6 ms·

Did markets incentive the development of agriculture, or was its invention largely independent?

gostsamo 5y ago
Not the OP, but: Agriculture is a technological invention, but its results are perishable and usually hard to transport. The idea of agriculture likely spred through already existing trade routes, but transporting food needed another technological advances to become reliable and profitable.
- throwaway894345 5y ago
  As an aside, from my very amateur understanding, agriculture’s propagation was a lot more an outward migration of agriculturalists than I had previously believed (as opposed to spreading agricultural ideas to hunters and gatherers). This seems to be supported by genetic evidence, which I don’t purport to understand. I heartily recommend “Ancestral Journeys: The Peopling of Europe from The First Adventurers to The Vikings” by Jean Manco.
  - AlotOfReading 5y ago
    This is only approximately true in parts of the middle east and mediterranean basin. It's very much not true in the rest of the world. Even in Europe, foragers and agriculturists lived in reasonably close proximity for thousands of years and yes, modern Europeans are related to both.
    - throwaway894345 5y ago
      This is presented as a rebuttal, but it seems to support my earlier comment that migration and cultural exchange (rather than the latter alone) accounted for the propagation of agrarianism.
  - akiselev 5y ago
    I'm curious why you assumed it was more due to cultural exchange? I always assumed the reverse because agriculture increases surpluses that lead to more births, more specialization (which leads to improved warfare vs hunter gatherers), and more land pressure that forces outward migration. AFAIK most of the hunter gatherers didn't convert to farmers, but they were squeezed out by those that did because they grew much more slowly. I didn't think cultural exchange was a major factor until much later when large agricultural societies started to colonize and "modernize" the rest of the planet.
    - throwaway894345 5y ago
      Naïveté mostly. I didn’t understand how relatively rigid culture is and how change happens largely through displacement. E.g., farmers largely out-bred hunter-gatherers to produce a largely agrarian world, rather than cultural exchange.
- masklinn 5y ago
  > Agriculture is a technological invention, but its results are perishable and usually hard to transport. The neolithic founder crops (rice, wheat, barley, flaxseed, various pulses) keep extremely well when whole or dried though.
  - gostsamo 5y ago
    If you keep them in a cool and dry place - yes. Like in your basement. Not so sure while being transported. In addition, the difference in food prices should cover the price of transportation and the risk of far journeys.
tablespoon 5y ago
> Did markets incentive the development of agriculture, or was its invention largely independent? Obviously not. Most agriculture until very recently was of the subsistence variety. People want food to eat before they want trade goods.
- dTal 5y ago
  But if you're already growing enough to survive on, the marginal effort to grow a whole lot more than that is not so big. And you probably already grow more than you need anyway, so that you don't starve in bad years. Seems to be that even subsistence agriculture will inevitably provoke some sort of economy, as long as other people are around.
  - throwaway894345 5y ago
    > But if you're already growing enough to survive on, the marginal effort to grow a whole lot more than that is not so big I don't think this perspective squares well with the reality that starvation and malnutrition were realities for most people for most of history. I don't think it's just because they didn't think to do the extra bit of effort to generate a surplus. :) > And you probably already grow more than you need anyway, so that you don't starve in bad years. If you do grow enough to have such a reserve surplus, you don't trade that away or else you starve during the bad years. That surplus can only be either a reserve for hard times or currency for trade, but not both. If you want currency you have to have a surplus on top of your reserve. > Seems to be that even subsistence agriculture will inevitably provoke some sort of economy, as long as other people are around. "Subsistence" is kind of a confusing term because we use it in cases like feudal Europe where most people were subsisting because their surplus was being taken by their Lords. If you aren't generating a surplus at all, then you presumably don't get an agrarian economy (but you can still trade other things, like local minerals).
    - thaumasiotes 5y ago
      >> But if you're already growing enough to survive on, the marginal effort to grow a whole lot more than that is not so big > I don't think this perspective squares well with the reality that starvation and malnutrition were realities for most people for most of history. I don't think it's just because they didn't think to do the extra bit of effort to generate a surplus. There are different ways for something to be a reality of life. Starvation was a risk throughout history in a way that it isn't today. But it wasn't something that happened to people under normal circumstances. The historical norm involves paying a large portion of your crop as taxes. Starvation tends to happen to many people at once, due to bad weather or other inclement circumstances. > If you do grow enough to have such a reserve surplus, you don't trade that away or else you starve during the bad years. You do. You always grow enough to have a surplus. But you can't just sit on it indefinitely or it will rot. So you personally store enough for winter, part of your in-kind taxes go to fill public granaries (which need to be continually refreshed), and otherwise you attempt to dispose of any remaining surplus as you can, often by giving it away.
