From Jane Dean:
Farming was not a good thing for us all according to the book I am
reading. People got smaller and sicker when farming was introduced
about 6ooo years ago. Too late, there is now nothing to hunt or
gather.
We set a trap from one of the hundreds of rabbits we are
beset with at the moment (bloody Romans – whatever have they done for
us?) and we caught a hedgehog – now an endangered species. He was very
sweet as he waited for us to release him. Apparently you cover him
with mud and bake him in a fire and his spines come off easily.
Note from Administrator : Hedgehogs are unknown in the U.S, like geography, history and half the really good vocabulary in the English language. The sweet little hedgehog was probably done for when the white man arrived, like so much else. (joke) . We hope Ms. Dean enjoyed her meal. You have to eat hedgehogs with horseradish sauce.
They say braised panda is delicious, but owing to the current high world food prices it is very expensive to buy in your local supermarket.
Yes, I’ve read about the downside of agriculture and the degradation of parts of nature which flowed from the cultivation of crops.
Here’s where my mind doesn’t want to go: without agriculture, no economic surplus, without capital (in the form of food), no investment in broader cultural developments allowing some of us to stop hunting so that we can get online and learn about the hundred billion galaxies whirling around us.
How seriously do we wish that those first seeds had never been sown?
Not really, but for every upside there seems to be a downside. It’s worth knowing about, at least.