos sapiens del paleolítico. Así también es llamativo que las cuevas cumplan precisamente la condición de lugar de aislamiento para poder crear el ambiente adecuado y llegar al estado alterado de conciencia.

Pero no nos equivoquemos. Las pinturas parietales no representan tan solo lo que los hombres paleolíticos vivían en sus estados alterados de conciencia, sino que también sirven como catalizador para poder provocar estos estados. Es decir, el hombre paleolítico elegía las cuevas con sus pinturas porque el ambiente de aislamiento y la visión de estos animales que podía vislumbrar gracias a la tenue luz de sus lámparas, acababan provocando este estado alterado de conciencia que a la postre era su forma de entra en los mundos mágicos y chamánicos que correspondían con su espiritualidad.

El libro tiene mucha miga y tiene muchísimo que discutir. Es una gran obra de erudición en donde todo está enfocado para hacer coherente su teoría sobre el sentido y significado de las pinturas rupestres. Es una teoría discutible y posiblemente mucha gente (entre ellas Pili) no les convenza demasiado. A mi me parece que está muy bien hilada y por ahí van los tiros de la explicación del arte parietal. Creo que es una teoría muy bien estudiada y muy meditada pero que al final, como todas las teorías sobre este tema, hay que realizar un acto de fe y creerlo o no creerlo. Repito que a mi me parece una explicación muy convincente, y aunque posiblemente no sea la definitiva, es posiblemente una de las explicaciones más plausibles que hasta el momento he leído.

Se esté de acuerdo o no con el autor, es una magnífica obra tanto para conocer el cómo y el porqué del arte paleolítico, como para pensar en él y crear un debate, aunque sea interno sobre la verdad de esta teoría o su equivocación.

[William Taylor · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a pleasureably well-written and exemplorarily well-researched work, that directs the reader to other works and authors at every new idea and quote, helping expand their library in all the related fields during their read. Mr. Lewis-Williams' breadth and depth of reading is impressively extensive, his hypotheses well presented and explanations clearly laid out and revised appropriately as the chapters progress. I enjoyed reading this book immensely and have yet to find anything comparable since I finished it. The writing presents the author's scientific approach and appraisal of this subject, fascinating to those with interests in both palaeontology and art, at the level of the best literature and, though not as extensive and not quite as groundbreaking, the thoroughness of the coverage and quality of the science reminds me of Darwin's Origin of Species. Mr. Lewis-Williams deserves the highest praise.

[Ryan Zachary · Rating 5 out of 5]

4 stars from a layperson, and let me preface this review with that, although I'm certainly left feeling that I have a lifetime's worth of knowledge about art and it's place in our culture when compared to the author's understanding to be honest. The book is brilliant and thorough as one can be regarding the fragments left from a civilization gone now for ten thousand years, it certainly filled in many gaps of understanding as my mild interest in the prehistoric world over the years has turned to obsession.

Several points where I doubted the book, interestingly enough are often pointed out by Lewis-Williams. Specifically I find it hard to accept that he could preface his thoughts on the full spectrum of consciousness by stating why 'altered states of consciousness' is a poor phrase, then go on to use the phrase for the entire book, eventually falling into the trap of poorly stereotyping non-rational thought that he himself had pointed out earlier. Similarly, the author does a great job of pointing out present bias as he gives a history of anthropological thought regarding the caves which almost seems(or may have actually been) a warning regarding his own present bias. I feel that there were many times where Lewis-Williams fills in the cracks of knowledge with loaded words when trying to get into the mind of the shamans themselves. The oversimplification of the differences in neanderthal and modern human consciousness seemed off though to be fair I don't know if we could ever understand the differences between our brains and theirs and my opinions could be colored by advances in neanderthal understanding that the book preceded.