throwaway894345 5y ago
Agriculture isn’t just one thing, but the earliest kind of agricultural innovation was wheat and it developed around the fertile crescent. The idea spread via migration and cultural exchange. Other agricultural innovations were developed elsewhere (cattle, horses, etc) and they spread via trade networks, conquest, etc. As an example, horse domestication (specifically for riding and traction as opposed to food) developed in the steppe region of eastern Europe and gave its discoverers an ability to manage bigger herds of sheep and cattle as well as to be more effective raiders and warriors. They were so much more effective at herding and warfare that they were able to spread their language over the Eurasian continent from the british isles to parts of China. Their language was proto indoeuropean and we’re pretty sure they are the same group archeologists identified as the Yamnaya or Pit Grave culture. It’s also worth noting that agriculture likely developed independently in China and certainly in the Americas. People crab about it a lot, but Guns, Germs, and Steel covers the development and spread of agriculture and other technologies pretty well, and the controversy seems to be more about alleged subtext than the actual facts presented.
- masklinn 5y ago
  > the controversy seems to be more about alleged subtext than the actual facts presented. It's not about subtext, it's about the actual text, namely GG&S's narrative, the thesis it purports to prove, and how it goes about doing that. GG&S is not an innocent list of facts and a recapitulation of historical events, if it were nobody would care about it. In case you are actually interested in "the controversy", the /r/askhistorians FAQ has multiple comments on the subject: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/historians_views#wiki_historians.27_views_of_jared_diamond.27s_.22guns.2C_germs.2C_and_steel.22 https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/historians_views...
  - throwaway894345 5y ago
    I think it's worth reading through those criticisms, but in general I think they validate my claim that "it's about subtext". For example, a popular criticism is that GG&S wrongly paints Native Americans as inferior, but I don't know how anyone can read the book and genuinely walk away with that impression considering that it is contradicted by the very explicitly stated and much repeated thesis. Other criticism seems to be philosophical and esoteric ("Like, what does it really mean to be 'conquered', man?") or otherwise pedantic. I get the distinct feeling that much of the criticisms are ultimately rooted in political differences. I don't think Diamond intends to be controversial or political, but I suspect the GG&S thesis chafes with the political narratives that have come to, shall we say, 'conquer' the humanities. Anyway, I can't prove it, and I don't have any interest in debating it--just something to keep in mind for anyone who is digging into GG&S criticisms.
pm90 5y ago
Agriculture enabled the centralization of human populations, allowing for specializations and advances in crafting more durable goods (clothing, weapons, metal working etc.) which could then be traded, increasing the wealth of your settlement. Obviously you need to grow food to feed your populace before you can expand... and agriculture was the best way to do that. It would be interesting to know though, if trade networks enabled the easy transfer of know-how and technology, so a settlement might make use of that to increase their productivity and such.
- AlotOfReading 5y ago
  Many modern archaeologists don't draw a direct line between agriculture and sedentarism. It's mainly a feature studies in the middle east, and in particular southern mesopotamian societies. Excavations in these areas were influential in early narratives about the neolithic, but the idea that it's the only way urbanism occurs has become pretty archaic as our understanding of the rest of the world improves. For example, we now know that all the innovations you mention predate urban settlements. Beyond that, the "why" of early urbanism is still fundamentally unclear. Some people, myself included, argue that there's no singular concrete reason that's universally applicable. Others take that a bit farther (e.g. Michael E. Smith) and argue that we need to invoke high level concepts of feedback loops and scaling laws to explain them. Regardless, there isn't a settled explanation in the literature.
samatman 5y ago
There is a great book which touches on this subject, Against the Grain: A Deep History of the Earliest States, by James C. Scott. It overturns many of the latent assumptions about early history, particularly in Mesopotamia. It's well argued, I recommend it. I listened to the audiobook FYI. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Against_the_Grain:_A_Deep_History_of_the_Earliest_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Against_the_Grain:_A_Deep_Hist...
- lmohseni 5y ago
  This book was particularly poignant to read during the early months of COVID, pandemics and viruses play an important role in his “Neolithic species resettlement camps”

