• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race?

The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race?

  • Hunting and gathering

    Votes: 2 40.0%
  • Agriculture

    Votes: 3 60.0%

  • Total voters
    5

Ellie_r

Member
Joined
Jun 26, 2012
Messages
131
Reaction score
12
Gender
Female
Political Leaning
Conservative
I recently read an article that i found quite fascinating as well as debatable. The article is titled The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race and is written by Jared Diamond. You can read the full article here The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race but in a nutshell Diamond is arguing that agriculture spurned a series of shifts in human society that negatively affected our health, happiness, and harmony.

I'm torn by anti-agriculturalism. On the one hand, the evidence is pretty clear that the products of agriculture-- refined grains, vegetable oils, and processed foods-- are the main causes of heart disease, diabetes, and the other "diseases of civilization." In addition, the surpluses of food created by agriculture enabled the creation of social hierarchy, empire, slavery, and the other products of economic power.

On the other hand, without those agricultural surpluses, we would have no significant trade, no means to exploit comparative advantage, no real opportunity for economic development. Earth would be populated by tiny groups of hunter-gatherers, without tall cities, laboratories, libraries, airplanes or space shuttles. Our consciousness would be of families and local communities, without a sense of being part of a greater race or planet.

In conclusion i ask you, which world would be better? Hunting and gathering or the agricultural route, and why do you pick one over the other?
 
Last edited:
listening to pinhead luddite idiots like that guy who came up with that theory is a far worse mistake

if everyone was a hunter gatherer no one would have the ability or the time to read the oozing BS that clown Diamond spewed.
 
This is some pretty theoretical history and I'm not sure I'm completely swayed by Jared's argument. He literally compares different contexts of history ignoring certain key issues. The first would rise out of this particular text:

While farmers concentrate on high-carbohydrate crops like rice and potatoes, the mix of wild plants and animals in the diets of surviving hunter-gatherers provides more protein and a bettter balance of other nutrients. In one study, the Bushmen's average daily food intake (during a month when food was plentiful) was 2,140 calories and 93 grams of protein, considerably greater than the recommended daily allowance for people of their size. It's almost inconceivable that Bushmen, who eat 75 or so wild plants, could die of starvation the way hundreds of thousands of Irish farmers and their families did during the potato famine of the 1840s.

While seemingly "solid" in its historical background, the underlined part ignores that even though starvation is certainly a problem for populations dependent on agriculture, these same populations also have near infinite populations growths and are less susceptible to extinction. It's also feels redundant to point out that agricultural populations are more technologically advanced than hunter gatherers.

I think Jared Diamond is a brilliant historiographer, however he's not really convincing in his theories. They definitely help explain why some populations have managed to conquer others (for those who read Guns, Germs and Steel) but they're not really convincing as far making an argument against progressive views of technology. If anything I find A Short History of Progress by Ronald Wright to be far more convincing (if not ominous) for why we should be weary of technology.
 
In conclusion i ask you, which world would be better? Hunting and gathering or the agricultural route, and why do you pick one over the other?

The worst mistake I made all day was reading this utterly ridiculous article. It may actually be the most inane thing I've read all year. I can only hope and pray that Mr. Diamond finds a vocation outside of medicine and journalism.
 
I really can't believe Jarad Diamond wrote this, I own two of his books and he's an excellent historical and social analyst, and I admired his work for his lack of bias towards any particular side in favor of pure analysis.

This short essay is just bizarre, totally outside of the style im familiar with.
 
My theory is that writers will often write outrageous and controversial things in order to get attention and sell more copies of their books. An author whining about the trappings of civilization upon which the entire existence of his profession rests is either and idiot or a muckraker. Diamond's earlier works suggest the later.
 
I recently read an article that i found quite fascinating as well as debatable. The article is titled The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race and is written by Jared Diamond. You can read the full article here The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race but in a nutshell Diamond is arguing that agriculture spurned a series of shifts in human society that negatively affected our health, happiness, and harmony.

I'm torn by anti-agriculturalism. On the one hand, the evidence is pretty clear that the products of agriculture-- refined grains, vegetable oils, and processed foods-- are the main causes of heart disease, diabetes, and the other "diseases of civilization." In addition, the surpluses of food created by agriculture enabled the creation of social hierarchy, empire, slavery, and the other products of economic power.

On the other hand, without those agricultural surpluses, we would have no significant trade, no means to exploit comparative advantage, no real opportunity for economic development. Earth would be populated by tiny groups of hunter-gatherers, without tall cities, laboratories, libraries, airplanes or space shuttles. Our consciousness would be of families and local communities, without a sense of being part of a greater race or planet.

In conclusion i ask you, which world would be better? Hunting and gathering or the agricultural route, and why do you pick one over the other?


