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The history of what we call work

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Re: The history of what we call work

#31

Post by abecedarius »

lelanthran wrote: post #10

> The chemical analysis of bones has demonstrated conclusively that early humans were not constantly teetering on the brink of starvation. On the contrary, they ate well despite having at their disposal only a few stone and wooden implements. > These findings support a surprising thesis, one that reverses everything we used to believe about the deep history of humanity. It was not the hunter-gatherers who “suffered f…

The lose-your-teeth thing seems to be more of a problem for poor farmer societies. IIRC skeletons of earlier foragers mostly had good teeth.

On lifespans, expectation at birth was very different from expectation for a young adult. (The latter was still much less than now, yes.)

Similarly I think we need to know more about the distribution of good years and bad years -- when your numbers are limited by famine, which you can't really store up for, it's not strange for the good years to be relatively light on the day-to-day work needed. If this long article mentions this, I missed it in my skim.

Re: The history of what we call work

#32

Post by the_greyd »

wayoutthere wrote: post #21
cwoolfe wrote: post #6

“Humankind,” Suzman writes, is apparently “not yet ready to claim its collective pension.” So why haven’t we traded rising incomes for more free time? Good question. This is part of the reason I'm in process of switching to a part-time schedule as a software engineer and parent of 3 young children. "...economists assure us that, in any case, the only long-term solution to global poverty is more economic growth." Whil…

The counter perspective is that some amount of degrowth will happen eventually. And in the west, decades of austerity have led to oppressive working conditions to the point people aren’t having children. We’re already seeing this effect on the workforce; my hypothesis is that much of the worker shortage is due to older workers dying from Covid or simply retiring and there aren’t enough millennials and Gen Z to fill t…

Anyone interested in declining birth rates, just take a look at the statistics in South Korea. 42% of the women in their 30s are unmarried (https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/pxotg9/over_42_o...). That's almost half! Our infinite growth systems will collapse, unless countries make it easier for women to raise a family.

Re: The history of what we call work

#33

Post by nineplay »

sillyquiet wrote: post #13

'Gathering food' is not the extent of the 'work' that hunter-gatherer societies performed, which is kind of the basis of that ridiculous pop-anthropology notion of hunter-gathers working some silly low number of hours per week. Food preparation and preservation, shelter, crafting necessaries like eating implements, food storage vessels, clothing, and weapons - these keep a member of that society (except for some of t…

> “Man the Hunter”

I don't think it's a coincidence that a lot of stuff that gets left out falls under the heading of "women's work". There's an enormous blind spot that underlies most discussions of work where working 'at home' is disregarded as though it is the natural state of women and not worth mentioning.

Women have always worked full time. Out of the home, in the home, with their partners, with their villages. Read frontier biographies from the US western expansion and notice the partnership and shared responsibilities. Notice who takes the deer carcass and processes the meet and hide. Notice who churns and cans and turns fabrics and leather into clothes and shoes and hats and bedding.

It rarely gets discussed, and feeds into a mythology which treats women 'working' as something that started in 1970 and is a sad byproduct of economic necessity.

Re: The history of what we call work

#34

Post by watwut »

agumonkey wrote: post #4
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #3

I have not read the book, but one line in the review caught my attention: > to value free time over money. I value free time over money, but, from what I can tell from the article, it seems that the author seems to believe that hunter/gatherer societies have a lot of “free time” on their hands. I’d suggest taking a quick shufti through some documentaries about life in hunter/gatherer societies.

There's another dimension to this. All duties aren't the same. Hunting is a duty.. but it's not the same as redoing 200x print copies for your petty boss. The former is 100% beneficial to you (a bit selfish but hey), massages your senses, strengthen your body, sharpen your skills. It's play time, somehow very freeing. The latter is dull and unless you gamify it, grinds you for no good reason.

Office worker finds working in hobby garden freeing, strengthening body and sharpening skills. However, for farmer it is a lot of work and duty.

Hunting for food, when you have to do it often is work like any other. No matter how much you like aspects of it initially.

