Easter Island, Fools' Paradise

TLS ^ | 11-18-2004 | Roland Wright

[Diva]

Wonder what happened 5,000 years ago to bring this incredible explosion about?

The invention of the plow, probably.

[Diva]

Back then the experts were predicting that the world would run out of food and energy resources by the mid 1990's.

Yep, I remember...and before global warming there was the global cooling nonsense.

[Serb5150]

Ping for later reading...

[BlackElk]

In the unlikely event that humanity ever runs out of space here on Earth, we will boldly discover why God created the rest of the universe.

Necessity is still the mother of invention.

Oh, and contraception will still not be acceptable to those with a Roman Catholic understanding of why it is wrong.

[narses]

"He made a series of bets with Julian Simon about the scarcity of various metals and lost every single bet."

Julian Simon rocks! (Sadly from the grave, but his ideas are imortal!)

[SunkenCiv]

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[Oberon]

It’s the tragedy of the commons, one more time.

[Arthalion]

Wonder what happened 5,000 years ago to bring this incredible explosion about?

The bronze age, but this author is a nitwit. Recent genetic studies on many food plants, and examinations of seeds found at food sites, now indicates that the earliest limited transitions to agriculture may have began 10k or more years ago. The Natufians in modern day Israel built the first permanent towns and primitive oat fields right at the end of the last ice age, and mankind has been on an upward technology arc ever since. By 8000BP, the Ubaid's in Mesopotamia were building cities and irrigating their fields. By 6000BP there were dedicated urban cultures existing on the planet.

5000 years ago we finally worked out how to forge metal strong enough to cut hard stone, allowing us to build stronger, larger buildings and bigger monuments. Earlier constructions, made of sandstone, wood, mud, or soft stone, simply eroded away over time. The author of this piece incorrectly assumes that civilization started when the first still existing monuments were constructed, but humanity had been up and running at a healthy pace for many millenia before that.

[Arthalion]

D’oh, zombie thread!

[Little Ray]

If people had owned the trees, there would have tree farms and tree cultivation - how much am I bid for this fine Wine Palm?

[Gothmog]

Something did happen around 6,000 years ago, I can’t remember off the top of my head whether it was a meteor strike or whatever. I read about it in one of these ancient civilization threads. Try asking blam or SunkenCiv.

[SunkenCiv]

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