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Foragers, Farmers, and Fossil Fuels: How Human Values Evolve, by Ian Morris
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Most people in the world today think democracy and gender equality are good, and that violence and wealth inequality are bad. But most people who lived during the 10,000 years before the nineteenth century thought just the opposite. Drawing on archaeology, anthropology, biology, and history, Ian Morris, author of the best-selling Why the West Rules--for Now, explains why. The result is a compelling new argument about the evolution of human values, one that has far-reaching implications for how we understand the past--and for what might happen next.
Fundamental long-term changes in values, Morris argues, are driven by the most basic force of all: energy. Humans have found three main ways to get the energy they need--from foraging, farming, and fossil fuels. Each energy source sets strict limits on what kinds of societies can succeed, and each kind of society rewards specific values. In tiny forager bands, people who value equality but are ready to settle problems violently do better than those who aren't; in large farming societies, people who value hierarchy and are less willing to use violence do best; and in huge fossil-fuel societies, the pendulum has swung back toward equality but even further away from violence.
But if our fossil-fuel world favors democratic, open societies, the ongoing revolution in energy capture means that our most cherished values are very likely to turn out--at some point fairly soon--not to be useful any more.
Originating as the Tanner Lectures delivered at Princeton University, the book includes challenging responses by novelist Margaret Atwood, philosopher Christine Korsgaard, classicist Richard Seaford, and historian of China Jonathan Spence.
- Sales Rank: #174379 in Books
- Published on: 2015-03-22
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 8.80" h x 1.20" w x 5.80" l, .0 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 400 pages
Review
"I may disagree with some ideas in [Foragers, Farmers, and Fossil Fuels], but I have thoroughly enjoyed reading this excellent and thought-provoking book. More important, by putting forth a bold, clearly formulated hypothesis, Ian Morris has done a great service to the budding field of scientific history."--Peter Turchin, Science
"A provocative explanation for the evolution and divergence of ethical values. . . . In the hands of this talented writer and thinker, [the] material becomes an engaging intellectual adventure."--Kirkus
"[A] very good and enjoyable read."--Enlightened Economist
"Stimulating."--Russell Warfield, Resurgence & Ecologist
From the Back Cover
"Ian Morris has thrown another curveball for social science. In this disarmingly readable book, which takes us from prehistory to the present, he offers a new theory of human culture, linking it firmly to economic fundamentals and how humans obtained their energy and resources from nature. This is bold, erudite, and provocative."--Daron Acemoglu, coauthor of How Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty
"Ian Morris has emerged in recent years as one of the great big thinkers in history, archaeology, and anthropology, writing books that set people talking and thinking. I found delightful things in every chapter of Foragers, Farmers, and Fossil Fuels, interesting enough that I found myself sharing them with family over dinner. The breadth of reading and the command of the subject are just dazzling. His major argument--that value systems adapt themselves to ambient energy structures, in the same way that an organism adapts to its niche--is fascinating."--Daniel Lord Smail, author of On Deep History and the Brain
"This is an important and stylistically excellent book written from a sophisticated materialist perspective. It is eminently readable, lively, and with clearly stated arguments explored in a systematic fashion. In a sense, it follows up on Jared Diamond's work on agricultural origins, and it parallels Steven Pinker's book on warfare in depicting a world that is culturally evolving in a certain direction. Foragers, Farmers, and Fossil Fuels should have a serious impact."--Chris Boehm, author of Moral Origins: The Evolution of Altruism, Virtue, and Shame
About the Author
Ian Morris is the Willard Professor of Classics and a fellow of the Stanford Archaeology Center at Stanford University. He has directed excavations in Italy and Greece and has published thirteen previous books, including Why the West Rules--for Now (Farrar, Straus and Giroux), The Measure of Civilization (Princeton), and War! What Is It Good For? (FSG). He lives in Boulder Creek, California.
Most helpful customer reviews
24 of 25 people found the following review helpful.
An oddly structured book
By Roger
This is a very strange book. It is better described as a poorly communicated thesis, a set of responses by others to the thesis, and then a response where the author finally gets his points out.
In brief, Morris suggests that core human values are evolutionary adaptations, but that these values are somewhat flexible and culturally adaptive. He then divides human history into three realms or phase transitions defined primarily by our rate of energy capture -- foragers, farmers and fossil fuel societies. Then he goes into three specific values which differe dramatically between the phase transitions -- propensity to use violence, egalitarianism and gender equality.
In the first set of chapters he lays out his facts. To those familiar with evolutionary psychology it will seem pretty obvious.
Then a series of people, obviously not familiar with evolutionary psychology or cultural evolution theory tear into Morris' ideas. In general they miss the point by a mile. It is like hearing creationists argue with an evolutionary biologist.
Then, in chapter 10, the book gets good. Morris finally lays out exactly what his thesis is clearly and explicitly.
Here are my thoughts:
1). I am not sure why he focuses on these three values. Are these the only ones which differed dramatically? Are these the only ones he is interested in? Or are they the only ones that support his thesis?
2). On violence it seems he conflate in tribe/ state and between tribe/ state violence. I think these are separate phenomena which require separate analysis.
3). On egalitarianism, he similarly conflates material equality with hierarchical or political dominance. Again, I am not sure why.
