Unlocking the Past Quotes

“James Hutton, peering at the fine detail of geological stratigraphy, newly exposed by eighteenth century industrial works. Realizing a simple story was illusory, he instead inferred a world in which ‘we find no vestige of a beginning—no prospect of an end’.”
― Martin Jones, Unlocking the Past: How Archaeologists Are Rewriting Human History with Ancient DNA

“Space, time and context all impose limits on what is possible.”
― Martin Jones, Unlocking the Past: How Archaeologists Are Rewriting Human History with Ancient DNA

“At one end of the spectrum was the view that humans were on a path of improvement by historical action and unique invention. At the other end was the view that we, as much as other species in nature, were subject to the rough and tumble of global fluctuation and natural selection.”
― Martin Jones, Unlocking the Past: How Archaeologists Are Rewriting Human History with Ancient DNA

“Some hominid species may persist for more than a million years, but not forever, and the same will probably be true of us. We are not part of an ongoing and unique surge towards human progress; we are finite components of a natural world that is changing and ephemeral.”
― Martin Jones, Unlocking the Past: How Archaeologists Are Rewriting Human History with Ancient DNA

“It has seemed to us that our powers of perception, our conscious thought and creativity, and our sheer ability to control nature, are attributes of such magnitude that they are a case apart.”
― Martin Jones, Unlocking the Past: How Archaeologists Are Rewriting Human History with Ancient DNA