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Comment by throwup238 | Hacker News Reader

We have evidence of control over fire (but not fire starting) at about 1 million years. Stone tools go even further back, at least 2 million years.

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Wait hang on, would they "control" file by finding natural sources (volcano, lightning strike wildfire, etc.) and then make use of that source for controlled sources of light/heat/etc? I guess I've always thought of "control" of fire including the intentional starting thereof.

> Wait hang on, would they "control" file by finding natural sources (volcano, lightning strike wildfire, etc.) and then make use of that source for controlled sources of light/heat/etc?

Pretty much. Being able to transfer/build a fire is a lot easier than starting one. Fire starting requires bow/flint&steel and a lot of patience. Control basically means using simple torches to transfer fire from one place to another (where the initial source is either lightning/wildfire or embers of a previous fire).

Some very recently published research (Dec 2025) claims evidence of fire starting among homo neanderthalensis. This would push back fire starting know-how (not only control) from 50k to 400k years ago. Cool stuff!

[1] https://www.nhm.ac.uk/press-office/press-releases/groundbrea...

There's pretty strong evidence that the use of fire to cook food is what enabled modern humans, with their short (and relatively fragile) digestive systems and giant energy hungry brains to evolve. Cooking food makes more calories bio-available in food and also reduced the amount of energy the body needs to expend on that food to harvest calories... so there's more energy available for thinking (etc).

When is the first evidence for cooking?

That’s a complicated question. The Wonderwerk Cave in South Africa where we found the first evidence of controlled fire also contained burned plant remains and bones, which could be interpreted as evidence of cooking. There were also burned fish remains found at the Gesher Benot Ya’aqov site in Israel, dated to about 780 kYA, which could also be interpreted as evidence of cooking.

By far the strongest evidence is the Qesem Cave in Israel, which had a central hearth and so many burned animal remains that it couldn’t have been accidental. Unfortunately the dating on that is controversial and the error bar is huge at 300 +- 100 kYA (200,000-400,000 years ago).

Thanks! That is much farther back than I thought, even 200 kYA.

And cooking kills like 99+% of pathogens, which freed us from much of the parasite/disease stress other animals must live with.

I had thought (perhaps wrongly) that our brains got a massive "boost" in capacity when our ancestors moved to coastal areas and the diet was dominated by (Omega 3 heavy) shellfish and crustaceans.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9505798/

ah, there's a very good movie about this exact topic (not scientifically accurate, one presumes, but still very good)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quest_for_Fire_(film)

Not to mention the Iron Maiden song! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SF7cWpBTZ6s

Firehawks spread fire to scare out game; that count?

https://wildlife.org/australian-firehawks-use-fire-to-catch-...

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