The Art of Tracking, the Origin of Science

In a work of painstaking and wide-ranging scholarship, backed up by fieldwork among the Kalahari hunter-gatherers, Louis Liebenberg explains how the art of tracking represents a crucial step in human evolution. Liebenberg examines the principles of tracking, and the classification and interpretation of spoor under difficult conditions. He also shows how the original speculative hypotheses of early hunter-gatherers have a direct line to the propositions of modern physicists who ‘track’ sub-atomic particles. In the book, the author argues that the art of tracking involves the same intellectual and creative abilities as physics and mathematics, and may therefore represent the origin of science itself. The book has been hailed as a real contribution to our understanding of the complexity involved in the process by which indigenous peoples track and hunt animals. It is insightful, detailed and well articulated.