Not the OP, but: Agriculture is a technological invention, but its results are perishable and usually hard to transport. The idea of agriculture likely spred through already existing trade routes, but transporting food needed another technological advances to become reliable and profitable.

throwaway894345 5y ago
As an aside, from my very amateur understanding, agriculture’s propagation was a lot more an outward migration of agriculturalists than I had previously believed (as opposed to spreading agricultural ideas to hunters and gatherers). This seems to be supported by genetic evidence, which I don’t purport to understand. I heartily recommend “Ancestral Journeys: The Peopling of Europe from The First Adventurers to The Vikings” by Jean Manco.
- AlotOfReading 5y ago
  This is only approximately true in parts of the middle east and mediterranean basin. It's very much not true in the rest of the world. Even in Europe, foragers and agriculturists lived in reasonably close proximity for thousands of years and yes, modern Europeans are related to both.
  - throwaway894345 5y ago
    This is presented as a rebuttal, but it seems to support my earlier comment that migration and cultural exchange (rather than the latter alone) accounted for the propagation of agrarianism.
- akiselev 5y ago
  I'm curious why you assumed it was more due to cultural exchange? I always assumed the reverse because agriculture increases surpluses that lead to more births, more specialization (which leads to improved warfare vs hunter gatherers), and more land pressure that forces outward migration. AFAIK most of the hunter gatherers didn't convert to farmers, but they were squeezed out by those that did because they grew much more slowly. I didn't think cultural exchange was a major factor until much later when large agricultural societies started to colonize and "modernize" the rest of the planet.
  - throwaway894345 5y ago
    Naïveté mostly. I didn’t understand how relatively rigid culture is and how change happens largely through displacement. E.g., farmers largely out-bred hunter-gatherers to produce a largely agrarian world, rather than cultural exchange.
masklinn 5y ago
> Agriculture is a technological invention, but its results are perishable and usually hard to transport. The neolithic founder crops (rice, wheat, barley, flaxseed, various pulses) keep extremely well when whole or dried though.
- gostsamo 5y ago
  If you keep them in a cool and dry place - yes. Like in your basement. Not so sure while being transported. In addition, the difference in food prices should cover the price of transportation and the risk of far journeys.

tablespoon 5y ago

> Did markets incentive the development of agriculture, or was its invention largely independent? Obviously not. Most agriculture until very recently was of the subsistence variety. People want food to eat before they want trade goods.

dTal 5y ago
But if you're already growing enough to survive on, the marginal effort to grow a whole lot more than that is not so big. And you probably already grow more than you need anyway, so that you don't starve in bad years. Seems to be that even subsistence agriculture will inevitably provoke some sort of economy, as long as other people are around.
- throwaway894345 5y ago
  > But if you're already growing enough to survive on, the marginal effort to grow a whole lot more than that is not so big I don't think this perspective squares well with the reality that starvation and malnutrition were realities for most people for most of history. I don't think it's just because they didn't think to do the extra bit of effort to generate a surplus. :) > And you probably already grow more than you need anyway, so that you don't starve in bad years. If you do grow enough to have such a reserve surplus, you don't trade that away or else you starve during the bad years. That surplus can only be either a reserve for hard times or currency for trade, but not both. If you want currency you have to have a surplus on top of your reserve. > Seems to be that even subsistence agriculture will inevitably provoke some sort of economy, as long as other people are around. "Subsistence" is kind of a confusing term because we use it in cases like feudal Europe where most people were subsisting because their surplus was being taken by their Lords. If you aren't generating a surplus at all, then you presumably don't get an agrarian economy (but you can still trade other things, like local minerals).
  - thaumasiotes 5y ago
    >> But if you're already growing enough to survive on, the marginal effort to grow a whole lot more than that is not so big > I don't think this perspective squares well with the reality that starvation and malnutrition were realities for most people for most of history. I don't think it's just because they didn't think to do the extra bit of effort to generate a surplus. There are different ways for something to be a reality of life. Starvation was a risk throughout history in a way that it isn't today. But it wasn't something that happened to people under normal circumstances. The historical norm involves paying a large portion of your crop as taxes. Starvation tends to happen to many people at once, due to bad weather or other inclement circumstances. > If you do grow enough to have such a reserve surplus, you don't trade that away or else you starve during the bad years. You do. You always grow enough to have a surplus. But you can't just sit on it indefinitely or it will rot. So you personally store enough for winter, part of your in-kind taxes go to fill public granaries (which need to be continually refreshed), and otherwise you attempt to dispose of any remaining surplus as you can, often by giving it away.

