This symposium addresses the interactive gene-culture co-evolution of the human brain with tool use and technology - ranging from simple stone tools millions of years ago to computers today. The stone tool record begins to exhibit increasingly complex variability during a period correlated with Homo sapiens origin and dispersal. This complex variability most likely reflects an evolving relationship between technology and spoken language –an uniquely derived human behavior, that intensified as humans became Earth's only obligatory tool-using primate. John Shea, Stony Brook University, New York. Recorded on 10/12/2018. (#34193)