[stunseed]

> But it's easy to forget that humans have spent most of human history trying to escape subsistence farming.

Do you define human history as the last ~10k years or last ~100k-500k years?

But yes, certainly at least the last 3000 years for most humans have been spent farming to a large degree. But if we are even moderate in estimations of human origins, farming is very recent.

[satvikpendem]

History means the time of recorded events, the 10 kya to present day, they used the word correctly. Anatomically modern humans are prehistory.

[throwaway27448]

History certainly does not predate sedentary farming. It seems reasonable to put at around ~8kya.

Certainly, some people still live as hunter gatherers. I presume people can deduce I do not refer to them.

[Noumenon72]

I think specifying "recorded history" would remove the confusion. Human history could refer to the history of anatomically modern humans, including before farming.

[satvikpendem]

History is recorded, that's the definition of the word. Prehistory is not recorded which is what the 500 kya to 10 kya refers to.

[Noumenon72]

The wikipedia for "Recorded history"[1] draws the distinction this way:

- Before writing: prehistory

- After writing: recorded history

- Both together: human history[2]

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recorded_history

2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_history

[throwaway27448]

History is a bit of a confusing word that way; I suppose I can see it can be used in an informal sense to refer to any timeline outside of just historiography, which does tend to refer to a distinct study from archaeology and anthropology. Noted.

[satvikpendem]

You used the word correctly don't worry. Seems like the initial replyer meant prehistory.