throwaway894345 5y ago

Agriculture isn’t just one thing, but the earliest kind of agricultural innovation was wheat and it developed around the fertile crescent. The idea spread via migration and cultural exchange. Other agricultural innovations were developed elsewhere (cattle, horses, etc) and they spread via trade networks, conquest, etc. As an example, horse domestication (specifically for riding and traction as opposed to food) developed in the steppe region of eastern Europe and gave its discoverers an ability to manage bigger herds of sheep and cattle as well as to be more effective raiders and warriors. They were so much more effective at herding and warfare that they were able to spread their language over the Eurasian continent from the british isles to parts of China. Their language was proto indoeuropean and we’re pretty sure they are the same group archeologists identified as the Yamnaya or Pit Grave culture. It’s also worth noting that agriculture likely developed independently in China and certainly in the Americas. People crab about it a lot, but Guns, Germs, and Steel covers the development and spread of agriculture and other technologies pretty well, and the controversy seems to be more about alleged subtext than the actual facts presented.

masklinn 5y ago
> the controversy seems to be more about alleged subtext than the actual facts presented. It's not about subtext, it's about the actual text, namely GG&S's narrative, the thesis it purports to prove, and how it goes about doing that. GG&S is not an innocent list of facts and a recapitulation of historical events, if it were nobody would care about it. In case you are actually interested in "the controversy", the /r/askhistorians FAQ has multiple comments on the subject: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/historians_views#wiki_historians.27_views_of_jared_diamond.27s_.22guns.2C_germs.2C_and_steel.22 https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/historians_views...
- throwaway894345 5y ago
  I think it's worth reading through those criticisms, but in general I think they validate my claim that "it's about subtext". For example, a popular criticism is that GG&S wrongly paints Native Americans as inferior, but I don't know how anyone can read the book and genuinely walk away with that impression considering that it is contradicted by the very explicitly stated and much repeated thesis. Other criticism seems to be philosophical and esoteric ("Like, what does it really mean to be 'conquered', man?") or otherwise pedantic. I get the distinct feeling that much of the criticisms are ultimately rooted in political differences. I don't think Diamond intends to be controversial or political, but I suspect the GG&S thesis chafes with the political narratives that have come to, shall we say, 'conquer' the humanities. Anyway, I can't prove it, and I don't have any interest in debating it--just something to keep in mind for anyone who is digging into GG&S criticisms.

pm90 5y ago

Agriculture enabled the centralization of human populations, allowing for specializations and advances in crafting more durable goods (clothing, weapons, metal working etc.) which could then be traded, increasing the wealth of your settlement. Obviously you need to grow food to feed your populace before you can expand... and agriculture was the best way to do that. It would be interesting to know though, if trade networks enabled the easy transfer of know-how and technology, so a settlement might make use of that to increase their productivity and such.

AlotOfReading 5y ago
Many modern archaeologists don't draw a direct line between agriculture and sedentarism. It's mainly a feature studies in the middle east, and in particular southern mesopotamian societies. Excavations in these areas were influential in early narratives about the neolithic, but the idea that it's the only way urbanism occurs has become pretty archaic as our understanding of the rest of the world improves. For example, we now know that all the innovations you mention predate urban settlements. Beyond that, the "why" of early urbanism is still fundamentally unclear. Some people, myself included, argue that there's no singular concrete reason that's universally applicable. Others take that a bit farther (e.g. Michael E. Smith) and argue that we need to invoke high level concepts of feedback loops and scaling laws to explain them. Regardless, there isn't a settled explanation in the literature.

samatman 5y ago

There is a great book which touches on this subject, Against the Grain: A Deep History of the Earliest States, by James C. Scott. It overturns many of the latent assumptions about early history, particularly in Mesopotamia. It's well argued, I recommend it. I listened to the audiobook FYI. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Against_the_Grain:_A_Deep_History_of_the_Earliest_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Against_the_Grain:_A_Deep_Hist...

lmohseni 5y ago
This book was particularly poignant to read during the early months of COVID, pandemics and viruses play an important role in his “Neolithic species resettlement camps”