Register | Sign In


Understanding through Discussion


EvC Forum active members: 65 (9162 total)
5 online now:
Newest Member: popoi
Post Volume: Total: 915,817 Year: 3,074/9,624 Month: 919/1,588 Week: 102/223 Day: 13/17 Hour: 0/0


Thread  Details

Email This Thread
Newer Topic | Older Topic
  
Author Topic:   Agriculture and cultural ecology
John
Inactive Member


Message 1 of 54 (59017)
10-01-2003 9:40 PM


This topic is a spin-off of a discussion in the Akhenaton thread. Speel-yi takes the position that agriculture makes no sense as a cultural adaptation and must have been imposed on the 'masses' by the 'elites.'
John writes:
You argue that agriculture isn't an 'evolutionarily' valid strategy, but confuse 'average lifespan' with reproductive success-- the latter, not the former, being the relevant variable.
Speel-yi writes:
A shorter lifespan for a woman means she has a decreased chance for producing adult children unless she decrease the interbirth interval from 4 years to 2 or so.
Wrong. And it is a basic component of evolutionary biology that you have missed. A woman who lives to 80 has no more fertile time than a woman who lives to 40, or even 30 in most cases. That is why average lifespan is the wrong variable. Lifespan only matters up to the point where a woman can no longer become pregnant. Once a woman is infertile she could live to a thousand and it wouldn't make a damn bit of difference.
The relevant variable is the average birth rate per woman. The key variable for birth rate is fat. Calories make babies. Agricultural based diets are high in carbohydrates relative to foraging based diets. Thus, birth rates go up.
quote:
No it is not, it is quite alive and many textbooks have incorrect information about human evolution and this in turn has an effect on social policy. Ever heard of the term "developing country?" What are they supposed to develop into?
Textbooks may have incorrect information, though I am not sure how you would spot it. The term 'developing country' means 'developing a technological infrastructure.' This is not social darwinism. It is economics. Like it or not, a non-industrial country will be crushed in this world. It will be overrun.
quote:
It doesn't take much training to do menial tasks associated with agriculture.
It takes no more training to learn to walk around and recognize what is edible. Agriculture is no easy thing.
quote:
The division of labor meant that you learned one task and did not learn about anything else.
BS. That degree of labor division does not occur until you have very complicated societies such as Egypt. This is not the case with early agricultural communities. There tends to be more division of labor in these communities but it reaches nowhere near the degree you pretend.
quote:
It does not take much training to survive in America, most people are completely ignorant of anything except what they need to know.
You are overlooking the obvious. Kids are 16 to 20 or later before they can support themselves. The reason is school. How well do you think someone would survive with no formal education at all? No grammar school, no kindergarten, nothing? By six of seven a forager or farmer is contributing. In the US, we'd call that illegal.
quote:
The skeletal record shows a great deal of physical stress and malnutrition. Porotic hyperostosis is very evident in many skulls from agricultural societies and it is still evident in in human skulls from India.
No argument. Early agriculture resulted in restricted diets. I haven't said differently. And, no, this does not contradict what I said earlier about birth rates. The human body will sacrifice the mother's health for the child, as long as there are calories enough. Aggriculturists have calories. What I said is that agriculture allows more people to live on a smaller plot of land than could foragers. The term is 'intensification.' It means getting more food out of the land by putting more effort into it. It usually results in a decrease in living standards for those involved. The critical question is 'Why?' Several things could account for the switch. Population growth could deplete the environmental resources-- you see this among the Yanamamo. Settlement along a particularly fertile riverbank could break the foraging cycle. If the local resources run dry, you are forced into agriculture. Chances are agriculture began slowly as foragers started encouraging wild crops. As their efforts paid off, their populations increased. Eventually these forager/farmers would get trapped into agriculture, their populations having grown too large to be supported by the environment.
------------------
No webpage found at provided URL: www.hells-handmaiden.com

Replies to this message:
 Message 3 by Rei, posted 10-02-2003 12:28 AM John has replied
 Message 5 by Dr Jack, posted 10-02-2003 6:50 AM John has replied
 Message 6 by Speel-yi, posted 10-02-2003 3:07 PM John has replied

