[Scarfleece]

  It's human nature to want more.

You pulled this out of your ass, and it's nonsense. Any anthropological study will tell you that hunter-gatherers are/were satisfied with what they could get. Anecdotally, there are vast amounts of people around the world who don't "want more".

[dragonwriter]

> hunter-gatherers are/were satisfied with what they could get.

If that were true, hunter-gatherers wouldn't have developed agriculture and/or husbandry as ways to get more, leading to civilization, leading to a state where, for the vast majority of the planet, knowing about hunter-gatherer society was something that came through anthropological studies rather than life experience.

[Scarfleece]

Same irrational presumption as the other guy, see my response.

I would also like to point out that studies show early agricultural societies had notably worse health than hunter-gatherers. This would make it unlikely that a successful, happy tribe would adopt agriculture just so they could "get more".

[dragonwriter]

> I would also like to point out that studies show early agricultural societies had notably worse health than hunter-gatherers. This would make it unlikely that a successful, happy tribe would adopt agriculture just so they could "get more".

So did early industrial societies compared to previous societies. In both cases, however, there were individuals who benefited immensely and got more; its the individual desire to get more, that is relevant in this discussion.

(Anyhow, the negative health impacts of the change would not have been obvious in advance, so would not have played a role in whether the motive to get more would have advocated in favor of driving adoption of the techniques.)

[bcheung]

We all came from hunter-gatherers. If hunter-gatherers didn't want more then logically they would have stayed hunter-gatherers. So, why do we have the current civilization? I suspect because being cold, not having medicine, refrigeration, running water, plumbing, transportation, etc sucks.

[bcheung]

I'm not making any assumptions. I'm just pointing out that people had the opportunity to remain hunter-gathers and they didn't. They were human thus the evidence of human nature doesn't support your argument.

I don't see a whole lot of people wanted to go from their current lives to hunter-gathers.

You're also talking to someone who has a large library of homesteading books and is interested in permaculture and sustainable living. I love technology and would never want to sacrifice my standard of living.

[Scarfleece]

Just because someone changed their means of obtaining food doesn't mean they did it out of an unquenchable thirst for more. It's that simple.

[Scarfleece]

You're making the presumption that people adopted agriculture because it "gave them more", when there could be a vast number of other reasons for adopting it.

More than likely, the first tribes that started becoming farmers did so because the area they lived in become bad for obtaining food (whether due to the extinction of big game events, or moving to a naturally inhospitable area). Because of the nature of agriculture, this gave them a lot more power, and they started conquering tribes.

When your choice is between "get slaughtered by the farmers", "have your food supply diminished by the farmers", or "become a farmer", guess which choice you pick?

This is all speculation, though. I'm merely trying to get you to realize that there are many reasons for technological progress (esp. the adoption of agriculture), the least of all being that "it's human nature to want more".

[dragonwriter]

> More than likely, the first tribes that started becoming farmers did so because the area they lived in become bad for obtaining food

We know where early agriculture and husbandry developed, and it wasn't in "naturally inhospitable areas" in either case. Even if so, making an area with poor food into one with better food is quite obviously an example of acting based on a desire to get more than you can as a hunter-gatherer, so accepting your own argument here disproves your claim that hunter-gatherers were content with what they got and didn't seek to get more.

> I'm merely trying to get you to realize that there are many reasons for technological progress (esp. the adoption of agriculture), the least of all being that "it's human nature to want more".

But your own defense of that position has been to present an argument that boils down to the motivation being exactly to get more.

[bcheung]

They had no game and thus no food. So they switched to agriculture because they wanted food.

(food > no food) == more

[Scarfleece]

"Wanting enough food" is not the same as "always wanting more".