Summary Of Worst Mistake In The History Of The Human Race By Jared Diamond

Jared Diamond’s 1987 article, “The Worst Mistake In The History Of The Human Race,” takes a different perspective on the agricultural revolution. According to Diamond, “The Worst Mistake In The History Of The Human Race” was the switch from hunting and gathering to agriculture and farming. Diamond’s revisionist interpretation questions the traditional progressivist belief that the agricultural revolution has continuously improved the health of our ancestors. Instead, Diamond considers the negative changes associated with the development of the agriculture. To support his claim, Diamond uses archeological evidence of past hunter- gatherer tribes as well as the health and nutrition of current tribes to expose the disadvantages of subsistence

Only consuming a few sources of crops limited their diets, causing vitamin and mineral deficiencies. Unlike hunter- gatherer tribes that had space to roam and had few neighbors, farming encouraged closer living quarters with humans and livestock. These changes caused a spread of diseases and parasites from animals to humans.

According to Diamond the change from hunter- gatherer societies to agricultural societies created social inequality between classes and the sexes. Class hierarchy resulted at least in part, from access to copious amounts of food. Those who had greater access to food were higher in the hierarchy and had better nutrition than the peasants that tended to the upper classes crops and livestock. Power differences became prominent in comparison to hunter-gatherer societies where everyone had the same opportunities and to find and hunt food.

In order to maintain functional farms women gave birth to more children to assist with farming and harvesting. The stress of multiple pregnancies combined with poor nutrition, infectious disease, and sometimes difficult manual labor, took a toll on these

The revisionist interpretation introduces a new understanding of the development of agriculture that stands out from the functionalist perspective of progressivists. It seems logical that hunting and gathering would promote a varied diet as long as nomadic hunter-gatherers could find places with a variety of fruits, vegetables, and wild game in order to maintain vitamin and mineral levels and adequate amounts of protein, carbohydrates, and lipids. Equally, the fewer incidences of infectious disease from close contact with people and animals, more leisure time, less physical stress from manual labor or multiple births, and equal opportunities for finding sustenance, make Diamond’s claim more alluring. Overtime the effects of agriculture have accumulated changing long lasting nomadic lifestyle