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Fields where Native Americans farmed a thousand years ago discovered in Michigan

smithsonianmag.com

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Re: Fields where Native Americans farmed a thousand years ago discovered in Michigan

#91

Post by MangoToupe »

robertlagrant wrote: post #88
MangoToupe wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does this matter? That is extremely difficult to differentiate via the archaeological record, so most archaeological research simply abandons the distinction. You should essentially never read intention into archaeology unless someone makes an extremely strong case the alternatives might be firmly excluded. As an example for a strong case of intention: if you find twenty skulls with pickaxes in their heads lined up o…

This is the intention the previous poster was countering: > These discoveries suggest that the area’s Indigenous farmers may have dumped their household waste and the remnants of fires onto their fields, using them as compost

Is the intention supposed to be in the quote, or are you trying to show there was no intention implied? I certainly agree with the latter.

Re: Fields where Native Americans farmed a thousand years ago discovered in Michigan

#93

Post by robertlagrant »

MangoToupe wrote: post #91
robertlagrant wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the intention the previous poster was countering: > These discoveries suggest that the area’s Indigenous farmers may have dumped their household waste and the remnants of fires onto their fields, using them as compost

Is the intention supposed to be in the quote, or are you trying to show there was no intention implied? I certainly agree with the latter.

I read "using them as compost" as intention

Re: Fields where Native Americans farmed a thousand years ago discovered in Michigan

#94

Post by larksimian »

BurningFrog wrote: post #68
acdha wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think they were just engaging in time-honored speculation about how different history could’ve been had a few historical accidents changed. For example, the Mayan civilization collapsed about 500 years before the Spanish showed up due to the worst drought in something like 7k years, so people have speculated about what Mesoamerica might have looked like when contact was made of those millions of people hadn’t died.…

The "immune system lottery" is really why the native Americans were doomed. They could have caught up with the technology etc and stood their ground. But when 90% of the population dies at or before first contact, the remaining 10% doesn't have a chance. Pretty sure this would have beaten the Mayas even if they were at the top of their game. It's pretty wild how world history turned on such a random and completely un…

It's not really random. Disease development in the Old World was a combo of long term urbanisation and animal husbandry. Urbanisation in the New World existed but wasn't as old and obviously there was way less animal husbandry. Also assuming the Bering straight crossing hypothesis humans probably left almost every freaking old world parasite and disease behind by the time they got into the americas. Hundreds of thousands or even millions of years of eveolution of diseases that evolved in Africa/Eurasia pretty much gets purged during that migration.

Re: Fields where Native Americans farmed a thousand years ago discovered in Michigan

#95

Post by throwaway2037 »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #69
throwaway2037 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The NASA Earth Observatory notes three particularly cold intervals. One began about 1650, another about 1770, and the last in 1850 Are these due to volcanic eruptions?

Why do you ask? I'm not familiar with any such theory. Krakatoa erupted in... 1883, which doesn't seem like a good match. And volcanic winters don't seem to last much more than 10 years. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volcanic_winter#Past_volcanic_... There is a theory that the Little Ice Age was precipitated by the reforestation of land in America as the natives died off from exposure to European diseases. And of cou…

I didn't realize that the original quote (from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44282822) was lifted nearly verbatim from Wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Ice_Age

More from that same page:

    > Several causes have been proposed: cyclical lows in solar radiation, heightened volcanic activity, changes in the ocean circulation, variations in Earth's orbit and axial tilt (orbital forcing), inherent variability in global climate, and decreases in the human population (such as from the massacres by Genghis Khan, the Black Death and the epidemics emerging in the Americas upon European contact).

Re: Fields where Native Americans farmed a thousand years ago discovered in Michigan

#96

Post by vanattab »

bruce511 wrote: post #82
hinkley wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This question is substantially why I stopped watching that show. I think at least a few of them may have trouble locating pure clay where they are dropped but not all of them, every season, for years.