NeilUnreal
Inactive Member


Message 2 of 54 (59018)
10-01-2003 10:15 PM


quote:
Once a woman is infertile she could live to a thousand and it wouldn't make a damn bit of difference.
It might make a difference in kinship selection. After all, much of human culture is a study in kinship selection, and the elderly are a vital repository of cultural information. Especially in societies where they participate substantially in child-rearing.
-Neil

Replies to this message:
 Message 9 by John, posted 10-03-2003 1:01 AM NeilUnreal has not replied

Rei
Member (Idle past 7013 days)
Posts: 1546
From: Iowa City, IA
Joined: 09-03-2003


Message 3 of 54 (59029)
10-02-2003 12:28 AM
Reply to: Message 1 by John
10-01-2003 9:40 PM


John, just a quick question:
Is your avatar a d-orbital?
------------------
"Illuminant light,
illuminate me."

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by John, posted 10-01-2003 9:40 PM John has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 8 by John, posted 10-03-2003 12:49 AM Rei has not replied

Quetzal
Member (Idle past 5872 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 01-09-2002


Message 4 of 54 (59066)
10-02-2003 6:40 AM


I didn't want to post this in the referenced thread, because it would be thoroughly off-topic even for me. However, I would like to address one error in speel-yi's most recent exchange (post 88), and it has bearing on the "cultural ecology" aspect, so may be more appropriate here.
Speel-yi writes:
I did fail to mention the prohibition for fallowing the land every 7th year. This wouldn't be needed for a culture that had a river flooding the land each year and renewing the soil in that way. Fallowing the land would be a dryland farming technique that would not originate in a river valley, it would be found in an environment that relied on seasonal rain to maintain moisture in the soils. What would be the origin of that behavior?
Fallowing is standard practice for both swidden and sedentary agriculturalists throughout the world, in many environments. Except for the length of the fallowing period, it has nothing whatsoever to do with rainfall and everything to do with depletion of soil nutrients. Traditional land-use in tropical forest environments, for example, requires the migration of agriculturalists from one forest patch to another after as few as three years due to soil depletion. The abandoned patches are left fallow to be re-occupied as much as 25 years later when the forest has had a chance to re-seed. Semi-nomadic agriculture, sometimes known as "bush farming", is highly density dependent. As population densities increase, fallow time shortens, and alternative regeneration methods (such as planting legumes or grasses) are increasingly used. Eventually this pattern continues until fallow periods are reduced to the point that soil degradation has substantively reduced local productivity, leading to boom-bust population cycles. I highly recommend Jolly and Torrey, eds, 1993 "Population and Land Use in Developing Countries", National Academy Press, Washington, which contains both a brief overview of this pattern and specific case studies from around the world.
The point to bring out here is that higher population densities induce changes in cropping patterns and intensification of agriculture. All of which is based on soil productivity. There's an interesting debate in ecology concerning which came first: population growth or agricultural intensification. The traditional, Malthusian idea that an evolution of agricultural technology and innovation brought about a population increase is challenged by modern scientists like Ester Boserup among others, who states that agro innovations were driven by higher population densities. (I haven't read the book, but the most common citation is Boserup, 1965, "The Conditions of Agricultural Growth: The Economics of Agrarian Change under Population Pressure", Aldine Press, Chicago).
In any event, it's not rainfall that is the key, and the fallowing idea certainly not original with the Levant.

Dr Jack
Member
Posts: 3514
From: Immigrant in the land of Deutsch
Joined: 07-14-2003
Member Rating: 8.7


Message 5 of 54 (59067)
10-02-2003 6:50 AM
Reply to: Message 1 by John
10-01-2003 9:40 PM


Chances are agriculture began slowly as foragers started encouraging wild crops. As their efforts paid off, their populations increased. Eventually these forager/farmers would get trapped into agriculture, their populations having grown too large to be supported by the environment.
I was under the impression that slash-and-burn nomadic farming techniques pre-dated sedentary agricultural settlements. There are also various nomadic groups that forage for plant material, but bring herds of food animals with them. It seems unlikely to me that this was a historic starting point though.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by John, posted 10-01-2003 9:40 PM John has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 7 by Speel-yi, posted 10-02-2003 3:16 PM Dr Jack has not replied
 Message 10 by John, posted 10-03-2003 1:06 AM Dr Jack has not replied

