Could eating meat really have caused us to evolve?
难道真是食肉让我们得以进化
About 2.3 million years ago,
大约230万年以前
Homo habilis - the first ancestor we THINK ate meat - appeared.
出现了我们认为最先开始食肉的祖先——能人
There had been an amazing change.
他们一定有过惊人的演变
Though habilis stood no more than a metre tall,
尽管能人站立身高不到1米
fossils show it had a bigger skull
从化石来看他们的颅骨却比南方古猿大
and a brain 30% larger than Australopithecus.
而且脑部比南方古猿大30%
And, crucially, scientists have speculated that
至关重要的是 科学家推测
this upright, big-brained chimpanzee
这种直立行走 脑大的猩猩
evolved as a result of eating meat.
本身就是因食肉而进化的结果
The Australopiths' brain size remained stable.
南方古猿的大脑稳步发育
Then meat-eating came in, and then the brains got bigger,
而后它们开始食肉 大脑就发育得更大
and that set everything off in the director of modern humans.
从而确定了进化成当代人类的主要演变趋势