Fossil and comparative primatological evidence suggest that alterations in the development of prehistoric hominin infants kindled three consecutive evolutionary-developmental (evo-devo) trends that, ultimately, paved the way for the evolution of the human brain and cognition. In the earliest trend, infants' development of posture and locomotion became delayed because of anatomical changes that accompanied the prolonged evolution of bipedalism. Because modern humans have inherited these changes, our babies are much slower than other primates to reach developmental milestones such as standing, crawling, and walking. The delay in ancestral babies' physical development eventually precipitated an evolutionary reversal in which they became increasing unable to cling independently to their mothers. For the first time in prehistory, babies were, thus, periodically deprived of direct physical contact with their mothers. This prompted the emergence of a second evo-devo trend in which infants sought contact comfort from caregivers using evolved signals, including new ways of crying that are conserved in modern babies. Such signaling stimulated intense reciprocal interactions between prehistoric mothers and infants that seeded the eventual emergence of motherese and, subsequently, protolanguage. The third trend was for an extreme acceleration in brain growth that began prior to the last trimester of gestation and continued through infants' first postnatal year (early "brain spurt"). Conservation of this trend in modern babies explains why human brains reach adult sizes that are over three times those of chimpanzees. The fossil record of hominin cranial capacities together with comparative neuroanatomical data suggest that, around 3 million years ago, early brain spurts began to facilitate an evolutionary trajectory for increasingly large adult brains in association with neurological reorganization. The prehistoric increase in brain size eventually caused parturition to become exceedingly difficult, and this difficulty, known as the "obstetrical dilemma", is likely to constrain the future evolution of brain size and, thus, privilege ongoing evolution in neurological reorganization. In modern babies, the brain spurt is accompanied by formation and tuning (pruning) of neurological connections, and development of dynamic higher-order networks that facilitate acquisition of grammatical language and, later in development, other advanced computational abilities such as musical or mathematical perception and performance. The cumulative evidence suggests that the emergence and refinement of grammatical language was a prime mover of hominin brain evolution.

中文翻译：

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大脑和文化的进化：从古猿到爱因斯坦的神经学和认知之旅。

化石和比较的原始动物学证据表明，史前人类素婴儿发育的变化激发了三个连续的进化-发展（evo-devo）趋势，这些趋势最终为人类大脑和认知的发展铺平了道路。在最早的趋势中，由于伴随两足动物的长期发展而发生的解剖学变化，婴儿的姿势和运动发展被推迟了。由于现代人类已经继承了这些变化，因此我们的婴儿比其他灵长类动物要慢得多，才能达到发展的里程碑，例如站立，爬行和行走。祖先婴儿身体发育的延迟最终导致了进化的逆转，使他们变得越来越无法独立地依附于母亲。史前第一次，婴儿是 因此，定期剥夺与母亲的直接身体接触。这促使出现第二种evo-devo趋势，在这种趋势中，婴儿使用进化的信号（包括现代婴儿保存的新的哭声方式）寻求看护者的接触舒适度。这种信号刺激了史前母亲与婴儿之间的强烈的双向互动，从而为最终出现母语和随后的母语提供了条件。第三个趋势是大脑发育的极端加速，开始于妊娠的最后三个月，一直持续到婴儿出生后的第一年（早期“脑喷”）。现代婴儿的这一趋势得到了保留，这解释了为什么人的大脑达到的成年人的大小是黑猩猩的三倍以上。人鼻颅能力的化石记录以及比较的神经解剖学数据表明，大约三百万年前，早期的脑突开始与神经系统重组相关，逐渐促进了越来越大的成年大脑的进化轨迹。史前大脑大小的增加最终导致分娩变得极为困难，这种困难被称为“产科困境”，很可能会限制未来大脑大小的演变，因此，优先考虑正在进行的神经系统重组。在现代婴儿中，脑部急促伴随着神经系统连接的形成和调整（修剪），以及动态高阶网络的发展，这些网络促进了语法语言的获得，并在后来的发展中，其他高级计算能力，例如音乐或数学感知和演奏。累积的证据表明，语法语言的出现和完善是人类大脑进化的主要推动力。