The final chapter is where this book went from 5 stars to 4. Honestly after reading a book filled with this much wonder to have the writer trivialize complex, cultural, conscious phenomena as being nothing but neurobiological processes, it makes me think that he has no idea what a shaman(or 'art', which he seems to like to put in quotations for some reason) actually is or does. Hopefully as the years go on this great work will be added to by research from a wider cultural background.

The most frustrating thing to me about this book other than the last chapter is that 12 years on I would love to get an update on his ideas considering that the past 12 years have seen a considerable amount of prehistoric progress and discovery, not even including most recently the debate on neanderthal burials seemingly closed as well as analysis of neanderthal DNA. However nothing seems to be available on the internet regarding any edits or changes to the book or even an author's website which might have answered my questions.

I should also add that there is probably a little bit of jealousy in my review as I will never be able to get over the fact that guys like David have been able to actually stand in these caves while I will never be able to. It sucks.

Overall I would recommend this book to anyone interested in the subject, David Lewis-Williams does a masterful job of laying out not only the history of modern thought on the subject but specific case studies of cultures that may have lived similarly from opposite ends of the world. It's the type of shit that will always inspire me to make more art.

[Mindy McAdams · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have a weird interest in prehistoric cave paintings. I like looking at them (in full-color photos; I've never seen any in person). It amazes me that humans living 30,000–40,000 years ago (in what is now Europe) created these awesome images — and that they did so deep inside hard-to-access dark caves, working by the light of torches. When I came across this book by a South African scholar, I was drawn to it because of its promise to explain something I'd never learned before: Why did those early humans make the cave paintings?

I was not disappointed. Lewis-Williams lays out a good theory, brick by brick. I wasn't 100 percent convinced, but I wouldn't be able to dispute much of what he's said. I especially liked that he brought in examples from Native American rock art and also examples from his area of expertise, the rock art of the San Bushmen of southern Africa. Eventually I reached a part where I felt like he was rehashing The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind without even referring to it (he did finally talk about that book in his final pages), and I got a bit weary after that. However, I loved his arguments about why these paintings are not "art" (in spite of what the title says), and probably not "communication" in most senses of the word.

I enjoyed the trippy parts about hallucinations and shamans of many cultures. It was especially nice how the author frequently cited anthropologists' work on the roles of shamans in pre-industrial societies and what living shamans have said in interviews about their experiences. Rather than relying solely on the role of myth in traditional societies and facts about hallucinogenic substances, he discusses the reports given by shamans and connects those to a theory of why some of our ancient ancestors in Europe made the cave paintings. I enjoyed the care with which he supported his arguments even when I didn't fully agree.

[dantelk · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quite an intresting read. Frankly I was expecting something a bit different, maybe some more discussion about the philosophy of art and how ancient art could be evaluated dadadada. Nope, this book was better than that!

I couldn't help feeling skeptic while reading Lewis-Williams's book. Knowledge and scientefic and artistic discussion does not seem mature enough to avoid any speculative claims in this field. I guess readers have to keep their guard while reading about this subject: Even amond the scholars, it may be hard to settle on common grounds on specific topics covered in this title. The amount of unknown is simply too much.

On the other hand, even if some of the authors claims were wholly misguided (I don't know if they are, future will tell), still it was a enjoyable read. The social and scientific information was inclusive. Lewis-Williams's examples from contemporary anthropologic cases were intresting, so was hearing about the history about the caves, and how scientific circles views evaluated through decades. Only maybe half of the book is really about the prehistoric stuff. The rest about techniques and discussions about the our (H.Sapiens and our other distant-relatives) minds, and some animism/shamanism.

The author covers a lot of different aspects from different sciences, and discusses alternative points from a wide range of researchers and other authors - which I liked a lot.

[Scotty · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book exceeded all of my expectations. I went in expecting a fascinating glimpse into the background and significance of the cave art of the Upper Paleolithic. But what James David Lewis-Williams has crafted in this book transcends that. We have elements of history, philosophy, neurobiology, theology, and so much more - we even get to read and learn about methods for constructing solid ethnographic theories, something that the author illustrates so well.