Not interested in humanity as a scattered race of Stone-age hunter-gatherer bands. Agriculture was the precursor to all scientific and technological development... like the ability to write and publish a book on how much it sucks that we're not all illiterate savages. :mrgreen:
 
My theory is that writers will often write outrageous and controversial things in order to get attention and sell more copies of their books. An author whining about the trappings of civilization upon which the entire existence of his profession rests is either and idiot or a muckraker. Diamond's earlier works suggest the later.

It appears that Mr. Diamond has run out of things to write about. Either that or he thinks he's Dr. Seuss.
 
Neither. Religion.
 
I think this sort of primativist yearning exposes an unbelievably narrow view of 'utility' and 'good'. One of the most glaring things is that he dances around the issue of life expectancy by focusing on the physical 'degeneration' of early civilized man in terms of height and early average age. What he fails to mention is that the average life expectancy of a bushman in the Kalahari is something on the order of 35-50 years of age, what accounts for our vastly increased span on this earth? Our scientific and medical technology. From whence did it come? From the establishment of civilized society and the partitioning of skillsets and professions as a result of... agriculture. Diamond ignores all the technological marvels from flight, to computers, to penicillin, and beyond. He pays token attention to art but childishly points out that his primitive man "great paintings and sculptures were already being produced by hunter-gatherers 15,000 years ago" as a comparison to artistic innovation and development from the time of organized society onward. Pretty much every art historian would call bull**** on that right quick.

One could go on and on, but the point being Diamond dramatically undervalues, and that doesn't express it nearly well enough, the benefits of organized civilization. If they best he can muster is that we had better bone density, were taller (for a little bit), and had less risk of incidence for various diseases (again wildly controversial and ignores... modern medicine) then he's making a pretty crap argument.
 
One particular group of hunter-gatherers made a spectacular error by feeding and educating some incompetent starving agriculturalists. They even tried to persuade them to move to a more appropriate place for their colony at Jamestown. That didn't end well for them.
 
in a nutshell Diamond is arguing that agriculture spurned a series of shifts in human society that negatively affected our health, happiness, and harmony.

Happiness and harmony could be argued maybe, but it's downright ridiculous to say that agriculture has negatively affected our health. The average live expectancy in prehistoric times was roughly 25. The average life expectancy worldwide today is 68. Heck, the country with the lowest life expectancy is still almost 40. Pretty hard to say agriculture has negatively affected our health, when the average person today lives almost 3 times longer than early hunter-gatherers did.
 
I recently read an article that i found quite fascinating as well as debatable. The article is titled The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race and is written by Jared Diamond. You can read the full article here The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race but in a nutshell Diamond is arguing that agriculture spurned a series of shifts in human society that negatively affected our health, happiness, and harmony.

I'm torn by anti-agriculturalism. On the one hand, the evidence is pretty clear that the products of agriculture-- refined grains, vegetable oils, and processed foods-- are the main causes of heart disease, diabetes, and the other "diseases of civilization." In addition, the surpluses of food created by agriculture enabled the creation of social hierarchy, empire, slavery, and the other products of economic power.

On the other hand, without those agricultural surpluses, we would have no significant trade, no means to exploit comparative advantage, no real opportunity for economic development. Earth would be populated by tiny groups of hunter-gatherers, without tall cities, laboratories, libraries, airplanes or space shuttles. Our consciousness would be of families and local communities, without a sense of being part of a greater race or planet.

In conclusion i ask you, which world would be better? Hunting and gathering or the agricultural route, and why do you pick one over the other?

We could not sustain the population density we have now without farming. If we did not discover this technique, we would likely be a much smaller population with the extinction of the majority or maybe all of the larger animals that we can get meat from by now.

It would be far worse both ecologically and for humanity, imho.
 
One particular group of hunter-gatherers made a spectacular error by feeding and educating some incompetent starving agriculturalists. They even tried to persuade them to move to a more appropriate place for their colony at Jamestown. That didn't end well for them.

Whatever happens, we have got
the Maxim gun, and they have not.


I'd say Darwin pretty much answered Diamond here. Agriculture wins.
 
I'm not familiar with any hunting society that wasn't a barbaric wrecking train.

See: Mongols, Huns, Goths, Vikings.
 
Whatever happens, we have got
the Maxim gun, and they have not.


I'd say Darwin pretty much answered Diamond here. Agriculture wins.

a fact that the Zulus found out the hard way

Maxim's great grand daughter went to college with me. NOt particularly enamored with what made her family famous
 
On a certain level hunter gatherer society's had it made. They worked a couple of hours a day to feed themselves and had lots of free time for art, religion and whatever recreational-religion drug they could find. Their needs were food and shelter, nothing more and life was simple. Imagine no alarm clocks, no boss, no economic concerns no bills etc. On the other hand an abscessed tooth was a long miserable death sentence as was a compound fracture. With all it's foibles I'll take modern life but I admit the romanticized version of being a hunter gatherer does sometimes seem appealing.
 