Re: The history of what we call work

#36

Post by sillyquiet »

nineplay wrote: post #33
sillyquiet wrote: post #13

'Gathering food' is not the extent of the 'work' that hunter-gatherer societies performed, which is kind of the basis of that ridiculous pop-anthropology notion of hunter-gathers working some silly low number of hours per week. Food preparation and preservation, shelter, crafting necessaries like eating implements, food storage vessels, clothing, and weapons - these keep a member of that society (except for some of t…

> “Man the Hunter” I don't think it's a coincidence that a lot of stuff that gets left out falls under the heading of "women's work". There's an enormous blind spot that underlies most discussions of work where working 'at home' is disregarded as though it is the natural state of women and not worth mentioning. Women have always worked full time. Out of the home, in the home, with their partners, with their villages.…

Very very true, but to clarify too, those roles aren't as cut and dry either - it's true hunting was mostly a job for boys and young men, but older less spry men were also crafters and fabricators for their societies. They were also, a lot of the time, the 'elites' I spoke of - spiritual leaders, chieftains, hunting group leaders (which probably formed the kernel of later period dedicated warrior groups), etc. Elderly women also fulfilled spiritual leadership roles occasionally.

Re: The history of what we call work

#37

Post by sillyquiet »

nivertech wrote: post #35

The Evolution of The Human Workforce: hunter-gatherers farmers slaves serfs employees on-site employees WFH contractors temps freelancers China-fication Uberization (gig workers) Robotization

no offense, but this is absurdly reductionist.

I guess its apropos for twitter.

Re: The history of what we call work

#38

Post by skyechurch »

lelanthran wrote: post #10

> The chemical analysis of bones has demonstrated conclusively that early humans were not constantly teetering on the brink of starvation. On the contrary, they ate well despite having at their disposal only a few stone and wooden implements. > These findings support a surprising thesis, one that reverses everything we used to believe about the deep history of humanity. It was not the hunter-gatherers who “suffered f…

>Without good dental hygiene adults can expect to lose their teeth by age 40, at which point (in a foraging society with primitive tools) that adult is going to be more than slightly malnutritioned.

If you go camping, and forget your toothbrush/toothpaste, rub your finger on the blackened remains of last night's fire and rub it on your teeth, it does a more than adequate cleaning job, albeit without the nice minty flavor. I've started to notice "charcoal" as a highlighted additive in commercial toothpastes recently, although I suspect this little bit of folk wisdom predates recreational camping and the advertising industry by a considerable amount, and is pretty easy to "discover" again should the thread ever be broken.

Also, a diet high in vegetable matter that requires heavy chewing and salivating is ime very good for overall dental health, as is chewing on anything not-sugary or otherwise damaging to your teeth, modern example: sugar free gum. Dental surgery is something I would not want to do in the premodern era, but if modern toothpastes etc were to disappear, I suspect we wouldn't miss them very much.

Re: The history of what we call work

#39

Post by agumonkey »

saba2008 wrote: post #12
agumonkey wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every sunday. You want some pictures ? People in the wild don't hunt elephants to survive. They survived pretty well for ages, they climb for honey, find smaller animals. It's not easy but it seems most humans are capable of it. I'm pretty sure the deal is worth it. The amount of satisfaction in apt usage of your senses and body is quite immense. I suffer daily due to insufficient stimulation (to the point I voluntee…

You miss hobby you do for entertainment with work you do for survival. Once it's no longer choice between 'apt usage of your senses and body' and 'insufficient stimulation', but between maximum performance and starvation, it stops being fun. Just read the happiness on faces of homeless.

I've been there, I get it. Sincerely. I know walking on a wire is. The difference is nature is not society. Homeless people are not struggling from efforts to gather food but from abandonment, rejection and inner circle crimes.

Re: The history of what we call work

#40

Post by Aunche »

handrous wrote: post #30
Aunche wrote: post #9

"Work" here is defined as the amount of time it takes to gather food. By that logic, a minimum wage worker who spends $40 a week on groceries only spends 6 hours a week on "work" including time spent grocery shopping.

For anyone deciding whether or not to read the review, this is not an accurate description of how the piece treats "work" throughout.

Yes. The author uses different standards of what constitutes as work work when it comes to hunter-gatherers compared to modern humans. That's the point of my comment. The time a hunter gatherer spends repairing their shelter counts as leisure, but the time spent making a salary used to pay off your rent counts as work.
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