This book, in my experience, does not have much in the way of prerequisite reading. The author does an outstanding job of making all of his references easily understood, but he also provides ample further reading for those interested. If you are a conscious human, you would be doing yourself a favor by reading this.

[W. Koistinen · Rating 3 out of 5]

The most interesting thing in this book was the description of how Neanderthals differed from us humans, and the origins of higher consciousness that developed in humans but not in Neanderthals, and so, the origins of language, which also made possible religions and political thought later. What with the actual cave paintings, they can also be seen as a first step in this development towards more complex societies. It wasn't any fast reading, but interesting enough to go through.

[Francisco · Rating 3 out of 5]

Obra interesante, aunque no destinada al público general, ya que requiere tener unos conocimientos previos bastante claros para que la tesis desarrollada pueda ser comprensible.
El apoyo gráfico, tanto en láminas como en ilustraciones, permite comprobar las afirmaciones que dan pie al estudio, además de disfrutar de algunas joyas de la pintura prehistórica.

[Sandrine · Rating 4 out of 5]

Absolutely fascinating read. Took the virtual tour of the cave paintings and you are immediately transported into a somatic state of experience. You understand that the portrayed is not reality, the message lies much deeper inside of you.

[Charles · Rating 1 out of 5]

Very dry. Little on it's announced subjects, mostly on brains.

[Caty Mushroom · Rating 1 out of 5]

Li na faculdade
É uma merda

[Catty Face · Rating 5 out of 5]

Access to most caves adorning parietal art is sadly restricted, this book helped make that a little less of a tragedy.

Lewis-Williams was one of the few researches who had the chance of stepping into Chauvet and Lascaux, the great paleolithic caves. The virtual visit of Lascaux he relates in chapter 9 makes this book a true journey. Travelling within Lascaux was organized methodologically from the entrance down to the deepest chambers, stopping at every "panel" or rock face to view the art and to review the interpretation of different researchers and studies that have tried to interpret the painting since the discoveries of the caves.

Understanding strange manifestations in early human behavior such as the beginning of art has evolved from loose assumptions into a science in itself, the first chapters of this book outline this development by offering an overview of the paleolithic period which helps put the reader in the cultural context of the study. Lewis-Williams gathers background data before delving into his own theoretic work: he defines cave art and retells the stories of researchers and explorers who first discovered the caves and the first attempts at understanding their purpose.

The Shamanistic argument isn't the most favorable among scientists, it is sometimes used as the easy cop out against a more grounded explanation, however it is the main tenant to DLW's theory and he successfully takes a multidisciplinary approach in its favor: archaeology, anthropology, ethnographer and neuroscience. Studies conducted among the San people of Africa and North American ethnic group try to relate their shamanistic rituals to the subterranean traces left in various caves across Europe over 20 000 years ago.

One of the most interesting questions raised in the book was how people unfamiliar with 2 dimensional imagery were able to paint and transfer their 3D world onto flat surfaces. The 2D concept isn't easy to grasp, modern generations are familiar with it, but it is alien and strange to our ancestor who only know the natural 3 dimensional world. Shamanism and spirituality are convincingly offered up again as explanation to this question, the images aren't representations of living creatures; to a shaman they are alive and potent spirits who reveal themselves through the rock face.

The Neanderthals adopted Homo Sapiens tools but not hunting techniques, they occupied the same ecological areas but not the Sapiens procurement strategies, Neanderthal never made art (arguably)...an entire chapter is dedicated to such claims. DLW uses biology and neuroscience as the reason behind cultural differences between Neanderthal and Sapiens, they are, according to him, wired differently: the Neanderthal's wiring doesn't have the capacity for the evolution of consciousness and therefore can't experience "heightened states of consciousness" that permitted Sapiens to innovate and create. It was one of the most interesting chapters but wasn't as clearly explained as the rest of the book, the study papers referenced are intimidating at first sight.