4) Morris suggests that each age gets the values it needs. It seems to me that a better explanation is that humans value dominance for themselves and that based upon the social context they are forced to settle for equilibriums. Foragers would love to all be alphas. However, in a world of effective weapons and easy exit where nobody wants to be a beta, the equilibrium point for effective social groups is egalitarianism.
Similarly, each gender would love to be dominant of its counterpart. In Farming societies, men were able to attain the upper hand, and women were forced to submit to thrive. In forager societies this is less true, and modern societies with high energy capture and high standards of living and state security nets and appliances which free women from housework, this is simply no longer true.
The same applies to violence. We may be fine with violence when it serves our needs. Problem is that this creates a struggle and zero sum dynamic. The equilibrium point in forager societies is to maintain peace within the tribe but to fracture and splinter with uncontrollable violence between tribes. In farmers, without exit freedom, tied to the land with some specializing in violence, the natural equilibrium is hierarchy, with the elite caring for their human livestock. In modern liberal states, the optimal equilibrium is networks of voluntary trade and egalitarian rights which shrivel up in environments of violence.
I would agree with Morris that our values are contextually adaptive. I do think that we greatly rationalize and tailor them to conditions. Those in hierarchies rationalize their position, those in violence rationalize and tailor and so on.
24 of 27 people found the following review helpful.
Energy Is Destiny
By Serge J. Van Steenkiste
Ian Morris convincingly demonstrates that the sources of energy available to a given society determine what types of values can thrive in that society. Mr. Morris segments the last twenty thousand years in three broadly successive systems of human values on a worldwide basis: Foraging values, farming values, and fossil-fuel values. The author acknowledges that his approach to human history for that period is reductionist, strongly materialist, mostly universalist, functionalist, and explicitly evolutionist.
Mr. Morris makes his case by starting with two assumptions based on what human biology has shown for the ten to fifteen thousand years since farming began:
1. Nearly all humans care deeply about some core values such as fairness, justice, love, hate, respect, loyalty, preventing harm, and a sense that some things are sacred.
2. These core values are biologically evolved adaptations.
These two assumptions lead the author to make two claims:
1. The last twenty thousand years can be subdivided into three broad stages during which humans have shown how they have interpreted these biologically evolved core values. These three stages mostly correlate with the three major methods, i.e. foraging, farming, and fossil fuels, that humans have perfected for capturing energy from their environment.
2. Changes in energy capture cause changes in human values.
Foragers have low tolerance for political and wealth inequality. However, they display a “middling” acceptance of gender inequality and violence.
Farmers consider political, wealth, and gender inequality a good thing. Nonetheless, they tend to be less tolerant of violence than foragers.
Fossil-fuel users have a negative perception of political and gender inequality. Furthermore, they have even less tolerance of violence than farmers. In contrast, fossil-fuel users adopt a “middling” acceptance of wealth inequality. Mr. Morris is here at his weakest when one reviews the lamentable catalog of human horrors since the 18th century saw the emergence of the Industrial Revolution in the United Kingdom.
These two above-mentioned claims raise two implications:
1. Fossil-fuel values are the right interpretations of our biologically evolved core values because we live in a fossil-fuel world. For this reason, forager and farming values are wrong until what the author calls Industria also passes into history.
2. The interpretations of our biologically evolved core values will evolve faster than ever before across the 21st century. Why? Energy capture is changing faster than ever before.
To his credit, Mr. Morris systematically addresses the diverse arguments made against his reductionist, strongly materialist, mostly universalist, functionalist, and explicitly evolutionist approach to human history. One cannot escape from the overall impression that many of these critiques get into the weeds while losing track of the big picture.
In summary, the author invites his readers to consider how important energy capture has been in modeling human values for the last twenty thousand years.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful.
Illuminating Argument On the Origin of Value Systems
By Anne Mills
This is broad brush history of the most interested kind, examining how human value systems arose, and what caused them to change. To survey so wide a scope in such a limited space (this is not a long book) of course risks over-simplification and over-schematization. But Morris is aware of these risks, and presents a compelling argument despite them.
The first part of the book presents Morris's central case: that a human value system reflect the constraints on the society that possesses that value system. Specifically, he focusses on "energy capture" -- how many kilocalories a day the average person in a society can command. Initially, when humans were hunter/gatherers, this was very low, creating small populations that needed large ranges to feed themselves. Such cultures tend to be egalitarian and quite violent. As people gradually domesticated plants and animals, the amount of energy that an individual could command jumped, and the evolution into agrarian societies produced a shift in values, to a more hierarchical and less violent structure. Finally, when people gained control over fossil fuels, the amount of energy each member of society could command surged again. The value structure changed rapidly, to a more egalitarian and even less violent model.
In the second part of the book, various commentators give their opinions of Morris's arguments. I was disappointed in this section: many of the arguments seemed to slide by Morris's own case, without much contact. For example, one commentator proposes a "real" value system towards which people strive, without explicitly rejecting Morris's argument that value systems arise from economic and cultural conditions. Things improve in the final section, in which Morris restates his case, rather more explicitly.
This is an odd format, and a short book (particularly given the scope of the subject) but I found it fascinating. On the strength of that, I am now going to read one of Morris's other books, to see if it is as good.
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