I realize this view of history is extremely common these days, but I think ppl underestimate the technological and cultural progress between 100k ya and the rise of cities 5k ya, and again from there to the height of the Bronze Age, and then to the classical era, and so forth.
Nov 4, 2025 · 10:52 PM UTC
It’s much much closer to the territory to imagine a bumpy exponential from the beginning of humanity rather than some sort of extreme discontinuity at the start of the Industrial Revolution. That framing elides a lot of really important stuff!
People living in the classical era in the Mediterranean or China could publish books, travel thousands of miles and return to their homes, debate philosophy, trade luxury goods, construct large buildings, and examine their own history scientifically!
Three thousand years before that, on the Euphrates, you could build a house in a city, write letters to your family living in a distant state, write down your forecasts to track your understanding of astrology, and innovate by growing different crops to see what would sell better
Three thousand years before THAT, you probably were an itinerant herder/farmer who knew a few hundred people in your tribal community and tried to make more durable pottery. One step further and… you hunted and gathered and died in small bands of a few dozen.