The amount of information packed in this book is astounding. Methodological and well organized. It has raised some very interesting questions, very well argued but not unchallengeable, the shamanistic argument is a leap in the dark. It contains some high quality illustrations and photographs.
I was deeply invested in this book.

[Linda Franklin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Many years ago I read that Leonardo da Vinci had written something about seeing figures and forms in irregularities of surfaces of walls. [See at end of review]. Not until much later did I learn the terms pareidolia and also simulacra. I got this Lewis-Williams book out of the library, as I am interested in the origins of art, children's art, cave art, etc., as well as pareidolia and simulacra. I often post a picture on Instagram of bark, or a rock, or shadows that look like a face or a figure of some kind, as do many other people around the world. This book, although published in 2002, does not make mention by the words, but does occasionally refer to an "undulation in the rock surface" and "inequalities in the rock" and "suggestive features of the surface" which he believes suggested animal forms, especially when the lighting was right...if an ancient cave artist moved his lamp, the shadows would change, maybe even obliterate the suggestive animal form. There are a number of color plates showing animal and human paintings in the caves, as well as some bl/wh images. I thought that from the title "origins of art" that this book would have explored what I was most interested in. Along with children's art, which all over the world has similarities, and is untaught. as Lewis-Williams might have written, "I argue that" the making of art is born in everyone, and perhaps even in other mammals, as we all have seen paintings done by elephants and gorillas, etc, some of which certainly are not just smearings of color, but have composition. I have had dogs that "see" an animal in a crushed carton in the road...which I have also seen as resembling an animal form. But perhaps there is another book or other studies that talk about what I am interested in. ??? Here is a quote from p.220 of the book, from the chapter "The Cave in the Mind": "Sometimes an undulation in the rock surface becomes a dorsal line of an animal if one's light is held in a specific position; and artist simply added legs and some other features to the shadow." and, p. 232: "A considrable number of the images are fitted into inequalities in the rock––or, as I argue, extracted from suggestive features of the surface." This book is definitely written in a professorial tone -- "as I argue" appears regularly, along with other such. I did enjoy the book, but not as much as I hoped I would. Below is the quote (translated of course) by Leonardo da Vinci: "[Pareidolia is ‘a psychological phenomenon involving a vague and random stimulus (often an image or sound) being perceived as significant, a form of apophenia.’]
And, from Wikipedia: In his notebooks, Leonardo da Vinci wrote of pareidolia as a device for painters: “If you look at any walls spotted with various stains or with a mixture of different kinds of stones, if you are about to invent some scene you will be able to see in it a resemblance to various different landscapes adorned with mountains, rivers, rocks, trees, plains, wide valleys, and various groups of hills. You will also be able to see divers combats and figures in quick movement, and strange expressions of faces, and outlandish costumes, and an infinite number of things which you can then reduce into separate and well conceived forms.”
~ Linda Campbell Franklin. @barkinglips on Instagram

[Harikrishnan Tulsidas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Cave paintings appear at the start of Upper Palaeolithic. These paintings mark the dawn of a newly attained gift of humans to represent three-dimensional features into two-dimensional figures. How did they get this gift, that was not seen in any human species previously?

We have evidence of people (for example in the 18th century Islamic societies), who lived without ever seeing an image of an animal. When shown a picture of the horse, they are unable to comprehend it easily. Understanding of scaled representations of actual things is not something that is built into the human brain. It is a learned craft.

How these humans around 50,000 learn this. Bigger brain size? Humans had large brains for large parts of their history, yet representational art appeared only 40,000 years ago. This creativity happened only in one species of humans.

Homo sapiens sapiens (H. sapiens), is the only surviving human species. Several human species had coexisted with other species since 3 million years - H. habilis, H. erectus, H. rudolfensis, H. gautengensis, H. ergaster, H. antecessor, H. cepranensis, H. heidelbergensis, H. neanderthalensis, H. naledi, H. tsaichangensis, H. rhodesiensis, H. floresiensis, etc. The interesting question is why other species vanished, while H.sapiens survived.

