It shouldn't. It's been extensively documented among modern human groups.
The major question is how much our understanding from recent forager groups applies to pleistocene foragers ("ethnographic analogy"). I'm in the generally skeptical camp. Many other anthropologists aren't, particularly those in older generations.
The Pleistocene lasts from 2.58 million years ago, maybe the first time our ancestors figured out tools, to 11,000 years ago, when we Homo sapiens had been around for ~200,000 years. Isn't that too wide a range of humans and ancestors to characterize in one group?
Are you skeptical about 11 kya ancestors doing similar things? Why?
Isn't that too wide a range of humans and ancestors to characterize in one group?
Yes, that's one reason why I have high standards for arguments from ethnographic analogy.
Are you skeptical about 11 kya ancestors doing similar things? Why?
Because modern forager groups have survived for centuries on the margins of colonial states. The environment they inhabit is very different from late pleistocene humans and we should default to skepticism in the absence of other evidence.
>It's been extensively documented among modern human groups.
Do you have some sources? A quick search doesn't pull up much evidence for current hunter-gatherer dependence on natural fire regime. Or you mean anatomically modern humans?
Yes, Tasmanians are the best example that comes to mind. They had a mythology developed around lightning and subsequent fires and would then try to keep a fire going as long as possible.
from the paper: "The consideration of fire ecology data and various factors involved in the complex process of fire ignition, combustion, and behavior, in relation to the GBY paleoenvironment and archaeology, enabled the rejection of recurrent natural fires as the responsible agent for burning (Alperson-Afil, 2012)."
The major question is how much our understanding from recent forager groups applies to pleistocene foragers ("ethnographic analogy"). I'm in the generally skeptical camp. Many other anthropologists aren't, particularly those in older generations.