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> Society doesn’t come into existence by itself in hunter-gathering time. Ummmmm… like how do you think cities got started?

microtherion 3y ago
There's no single answer. Most of them did indeed get started organically, but some got started by dukes who were in the city starting business: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Zähringen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Zähringen Some got started by Roman Emperors: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augsburg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augsburg Some got started by a country wanting a new capital: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brasília https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brasília And some grew organically, but were at some point or other subject to a massive master plan: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haussmann%27s_renovation_of_Paris https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haussmann%27s_renovation_of_Pa... https://thegreatestgrid.mcny.org https://thegreatestgrid.mcny.org
- piloto_ciego 3y ago
  Sure all that is true but this guy was asserting that cities didn’t just come about organically, when… well a lot of them did lol.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
archibaldJ 3y ago
So you think cities and villages just magically got built because people would come together and interact like some kind of brownian motion? I already laid down my arguments from an anthropological perspective. There was something very special about the past 2000~4000 years (since the beginning of stone age 3 million year ago, and anatomically modern humans 300,000 years ago) and that is why at the year 2024AD, things have progressed into the current state. (Or why have we not progressed faster as a civilization/species?) It's about cost and the sustaining of people's attention and work. Even for communities that started so to speak "organically", they would have dependency on some form of leadership at some points, if not throughout, or it would not be self-sustainable and grow to scale up e.g. into a village/city.
- piloto_ciego 3y ago
  There are a lot of assertions in your post. Again, take an anthro class or at least read about the origin of cities. Hell, we don’t even know if all the early ones were inhabitated year round. Nor do we know if many of the early cities required “leadership” in any real way. Also, there may be more ways to measure “progress” than you’re aware of. Depending on the metric you choose… we may not be doing as well as you’d think. Is this Steven Pinker’s nephews HN account?
  - archibaldJ 3y ago
    you are totally missing the point. whatever. At this point none-technical discussion on HN has become almost like reddit.
    - piloto_ciego 3y ago
      What are you talking about? This actually is a technical discussion. You’re asserting things about the formation of cities that aren’t just unknown or mysterious, you’re asserting things that are patently untrue, then upset when someone calls you out for it lol. How Reddit is that? You’re saying, “cities require strong leadership, planning, cost, and sustaining people’s attention, and work.” (To roughly paraphrase). I’m saying, “that’s not necessarily true, we don’t know enough about this to assert this. You should read some more about it or take an anthropology class.” This is a highly technical subject, it’s just not one about computers or math or physics. Like, for some early cities we are unsure if they were even inhabited year round, for some cities it appears that there was absolutely no leadership. Maybe megalopolises requires strong central authority but I’m not so sure. Even if you spend $8b and start your own version of Fordlandia you still may not succeed at building utopia because how do you maintain things how “you want them” when people like me exist who will try to flaunt your rules? Violence?
      - archibaldJ 3y ago
        At this point it sounds like I'm talking to gpt3.5 with the system prompt as "angry troll on the internet". Won't be surprised if I am. If you are not a chatbot, here is my advice after reading this incoherent thing you wrote: go work on something to make the change you want to see in your life. It saddens me that discussions on HN are now turning into dumpster fire like this.

microtherion 3y ago

There's no single answer. Most of them did indeed get started organically, but some got started by dukes who were in the city starting business: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Zähringen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Zähringen Some got started by Roman Emperors: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augsburg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augsburg Some got started by a country wanting a new capital: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brasília https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brasília And some grew organically, but were at some point or other subject to a massive master plan: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haussmann%27s_renovation_of_Paris https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haussmann%27s_renovation_of_Pa... https://thegreatestgrid.mcny.org https://thegreatestgrid.mcny.org

piloto_ciego 3y ago
Sure all that is true but this guy was asserting that cities didn’t just come about organically, when… well a lot of them did lol.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]

archibaldJ 3y ago

So you think cities and villages just magically got built because people would come together and interact like some kind of brownian motion? I already laid down my arguments from an anthropological perspective. There was something very special about the past 2000~4000 years (since the beginning of stone age 3 million year ago, and anatomically modern humans 300,000 years ago) and that is why at the year 2024AD, things have progressed into the current state. (Or why have we not progressed faster as a civilization/species?) It's about cost and the sustaining of people's attention and work. Even for communities that started so to speak "organically", they would have dependency on some form of leadership at some points, if not throughout, or it would not be self-sustainable and grow to scale up e.g. into a village/city.

piloto_ciego 3y ago
There are a lot of assertions in your post. Again, take an anthro class or at least read about the origin of cities. Hell, we don’t even know if all the early ones were inhabitated year round. Nor do we know if many of the early cities required “leadership” in any real way. Also, there may be more ways to measure “progress” than you’re aware of. Depending on the metric you choose… we may not be doing as well as you’d think. Is this Steven Pinker’s nephews HN account?
- archibaldJ 3y ago
  you are totally missing the point. whatever. At this point none-technical discussion on HN has become almost like reddit.
  - piloto_ciego 3y ago
    What are you talking about? This actually is a technical discussion. You’re asserting things about the formation of cities that aren’t just unknown or mysterious, you’re asserting things that are patently untrue, then upset when someone calls you out for it lol. How Reddit is that? You’re saying, “cities require strong leadership, planning, cost, and sustaining people’s attention, and work.” (To roughly paraphrase). I’m saying, “that’s not necessarily true, we don’t know enough about this to assert this. You should read some more about it or take an anthropology class.” This is a highly technical subject, it’s just not one about computers or math or physics. Like, for some early cities we are unsure if they were even inhabited year round, for some cities it appears that there was absolutely no leadership. Maybe megalopolises requires strong central authority but I’m not so sure. Even if you spend $8b and start your own version of Fordlandia you still may not succeed at building utopia because how do you maintain things how “you want them” when people like me exist who will try to flaunt your rules? Violence?
    - archibaldJ 3y ago
      At this point it sounds like I'm talking to gpt3.5 with the system prompt as "angry troll on the internet". Won't be surprised if I am. If you are not a chatbot, here is my advice after reading this incoherent thing you wrote: go work on something to make the change you want to see in your life. It saddens me that discussions on HN are now turning into dumpster fire like this.