Human species remained without change for a long time. H.sapiens evolved 300,000 years ago (or even probably earlier according to current DNA evidence). Something happened only in H.sapiens, not in other humans, at around 70,000 years. That unique event took place when H.sapiens were still in Africa.

Sometime before this the H.sapiens species were almost on the way to extinction, with the population reduced to some 600 individuals. The change, now called the “Cognitive Revolution”, turned the fortunes of this weak and insignificant species at that time.

Around this period H.sapiens made the second attempt (?) to leave Africa and was quite successful. An earlier known attempt around 100,000 years ago to leave Africa was a disaster. After the second successful attempt in migration, H.sapiens also started dominating other humans. Brain size of H.sapiens was a bit smaller than Neanderthals. H.sapiens were also weak scavengers, not brutal savages as we would like to believe today.

From where did H.sapiens get this power to dominate others human species (as well as other animals)?

Central to this answer is belief. H.sapiens at 70,000 years back got the ability to believe in things that do not exist. Complex language, art, commerce and religion made its appearance. The first figurine known today is from around 40,000 ago, and it a the Lion-man (or Lioness-woman) of the Hohlenstein-Stadel. The ability to believe in things that do not exist in real world became a distinctive character of H.sapiens.

How did this help H.sapiens? This ability to believe gave H.sapiens capacity to form larger groups. Other humans, as wells as other animals, could create only groups up to 20 or 30 individuals. Today, India or China is a group of over 1.2 billion H.sapiens each. The Catholic church is a group of 1.5 billion H.sapiens led by an alpha male. Except that this alpha male does not procreate. He is a shaman.

Larger groups are readily equated with superior physical strength, which is true. However, the real advantage is in an exponential increase in creativity when different brains come close. Today, inventions come from the most populous cities.

However, is this belief based only on imagined things? Is there another reality behind this creative imagination?

Cave art makes its appearance from around 40,000 years. The surprising fact is that cave art has a similarity wherever you go in the world, be it France or Indonesia. Animals and some geometric shapes are carved or painted in caves. Why dark caves? Why only animals, not the landscape, not even realistic humans (only stick people or human-animal figurines are painted).

Importantly, animals seem to float on the walls and ceilings of the caves. In many cases legs are hanging, sometimes even the underside of the hoofs are seen.

James David Lewis-Williams in this book says that cave artists are not making up things. They are not letting their imagination run wild. They are drawing things they “saw”, in their minds, in altered states of consciousness.

This belief makes us what we are today, and they exist in the spectrum of our consciousness.

Cave art could be the evidence for expanded human consciousness. This consciousness can be referred as higher consciousness, that is different from the ordinary awareness. We may call it altered the state of consciousness, but is not something separate from our normal consciousness. We all experience such consciousness when we slowly drift into sleep. We are very much aware of dreams, and there are other stages of consciousness when we move in and out of a deep sleep.

Several psychotropic substances enhance these altered states of consciousness. Other conditions could also be responsible. However, we have several pieces of evidence of psychotropic substance use in ancient religions and also in ethnographic groups of the present.

Cave artists are not making up things. They see reality on rock surfaces. They are making animals appear from the rocks, a reality they have experienced. To the people who made the pictures, they are not images; they are not symbolic representations, but real “beings”.

When you drift into higher states of consciousness, you see and experience a variety of visual images. You also hear, smell and feel many things. Initially, you are choked and constricted; you feel you are falling through a long dark tunnel. Or else you are drowning in waters and feel tremendous pressure on your chest. Then the animals and other "spirits" appear. They help you navigate and assist you to rise to higher levels - into the light.

The cave art also includes many symbols - grids, zig-zags, dots, etc. Do they persist to this date as the cross and swastika? A “wounded man” lies among the ethereal animals, speared. “Crucified man” imagery continues to this age.

