Throughout history, there has been changes and evolutions that brought us to where we are today. One vast dramatic change, maybe even the biggest, was the transition from a hunting and gathering society to the development of agriculture an agricultural society. From hunting animals and gathering plants (roots and berries) to the growing of crops and domesticating of animals. Many people agree agriculture was one of the best developments that happened in history for many reasons, however, there has been strong evidence that shows that may not be the truth. Although agriculture brought some positive advancements, it also brought social and gender inequality, spread of diseases, and malnutrition that led agriculture to become the worst mistake …show more content…
Agriculture brought a way to keep increasing the population because of the stable supply of food. We could grow more food and yet without much work. Opposed to hunter and gathers that spent most time hunting and gathering without gaining much food. In addition to more food, there was more variety and people were able to focus on improving and mastering specialized skills instead of just focusing on food. Most people nowadays have tools that were not thought possible and have so many uses. At the same time, it's hard to forget the fact that social and gender inequality, spread of diseases, and malnutrition all came from the start of …show more content…
Despite some people's views that argue that our lives and the way we live now is much more improved than those lives of hunters and gatherers because of the many advancements, agriculture created much inequality among people. Before agriculture, during the Paleolithic times, men and women were equal in the sense that women provided most of the food from gathering and men hunted wild animals. That all changed when the growing of crops and domesticating of animals happened. Agriculture created this wedge between men and women since men were normally stronger than women and were able to plow and tend to the crops, while the woman's started only preparing the food. This lead to even more gender inequality because men, in much of our history, had more authority than women. Similar to gender inequality, class divisions also came into play. When people only hunted and gathered, they did not collect more than was needed, only enough to survive. When crops were grown and there was a stable supply of food and this gave the change for people to have extra food. With this surplus of food they could trade for things of value and even more land. The more surpluses of food, someone had, the more valuable items they could gain, and the more wealthier they were. People have been able to uncover houses located in one of the first cities, Catal Huyuk
The populist movement occurred in the late 19th century, formed from the Grangers movement where its goal was ta movement for people, to change the economic system where it would benefit farmers. The grange movement rapidly declined in the 1870s and was replaced by the farmer alliances. The farmer alliances were more political rather then social. The farmer’s alliance later formed the populist. The populist movement is considered to be an agrarian revolt by farmers and those concerned with agriculture, because in the gilded age many people were moving to rural areas where banks and industrial systems were superior over agriculture. The high tariffs, decentralization of currency, and decreasing crop prices were hurting the farmers. Founded by James B Weaver and Tom Watson, they wanted the government to have a stronger control over banking and industries. Populism pursued limited coinage of silver and adjusted income tax so the wealthy would be paying more than the poor. They wanted free coinage of silver because this would eventually help the farmers pay off their debts. Parallel, they wanted the government to have control over railroads, telephone and telegraph systems. They wanted to government to be more in control and involved in the economy and most of all, wanted to stop laissez faire. They aimed for a secret ballot and direct election where the president would only hold office for 1 term. Although they won several seats in congress, the Populist Party never won any presidential elections. The Democrats supported much of the Populists goals. Nevertheless, they voted Democrat William Jennings Bryan for the presidency. His goal of unlimited coinage of silver gained the support of the Populist Party uncovered injustice...
Hunting and gathering is probably a preferable lifestyle compared to a farmer, but it seems a bit over the top to blame absolutely every problem in our society on agriculture. It’s a common argument, but Jared Diamond's theory does seem to be quite an over-simplification. For example, he argues that inequality between sexes could be caused by agricultural because women were made beasts of burden and given greater pressure to work on the fields. However, the root cause of that isn’t agriculture, it’s sexism and stereotyping, because without an outdated sexist mindset no one would treat women differently in the agricultural department, and it is an oversimplification to ignore this. Furthermore, because of farming and globalization people now are given even more opportunity for a diverse diet. Although early farmers had access to only one or a few crops versus hunter-gatherers who had an entire forest of varied food, people nowadays have many more options than both hunter-gatherers and early farmers combined. A grocery store has ten times as many diverse and varying food items as a forest does, providing food from all corners of the world not just a single location or country, allowing people to create a perfectly balanced diet if they so choose. In conclusion, I agree with Jared Diamond's thesis on certain grounds, but I mostly disagree that the introduction of agriculture was the “worst mistake in human
In The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race by Jared Diamond elaborates that agriculture resulted into a poorer quality of living among modern humans. He says that agriculture paved a road of health issues and famine since it didn't provide enough nutrients in their diet. Humans didn’t want to depart from hunting and gathering since it was a still good way of living but there was one downside; no stored food.
