ecosystem importance: dhw's 'humans plus food' derision (Introduction)

by David Turell , Monday, January 16, 2023, 21:05 (675 days ago) @ David Turell

Jow humans have changed the Earth the past 10,000 years and adapted to it:

https://phys.org/news/2023-01-years-humans-today.html

"While humans have been evolving for millions of years, the past 12,000 years have been among the most dynamic and impactful for the way we live today, according to an anthropologist who organized a special journal feature on the topic in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

"Our modern world all started with the advent of agriculture, said Clark Spencer Larsen, professor of anthropology at The Ohio State University.

"'The shift from foraging to farming changed everything," Larsen said.

"Along with food crops, humans also planted the seeds for many of the most vexing problems of modern society.

"'Although the changes brought about by agriculture brought plenty of good for us, it also led to increasing conflict and violence, rising levels of infectious diseases, reduced physical activity, a more limited diet, and more competition for resources," he said.

"'We didn't get to where we are now by happenstance. The problems we have today with warfare, inequality, disease and poor diets, all resulted from the changes that occurred when agriculture started," Larsen said.

"The shift from foraging to farming led humans, who had led a mostly transitory life, to create settlements and live a much more sedentary existence.

"'That has had profound implications for virtually every aspect of our lives back then, now, and going forward," he said.

"Growing food allowed the world population to grow from about 10 million in the later Pleistocene Epoch to more than 8 billion people today.

"But it came at a cost. The varied diet of foragers was replaced with a much more limited diet of domesticated plants and animals, which often had reduced nutritional quality. Now, much of the world's population relies on three foods—rice, wheat and corn—especially in areas that have limited access to animal sources of protein, Larsen said.

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"'This is evidence of humans adapting genetically to be able to consume cheese and milk, and it happened very recently in human evolution," he said. "It shows how humans are adapting biologically to our new lifestyle."

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"Research reported in this PNAS issue also reveals how these first human communities created the ideal conditions for another problem that is top-of-mind in the world today: infectious disease. Raising farm animals led to the common zoonotic diseases that can be transmitted from animals to people, Larsen said."

Comment: this shows that living humans are transforming the Earth to a greater degree than previous top predators. All part of evolving the earth to fit it for humans.