4 ms·

> gender roles were not always the same in early-human cultures, and there's nothing that predisposes either sex toward certain kinds of work. Except the biolo

by flukus 8y ago

> gender roles were not always the same in early-human cultures, and there's nothing that predisposes either sex toward certain kinds of work. Except the biological differences in strength, speed, etc. Unless they're arguing that these came about after agriculture, but a look at our close relatives would suggest it's always been there. > In the Philippines population Correct me if I'm wrong but I didn't think the Philippines had much in the way of large game, this and the general geography (mountainous rain-forest) could be negating the advantages men had in other parts of the world. > and I'd suspect the tendency to believe it was men is simply a result of assumption based on modern gender roles I'd suspect it's based on the belief that you'd want the stronger, taller, faster people doing the work the involve strength and speed. This won't always be men, but usually it will be. We are a sexually dimorphic (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_dimorphism#Humans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_dimorphism#Humans) species, it shouldn't be at all surprising that we divided labor based on these obvious physical differences.

dogma1138 8y ago
Even without sexual dimorphism in regards to strength it’s not hard to understand why. 14,000 years ago most people didn’t live pass 30-40, pregnancy takes you out of commission as far as hunting goes for at least a year for population growth it means that a woman had to successfully give birth to more than 2 children that would manage to survive till purberty on average, there are no indications that puberty was any different than it is today which would mean that essentially they only had 10-15 or so years to pop out 3-4 kids if not more considering the child mortality rates of the era.
- cimmanom 8y ago
  That's been debunked. The low average life expectancy was not because adults died young but because child mortality (especially for children under 5) was sky-high. There was also an article on here just yesterday about how we list ancient skeletons as "50+" instead of "75" years old because we can't distinguish ages of skeletons above 50, which also contributes to that misconception. Long story short: a prehistoric human who made it to puberty had a pretty good chance of living to be 60-80, well past menopause.
  - dogma1138 8y ago
    The article was talking about 2000 years ago, not 15,0000 years ago that's a pretty big difference, not to mention that the article wasn't as much debunking things but falling into a huge selection bias fallacy by using historical figures as the basis for calculating the age who also often didn't live anywhere close to 80 years. Pre-historic humans who made it to puberty didn't live anywhere near 60-80 years on average we have the plenty of skeletons to know that (in fact modern hunter gatherers who do benefit from some levels of outside intervention don't even get to that). It's also important to note that unlike today or even later in history the age past puberty didn't sky rocket. Women often died due to child birth, men died hunting dangerous game, and both often died to the elements as at the time we were still migratory and didn't live in settlements. >Based on Early Neolithic data, total life expectancy at 15 would be 28–33 years. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_expectancy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_expectancy If you have better data by all means share it.
- beojan 8y ago
  > 14,000 years people didn’t live pass 30 Are you sure? Life expectency of ~30 doesn't mean people didn't live past that, since that's due mostly to child mortality.
  - dogma1138 8y ago
    Yes I'm sure those are the figures for life expectancy at 15: >Based on Early Neolithic data, total life expectancy at 15 would be 28–33 years https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_expectancy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_expectancy we have a lot of skeletons. The fallacy many people tend to fall into is forgetting that while you are quite likely to die at childbirth or early years unless you were extremely privileged you would also be almost as likely to die even when older when every day of your life was a struggle. Sure the elites that lived lives of relative luxury could live almost as long if they didn't require medical intervention but the plebs? pffttt any accident could be fatal without modern medicine and working hard laboring life without any support structure simply didn't allow people to live that long which caused essentially a pretty big discrepancy in early history and classical times between the life expectancy of the lower and upper classes much more than what we see today.
    - TangoTrotFox 8y ago
      As mentioned in that entry "The following information is derived from the 1961 Encyclopædia Britannica and other sources, some with questionable accuracy." Like somebody else has mentioned, older life expectancy figures are pretty bad because it's difficult to pin down the exact age of mortality for skeletons beyond a certain point. And then there is also the question as to whether or not we're discovering representative samples.
      - dogma1138 8y ago
        Look at all the sources don't just pick and choose one. https://www.brown.edu/academics/economics/sites/brown.edu.academics.economics/files/uploads/2007-14_paper.pdf https://www.brown.edu/academics/economics/sites/brown.edu.ac..., page 32 (the numbers are expectency so for example at 15 if the life expectancyis 14 you get total life expectancy of 29).