According to Diamond There are at least three sets of reasons to explain the findings that agriculture was bad for health. First, hunter-gatherers enjoyed a varied diet, while early farmers obtained most of their food from one or a few starchy crops. The farmers gained cheap calories at the cost of poor nutrition. Second, because of dependence on a limited number of crops, farmers ran the risk of starvation if one crop failed. Finally, the mere fact that agriculture encouraged people to clump together in crowded societies, many of which then carried on trade with other crowded societies, led to the spread of parasites and infectious
Contrastingly, the agricultural transition promoted crops as well as self promotion which causes greed and decreases community closeness. Due to the abundance which farming life provides agriculture allowed for huma to stay in one place rather than travel. In this manner farming life created an array of jobs not seen before. Some jobs were better and highly praised like royalties or religious leaders. Otherwise humans were given jobs which induced hard labor. These contrasts in work and money indicate hierarchies and classes (higher, middle, and lower). Rather than working together to get by humans were now competitors with one another trying to gain success and power. Culturally the expansion of occupation variety allowed for aesthetics to take a rise, where earlier humans were preoccupied mainly on survival rather than art and beauty. There was the ability to create pots, clothing, and jewelry. Even now, humans are known culturally for relying on beautiful things which reflect who we are as well as status. Although, aesthetics could be a benefit of this transition, it allowed for the separation of people through status by the beauty and worth of their belongings. These social and cultural changes while allowing the growth in population, decreased the value in human relationships. Not only has population increase negatively affected the relationship among
Prior to the use of agriculture, life was extremely different for women. The information that historians have obtained is limited, but there are certain aspects of Paleolithic society that have been discovered and point towards a more liberal lifestyle for women. Generally, a woman’s job was to gather food and tend to her children while her male counterpart hunted. These simple divisions allowed both men and women to play significant roles in hunter-gatherer society, which further allowed women to be held in equal if not greater esteem then men. According to Elisabeth Gaynor Ellis and Anthony Elser, authors of World History: Connections to Today, women also held...
For example, the author explained that crops provide reliable food supply which led to population growth. Due to population growth life became much more complex for the farmers. They had many more bodies around which inevitably led to societies beacomming more complex as well. This all led to esablishing governments and also leaders which today we know as king and queens. This was the begging of social justice and order. On the flip side, hunting and gathering did not have a government which means they ddi not have as much justice and order. Overall, from what the articles say hunter and gathering lived a survival method life. They hunted their food on a day to day basis and never new when their next meal would be, but farmers always had food ready to go due to the fact that they grew it months in advance. In a nutshell, “Beginings: The foraging Era,” makes an overall much more compelling
To mainstream archaeologist, the rise in population meant there was also a rise in human condition. Logically, this claim made sense, and it remained unchallenged for years. However, the claim was just an idea with very little backing to it. Eventually archaeologists began to dismantle the claim, and found evidence in support of a new idea. Agriculture devastated the human condition. This new claim completely opposed the older one. Agricultural advances were seen in a different light, no longer was it viewed as the most crucial point in human evolution, but as the worst mistake mankind has ever made.
The main opinion that many historians believe on why the Agricultural Revolution started so late in the history of humankind, one was because of the last Ice age. During the time of the Ice ages, there was not fertile soil and all the crops were dying, so societies had to find another way to feed themselves. Taylor reminds us that,“Active hunting by Paleolithic hunters, along with climatic changes in some areas brought about the extinction of large mammals on which Paleolithic people depended on for survival” (Taylor). The end of the Ice Age brought more favourable conditions for farming. After it ended huge forests began to grow were previously the ice was.
Agriculture plays an enormous part in having a functioning society. The farming fields in the
very good at in the 1700, and so many people could not afford to go
Fewer people mean fewer demands on the environment. With growth in human population, the grasses and animal populations humans used for sustenance did not have time to recover, which turned into humans using the earth's natural resources in an unsustainable manner (class discussion 02.14.03). Humans living in agrarian society do not necessarily use the environment's resources in an unsustainable manner, but the greater the population density, the more land will be needed to support that population in a sustainable manner. As resources become more and more scarce, field owners will be less willing to let land lay fallow (class discussion 02.21.03). Humans then found a "tech fix" with the development of agriculture and the domestication of animals.
So overall, Agriculture is playing a very important role in changing the lifestyle of different people. Agriculture might have made everything easy for us but it still has its cons. We see the effects of agriculture and how it affects the lives of other species and the environment.
...as greatly advanced in the past 200 years thanks to mechanical tools replacing manual labor. It is the most important industry and will forever remain the base of our economy. Humans have constantly been trying to make it easier and quicker to produce crops, from wooden ploughs to pesticides. Agriculture is easily one of the most important and obvious signs of humanity and its adaptation and evolvement over thousands of years.