Booze: The Genesis of Civilization!

[mojo]

New study suggests that getting pissed was the main reason our ancestors developed agriculture, the major impetus for the begginings of civilised societies.

www.dnaindia.com/scitech (http://www.dnaindia.com/scitech/report_early-man-may-have-taken-up-agriculture-to-get-high-on-booze_1327525)

In a new research, a team of archaeologists has identified traces of alcohol in prehistoric sites, which suggests that the thirst for a brew was an incentive for Neolithic man to start growing crops.
According to a report in Spiegel Online, as early as around 9,000 years ago, long before the invention of the wheel, inhabitants of the Neolithic village Jiahu in China were brewing a type of mead with an alcohol content of 10%, archaeologist Patrick McGovern discovered recently.


His theory states that agriculture - and with it the entire Neolithic Revolution, which began about 11,000 years ago - are ultimately results of the irrepressible impulse toward drinking and intoxication.
"Available evidence suggests that our ancestors in Asia, Mexico, and Africa cultivated wheat, rice, corn, barley, and millet primarily for the purpose of producing alcoholic beverages," McGovern explained.


Whilst i think the theory has some merit i don't believe it was the sole reason, and in particular i don't see the spread of brewing originating in China at all, i'm pretty sure there is evidence of alcoholic beverages being brewed in catalhoyuk at approximately the same period.
Unless these guy's had vimana's i can't see how they could have shared the technology.
I'd think that brewing sprang up in most regions in isolation and not as a shared technology, lets face it it's not a particularly difficult process.
In fact i'd be surprised if the use of ethnogens and simple brewing didn't reach as far back as 100,000 years or more.

[Mungodave]

Who cares?

Dig them trenches....
Make more beer.



Now I'm thirsty.



.

[Raptor Jesus]

Unless these guy's had vimana's i can't see how they could have shared the technology.

- With a lot of the discoveries that are coming out I don't think this is such an outlandish theory.


I'd think that brewing sprang up in most regions in isolation and not as a shared technology, lets face it it's not a particularly difficult process.

- This is just as credible. Perhaps people were more in tune with their intuition back then and just worked out how to do it.

*** Either of the above theories would work for me...


In fact i'd be surprised if the use of ethnogens and simple brewing didn't reach as far back as 100,000 years or more.

- It's hard to put a date on anything, but the only thing I'm sure of is that mainstream ancient history scholars' dates are *way off* in all directions. I think we've been around for far longer than we're told.

****

OFF TOPIC:

Mojo, what's the most credible history of the ancient world and 'golden age megalithic' culture in your view? It doesn't have to be scholarly stuff, it can be kooky too, I read all sorts.

Do you have an ancient China thread? Im especially interested in what was happening in Guangdong a couple of thousand years ago:

Five Rams descended from heaven to found the city of Guangzhou. O RLY?

[anarch]

I have seen this theory before and it makes me wonder. Why is the focus on booze? This could not of been the first cultivated intoxicant and I say this from a stand point of K.I.S.S.

Things like mushrooms or opium grow in the wild but are easily cultivated or produced. Easier than the process of fermentation. To say we stopped running around as but naked cave men eating our meat raw off the Zebra because we wanted to grow crops to ferment.... well it seems outlandish to me as a motivator to self domesticate. Especially when their are easier ways to get a buzz off of something.

I also think humanity , in its current form, is much older than 11,000 years. As I do a quick search I can find plenty of archeological finds older than that time frame. So on the note I would agree whole heartedly with mojo and the use of ethnogens going WAAAAAY back into our history. But was it drug use that caused us to start wearing cloths and stop eating raw animals? .....Maybe....

I know how I act on different substances.

When I am drunk I am not gonna zone out on my tasks...I am more likely to pass out.

But when I trip...I can enter that "zone"... and I could see a cave man of 100,000 years ago... Tripping on some wild shrooms, eating on something furry with a wild idea of separating all the pieces of the animal including the skin... Next thing ya know caveman has a new coat.

[GeneralStriker]

i always figured that the discovery of natural mind altering plants was a fortunate accident. in the case of booze, i think, it was in the discovery of naturally fermented fruit. cultivation and confection came later. how much later is anyone's guess. anyone remember that thread (probably Lala's) about the drunken roos running around the outback? it didn't take any particular stroke of genius for ancient humans to learn that certain naturally occurring plants get you loaded.

[mojo]

OFF TOPIC:

Mojo, what's the most credible history of the ancient world and 'golden age megalithic' culture in your view? It doesn't have to be scholarly stuff, it can be kooky too, I read all sorts.

Do you have an ancient China thread? Im especially interested in what was happening in Guangdong a couple of thousand years ago:

Five Rams descended from heaven to found the city of Guangzhou. O RLY?

i have done a couple of threads on ancient chinese tech and civilization. mostly to do with the silk road being in use between mesopotamia, the indus and china much earlier than main stream places it.

i also did a little bit of research on very early chinese writing and symbology which dates back about 9000 years, those threads are still at ats i reckon.
i'll dig them up and repost if your interested.

on a related note, google "cao cao tomb", they just discovered his tomb the other day, a really interesting dude.

personally i believe ethnogens hold an extremely important place in our history.
art and religion in particular which imo are just as important as agriculture in our move from a hunter gatherer society to a city/state based society.
theres no doubt in my mind that our ancestors were doing advanced shit long before 10 or 11,000 bp.

[Raptor Jesus]

Yup I'd love to read them Mojo....

[mojo]

Yup I'd love to read them Mojo....

check out my "chinese writing 8000 years old" thread.

id give you a link but im about to head out, check recent posts.

i have some other shit that might interest you, i'll try to get it posted over the next couple of days.

happy new year everyone, hope the next 12 months is fucking awesome for you all. :D

[Raptor Jesus]

Thanks I noticed it after I posted... will read it in the new year.

I hope we all have an awesome decade...

[pack3tg0st]

Easier than the process of fermentation.

Fermentation is SUPER easy.... hard to imagine hunting a magic mushroom being easier than baking a loaf of bread...

Brewing beer and baking bread is the exact same chemestry... the only difference being that if you leave the ingredients for a loaf of bread sitting around, it won't make itself...

put a glass of juice on the counter for a few days... viola... alcohol.

[GeneralStriker]

put a glass of juice on the counter for a few days... viola... alcohol. and there you have it folks. you don't need to to know why yeasts shit to benefit from the fact that they do.