Neanderthals, who co-existed with humans for some time and interbred (the book gets this wrong) did not indulge in cave art, even though they occupied some of the same caves at times. In all probability, Neanderthals saw the paintings left by their cousins. They could have been baffled and never made any sense out of the figures.

Cave art ended with the conclusion of the last ice age. History saw the start of a new dawn that ended the hunter-gatherer lifestyle that gave way to cities and settled agriculture. Caves and tunnels did not disappear. They make the appearance as cavernous buildings - pyramids, ziggurats, temples and churches, with paintings covering the walls and ceilings. Another set of animals and half animal - humans images, floating out of the walls. They beckon you to another world.

Geographic patterns persist. Of chanting, singing and dancing we have no evidence from the Upper Palaeolithic, but if “present is key to the past”, we have to conclude that all the religious paraphernalia and beliefs have a long history.

Why belief arose in one animal species has the answer in the higher consciousness that H.sapiens acquired 70,000 years onwards. It has deep relations to dreams, in the sense that dream state consciousness is part of this higher consciousness.

The cave paintings are not graffiti painted by bored individuals or aesthetically inclined artists. They represent part of our consciousness that we all experience, yet not understand well.

Lewis-Williams talks about social stratification and conflicts maybe from a Marxist perspective. I am not sure how relevant this could be. Shamanism does not indicate social stratification. Such rigid social stratification happened after the hunter-gatherer mode of living was abandoned. So these views should be taken cautiously. Otherwise, the book is a good read.

[Aykut Karabay · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mağara sanatı neden ve nasıl ortaya çıktı? Neden Üst Paleolitik dönemde yaşayan atalarımız duvarlara çizerek bir şeyler ifade etme ihtiyacı hissetti? Kitap temel olarak bu soruların peşinden giderek nörolojinin ve arkeolojinin ışığında cevaplar arıyor.
Buna cevap olarak; milyonlarca yıl önce bile insanların maddi olmayan bir aleme inandıklarını, bu inancın bugün hala kaybolmadığını, modern düşüncedeki devam eden bu rahatsızlığın insan beyninin derinlerinde yattığını ileri sürüyor.

Bu durumun Üst Paleolitik çağ insanlarının içinde yaşadıkları toplumsal ve düşünsel bağlamla da ilgili olduğunu öne sürüyor. Zihinsel etkinliğin toplumsal bağlam ile etkileşim içinde olduğunu, bir topluluk tarafından paylaşılan insani deneyim hakkındaki kavramların bireylerin zihnini etkilediğini, bazı zihinsel durumlara toplumsal kontrol altında ulaşmanın toplumsal ayrımcılığın temeli olduğunu, ve bunun milyonlarca yıl önce bile geçerli olduğunu gösteriyor.

Üst Paleolitik dönem insanlarının değişen bilinç durumundan toplumlarını değiştirmek için yararlandıklarını, imgelerin toplumsal ilişkileri belirlediğini ve tarif ettiğini iddia ediyor.

Süslenmiş mağaraların üst Paleolitik dönem toplumunun ve düşünce yapısının basit birer yansıması olmadığını, aksine bu mağaraların o dönem yaşamının biçimlendirilmesi için kullanıldığını gösteriyor. (Bir nevi sosyal medya )

Ve son olarak mağara sanatı üzerinden toplumun anlaşmazlığa düşmeden, var olan düzene karşı çıkan bireyler olmadan gelişemeyeceğini, evrilemeyeceğini öne sürüyor. İnsan toplumunun kökeninde de gerilimlerin, adaletsizliğin, ayrımcılığın olduğunu iddia ediyor.