I'm not familiar with any hunting society that wasn't a barbaric wrecking train.

See: Mongols, Huns, Goths, Vikings.

The Viking expansions were entirely due to the pressure of lack of farmland for junior sons.
 
The Viking expansions were entirely due to the pressure of lack of farmland for junior sons.

yeah, except, given how much fun can be had pillaging, raping, and burning ones' way across middle ages europe, i've always looked with a skewed eye on the "well we had to do it" excuses.
 
I recently read an article that i found quite fascinating as well as debatable. The article is titled The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race and is written by Jared Diamond. You can read the full article here The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race but in a nutshell Diamond is arguing that agriculture spurned a series of shifts in human society that negatively affected our health, happiness, and harmony.

I'm torn by anti-agriculturalism. On the one hand, the evidence is pretty clear that the products of agriculture-- refined grains, vegetable oils, and processed foods-- are the main causes of heart disease, diabetes, and the other "diseases of civilization." In addition, the surpluses of food created by agriculture enabled the creation of social hierarchy, empire, slavery, and the other products of economic power.

On the other hand, without those agricultural surpluses, we would have no significant trade, no means to exploit comparative advantage, no real opportunity for economic development. Earth would be populated by tiny groups of hunter-gatherers, without tall cities, laboratories, libraries, airplanes or space shuttles. Our consciousness would be of families and local communities, without a sense of being part of a greater race or planet.

In conclusion i ask you, which world would be better? Hunting and gathering or the agricultural route, and why do you pick one over the other?

Not sure if this has been talked about or not, but the problems you are talking about are less about agriculture itself and more about agribusiness and food processing.

Agribusiness is about applying large-scale benefits to agricultural operations. By using technilogical innovations and economies of scale, agribusiness operations can create and maintain profits.

Part of this is via processed foods. Foods are processed so food manufacturers can have better chance to profit. Primarily, this is by using various preservatives so foods have a longer shelf life. Also, it involves using high fructose corn syrup as a sweetener rather than sugar. The reason why HFCS is preferred is because it is much easier for transport than sugar is.

So no - I don't think agiculture is the worst mistake in the history of mankind. That's just silly as ****. And even more stupid.

Rather, what we need to do is decide which agricultural advances are worthwhile to continue.

I work in agriculture, and there are some GREAT innovations happening.

One is soilless farming in which crops are grown indoors. Rather than dump fertilizers in the soil in a broadcast way, fertilizers are spritz on the roots controlled by a computer. This is a much more efficient way of fertilizer use than what is currently done.

And what I'd be excited for is greater use of urban agriculture. I would like to see cities develop ways to grow their own produce. One suggestion is rooftop gardening. I would really like to see that further develop.
 
The Viking expansions were entirely due to the pressure of lack of farmland for junior sons.

I'm not really sure what you're talking about. The Vikings were sustained primarily through fishing and livestock. Agriculture is kind of hard to cultivate when you live in a frigid climate:

Viking Food: 800 - 1100 AD
 
I recently read an article that i found quite fascinating as well as debatable. The article is titled The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race and is written by Jared Diamond. You can read the full article here The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race but in a nutshell Diamond is arguing that agriculture spurned a series of shifts in human society that negatively affected our health, happiness, and harmony.

I'm torn by anti-agriculturalism. On the one hand, the evidence is pretty clear that the products of agriculture-- refined grains, vegetable oils, and processed foods-- are the main causes of heart disease, diabetes, and the other "diseases of civilization." In addition, the surpluses of food created by agriculture enabled the creation of social hierarchy, empire, slavery, and the other products of economic power.

On the other hand, without those agricultural surpluses, we would have no significant trade, no means to exploit comparative advantage, no real opportunity for economic development. Earth would be populated by tiny groups of hunter-gatherers, without tall cities, laboratories, libraries, airplanes or space shuttles. Our consciousness would be of families and local communities, without a sense of being part of a greater race or planet.

In conclusion i ask you, which world would be better? Hunting and gathering or the agricultural route, and why do you pick one over the other?

Amazing that someone can be educated but so stupid at the same time.We would not be where we are today without those two things.Hunter gathers used tools to hunt and gather food with and many of them most likely used some of that same tool making ability for agriculture. Which in the long run allowed civilizations to be created. The idea that anyone of those things is a mistake is absolutely ludicrous.
 
Last edited:
Trying to imagine the world's seven billion people surviving as hunter gatherers.. nope. Can't do it.

Moreover, the pre agricultural people tended to have rather short and difficult lives, even when there were only a few thousand humans to compete for the limited food supply.

The biggest mistake is thinking that the past was better than the present.
 
Back
Top Bottom