Speel-yi
Inactive Member


Message 6 of 54 (59128)
10-02-2003 3:07 PM
Reply to: Message 1 by John
10-01-2003 9:40 PM


quote:
You argue that agriculture isn't an 'evolutionarily' valid strategy, but confuse 'average lifespan' with reproductive success-- the latter, not the former, being the relevant variable.
I have no confusion about what it means. The replacement rate for people is currently 2.11 children per woman and it takes about 7 years to grow a child until they can survive without too much help from the parents. Given this, if a woman begins reproducing at age 15, she will be 22 when her first child can survive and in a forager context, she will have another child that is 3 by then and that child will be 7 when she is 26 with yet perhaps another on the way. She will probably be done having children by the time she is in her mid-30s having produced 4 children by then. One will probably have died before that time as well since infant/child mortality in this context is about 30%.
When we look at the Neolithic transition, we see a greater percentage of women dying in their mid 20s. By this time with a birth interval of 2 years, she will have produced 5 children, of which 40% will have died before age 5 and of the remaining ones, if any are below the age of 5, their chances of survival are low without a mothers care. The replacement rate would not be met. There would be no increase in population unless there was immigration.
Speel-yi writes:
A shorter lifespan for a woman means she has a decreased chance for producing adult children unless she decrease the interbirth interval from 4 years to 2 or so.
quote:
Wrong. And it is a basic component of evolutionary biology that you have missed. A woman who lives to 80 has no more fertile time than a woman who lives to 40, or even 30 in most cases. That is why average lifespan is the wrong variable. Lifespan only matters up to the point where a woman can no longer become pregnant. Once a woman is infertile she could live to a thousand and it wouldn't make a damn bit of difference.
The relevant variable is the average birth rate per woman. The key variable for birth rate is fat. Calories make babies. Agricultural based diets are high in carbohydrates relative to foraging based diets. Thus, birth rates go up.
It doesn't matter if an organism produces more offspring, it does matter that those offspring survive to do the same themselves. There are also essential nutrients that are required to make a human. I covered this already and you can't simply supply calories and expect people to remain healthy enough to reproduce. They need essential fatty acids, essential amino acids and more. These nutrients are disproportionately low in carbohydrate laden diets. We are seeing a massive move away from the high carb "Food Pyramid" diet recently because it is so unhealthy. Not only is it unhealthy for the individual, it inhibits fertility.
quote:
Textbooks may have incorrect information, though I am not sure how you would spot it. The term 'developing country' means 'developing a technological infrastructure.' This is not social darwinism. It is economics. Like it or not, a non-industrial country will be crushed in this world. It will be overrun.
How I would spot it? Hmmm, another insult.
Developing counties? They are not developing an infrastructure. They are presently being overrun. The United States has 5% of the world population and consumes at least 50% of the resources. There is no way a developing country will ever be developed and there is no intention to do so despite the propaganda the U.S. government claims.
quote:
It takes no more training to learn to walk around and recognize what is edible. Agriculture is no easy thing.
Could you survive without all the things that you have at hand? You are oversimplistic in your claim about foraging. Could you make a stone spearpoint? Where would you get the rock? Which type is best to use? When do the right plants come into season and which ones are poisonous? Can you butcher an animal after having killed it? Can you even make a fire?
quote:
The human body will sacrifice the mother's health for the child, as long as there are calories enough. Aggriculturists have calories. What I said is that agriculture allows more people to live on a smaller plot of land than could foragers.
Too much of a sacrifice will result in the death of the mother and then both mother and child die. There is a cost/benefit to each pregnancy. There are evolutionary benefits to delaying the first pregnancy and cultural constraints are in line with this by and large.
I have a question for you John. Who will take care of you when you are 80?
------------------
Bringer of fire, trickster, teacher.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by John, posted 10-01-2003 9:40 PM John has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 12 by John, posted 10-03-2003 10:10 AM Speel-yi has replied

