Stone to Silicon

Tools & manufacturing · c. 3.3 million years ago

First stone tools

Struck stone flakes give hominins an edge no body could grow.

Flaked cores and sharp flakes appear at Lomekwi, Kenya, about 3.3 million years ago, and the Oldowan industry follows by 2.6 million years ago. Cutting meat and cracking bone opened a richer diet and started every later toolmaking tradition.

See it in the living treeWikipedia

Arcs above join it to what it stood on, arcs below to what it led to. The bar places this stretch on the tree's whole timeline.

What it led to 10

Related measurements

The dashed line marks when it first worked.

World population over a million years Latest: 6.27k million people (2000) Source: DeLong 1998, table 'Total World Population' (Kremer series); Kremer 1993, Population Growth and Technological Change: One Million B.C. to 1990, QJE 108(3)

World GDP over a million years Latest: 41k billion 1990 international $ (2000) Source: DeLong 1998, Estimating World GDP, One Million B.C. - Present; Wikipedia: Gross world product (DeLong table, cross-check)