by flukus 8y ago

dogma1138 8y ago

Even without sexual dimorphism in regards to strength it’s not hard to understand why. 14,000 years ago most people didn’t live pass 30-40, pregnancy takes you out of commission as far as hunting goes for at least a year for population growth it means that a woman had to successfully give birth to more than 2 children that would manage to survive till purberty on average, there are no indications that puberty was any different than it is today which would mean that essentially they only had 10-15 or so years to pop out 3-4 kids if not more considering the child mortality rates of the era.

cimmanom 8y ago
That's been debunked. The low average life expectancy was not because adults died young but because child mortality (especially for children under 5) was sky-high. There was also an article on here just yesterday about how we list ancient skeletons as "50+" instead of "75" years old because we can't distinguish ages of skeletons above 50, which also contributes to that misconception. Long story short: a prehistoric human who made it to puberty had a pretty good chance of living to be 60-80, well past menopause.
- dogma1138 8y ago
  The article was talking about 2000 years ago, not 15,0000 years ago that's a pretty big difference, not to mention that the article wasn't as much debunking things but falling into a huge selection bias fallacy by using historical figures as the basis for calculating the age who also often didn't live anywhere close to 80 years. Pre-historic humans who made it to puberty didn't live anywhere near 60-80 years on average we have the plenty of skeletons to know that (in fact modern hunter gatherers who do benefit from some levels of outside intervention don't even get to that). It's also important to note that unlike today or even later in history the age past puberty didn't sky rocket. Women often died due to child birth, men died hunting dangerous game, and both often died to the elements as at the time we were still migratory and didn't live in settlements. >Based on Early Neolithic data, total life expectancy at 15 would be 28–33 years. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_expectancy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_expectancy If you have better data by all means share it.
beojan 8y ago
> 14,000 years people didn’t live pass 30 Are you sure? Life expectency of ~30 doesn't mean people didn't live past that, since that's due mostly to child mortality.
- dogma1138 8y ago
  Yes I'm sure those are the figures for life expectancy at 15: >Based on Early Neolithic data, total life expectancy at 15 would be 28–33 years https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_expectancy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_expectancy we have a lot of skeletons. The fallacy many people tend to fall into is forgetting that while you are quite likely to die at childbirth or early years unless you were extremely privileged you would also be almost as likely to die even when older when every day of your life was a struggle. Sure the elites that lived lives of relative luxury could live almost as long if they didn't require medical intervention but the plebs? pffttt any accident could be fatal without modern medicine and working hard laboring life without any support structure simply didn't allow people to live that long which caused essentially a pretty big discrepancy in early history and classical times between the life expectancy of the lower and upper classes much more than what we see today.
  - TangoTrotFox 8y ago
    As mentioned in that entry "The following information is derived from the 1961 Encyclopædia Britannica and other sources, some with questionable accuracy." Like somebody else has mentioned, older life expectancy figures are pretty bad because it's difficult to pin down the exact age of mortality for skeletons beyond a certain point. And then there is also the question as to whether or not we're discovering representative samples.
    - dogma1138 8y ago
      Look at all the sources don't just pick and choose one. https://www.brown.edu/academics/economics/sites/brown.edu.academics.economics/files/uploads/2007-14_paper.pdf https://www.brown.edu/academics/economics/sites/brown.edu.ac..., page 32 (the numbers are expectency so for example at 15 if the life expectancyis 14 you get total life expectancy of 29).