You Are a Researcher Excavating a Site in a Cave

question 69

Essay

You are a researcher excavating a site in a cave in Israel.There are many layers of sediment and primitive artifacts (flint tools for cutting and scraping)from ancestral Homo species within the cave.As you work your way deeper and deeper through the layers,you notice that artifacts in the deeper layers (laid before 350,000 years ago)do not show any signs of having been exposed to fire.
Artifacts in layers less than 350,000 years ago show rapidly increasing evidence of exposure to fire.Your colleagues working in nearby caves and caves scattered around the eastern Mediterranean Sea have found similar evidence dating in the same time frames.The evidence is also consistent with that of European sites.What does this suggest about the use of fire by ancestral humans?

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Definitions:

Production Process

Refers to the method or sequence of operations involved in the production of a good or service.

Prime Costs

The combined costs of direct materials and direct labor, which are directly attributable to the production of goods.

Prime Costs

A business's direct costs of materials and labor that are associated with the production of goods or services.

Idle Time

The period of time when resources, such as employees or machines, are available but not in use or producing, often resulting in inefficiency.