# Was the Agricultural Revolution a mistake? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 21, 2021, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740 "2021-11-21T22:54:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2021, 7:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/142 "2021-11-27T19:20:34Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > And I’m willing to bet that people have engaged in sexual activities that don’t make babies since people have been people. I recall reading of some Pacific island tribe where only select males were supposed to reproduce. The others would have a hole made in their urethra at the base of the penis so they could still copulate, but when they climaxed, they would hold the distal end of the urethra closed so they didn’t actually inseminate their partner. How the lucky ones were chosen or what would happen to a drone if he “forgot” I don’t recall. 😬 ---
**Author:** ![Dr\_Paprika](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr_paprika/32/3042_2.png) [@Dr\_Paprika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr_Paprika)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2021, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/143 "2021-11-28T16:33:50Z")
I have started reading The Dawn of Everything and withdraw my previous comments. I was wrong. This is a groundbreaking and important book and I will be giving copies as Christmas gifts. It is a pleasure to read as well. But it is not so much an attack of Harari, mentioned three times in a massive tome. It does not agree with some of his Jean-Jacques assumptions or viewing things from the perspective of wheat. It sometimes agrees with him. It suggests he could have phrased specific sentences differently, comparing people to people and not primates. ---
**Author:** ![Dr\_Paprika](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr_paprika/32/3042_2.png) [@Dr\_Paprika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr_Paprika)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2021, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/144 "2021-11-29T02:58:02Z")
The book deserves its own thread. Going to wait till I’ve finished it which might be awhile. It is an ambitious book and very hard to summarize, but _The Atlantic_ did it in this way (Oct.18,2021). The rough ideas are different from Harari but less so than implied. QUOTE: “is “civilization” worth it, the authors want to know, if civilization—ancient Egypt, the Aztecs, imperial Rome, the modern regime of bureaucratic capitalism enforced by state violence—means the loss of what they see as our three basic freedoms: the freedom to disobey, the freedom to go somewhere else, and the freedom to create new social arrangements? Or does civilization rather mean “mutual aid, social co-operation, civic activism, hospitality [and] simply caring for others”? These are questions that Graeber, a committed anarchist—an exponent not of anarchy but of anarchism, the idea that people can get along perfectly well without governments—asked throughout his career. _The Dawn of Everything_ is framed by an account of what the authors call the “indigenous critique.” In a remarkable chapter, they describe the encounter between early French arrivals in North America, primarily Jesuit missionaries, and a series of Native intellectuals—individuals who had inherited a long tradition of political conflict and debate and who had thought deeply and spoke incisively on such matters as “generosity, sociability, material wealth, crime, punishment and liberty.” The Indigenous critique, as articulated by these figures in conversation with their French interlocutors, amounted to a wholesale condemnation of French—and, by extension, European—society: its incessant competition, its paucity of kindness and mutual care, its religious dogmatism and irrationalism, and most of all, its horrific inequality and lack of freedom. The authors persuasively argue that Indigenous ideas, carried back and publicized in Europe, went on to inspire the Enlightenment (the ideals of freedom, equality, and democracy, they note, had theretofore been all but absent from the Western philosophical tradition). They go further, making the case that the conventional account of human history as a saga of material progress was developed in reaction to the Indigenous critique in order to salvage the honor of the West. We’re richer, went the logic, so we’re better. The authors ask us to rethink what _better_ might actually mean.“ ---
**Author:** ![Dr\_Paprika](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr_paprika/32/3042_2.png) [@Dr\_Paprika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr_Paprika)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2021, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/145 "2021-11-29T16:08:10Z")
Semantics differ but the argument things differ not unilaterally improve is still there. ---
**Author:** ![wguy123](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wguy123/32/3161_2.png) [@wguy123](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wguy123)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2021, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/146 "2021-11-29T21:53:55Z")
Mark Bittman would answer the question as “yes”. His recent book, _Animal, Vegetable, Junk: A History of Food, from Sustainable to Suicidal_, is an excellent read. ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2022, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/147 "2022-01-25T00:09:42Z")
