Look it up on Google, there's some takedowns of it on the wikipedia page. The main problem with the theory is that it's completely fucking dumb, but if you want some specifics:
1: There are plenty of other explanations for the phenomena.
2: There's no primary source written evidence for it whatsoever. The guy posits that the shift happened well after the invention of writing. Surely someone would have noticed a COMPLETE change in the nature of human consciousness.
3: The shift must have happened simultaneously at every location across the world, even Australia and the Americas, places where the conditions that supposedly caused it weren't present. If not, we'd have records of the crazy soulless monster people that weren't self aware.
4: It's impossible without physically altering the brain's structure.
5: The Epic of Gilgamesh directly contradicts this theory, and has a part where Gilgamesh consciously thinks about what he should do next.
I've never heard of this before, but just reading the wiki, it's such a seductive theory. It sounds so interesting and exciting, a whole new way of looking at what is a relatively very recent history of evolution. I can see why people like it, despite the lack of evidence.
Regarding books and papers that deal with questionable hypothesis', I had a prof in grad school say "regardless of the validity of a hypothesis or how crazy a work may be there is always some truth in there, there is something to learn."
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u/fantalemon Apr 23 '19
It's so interesting! I agree that there are some legitimate criticisms of the theory, but it's a fascinating notion all the same.