There's a nice, short book called "Neanderthals, Bandits, and Farmers" by
Colin Tudge that advances the idea that humans developed gardening
techniques long, long before the Neolithic "dawn of agriculture" 10,000
years ago. We've had fire for 500,000 years, so you can bet we've been
tending plants a long time, too. "Pure" hunter-gathering, as Paul suggests,
probably disappeared before the genus Homo arose.
And yes, population is a key to sustainability. Pack in too many of any
species, human or not, of whatever cultural practices, and you'll degrade
the environment (look at rabbits, cattle, elephants--there are countless
examples). Agriculture took the lid off of human numbers, and the Earth has
been been going downhill ever since. We need to develop structural
constraints on population or nature will do it for us.
Toby
www.patternliteracy.com
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