Disaster Is the Mother of Civilization
Jan. 20th, 2020 04:59 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ysabetwordsmithThere's a lot of truth in this.
However, there's also a bit of exaggeration. Humans invented agriculture long, long before they invented civilization. It dates back to when humans looped around several favorite spots within a territory. Many seeds will pass through digestion intact, which means all the potty spots had lots of edible plants growing around them. These were often better than random wild plants because the best plants got eaten and shat out in the same place. People learned to propagate the things they liked the best.
The problem is, it didn't look like modern agriculture, so people don't recognize it when they see it. They still don't. They'll walk right through an Amazon tribe's carefully managed food forest and not see it because it doesn't look like a monoculture. Even a Three Sisters garden can be overlooked. To say nothing of forbidding aboriginal Australians from gardening with fire.
I'm a mediocre gardener at best. But I am considerably better at scattering self-sufficient edibles around the yard. Mulberries, black raspberries, blackberries, pie cherries, herbs, edible flowers -- it delights me when I can go outside and forage for things to eat.
However, there's also a bit of exaggeration. Humans invented agriculture long, long before they invented civilization. It dates back to when humans looped around several favorite spots within a territory. Many seeds will pass through digestion intact, which means all the potty spots had lots of edible plants growing around them. These were often better than random wild plants because the best plants got eaten and shat out in the same place. People learned to propagate the things they liked the best.
The problem is, it didn't look like modern agriculture, so people don't recognize it when they see it. They still don't. They'll walk right through an Amazon tribe's carefully managed food forest and not see it because it doesn't look like a monoculture. Even a Three Sisters garden can be overlooked. To say nothing of forbidding aboriginal Australians from gardening with fire.
I'm a mediocre gardener at best. But I am considerably better at scattering self-sufficient edibles around the yard. Mulberries, black raspberries, blackberries, pie cherries, herbs, edible flowers -- it delights me when I can go outside and forage for things to eat.
