Sigh. There’s so much actually interesting in piecing together the past. Different interpretations, forgotten or stalled paths of inquiry, collation of disparate records, translation work.
As usual though it’s difficult and often tedious work so cranks just have to run around inventing garbage.
The actual history of agriculture is nuanced and extensive. Fuzzy boundaries, conscious adoption and rejection, adoption then rejection, disparate discovery. Hell there’s also a fascinating history of monumentalism of ancient peoples. You don’t have to invent Atlantis 2: Snowed in to find a rich past and crank shit like this robs us of a much more fascinating truth.
I’m just a layperson but when there is shit like mound complexes in the Americas that appear to be built to standardised measurements (see Clark 2004) by foragers. Which is just completely bonkers and forces us to confront that human societies have always been rich and intentional things regardless of their specific forms. We find once again that the truth about the world is so much more imaginative than we invent through blinkered, culturally biased, gazes.
Sigh. There’s so much actually interesting in piecing together the past. Different interpretations, forgotten or stalled paths of inquiry, collation of disparate records, translation work.
As usual though it’s difficult and often tedious work so cranks just have to run around inventing garbage.
The actual history of agriculture is nuanced and extensive. Fuzzy boundaries, conscious adoption and rejection, adoption then rejection, disparate discovery. Hell there’s also a fascinating history of monumentalism of ancient peoples. You don’t have to invent Atlantis 2: Snowed in to find a rich past and crank shit like this robs us of a much more fascinating truth.
Very nicely said. Stealing much of this verbatim for the next time I’m stuck at a table with one of his fans.
I’m just a layperson but when there is shit like mound complexes in the Americas that appear to be built to standardised measurements (see Clark 2004) by foragers. Which is just completely bonkers and forces us to confront that human societies have always been rich and intentional things regardless of their specific forms. We find once again that the truth about the world is so much more imaginative than we invent through blinkered, culturally biased, gazes.
Great description, the thing most people get wrong about defending science and history is that they dont convey how fucking weird it really is.