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American paleontologist Elisabeth Vrba and other scientists have suggested that climate changes 2.5 million years ago accelerated the evolution of hominins (members of the human lineage), giving rise to our genus, Homo. The details of this process, and the exact pathways of ancestors and descendants, are highly controversial (see human evolution). Even so, most paleoanthropologists and archaeologists believe that a shift from forests to drier savanna lands in Africa imposed evolutionary pressures that favoured an upright stance and ability to run and walk long distances. This posture freed the hands for grasping and made possible the eventual use of tools. Homo fossils suggest a migration out of Africa to China and Java as early as 1.8 million years ago during the middle of the Pleistocene. This “Out of Africa” theory is now interpreted as multiple events over many millennia. H. erectus was well established in eastern and southeastern Asia by one million years ago. Another distinctive human precursor (H. antecessor) arrived in Atapuerca, Spain, by 800,000 years ago. A human ancestor named H. heidelbergensis is found from sites in Africa, Europe, and possibly Asia. These fossils date to between 600,000 and 200,000 years ago. There is no more controversial subject in this field than the identity and fate of the next major group, the Neanderthals (H. neanderthalensis), who lived between 200,000 and 30,000 years ago in Europe and western Asia. Most recent work suggests that Neanderthals were not the direct ancestors of modern humans. Both H. neanderthalensis and H. sapiens may have evolved from H. heidelbergensis.

Modern humans (H. sapiens) first appeared in Africa about 200,000 years ago. They arrived in the Middle East about 100,000 years ago, apparently living in the same environmental settings as the Neanderthals. By 45,000–43,000 years ago, modern humans had begun to settle in Europe, but in less than 10,000 years they supplanted Neanderthals completely. H. sapiens also spread into Asia and across the narrow seaways of Java, the Sunda Islands, and New Guinea to Australia by at least 50,000 years ago. Spread of humans into the New World was delayed until possibly as late as 14,000–13,300 years ago, although there is evidence for earlier colonization. A wealth of evidence is available in Europe for the development of human technology and culture during the Upper Paleolithic through Neolithic cultural stages, ranging from the skillfully crafted stone, bone, and wooden tools found in many locations to rare but revealing cave art. These artifacts can be interpreted in various ways, but they clearly were the product of intelligent and emotionally complex humans.

It is probably no coincidence that after the strictures imposed by cold and rapidly changing Pleistocene climates and landscapes, human civilization and recorded history arose during the more amenable climate of the Holocene. However, even in these quieter times, vast climate and sea-level disruptions have occurred. In the late 1990s evidence of catastrophic flooding of the Black Sea was discovered. The event took place approximately 8,000 years ago and would have flooded settlements and displaced peoples, possibly accelerating the dispersal of Neolithic foragers and farmers into Europe.

Vivid cave paintings, such as those in Lascaux, France, as well as rock engravings in Australia and many other parts of the world, depict bison, antelope, horse, mammoth, and other animals with which humans interacted during the Late Pleistocene. Many tools were obviously intended for hunting both large and small game. Other tools are interpreted as specialized scrapers for hides and awls for sewing skins. Rare finds of mammoth and other animals with stone points embedded in the bones or closely associated with the skeletons attest to the hunting of animals. In addition, camps in Siberia have tent circles composed of woolly mammoth jaws and tusks. These could have come from either hunted or scavenged animals. Like Stone Age peoples known from recent centuries, these hunter-gatherers used the meat, bones, hides, and sinews of animals, along with many plants, for food, tools, and shelter. It is clear that these animal resources were critical to survival, especially in the cold regions.

Economic significance of Quaternary deposits

Most of the world’s soils are formed upon Quaternary sediments. They form the breadbasket of the North American central plains. Much of this abundance comes from the vast floors of former glacial lakes, such as Lake Agassiz and the windblown glacial-age dust that accumulated as thick layers of silt called loess. Reworking of these primary deposits by streams and rivers formed the vast floodplains and deltas of the Missouri and Mississippi rivers of the United States, the Huang He and the Yangtze River (Chang Jiang) of China, the Rhine valley of Europe, and others around the world. Deposits of sand and gravel left by melting glaciers are crucial raw materials for civil engineering and construction projects worldwide. Sand and gravel are also extracted from Quaternary marine and fluvial terraces, former shorelines, and even offshore on the continental shelf. Quaternary sea-level changes and shoreline migrations modified the surface of continental shelves and nearshore basins that define bottom-fishing areas. For example, the Gulf of Maine, Georges Bank, Scotian Shelf and Gulf of St. Lawrence, the Grand Banks, and the Irish, Celtic, and North seas were all affected by sea-level changes and, in some cases, direct glacial activity that produced the variable seafloor types and deflections of currents that result in highly productive fisheries.

Extensive groundwater supplies lie within Quaternary sediments. Occasionally, high-value minerals are found in Quaternary sediments. For example, gold and diamond placer deposits are found in stream gravels and beaches. The 1849 California Gold Rush started from such a deposit at Sutter’s Mill, and gold is still mined from placers in Alaska. In the United States, the greatest economic benefit of Quaternary sediments is in land for homes and recreational retreats. Much of the coastline of the eastern and southern United States is coastal sand brought by the glaciers or through changing sea levels during the period. When observed at geologic time scales, shorelines are constantly in motion, and ephemeral shifting is perceived even over the course of human lives.