Did Farming Send Humans Down The Wrong Path

Fluffernutter said:
"I've killed all the deer in this part of the forest and my tribe has eaten all the berries."

"I think I'll move to another part of the forest."

"Oh, crap! another tribe of people live over there. They don't like that I am stealing their resources."


OR

"I've noticed that the deer are pleantiful during only certain times of year. Therefore, I have to think of a way to manage food throughout the year. What if instead of eating 100% of the berrues this year, what if we eat only 80%....and then dry and plant the other 20%. That way, we can get food later from today's food sources."

"Plus, while we wait, we can trap some of the deer and let them breed in an enclosed area. Then, we can eat some or even drink their milk."

"While we are at it, we can play checkers as we pass the time."

"Since we aren't going anywhere and have stopped our nomadic lifestyle, it would be cool if the folks in my tribe that are good at math could create a series of borrowing and paying back objects that I can trade for deer-skinned shoes."

"Then, our young men can stay fit at protect us from other nomadic tribes that may want to eat our cultivated berries OR domesticates deer. Plus, when they are not protecting our resourses, they can kick a ball around to each other in between two sets of trees."

"My daughter likes to use the berry juices and deer blood to paint elaborate pictures of the landscapes, people, and the stars on rocks and tree bark. Now that we don't have to move everyday, she can keep practicing. Maybe someday she will be able to trade her paintings for objects to allow her to buy a new shelter."

"Hey, I notcied that this year's crop yield is larger than last year's. We have so many extra berries we can approach a neighboring tribe and ask if they want some. Who knows, maybe they will trade some tall grass that kernels grow out of them. After all, back in my nomadic days, I heard that there was some interesting grasses on the other side of the forest.
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Common sense. Thank you. Not that common these days.
 
You are looking it from the perspective of a modern age person with modern problems and say that they had more time to enjoy.

In fact they had to work all day long because hunting good, taking care of the camp, moving and all other things took almost all their time. Just cleaning of the camp, making sure fire stays intact and stuff like that required a lot of work. It is no accident that with agriculture came development of culture as well, especially technology since people now had more free time to think because there were people who were not busy working. Yeah, hunter-gathering system can work but you are just tapping in one stop. There is no progress and we would be just another animal on this planet. Any problem we are facing now will be solved in the future when we evolve more, not physically but mentally. We still have cave man mentality but over thousands of years we will definitely find peace and comfort in technology and development. Find a way to use it even better while enjoying ourselves and having healthy lives.
 
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INTERL0PER said:
I assume you meant farming, not gaming... And I have no idea.

The stuff about disease increase after the start of agriculture was just what I've read, and obviously specifically applies to early agriculture and the first examples of humans living in villages instead of as hunter gatherer's.

I'd assume that eventually farming (and all the civilization benefits it brings with it) leads to longer lifespans. But I'm not sure.

I do think it would've probably taken us quite a while to learn how to live in villages successfully.

I imagine completely changing the species lifestyle from roaming packs of hunters to sedentary farmers would've brought many, many problems with it, and it would've taken a long time to iron out the kinks.
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Waste (crap) disposal would be the biggest challenge when changing from roaming lifestyle of life in a village/city. You don't move and population is big so amount of crap around you grows and stays.

But very soon even early cities found way to deal with it. Romans had running water before BC in their cities. Of course system was not perfect and they had many dirty parts, like London would later but still it was heading into direction where it is now. Now waste disposal is pretty efficient.
 
So everyone here think that we are better off with the path we took with Farming. I get it but I also hear people talk about Overpopulation,Global Warming, Crooked Gov't, etc. I wonder what we be like if humans never found farming.
 
Tell your daughter to go up and just say one word: potato.
 
ArtOfDrowning said:
You are looking it from the perspective of a modern age person with modern problems and say that they had more time to enjoy.

In fact they had to work all day long because hunting good, taking care of the camp, moving and all other things took almost all their time. Just cleaning of the camp, making sure fire stays intact and stuff like that required a lot of work. It is no accident that with agriculture came development of culture as well, especially technology since people now had more free time to think because there were people who were not busy working. Yeah, hunter-gathering system can work but you are just tapping in one stop. There is no progress and we would be just another animal on this planet. Any problem we are facing now will be solved in the future when we evolve more, not physically but mentally. We still have cave man mentality but over thousands of years we will definitely find peace and comfort in technology and development. Find a way to use it even better while enjoying ourselves and having healthy lives.
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I think you looking at it as if we would just stop evolving and progress forward if we stayed and hunters and I dont think that would have been true. I think we would just evolved differently. We have different and MAYBE Better technology if we stay as hunters. The problems we would have today as hunter would be completely different than what we have as Farmers. Might be better.


I know that there are Some natives (primitive tribes) left in the world and they dont have shit that we do but they are such a small group that I think it is hard to tell how a species would evolve from such a small group.
 
Cheese said:
My daughter has a debate coming up on Farming vs Hunter-gatherers and weather humans were better off before they started Farming.

Its sounds silly that we be better off if Humans didnt learn how to farm But some of the things the paper states are interesting. Like before farming people only work about 12-15 hr a week and after farming human now work 40+ hrs a week cause farming.

