"Etched Ostrich Eggs Illustrate Human Sophistication"

An interesting story on BBC's home page today about recent discoveries concerning ostrich egg fragments and the importance of art and symbolism in human culture. "Symbolic thought - the ability to let one thing represent another - was a giant leap in human evolution, and sets our species apart from the rest of the animal world"; the article goes on to say that the egg fragments, which are 60,000 years old and were found in South Africa, are significant because of the large amount discovered there ("close to 300 pieces") and that they are trying to decipher what seems to be a "system of symbolic representation" (all quotations from Jonathon Amos' article published today on BBC!)