Mağara sanatının beyindeki bölümler arasındaki karşılıklı bağlantıların otomatik olarak yarattığı tanrıların, ruhların yansıması olduğunu, bunun dinin ve tanrı kavramının özü olduğunu gösteriyor. Mutlak biricik varlık(aşkınlık) duygusunun, beyindeki sinirsel devrelerin taşmasından kaynaklandığını iddia ediyor. Dolayısıyla dinin ve sanatın temel kaynağının beyin donanımımız olduğunu ve tanrının ortadan kalkmama nedeninin de beynimizdeki bu girift bağlantı olduğunu gösteriyor.

Nörobiyolojinin ışığında milyonlarca yıl önceki inançlar, eylemler ve sanatın yok olmayacağını ancak kafamızın içindekinin sadece bizim zihnimizde olduğunu ve dışımızda bir yerde bulunmadığını gösteriyor. Bunun sanatın değerini azaltmayacağını, bu yücelik duygusunun mistik bir geriye gidiş olmaması gerektiğini anlatıyor. Yücelik duygusunun Avcı toplayıcı topluluklarda işe yaradığı ve muhteşem sanat yapıtları ortaya çıkarmış olabileceği, ancak bugün bu tanrılara, ruhlara, dinsel inançlara ihtiyaç duymadan’da sanattan heyecan duyabileceğimizi, yaratıcı ve doyuma ulaşmış bir yaşam yaşayabileceğimizi anlatıyor.

[Arthur · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lewis-Williams’ The Mind in the Cave is a book that dares to think big. It reaches toward the origins of human creativity and attempts to understand them through neurological patterns and altered states of consciousness. That alone is admirable: someone is finally trying to bridge the gap between brain, image, and meaning, rather than staying confined to dates and pigment analysis. The fascination with cave art pulses through every sentence.

And yet, the book becomes trapped in its own certainty. The hypothesis that these artworks stem from shamanic trance is compelling, but it’s presented as the explanation. Other possibilities—play, memory, communication, even boredom—are barely given a glance. The thinking narrows as the chapters progress, as if the reader is being led through a tunnel where every side path is walled off.

The structure is also repetitive. Ideas are recycled rather than deepened, as though the author fears they won’t be understood unless restated. While Lewis-Williams attempts to weave complex links between consciousness and visual language, his tone is often didactic. At times, chapters feel more like lectures you can’t leave than an open-ended exploration.

What lingers is a mixed impression: admiration for the scope, frustration at the lack of nuance. Readers drawn to singular explanations and spiritual frameworks may find much to appreciate. Those looking for plural meanings or experiential perspectives may be left unsatisfied.

A book that poses grand questions, but too readily claims to have found the answers.

[Úrsula Bischofberger · Rating 5 out of 5]

Espléndido ensayo, que Amazon me vendió cuando yo iba a comprar otros. No lo he terminado, a lo mejor cuando lo termine modifico esta reseña, no sé.
El autor ha hecho un potentísimo trabajo interdisciplinar para explicar el porqué del arte paleolítico, y lo vincula, con múltiples pruebas, a los estados de conciencia alterados.
Me he llevado a las siguientes reflexiones.
Por un lado, al carácter parcial, injusto y negativo para el género humano de priorizar sólo la conciencia "normal", productiva y que solemos priorizar. Esto nos pasará factura. Desde que lo leí, estoy muy pendiente de mis estados hipnagógicos y trato de no olvidar mis sueños, porque los hombres paleolíticos, a través, de Lewis-Williams, me han dado esa soberbia lección.
Por otro, la dificultad cada vez mayor de abordar adecuadamente algunas parcelas de la realidad: me parecía, a veces, que el autor escribía "contra" todas las hienas de todas las disciplinas que iba utilizando al desenvolver el tema, que se lanzaban contra él... y, efectivamente, me parece que hay conceptos que desde la etología ya se han abandonado, por lo que algunas de las tesis del autor se derrumbarían...
En resumen: seamos valientes para aproximarnos a nuestras conciencias alternativas, seamos valientes para atrevernos a ser interdisciplinares.