Farmming allowed for Food Storage which caused a few ripples in the way people have changed. Before people stored food, they moved along with the food source. So populations were kept small. Children were born around every 4 yrs cause the older kids were able to keep up better. Once people started storing food, they started to stay in one place longer and it gave birth to cities and such and which bought thing like Trash and Diseases. Diease were almost nonexistent in the times of hunters cause people werent living with domestic animals and such.

So before farming came,population was kept lower, few diseases around and people had more time to enjoy life.
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In this context if you consider farming to be work you have to consider hunting, foraging and gathering to be work as well.

Also I think having a stable food supply > chasing food around and starving to death.
 
Cheese said:
So everyone here think that we are better off with the path we took with Farming. I get it but I also hear people talk about Overpopulation,Global Warming, Crooked Gov't, etc. I wonder what we be like if humans never found farming.
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Cheese wouldn't exist and you would have to have a different username.
 
TWas acrually Farmville that caused ruination of society
 
Fugazy said:
In this context if you consider farming to be work you have to consider hunting, foraging and gathering to be work as well.

Also I think having a stable food supply > chasing food around and starving to death.
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Would we really be Starving to Death though? If Hunting was how we Lived,I think we would be pretty good at it and would learn how to mange our food source and not kill the all. Maybe some kind of Hunting season system. People are starving now on the farming system.
 
Cheese said:
Did Farming Send Humans Down The Wrong Path -- My daughter has a debate coming up on Farming vs Hunter-gatherers and weather humans were better off before they started Farming.

Its sounds silly that we be better off if humans didn't learn how to farm, but some of the things the paper states are interesting. Like before farming people only work about 12-15 hr a week and after farming human now work 40+ hrs a week cause farming.
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No, farming did not send humans down the wrong path. What side of the debate is your daughter taking? I'll take the side that favors farming and win the argument with one source:
 
When we started farming romaine lettuce, defecating became a lot more pleasant.
 
Cheese said:
Would we really be Starving to Death though? If Hunting was how we Lived,I think we would be pretty good at it and would learn how to mange our food source and not kill the all. Maybe some kind of Hunting season system. People are starving now on the farming system.
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I don't mean constantly starving, I just mean more likely to starve and sufferung from starvation more often. With that way of life your food supply fluctuates and is much more volatile than when you can raise plants and animals, and store excesses for scarce times. You can be a tribe of good hunters, but if the seasons are tough, there may be very little to hunt.
 
Cheese said:
I get it but I also hear people talk about Overpopulation, Global Warming, Crooked Gov't, etc. I wonder what we be like if humans never found farming.
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Not sure what farming has to do with overpopulation, global warming, and corrupt governments. Industry may be closer to that, but even industry would not affect those 3 areas. Apples and oranges.
 
"Wrong" is subjective but I believe humans have evolved to be hunter gatherers and we are obviously not "naturally" designed for modern civilization. We would be healthier, happier, more egalitarian, and the host of psychological and social issues that plague modern humans wouldn't exist. But at the same time, I think we were meant to discover agriculture. There was no way around it. It's also in our nature to innovate and find ways to make things easier for us.

Phr3121 said:
No, farming did not send humans down the wrong path. What side of the debate is your daughter taking? I'll take the side that favors farming and win the argument with one source:
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The irony of this is that Diamond himself is on the other side of the argument.
 
Phr3121 said:
Not sure what farming has to do with overpopulation, global warming, and corrupt governments. Industry may be closer to that, but even industry would not affect those 3 areas. Apples and oranges.
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The paper claims that Farming allowed people to stay in one area for longer periods of time. So in return that forced humans to create a system of haves and have nots. the land owners and farmers were the ones that be rich and then gov't forum and the Civ we have today rose from that.


I dont know how true that is cause Tribes had to have a leader and he had to have gotten more than somebody.
 
Cheese said:
So everyone here think that we are better off with the path we took with Farming. I get it but I also hear people talk about Overpopulation,Global Warming, Crooked Gov't, etc. I wonder what we be like if humans never found farming.
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Industrialization causes overpopulation, and along with natural reasons also causes global warming. People will take advantage of others regardless of technology.

So I guess farming indirectly led to two of those problems, but I wouldn't blame farming for them
 
Cheese said:
The paper claims that Farming allowed people to stay in one area for longer periods of time. So in return that forced humans to create a system of haves and have nots. the land owners and farmers were the ones that be rich and then gov't forum and the Civ we have today rose from that.
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"The book attempts to explain why Eurasian civilizations have survived and conquered others, while arguing against the idea that Eurasian hegemony is due to any form of Eurasian intellectual, moral, or inherent genetic superiority. Diamond argues that the gaps in power and technology between human societies originate primarily in environmental differences, which are amplified by various positive feedback loops. When cultural or genetic differences have favored Eurasians (for example, written language or the development of resistance to endemic diseases), he asserts that these advantages occurred because of the influence of geography on societies and cultures."

Once basic needs are met, men can focus (think) on other things and invent. Advances in weaponry, medicine, and technology.
 
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