Speel-yi
Inactive Member


Message 7 of 54 (59129)
10-02-2003 3:16 PM
Reply to: Message 5 by Dr Jack
10-02-2003 6:50 AM


quote:
I was under the impression that slash-and-burn nomadic farming techniques pre-dated sedentary agricultural settlements. There are also various nomadic groups that forage for plant material, but bring herds of food animals with them. It seems unlikely to me that this was a historic starting point though.
Swidden agriculture or horticulture is the term for "slash and burn" but it is not always slash and burn. They are not really nomadic, but they do have an extended range. The term for the intermediate stage between horticulture and foraging is collecting. This term was first used by Lewis Binford about 20 years ago. The ancient Natufians were most likely collectors with plants being collected and stored in central locations with foraging being employed for much of the protein intake.
------------------
Bringer of fire, trickster, teacher.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 5 by Dr Jack, posted 10-02-2003 6:50 AM Dr Jack has not replied

John
Inactive Member


Message 8 of 54 (59190)
10-03-2003 12:49 AM
Reply to: Message 3 by Rei
10-02-2003 12:28 AM



This message is a reply to:
 Message 3 by Rei, posted 10-02-2003 12:28 AM Rei has not replied

John
Inactive Member


Message 9 of 54 (59193)
10-03-2003 1:01 AM
Reply to: Message 2 by NeilUnreal
10-01-2003 10:15 PM


It might make a bit of difference, but it isn't going to justify using average lifespan as an indicator of reproductive success, which is what Speel-yi appears to be doing.
------------------
No webpage found at provided URL: www.hells-handmaiden.com

This message is a reply to:
 Message 2 by NeilUnreal, posted 10-01-2003 10:15 PM NeilUnreal has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 11 by Speel-yi, posted 10-03-2003 2:43 AM John has replied

John
Inactive Member


Message 10 of 54 (59194)
10-03-2003 1:06 AM
Reply to: Message 5 by Dr Jack
10-02-2003 6:50 AM


I'm not sure what your objection is, or even if there is an objection. If we could investigate early agriculture thoroughly, we'd probably find all sorts of experiments.
------------------
No webpage found at provided URL: www.hells-handmaiden.com

This message is a reply to:
 Message 5 by Dr Jack, posted 10-02-2003 6:50 AM Dr Jack has not replied

Speel-yi
Inactive Member


Message 11 of 54 (59197)
10-03-2003 2:43 AM
Reply to: Message 9 by John
10-03-2003 1:01 AM


No, I have been trying to point out a fallacy you tried to use earlier.
quote:
Hunter-gatherer life expectancy at birth is 26 years
For horticulturalist — 19 years
John Bock - Division of Anthropology | CSUF
And John added:
quote:
Is this a long life to you? Is even 40 years long compared to our 80?
Found in the thread:
http://EvC Forum: Is Akhenaton the founder of monotheism? -->EvC Forum: Is Akhenaton the founder of monotheism?
I merely pointed out that it is a mean that is heavily influenced by infant mortality. I then went on to point out that Predynastic Egypt had a life expectancy of 18 and this went to 17 in the Old Kingdom but finally recovered to 28 in the New Kingdom. Natural Selection produced a genotype that was adapted to the new environment and the culture improved to reduce infant mortality.
------------------
Bringer of fire, trickster, teacher.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 9 by John, posted 10-03-2003 1:01 AM John has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 13 by John, posted 10-03-2003 10:13 AM Speel-yi has not replied

John
Inactive Member


Message 12 of 54 (59216)
10-03-2003 10:10 AM
Reply to: Message 6 by Speel-yi
10-02-2003 3:07 PM