I seem to recall one or two doing this. But i suspect the reason they don't is cause they don't need to. They all have a pot already. The benefits of more pots seems low. Conversely the calorie cost seems high (if only just collecting clay and cutting wood to fire it.) On Alone thd priorities are shelter and food. Clay pots seems like a luxury in terms of utility use and energy cost.

This is the correct answer. Alone is not really a how to live in the woods show, it's a managed starvation show. The contestants are limited to about a 1 sq mile area which may or may not have a good source of clay. They purposely set them out just a few weeks before winter so they do not have a long time to prep. Conserving and replenishing calories is the name of the game.

Re: Fields where Native Americans farmed a thousand years ago discovered in Michigan

#97

Post by api »

Huxley1 wrote: post #87

I always thought large-scale farming like this only happened under big state systems. But it looks like these communities were able to build something pretty big without that kind of centralized power. It’s also kind of amazing that the fields stayed preserved for a thousand years. Makes me wonder if we’re still underestimating how advanced some of these early farming cultures were.

A while back it dawned on me that we think the greatest past civilizations were all in Egypt, the Middle East, and Mesopotamia because those areas are deserts or semi-deserts. They built out of stone because they didn't have much wood, and their writings survived because they weren't destroyed by water.

There could have been very sophisticated societies, even large scale civilizations, in the past in places like North America that built mainly out of wood, clay, bone, and other readily available materials, and there'd be nothing left. Any writings would be gone too, since writings don't survive well in wet climates unless they are chiseled into very durable stone or vitrified pottery (and even then they can erode).

Re: Fields where Native Americans farmed a thousand years ago discovered in Michigan

#98

Post by xeromal »

WalterBright wrote: post #86
WalterBright wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of them did a simply terrible job of building a fireplace, from poisoning themselves with the smoke to literally burning their shelter down. Some built a bed up off the ground, which is smart, but never seemed to consider heating up rocks in the fireplace during the day and slipping them under the bed at night. Anyhow, some mud and clay skills would help make a decent fireplace. Staying warm is a crucial skill,…

P.S. I've learned to spot the losers early on. They always try to build a monumental log cabin, which drains away their energy and they cannot replace it and tap out. Others spend their time carving toys for their kids instead of looking for food. To win you need to make a minimal cabin and spend all your time looking for food.

I haven't watched the show but I watched the first season and loved when the guy from my homestate (GA) did the right thing and just wallered in a mud pit for the whole thing to win. One random dude was trying to build a kayak or some shit. lol

Re: Fields where Native Americans farmed a thousand years ago discovered in Michigan

#99

Post by westurner »

folli wrote: post #2

Tangentially related: I'm trying to make LiDAR data in Switzerland more accessible, see https://github.com/r-follador/delta-relief There's some interesting examples in the Readme.

Does LIDAR work underwater?

FWIU in Grand Traverse Bay, Lake Michigan, there's a 9,000 year old stonehenge-like structure 40 feet underwater; that's 4000 thousand years older than Stonehenge and about 6000 years older than the Osireoin and the Pyramids.

/? Michigan underwater stonehenge: https://www.google.com/search?q=michigan+underwater+stonehen...

There's not even a name or a wikipedia page for the site? There are various presumed Clovis sites which are now underwater in TN, as well.

Re: Fields where Native Americans farmed a thousand years ago discovered in Michigan

#100

Post by [deleted] »

vanattab wrote: post #96
bruce511 wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I seem to recall one or two doing this. But i suspect the reason they don't is cause they don't need to. They all have a pot already. The benefits of more pots seems low. Conversely the calorie cost seems high (if only just collecting clay and cutting wood to fire it.) On Alone thd priorities are shelter and food. Clay pots seems like a luxury in terms of utility use and energy cost.

This is the correct answer. Alone is not really a how to live in the woods show, it's a managed starvation show. The contestants are limited to about a 1 sq mile area which may or may not have a good source of clay. They purposely set them out just a few weeks before winter so they do not have a long time to prep. Conserving and replenishing calories is the name of the game.

[deleted]
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