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Essay on agriculture technology
Essay on agricultural technology
Essay on agricultural technology
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The development of agriculture allowed humans to focus on pursuits other than survival and support larger populations, both of which spurred social, technological, and intellectual advancements. Previous hunter-gatherer populations were limited by the parent’s ability to care for one child at a time while still focusing on their own survival and by the number of people that can be supported by the available amount of food. Once these barriers were crossed, crucial requirements to instigate and promote complex civilizations were met. Domestication of animals is an example of early feedback from this milestone. Daniel Webster, an influential political figure in the nineteenth century, proposed that “... cultivation of the earth is the most important
labor of man. When tillage begins, other arts follow. The farmers, therefore, are the founders of human civilization” (Butterfly and Sheperd 96). The Neolithic Revolution, or shift to agrarian societies, had major effects on sociological behaviors as well. Humans gained awareness of themselves, their environment, and the idea of ownership. These helped lead to the cultivation of “machines, buildings, improvement of land, and human capital” (Butterfly and Sheperd 100). These key concepts and innovations originated from agricultural practices, instigated further growth and the birth of civilization today.
The Europeans lived nomadic lifestyles centered on sheer will to survive. Conquering the wild was dependent on simply finding food and shelter. Men were no longer controlled by civilization and had a sense of confusion when faced with the environment. “In addition civilized men faced the danger of succumbing to the wilderness of his surroundings and reverting to savagery himself” (Nash, 2014, p. 24). It was not until around ten thousand years ago when man began to realize that they were essentially at the top of the food chain and could control their environment to an extent instead of their environment controlling them. At this time, they began to settle into an agriculture society. Nash (2014) stated, “For the first time humans understood themselves to be distinct from and, they reasoned, better than the rest of nature” (p. xx) Control was an important concept when achieving
The text “The Domesticity of Giraffes” is a poem written by Judith Beveridge. It is based upon the concept of caging animals, specifically giraffes, and the negative effects of keeping animals in captivity.
Jared Diamond Argues that the worst mistake in Human History is the invention and widespread introduction of agriculture, because it has created a plethora of social, economic, and health problems for the word. One example of this is when the article states, “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.” This illustrates that the author's main argument is that agriculture was the worst mistake in human history because it shows how agriculture has negatively impacted health of both early farmers and people today by creating mass produced bulk crops that are low in nutrition. Furthermore, another example
One of these points is that with enough passion and grit one can start a serious social movement. The example here is Alan Chadwick gaining a huge following despite coming on campus to just be a gardener. The man was so influential that he literally effected people for the rest of their lives, “Chadwick was so great a teacher that Lingemann 's interest in gardening became her life 's focus” (p 279) This line of logic is strong because Chadwick went from a nobody to one of the most influential people in his field. He built up his reputation and following with pure passion. One other strong point is the connection between nurturing a garden and nurturing a person. Waters makes the point that humans intrinsically want to protect something growing and look after it, “Watching something infinitely fragile sprout in warm, fertile earth and nursing it along to the point where it can survive and grow strong is practically definitive of what it is to be human.” (p 280) This point is strong because there truly is no joy like raising something small and weak to become strong. The evidence here is that people innately feel the need to have children and then protect them. One weak point in the essay is Waters subtle persuasion that the best way to do agriculture is the most natural way. She states, “Alumni apprentices have started their own farms,
After reading Guns, Germs, and Steel, the five main points are domestication of plants and animals, food production, government, innovation, and germs. The domestication of plants and animals helped determine a society's supply of food. First of all, there is the domestication of plants. Domesticated plants were used for food, clothing, and traction. There is about 200,000 wild plant species, but human only eat only a few thousands of those wild plant species, and on top of that, only a few hundred are even domesticated. Many wild plant species do not quality because the vast majority of wild plants are unsuitable for domestication: they have a woody structure, they are unable to produce edible food, and roots and leaves are also inedible. The Fertile Cresent, containing comparatively moist and fertile soil, had the olive, fig, and grape. These plants were among the easiest to cultivate out of all the wild fruit species. The Fertile Cresent was the center of food production in the world, the rise of agriculture, and one of the earliest places of independent domestication. It was the site of origin of many of the world's major crops and most of the major domesticated animals. Thoughout the world, there are only 14 species of big terrestrial mammals that were domesticated. For instance, the Fertile Cresent had four species: the goat, sheep, pig, and cow. These four species happened to be four out of the five major species of large domestic mammals. Domesticated animals were used for food, clothing, and transportation. The domestication of plants and animals held food supplies to maintain the food supplies, large sedentary societies, and technology. These things further progressed into food production, political organizations, ideas...
Farmers everywhere in the United States during the late nineteenth century had valid reasons to complaint against the economy because the farmers were constantly being taken advantage of by the railroad companies and banks. All farmers faced similar problems and for one thing, farmers were starting to become a minority within the American society. In the late nineteenth century, industrialization was in the spotlight creating big businesses and capitals. The success of industrialization put agriculture and farmers on the down low, allowing the corporations to overtake the farmers. Since the government itself; such as the Republican Party was also pro-business during this time, they could have cared less about the farmers.