quote:
I have no confusion about what it means.
You did, and you still do.
quote:
The replacement rate for people is currently 2.11 children per woman...
Why do you think current replacements rates are relevant?
quote:
Given this, if a woman begins reproducing at age 15, she will be 22 when her first child can survive and in a forager context, she will have another child that is 3 by then and that child will be 7 when she is 26 with yet perhaps another on the way.
Well, you've started our girl reproducing about 4 years too early.
[qs]humans grow longer and begin reproducing around age 19 in hunter-gatherer societies typical of our evolutionary past.
404 File Not Found :: New Mexico's Flagship University | The University of New Mexico
You've also biased the data toward your position in other ways. Both infant and child mortality rates are higher for foragers than for agriculturalists, for example.
No webpage found at provided URL: http://www.unl.edu/rhames/courses/kelly5_end.htm-- there is a chart about halfway down the page.
The same chart also gives an average reproduction rate of 5.5 for foragers and 6.1 for agriculturalists, so lets run some rough calculations.
Our woman has 5.5 kids, 23 percent of whom die as infants. This leaves us with 4.5 ( roughly ). 43% of these children die in childhood leaving 2 children to mate and make babies. This is dead-on replacement.
Our agriculturalist has 6.1 children of whom 21% die as infants leaving us with 5 kids ( again, roughly ). 38% of these die in childhood, which eliminates another 2. Thus the agriculturalists nets one extra child. This is population growth, and at a descent clip as well.
The reasons are...
Agriculture and sedentism tend to lead to population growth
They tend to increase fertility for biological reasons
Increased carbohydrate consumption from agricultural crops may keep body fat levels high enough to increase fertility (or at least not periodically reduce it)
foragers often get very lean during the season of scarcity (it varies in different regions), which reduces female fertility
this is an effect familiar to female runners and dancers
Less mobile mothers have fewer spontaneous abortions
Since the mother does not have to carry her infant around while foraging, sedentism makes it practical for a woman to have more than one infant at a time, allowing larger families
mothers are not forced to take measures to prevent having another infant while a previous one is still small
such as abstinence rules, contraceptive measures, induced abortions, or infanticide, all of which were practiced by at least some foragers
Less mobile mothers may wean children sooner; this shortens the period of reduced fertility due to lactation
They may wean earlier simply because the child is not always right in their arms or on their back, as it is for mobile foragers. This has the unintentional result of increasing fertility
They also may wean earlier with the intention of having more children for farm labor; many foragers are aware of the fertility- inhibiting effect of lactation
Agriculture also provides economic incentives to have more children
Farming creates a greater demand for labor, that is, kids to help with the work
Sedentism reduces the cost of having children, since the mother does not have to carry them around as much
So farmers tend to have large families, and the population tends to grow
No webpage found at provided URL: http://members.aol.com/wprehist/3250s08.htm
quote:
How I would spot it? Hmmm, another insult.
Yes, if you want to take it that way. You could, however, take it constructively.
quote:
Developing counties? They are not developing an infrastructure.
What exactly do you think factories are? Roads?
quote:
Could you survive without all the things that you have at hand?
It would take all of about a month to learn. That is the point.
quote:
You are oversimplistic in your claim about foraging.
You are overly romantic.
quote:
Could you make a stone spearpoint?
Spearpoints are hard, but they are also unnecessary. Chimps forage just fine without them. I can, however mangae the simple knives, axes and scrapers our ancestors used for tens of thousands of years. These are much more important and much easier.
quote:
Where would you get the rock?
If I had been born into a foraging culture that makes stone tools someone would have told me. That would take all of about five minutes.
quote:
Which type is best to use?
The best is volcanic glass, but that is pretty rare. Flint is second best, but most cherts are tolerable.
quote:
When do the right plants come into season and which ones are poisonous?
I've lived where I live long enough to know the plants. Foraging is not that hard. A friend of mine, born and raised in the city and kinda nuts, lived for months on stuff he found growing wild. It simply isn't that hard.
quote:
Can you even make a fire?
Yes, actually. That isn't terribly hard either, if someone shows you how to do it. You can teach someone in a couple of hours. And that is the whole point. The basics are easily learned. If you grew up in a foraging society, you would have been taught.
quote:
I have a question for you John. Who will take care of you when you are 80?
I have no idea. More red-herrings?
------------------
No webpage found at provided URL: www.hells-handmaiden.com

This message is a reply to:
 Message 6 by Speel-yi, posted 10-02-2003 3:07 PM Speel-yi has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 14 by Speel-yi, posted 10-03-2003 1:31 PM John has replied

John
Inactive Member


Message 13 of 54 (59217)
10-03-2003 10:13 AM
Reply to: Message 11 by Speel-yi
10-03-2003 2:43 AM


Again, you are confusing life expectancy with reproductive success.
------------------
No webpage found at provided URL: www.hells-handmaiden.com

This message is a reply to:
 Message 11 by Speel-yi, posted 10-03-2003 2:43 AM Speel-yi has not replied