> [@GreenWyvern](#): > > If there’s more food available, they will decide that they can support and raise more children. If there isn’t much of a surplus, they will decide that it’s not such a good idea to have more children. Is there any evidence to support this (that pre- agricultural populations were controlled by voluntary birth control, rather than mortality?) Given the fact human populations haven’t generally done this (admittedly our point of view is skewed somewhat by a few millennia of agriculture) it seems like it would need some evidence to back it up. It would fairly straight forward, as you would see an decrease in the age of the remains found in post-agricultural settlements vs pre-agricultural ones if was (as child mortality would increase) ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2022, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/148 "2022-01-25T18:27:02Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > Is there any evidence to support this (that pre- agricultural populations were controlled by voluntary birth control, rather than mortality?) Does [infanticide](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infanticide#Paleolithic_and_Neolithic) count as “voluntary birth control”? ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2022, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/149 "2022-01-25T18:29:11Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Does [infanticide](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infanticide#Paleolithic_and_Neolithic) count as “voluntary birth control”? Definitely not, I’d say. Especially as that wiki article also says: > The children were not necessarily actively killed, but neglect and intentional malnourishment may also have occurred ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2022, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/150 "2022-01-25T18:37:44Z")
Well, some definitely were just exposed or worse. Not _technically_ birth control, I know, but certainly equivalent for population control purposes, in the “not having more children” arena. ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2022, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/151 "2022-01-25T18:41:15Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > “not having more children” arena. I mean its definitely having more children, who then die. So supports my original statement that bland statements like “Agriculture supports larger populations than hunter gathering” actually mean “less of your children will die” to the individual hunter gather or farmer. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2022, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/152 "2022-01-25T18:44:19Z")
Intentionally exposing a newborn to let it die seems very different from losing a child you wanted. ---
**Author:** ![Schnitte](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/schnitte/32/9033_2.png) [@Schnitte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Schnitte)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2022, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/153 "2022-01-25T18:51:26Z")
Without the agricultural revolution, we wouldn’t have anything of all that followed and built upon it. No economy built on division of labour, no machinery, no amenities such as those we have come to cherish, no modern medicine, none of that. We’d be sitting in caves or on savannahs, with most of us dying of some easily curable (by the standards of the world we actually live in) medical condition in our twenties or thirties at the latest. I find it far-fetched to even consider that the agricultural revolution might have been a mistake. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2022, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/154 "2022-01-25T18:59:02Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > Intentionally exposing a newborn to let it die seems very different from losing a child you wanted. Well, it did tend to [generate conquerers](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infant_exposure#Mythological). ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2022, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/155 "2022-01-25T20:24:05Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > I mean its definitely having more children, who then die. …are killed by you. > [@Schnitte](#): > > Without the agricultural revolution[…]We’d be sitting in caves or on savannahs Or living in villages and towns. Like the Jōmon or the Kwakiutl. > [@Schnitte](#): > > I find it far-fetched to even consider that the agricultural revolution might have been a mistake. There _was_ no revolution. Thinking there was a revolution is the mistake. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2022, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/156 "2022-01-25T23:46:23Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > There _was_ no revolution. Thinking there was a revolution is the mistake. Would you argue that there was no industrial revolution because there were waterwheels and windmills harnessing wind and rivers beforehand? ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2022, 6:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/157 "2022-01-26T06:10:23Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > Would you argue that there was no industrial revolution because there were waterwheels and windmills harnessing wind and rivers beforehand? No. But then neither of those, by itself, constitutes “the Industrial Revolution” But I _would_ argue there wasn’t one if people spent _10 000_ years going back and forth between using steam engines and spinning jennies and mechanized factory production, and not. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2022, 6:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/158 "2022-01-26T06:22:38Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > But I _would_ argue there wasn’t one if people spent _10 000_ years going back and forth between using steam engines and spinning jennies and mechanized factory production, and not. You italicized 10,000 years as if that’s meant to be a long time, but it’s the blink of an eye compared to the 2.5 million years our genus had been hunting and gathering for. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2022, 6:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/159 "2022-01-26T06:23:07Z")
Still doesn’t make it a _revolution_ ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2022, 6:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/160 "2022-01-26T06:24:21Z")
It completely changed our fate as humans, and the world around us, as well as the fate of thousands of species and ecosystems across the planet. Seems pretty revolutionary to me. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2022, 6:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740/161 "2022-01-26T06:27:44Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > It completely changed our fate as humans, and the world around us, as well as the fate of thousands of species and ecosystems across the planet. Sure, it did that. What it didn’t do, though, was happen _suddenly_. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740.md?page=7) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-agricultural-revolution-a-mistake/954740.md?page=9)