Archaeological excavations at the Acheulean site of Saffaqah near Dawadmi in central Saudi Arabia have found that Homo erectus, an extinct hominid species that lived between 1.9 million and 143,000 years ago, used ‘least-effort strategies’ for tool making and collecting resources.

C. Shipton et al. 2018. Acheulean technology and landscape use at Dawadmi, central Arabia. PLoS ONE 13 (7): e0200497; doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0200497