The Garden of Eden and Hunter -Gatherers

[Charlie Hatchett]

Great article, David.

I think the author's hypothesis makes sense. Me and my wife have talked about this particular topic a lot. Sometimes we've wondered if the hunter-gathers had a better quality of life than we do...with the rat race and all.
The hunter-gather lifestyle left a lot more leisure time on your hands, compared to agriculturally based lifestyles, which normally occurred along with heavier human populations in the region.
With the hunter-gather lifestyle, you'd kill a big buck, or buffalo, and 5-10 of you were good to go, protein wise, for a week, plus. And if the region was relatively unpopulated, human wise, hunting would have been easy.

To me, it follows that there would have been more time for artistic expression, creativity, spiritual pondering, and technological innovation.

Nice heads up on the article...that was really interesting.

David Campbell:

I don't generally get that involved with Old World archaeology but this
startling discovery in Kurdish Turkey certainly has implications with Gault
and Collins' revised appraisal of Clovis. This site was discovered in 1963(odd coincidence, eh?) and the monolithic temple dates to 9,500 BC. The builderswere hunter/gatherers the same as Clovis. Makes one think there may be moreparallels between the two.

http://www.thefirstpost.co.uk/index.php ... subID=1007

[marduk]

where does the garden of Eden come into this
that particular story dates from around 600bce

[Minimalist]

Great article, David.

I think the author's hypothesis makes sense. Me and my wife have talked about this particular topic a lot. Sometimes we've wondered if the hunter-gathers had a better quality of life than we do...with the rat race and all.
The hunter-gather lifestyle left a lot more leisure time on your hands, compared to agriculturally based lifestyles, which normally occurred along with heavier human populations in the region.
With the hunter-gather lifestyle, you'd kill a big buck, or buffalo, and 5-10 of you were good to go, protein wise, for a week, plus. And if the region was relatively unpopulated, human wise, hunting would have been easy.

To me, it follows that there would have been more time for artistic expression, creativity, spiritual pondering, and technological innovation.

Here, Charlie.....it's posted in the Joke Thread but I won't make you go digging for it.

An old Indian chief sat in his hut on the reservation,
smoking a Ceremonial pipe and eyeing two U. S. government officials sent to interview him.

"Chief Two Eagles" asked one official, "You have observed
the white man for 90 years. You've seen his wars and his technological
advances. You've seen his progress, and the damage he's done."

The Chief nodded in agreement. The official continued,
"Considering all these events, in your opinion, where did the white man
go wrong?"

The Chief stared at the government officials for over a
minute and then calmly replied...

"When white man found the land, Indians were running it.
No taxes,

No debt,

Plenty buffalo,

Plenty beaver,

Women did all the work,

Medicine man free,

Indian man spent all day hunting and fishing,

All night having sex."

Then the chief leaned back and smiled...

"Only white man dumb enough to think he could improve system
like that."

[stan]

i believe it.

Plus we have the clock to add to our anxiety.

[War Arrow]

Personally, it seems to me like it all went down hill as soon as we came up with the written word.
And I think I can prove that in a court of law if anyone's interested.

[marduk]

Personally, it seems to me like it all went down hill as soon as we came up with the written word.

some people say leaving the trees was a bad idea
personally I think we should have stayed in the oceans

[War Arrow]

some people say leaving the trees was a bad idea
personally I think we should have stayed in the oceans

It's those bloody unicellular organisms I blame. Swanning around like they own the place with their fancy-pants high-falutin' nucleii and everything.

[Charlie Hatchett]

Here, Charlie.....it's posted in the Joke Thread but I won't make you go digging for it.

....I agree, Chief Two Eagles, "Only white man dumb enough to think he could improve system like that."

[Charlie Hatchett]

where does the garden of Eden come into this
that particular story dates from around 600bce

According to who? Or, are you talking about when it was finally written?

[Charlie Hatchett]

Personally, it seems to me like it all went down hill as soon as we came up with the written word.
And I think I can prove that in a court of law if anyone's interested.

Ha! A good one for the joke page.

[marduk]

According to who? Or, are you talking about when it was finally written

well Charlie considering the word Eden is in its original form Sumerian and is attested from as early as 3000bce as meaning "plain, steppe, open country" and not notably garden it follows that the Hebrews picked up the word during their sojourn in Babylonian under Nebuchadrezzar.
http://psd.museum.upenn.edu/epsd/epsd/e1199.html
this of course is also the same time they picked up the idea of evil talking serpents which originates with the sumerians, the tree of life which also originates with the sumerians and also the flood story which also appears in Genesis which is demonstrable to have been dreived from an earlier akkadian story which in turn originates with a Sumerian original

the fact that the bible is set with one notable fictitious exception in Mesopotamia seems lost on most people

[Beagle]

Hunting/Gathering in the Garden of Eden. Sounds great!

But even there - you wouldn't want to hunt mastodons during mating season.

http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stor ... 774891.htm

From Archaeologica News section:

[Minimalist]

you wouldn't want to hunt mastodons during mating season.

When it's "mating season" I'm too busy to hunt anything!

[Beagle]

But even then, you have to........oh never mind.

[Minimalist]

As an old guy I used to work with would say...

"It now takes me all night to do what I used to do all night....but I don't begrudge the time."