Speel-yi
Inactive Member


Message 14 of 54 (59247)
10-03-2003 1:31 PM
Reply to: Message 12 by John
10-03-2003 10:10 AM


quote:
It would take all of about a month to learn. That is the point.
Then why would a large brain evolve in the first place? The costs of large brains are high. If they were not, we would expect to see many species with high encephalization quotients. The next closest species has a quotient about 1/3 that of humans.
quote:
I've lived where I live long enough to know the plants. Foraging is not that hard. A friend of mine, born and raised in the city and kinda nuts, lived for months on stuff he found growing wild. It simply isn't that hard.
And how many offspring did he produce during this time? Did he make clothing as well or did he carry the things he would need with him went he started this? I'd also be fairly sure that he lost a lot of weight during this period and exhibited some malnutrition symptoms. It is one thing to survive for a few months in an environment and quite another for a species to reproduce in that environment.
------------------
Bringer of fire, trickster, teacher.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 12 by John, posted 10-03-2003 10:10 AM John has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 15 by John, posted 10-04-2003 11:12 AM Speel-yi has replied

John
Inactive Member


Message 15 of 54 (59349)
10-04-2003 11:12 AM
Reply to: Message 14 by Speel-yi
10-03-2003 1:31 PM


quote:
Then why would a large brain evolve in the first place?
Large brains evolved because hunting and gathering is hard and requires intelligence? Think about this. Rats, birds, whales, lizards, spiders... all hunt and/or gather. It is the de facto standard means of subsistence for the animal kingdom. If it required giant brains, wouldn't all animals have huge brains like ours? Yes, indeed-ie. But that isn't we see. There must be another reason for our brain.
I am not sure if there is a consensus in the field, but the theory I favor for the initial push to big-brains involves where are ancestors lived and how they survived. Our ancestors lived in a very hot and sunny part of Africa. Animals in this environment become quite sluggish during the middle of the day. This includes the hunters-- the cats. Humans are very good at keeping cool. We have little hair and sweat a lot. Body proportions are such that heat escapes rapidly. In other words, we could function during the middle of the day when other animals, both prey and predator, are at their weakest. It was adaptation to this niche that provided the initial push for brain size. How? Our brains are huge, but we don't actually need all it to survive. There is a lot of redundancy. This is easily demonstrated by investigating modern brain trauma cases. Some people loose large parts of their brain and still function relatively normally. Heat kills brain cells. Since we were operating in a very hot niche, there was a need for redundancy, for backup brain cells-- hence, brain size increased.
quote:
And how many offspring did he produce during this time?
During two months? And seeing as how he had no girlfriend, how many do you think? Kind-of a dumb question, really.
quote:
Did he make clothing as well or did he carry the things he would need with him went he started this?
Doesn't matter. You are nit-picking. Clothing is pretty much irrelevant. In Texas, it is even a draw-back. What he ate, he found. That is the only claim I made.
quote:
I'd also be fairly sure that he lost a lot of weight during this period and exhibited some malnutrition symptoms.
You are wrong. I was impressed with the effort. He did quite well. He made himself sick a time or two, but nothing serious. He came out of it no more malnurished than he went into it.
quote:
It is one thing to survive for a few months in an environment and quite another for a species to reproduce in that environment.
If you can make it a couple of months, you can make it. Especially here. The environment doesn't change much with the seasons.
I used to live in San Marcos, a college town about 30 miles from Austin. There is a thriving colony of hundreds of parrots in San Marcos. They started out as pets, apparently. A few escaped and they set up shop. The university has been tracking them for years. If these parrots, with their tiny little bird brains, can make it, why do you have such a hard time believing that a human, or humans, can manage it? It doesn't make sense.
------------------
No webpage found at provided URL: www.hells-handmaiden.com

This message is a reply to:
 Message 14 by Speel-yi, posted 10-03-2003 1:31 PM Speel-yi has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 16 by Speel-yi, posted 10-05-2003 4:06 AM John has replied

Newer Topic | Older Topic
Jump to:


Copyright 2001-2023 by EvC Forum, All Rights Reserved

™ Version 4.2
Innovative software from Qwixotic © 2024