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Did hunter gatherers work less or more than modern humans?

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NewTime
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30 Aug 2016, 7:55 pm

Did hunter gatherers work less or more than modern humans? Apparently consensus is that they worked less. There are those who believe they worked more, that they had to work constantly to sustain themselves and had little free time.



lostonearth35
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30 Aug 2016, 8:48 pm

At least hunter gatherers were able to obey their fight or flight instinct. When modern humans are stressed they usually can't so that's why we have all kinds of stress-related problems, including obesity.

I don't envy the fact that their average lifespan was only 18 years, though.



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30 Aug 2016, 8:54 pm

NewTime wrote:
Did hunter gatherers work less or more than modern humans? Apparently consensus is that they worked less. There are those who believe they worked more, that they had to work constantly to sustain themselves and had little free time.

depends on who you're comparing them to. sweatshop workers? part-time writers?

i think the biggest difference is that they weren't stratified. there was the division of tasks and responsibilities across genders and age ranges, and that was pretty much it. everybody lived the same kind of life


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30 Aug 2016, 8:55 pm

lostonearth35 wrote:
At least hunter gatherers were able to obey their fight or flight instinct. When modern humans are stressed they usually can't so that's why we have all kinds of stress-related problems, including obesity.

I don't envy the fact that their average lifespan was only 18 years, though.
Robert J. Sawyer's Neanderthal Parallax trilogy has some good speculation regarding how hunter-gatherer societies compare with ours.


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AspE
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30 Aug 2016, 9:10 pm

It's often said that they worked less, but I think the commute time was longer.