Humans are smarter thanks to super disaster

A terrible volcanic eruption that greatly reduced the number of prehistoric creatures on the earth, but it also contributed to humanity's attainment.

When the super volcanoes erupt, the earth's climate changes and life is facing great challenges. Scientists have proved that such an event happened 74,000 years ago, when the giant Toba volcano erupted on an island that today is called Sumatra (Indonesia). Its spraying force is said to be 1,000 to 10,000 times that of St. Helen is famous in America.

Many anthropologists argue that the activity of Toba volcano has a great impact on human evolution, because the population on the planet once fell sharply after the volcanic activity.

Alan Robock and Georgiy Stenchikov - two scientists from Rutgers University (USA) - and colleagues used 6 climate simulation models to understand the impact of Toba volcano. A model shows that the earth has experienced a continuous winter for 10 years. This situation can have serious consequences for people and global ecosystems.

Toba Volcano on Sumatra Island, Indonesia.(Photo: andaman.org)

According to the team, the ash of Toba volcano prevents sunlight from causing global temperatures to drop sharply . A cold winter lasts continuously for at least 10 years, causing plants and animals to mass extinction. Only a few thousand people survived that terrible winter. That explains why all of today's human DNA is nearly the same.

Although humans evolved a different way than primates a few million years ago, all human beings today are descendants of several thousand people who survived the Toba disaster. Our intelligence is only 74,000 years - the equivalent of an blink of an earth's age - to evolve to the present day.

Scientists do not know when the next eruption of the Toba super volcano will occur, but they calculate that each of its eruptions is 50 to 100 thousand years apart. They stated that after a disaster like the eruption of Toba, our ancestors were forced to give up the lifestyles that had formed many generations ago. They must brainstorm more in the search for food.

Many neurologists also affirmed that human intelligence including language learning and planning has evolved strongly to cope with similar simulations in the future.