First farming is a key aspect and so is domesticating plants and animals the line "hunter gatherers of the Chatham (only 5 people per square mile) and of New Zealand's South Island, and the farmers of the rest of New Zealand (28 people per square mile). In contrast, many islands with intensive agriculture attained population densities exceeding 120 per square mile Page 61" This line shows how farming can increase the density of people due to a surplus of food that was acquired by farming and nearly impossible by hunting and gathering. That surplus allows for many more things to occur such as advance in technology and political advances. This is seen in the line "In general, the larger the size and the higher the density, the more complex and specialized were the technology and Political organization page 62" In this line "In addition, the largest domestic mammals interacted with domestic plants to increase food production by pulling plows and thereby making it possible for people to till land that had previously been uneconomical for farming." it shows how animals that are domesticated are used not only for food and materials but also for plowing the field and allowing to expand the farms. But these animals bring along nasty germs. This lines helps explain it "The major killers of humanity throughout our recent history—smallpox, flu, tuberculosis, malaria, plague, measles, and cholera—are infectious diseases that
Humans and dogs have been pals for what seems like forever. However, all relationships have to start somewhere, and this relationship is no different. From the beginnings of domestication to where we are today, how we have adapted dogs to our needs and how dogs have adapted us to their needs is a story that sounds fictional. This couldn’t be further from the truth. We call them Man’s Best Friend for a reason--we artificially created them to become our best friends, and they created the mannerisms we use today.
“The discovery of agriculture was the first big step toward a civilized life.” (Arthur Keith)
Jared Diamond makes the argument that when humans decided 10,000 years ago to no longer be hunter-gatherers and made the decision to become sedentary and start domesticating their animals and crops, the result is that the human race has experienced a steady downfall. Diamond makes the point that “with agriculture came the gross social and sexual inequality, the disease and despotism that curse our existence,” (Diamond). While the present system certainly is far from being perfected, Diamond’s various complaints and solutions certainly would not be of much use in the present time either.
Animal testing is a controversial topic with two main sides of the argument. The side apposing animal testing states it is unethical and inhumane; that animals have a right to choose where and how they live instead of being subjected to experiments. The view is that all living organism have a right of freedom; it is a right, not a privilege. The side for animal testing thinks that it should continue, without animal testing there would be fewer medical and scientific breakthroughs. This side states that the outcome is worth the investment of testing on animals. The argument surrounding animal testing is older than the United States of America, dating back to the 1650’s when Edmund O’Meara stated that vivisection, the dissection of live animals, is an unnatural act. Although this is one of the first major oppositions to animal testing, animal testing was being practiced for millennia beforehand. There are two sides apposing each other in the argument of animal testing, and the argument is one of the oldest arguments still being debated today.
Seldom considered, domesticated animals contributed to many of the unforeseen problems that wove the narrative of early colonial America. Creatures of Empire, by Virginia Anderson, outlines the events in which English livestock severely disrupted the lives and livelihoods of the natives in the 1600s. She writes of both the natives and two groups of English colonists’ experiences in the New England and Chesapeake regions. The colonists’ sought to civilize the Indians by means of animal husbandry and displayed little to no consideration for the preservation of the natives’ traditional culture throughout their imperialistic quest. Relations between the natives and colonists deteriorated as a consequence of oppressive English ideals, and values,
The reasons behind the domestication of animals and plants by humans are numerous and the dates of the original domestication event for each species are highly differentiated. In understanding the jump to domestication, which likely began at the end of the Pleistocene era roughly 12,000 years ago, it is important to look at the changes in human lifestyle during that time. This time period was marked by an unpredictable climate (Diamond, 2002). The changes in the environment meant that the growth of wild plants that were used as food sources was not as guaranteed as it had been in the past; therefore, humans could no longer depend upon their hunter-gatherer lifestyle for survival. The evolutionary consequences of a switch to an agrarian lifestyle initially seem detrimental to humans. Diamond (2002) explains that this switch lead to more work, more diseases, and bad nutritional conditions, which all contributed to a decreased body size in humans. However, the greater food production of the agrarian culture gave rise to a population explosion alongside a technological explosion and social stratification since humans could now begin to focus on jobs other than collecting food (Diamond, 2002).
The modern chicken is believed to have been domesticated in South East Asia, specifically the Indus Valley as early as 3200 B.C. and is believed to be the epicenter of the domestication of the chicken. Another possibility due to recent evidence from excavations In China have raised questions in regards to exclusive domestication in the Indus Valley. Finding the exact area where the chicken was domesticated is a difficult task due to an inconclusive, and the lack of DNA .Michael Zody a computational biologists studying genetics at the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT stated “Because wild and domestic birds mixed over time, it makes it really difficult to pin point”. It is known that the modern chicken descended from the red jungle fowl, grey jungle, Lafayetti jungle fowl and the green jungle fowl. Supporting evidence is that the chicken inherited the yellow skin from the grey jungle fowl. It also shares similar traits of the red jungle fowl such as wattles and combs, spurs on their legs for self-defense and the chicken and red jungle fowl share similar vocalizations. The domesticated chicken was a huge cultural significance in the ancient world, and several civilizations used to and still do see the chicken as a sacred animal. Due to their aggressiveness chickens were originally bred for cockfighting instead of food. In the first century A.D. cockfighting was how the ancient Greeks of Pergamum taught valor to the future soldiers. The modern chicken is much different than the first chicken, the nutritional contribution of the first chickens were meek, in comparison to today’s chicken. To this day hens are still viewed worldwide as nurturance and fertility, in ancient Egypt a hens eggs would be hung from temple to ensure a bountifu...
...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.